Mag-log in~Derek~The tension in the room sharpened at the guard's words. All attention shifted to him, the urgency in his posture mirrored in the gazes of the rest. I didn’t move from where I stood, but my focus narrowed on him.“Speak,” I said.The guard straightened. “Your Highness, a missing person report was filed early this morning. The individual was last seen at Colvin’s nightclub.”“Details,” I demanded.“Yes, Your Highness. Richard Featherington. He had been drinking with friends in the Corwin's club in the western parts of Silverfall pack. They are saying he left alone around 1 am, appearing intoxicated. He never made it home.”I narrowed my eyes. So a male? That didn’t fit the pattern. But I couldn't just write it out like that without knowing the rest of the details. There were always chances that what we deducted as the pattern was not what the ritual demanded. I needed more details.“Age?” I asked.“Forty five, Your Highness.”That alone shifted the direction of my thoughts. Way
~Derek~Celina stood by the table, her gaze still fixed on the map, her expression thoughtful. There was a quiet intensity in the way she observed things, a natural instinct that didn’t come from training alone. It wasn’t guesswork that had led her there, it was clarity. The kind that came without effort. And that was what caught my attention. Because I had already seen it. The pattern had begun to take shape in my mind the moment we laid out the locations. The spacing, the alignment, the intention behind each point. It had not taken long to recognize what it could become. A heptagonal structure, incomplete, as if waiting for the final victim to complete the structure.I had thought of discussing it once I called a meeting with the rest of the team but Celina surprised me by reaching the conclusion before I could do it. And she didn’t do it through calculation refined by years of strategy or battlefield experience, but through instinct alone. There was nothing remarkable in my noticin
~Celina~I stared at Derek, thoughts churning inside my mind. My memories… Was something really wrong with them? I had never thought much about it before. My past had always been something distant, but never something I felt the need to question. Now, it didn’t feel distant anymore. It felt… missing. I tried to think. Not casually like I always had, but pushing myself to go further back than I ever had before. To reach for something that existed before that moment I had always accepted as the beginning. The day my mother had brought me to Mike. I closed my eyes briefly, concentrating. That day came easily. Too easily. Her hand holding mine, the unfamiliar path, the quiet exchange between her and Mike, the way she had looked at me before she left. And then nothing. No fragments or flashes. No blurred pieces of something just out of reach. Just emptiness.I opened my eyes slowly, a frown on my lips as realization dawned.“That’s the first thing I remember,” I said quietly. “The day she
~Celina~By the next morning, the unease from the previous day hadn’t faded. If anything, it was far deeper than before. It wasn’t the kind of feeling that I could ignore or brush aside as imagination. It stayed with me through the night every time I let my mind drift back to Amanda’s words and the ritual she had described. And the more I thought about it, the harder it became to dismiss the connection that had begun to form in my head. Clara and the dark witch who had been with her while performing the ritual to summon me back to Logan’s pack. Early in the morning, I stepped out of my room, ready to meet Derek. I simply couldn’t wait anymore. Derek would already be working, and if there was even the smallest chance that what I was thinking mattered, I wasn’t going to hold onto it any longer than necessary. The walk to his office felt longer than usual somehow. By the time I reached the door, I had already gone over it more than once, questioning whether I was overthinking it, wheth
~Derek~After meeting Amanda, I went back to my office. I sat on my chair and let out a sigh. Amanda’s words and their implications kept ringing inside my mind even as I tried to ground myself. Right under my nose, someone had the audacity to kidnap people, and they even had the audacity to kill them as sacrifices. That too young maidens who hadn’t even begun their lives. How dare they?I couldn’t get that girl’s terrified wide eyes out of my mind. When I find whoever was doing it, they will wish that they had never even been born in this world. I will make sure of that. This is a promise to the poor girl who died so unjustly.I leaned back in my seat before mindlinking James.‘James, come to my office.’‘Alright. On my way,’ came his swift reply. In just a few moments, I heard a knock on the door.“Come in,” I said, and watched as James walked inside, his gaze meeting mine with a mix of anticipation and nervousness. “Did you find anything after seeing the body?” He asked right away
~Celina~The moment I stepped back inside my room after coming back from Amanda’s place, I closed the door behind me. Leaning back against it, I closed my eyes as thoughts raced inside me. My mind kept circling back to what Amanda had said. Seven sacrifices. If it succeeds, it would result in them gaining power that couldn’t be contained. Just the thought filled my mind with dread. And the most troubling of all, the peculiar feeling I got in the midst of listening to her words.I moved further into the room, lowering myself onto the edge of the bed, my fingers resting absently against my stomach as I tried to make sense of what I had felt. It hadn’t been pain. Not even discomfort. Just a disturbance. A ripple that had passed through me so quickly I could have dismissed it if it hadn’t felt so wrong. Was it just a normal reaction to those chilling words? I mean anyone would feel something after hearing about a ritual like that. Death, sacrifice, something dark enough to rattle even so
~Celina~The air felt like it froze for a few seconds as I stared at Fiona, expecting her to make the realisation at any moment. As I stood there with my nerves coiled like a spring, Fiona raised her brows at me.“N-no! There is nothing like that!” I yelled out, flustered, and seeing Fiona blink at
~Derek~Watching Celina storm off in a huff, I stood there dumbfounded. Why was she angry when I just told her the truth?“You idiot! What have you done?” Fiona yelled at me, and I frowned at her.“What have I done?” I asked, puzzled.“What a moron! Who speaks to a girl like that, you blockhead?”“
~Celina~The words stung, and I glared at him despite the lingering fear and doubt. How dare he mock me like that? As if I were just a coward who wouldn’t even dare to breathe hard in front of him, let alone fight him? The audacity!“Who said I was scared?” I growled out, glaring at his offending p
~Celina~As the cheers grew louder, Derek stalked towards the centre of the fighting ring, like a predator on the prowl. Once he reached the middle, he stopped, his body still as his icy gaze scanned the arena. I gulped as my gaze trailed down his shirtless torso for the first time. His bare chest







