Chapter 107: Shadows in the Forest

The clearing was too quiet.

No birds. No rustling wind. Just the thick, unnatural silence that made Serena’s skin crawl.

She stood beside Elias, Zara at her left, Theron behind them. Ahead, the guards formed a tense half-circle around what they’d found—if it could even be called that.

It was a man—or what was left of him.

His body was suspended between two trees, bound by thick, pulsing vines of black magic that hissed and writhed like serpents. His eyes were wide open, glassy with terror, and his lips moved in a silent scream that made Serena’s heart lurch.

“Who is he?” she whispered.

Zara knelt beside the body, sniffing. “From the Northern Ridge Pack. Their scout patrol, if I’m right.”

Elias’s jaw tensed. “That pack hasn’t responded to any of my calls in two days.”

“They won’t,” Theron said darkly, eyeing the black vines. “This was a warning.”

Serena took a cautious step closer, drawn by something—some strange pull beneath her skin. Her power buzzed like it recognized the magic ahead. A magic that didn’t belong to this world.

As she reached out, the vines snapped toward her, shrieking like wild banshees.

“Serena!” Elias yanked her back just as the shadows barely missed her fingertips.

But she’d felt it—just before they struck.

A voice.

Not one she could hear. One that echoed deep inside her bones.

Come. Come and see. Come and burn.

Serena shivered violently.

“That wasn’t just dark magic,” she said. “That was a summoning.”

Theron’s eyes narrowed. “Someone is calling to you.”

“No,” she whispered. “They’re inviting me.”

Zara stood, drawing her blade. “We should burn this. Send a message back.”

Elias placed a hand on her arm. “Not yet. I want to understand what we’re dealing with first.”

Theron didn’t argue, but his entire stance was rigid. “You’re letting her get too close to it.”

“I have to,” Serena said. “This magic—it’s looking for me. If we burn the body now, we lose the chance to trace it.”

Zara snorted. “You want to trace a death spell back to the caster? You’ll burn yourself alive in the process.”

“Then I’ll burn smart,” Serena shot back.

Elias met her gaze, worry dancing in the gold of his eyes. “You’re not doing this alone.”

“I don’t plan to.”

Back at the estate, Serena sat in the center of the spell chamber that had been buried deep below Elias’s war hall—an old room that hadn’t been touched in years.

The walls were carved with runes. The air crackled with latent power.

It was here, Elias had said, that his mother used to work her most dangerous rituals. She had been feared not just as a Luna—but as a sorceress.

Serena didn’t need to be told twice.

If she was going to track the magic back to its source, she needed the strongest ground possible.

Zara and Theron stood at the edges, watching her. Elias paced like a caged wolf, his arms folded tightly.

Serena closed her eyes and began.

She summoned the memory of the shadow vines—the way they’d reached, screamed, hissed. She let the residue of their darkness enter her mind, careful not to let it take root.

The runes lit up slowly around her, reacting to the strain of dark and light battling in her soul.

Suddenly, the chamber pulsed.

Then again.

And then a blinding flare of light burst from the floor beneath her, throwing her backward.

“Serena!”

Elias was at her side in an instant.

She gasped, shaking, blinking the white from her vision. “I saw… I saw where it came from.”

Zara leaned forward. “Where?”

Serena looked up, voice shaking. “Not just where. Who.”

They gathered in Elias’s war room, the map of the territory laid out between them. Serena pointed to the far north—past the ridges, into territory long abandoned after the Witches’ War.

“There’s a fortress hidden here. Covered by cloaking wards. That’s where the spell originated.”

Theron frowned. “That’s deathland. Nothing lives there.”

“Something does now,” Serena said grimly.

Zara scowled. “We should send scouts.”

“No,” Elias said. “If we send scouts, they’ll be found and slaughtered. This isn’t just magic—it’s a trap.”

“So we do nothing?” Zara snapped.

“No.” Serena stepped forward, her voice steady. “We go. But we go prepared.”

Theron met her eyes. “That sounds like suicide.”

Serena looked around the room, at every warrior, every leader, every bonded soul who had stood beside her and Elias through every trial.

“We’ve been waiting for an attack,” she said. “But what if we strike first?”

Elias’s eyes darkened, then brightened with something dangerous. “You want to go to them.”

“I want to end this before it grows into something worse. Before more lives are lost. Before the prophecy becomes a graveyard.”

The silence that followed was heavy.

And then Elias nodded.

“I’m with you.”

Zara rolled her eyes. “If you’re going to do something reckless, might as well do it with style.”

Theron grunted. “At least we’ll die knowing we didn’t sit on our asses.”

Serena exhaled, her heart pounding.

They were with her.

And now… the real war was beginning.