The Night the Curse Was Born

POV: Vaelor

"She's waiting for you at the stones."

My father's voice cut through the great hall like a blade. I looked up from sharpening my knife, meeting his iron gaze. The firelight threw shadows across his scarred face, making him look older than his years..

"A witch?" I asked, standing. My wolf stirred beneath my skin, restless and hungry.

"Trespassing on sacred ground." He crossed his arms. "The pack expects blood, Vaelor. Don't disappoint them."

I nodded once, sheathing the blade at my hip. This was a test. Another one. My father had been testing me since I could walk, preparing me for the day I'd take his place as Alpha. A lone witch on our borders? Easy prey.

"I'll bring you her head," I said.

He smiled, cold and approving. "Good boy."

The night air bit at my skin as I left Rauvenhollow's walls behind. Six of my father's best warriors flanked me, their boots crunching through snow. None of them spoke. They didn't need to. We all knew what happened to witches who crossed into wolf territory.

The sacred stones rose ahead, ancient and dark against the star-scattered sky. Power hummed in the air around them, old magic that predated even the first wolves. And there, standing between two of the tallest monoliths, was her.

She didn't run. That was my first mistake, thinking she would.

"You're trespassing," I called out, my hand moving to my blade. My wolf surged forward, pressing against my consciousness, demanding I shift and tear her apart.

The witch turned to face me. She was younger than I expected, maybe thirty winters at most. Dark hair spilled over her shoulders, and her eyes caught the moonlight like chips of amber. She wore simple robes, no armor, no visible weapons.

"Vaelor Rauvenhollow," she said. Not a question. A statement.

I stopped ten paces away, my warriors spreading out behind me in a half circle. "You know my name. Good. Then you know what happens next."

"I know what you think happens next." She didn't flinch, didn't reach for magic or defense. She just stood there, impossibly calm. "But you're wrong."

One of my warriors, Gareth, growled low in his throat. "Let me end this, my lord. She insults you."

I raised a hand, silencing him. Something about this felt wrong. Witches didn't walk into wolf territory alone. They didn't stand and wait for death.

"Why are you here?" I demanded.

"To stop something terrible." She took a step closer, and I saw fear flicker across her face. Not fear of me. Fear of something else. "Your bloodline, Vaelor. There's something tied to it, something that shouldn't exist. I came to sever it before it's too late."

My wolf snarled inside me, furious at her words. "You're lying."

"Your wolf," she pressed on, her voice urgent now. "Can't you feel it? It's not whole. There's something else inside you, something sleeping, waiting."

Ice flooded my veins. How could she know? I'd felt it for months now, the strange hollow place in my chest, the sense that my wolf was incomplete somehow. But I'd told no one. Not even my father.

"You know nothing about me," I spat.

"I know more than you think." She reached into her robes, and three of my warriors lunged forward, swords drawn.

"Stop!"

The shout didn't come from me. My uncle, Draeven, burst from the tree line, his face twisted with greed and fury. He moved faster than any of us expected, faster than he should have been able to. Dark magic crackled around his hands.

"Foolish boy," he snarled at me. "Talking to the witch when you should be taking what she knows."

Everything happened too fast.

Draeven launched himself at the witch, his corrupted claws extended. She threw up a shield of shimmering light, but he tore through it like paper. I heard her scream as his claws raked across her side, saw blood spray black against the snow.

"No!" I didn't know why I shouted it. Didn't know why my body moved before my mind caught up. I crashed into Draeven, sending us both sprawling. My warriors stood frozen, confused, caught between orders and instinct.

"What are you doing?" Draeven roared, shoving me off. "She has power, knowledge we can use."

The witch, Lyseth, I realized I didn't even know her name until that moment, collapsed against one of the stones. Blood poured from the wound in her side, too much blood. Her face had gone white.

"You've killed us both," she whispered, looking at Draeven with something like pity.

Then she looked at me.

"I'm sorry," she said. "This wasn't how it was supposed to happen."

Power exploded from her body, raw and desperate. It wasn't controlled, wasn't careful. It was the magic of a dying woman trying to finish what she started, no matter the cost. The curse hit me like lightning.

Fire tore through my veins, burning me from the inside out. I screamed, falling to my knees as something ancient and terrible wrapped around my soul. My wolf howled in agony, thrashing against chains I couldn't see.

"What did you do?" I choked out.

Lyseth's blood pooled beneath her, steam rising where it touched the sacred stones. "I sealed it," she gasped. "The thing inside you. I locked it away. It's the only way to keep it from waking."

Rage consumed me. Blinding, absolute rage. My wolf burst free without my permission, bones cracking and reshaping. But it felt wrong, incomplete, like part of me was trapped behind a door I couldn't open. The pain made me insane.

I didn't remember crossing the distance between us. I didn't remember my claws finding her throat.

I only remembered the moment her eyes went dark, the moment the light left them. And the words she whispered with her last breath, so quiet only I could hear them.

"My daughter will finish what I started."

Her body went limp in my hands. I dropped her, stumbling back, my human form returning in broken waves. Blood covered my hands, my chest, dripping onto the snow.

"Vaelor." Gareth's voice sounded far away. "What happened?"

I opened my mouth to answer, but the words died in my throat. The ground trembled beneath my feet. Deep inside my chest, in that hollow place where my wolf felt incomplete, something stirred. Something that had been sleeping for a very, very long time.

And it laughed. The sound echoed through my skull, foreign and ancient and hungry. My warriors backed away, their faces pale with terror.

"My lord?" Gareth whispered.

I looked down at my hands, still stained with Lyseth's blood, and felt the curse settle into my bones like roots digging deep. Whatever she'd sealed inside me, it was awake now. And it wanted out.