All Chapters of Echoes of Ruin: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

Obscura didn’t look ready.The gates opened at dawn, iron creaking like the bones of something ancient that hadn’t finished healing. New sigils pulsed low and blue along the archways, flickering like a heartbeat trying to remember its rhythm. They’d etched the symbols deep into the stone this time, not the elegant carvings we’d had last semester, but brutal, blocky wards meant to repel bloodsteel and chainfire. Magic without manners. Protective, but ugly.I arrived before the crowds. That wasn’t unusual for me. Most wolves liked to make a show of their return, rolling in with their packs and dragging their scent all over the courtyards like it meant something. But I wasn’t here for spectacle. I was here to see what had changed. And more importantly, what hadn’t.The courtyar

By the third day back, my schedule looked more like a battlefield map than a class roster.Strategic council at dawn. Dueling pairings at noon. Leadership committee after dinner. If it wasn’t one of Marric’s briefings, it was another list of wolves demanding to know why a Bloodpine was walking our halls in Hawthorne colors.I hadn’t even unpacked my second bag.I stood in the Hawthorne common room, back straight, jaw tight, watching as two juniors squared off over who got the upper bunk in their shared dorm. One of them was growling. The other already had claws out.“Enough,” I snapped, voice low but full. It echoed just enough to remind them who I was. Not their Alpha, but the closest thing now that Caelum was gone.

The only thing worse than an after-hours strategy meeting was knowing we had to have one.The war room tucked beneath Hawthorne’s east wing wasn’t large, but it was fortified. Chalk-lined wards circled the entire space, reinforced after the winter breach. We didn’t speak until all five of us were seated, the sigil locks sealed, and Professor Marric had finished pacing the perimeter like the threat might be hiding in the shadows of his own damn classroom.Elias was already unrolling a map over the center table, copper-rimmed with glow-ink runes along its edges. He tapped his finger against a marked ridge just beyond the western ward line.“Same spot. Third time in two weeks,” he said. “Someone keeps carving into the trees.”&ldquo

The hall outside the Headmaster’s office was peaceful, but my stomach wasn’t. I could feel the dull clench of anxiety twisting itself tighter in my gut since I got the summons from my dorm mailbox this morning. I’d had time to grab my coat before I was practically marched to the closed door and shoved in. Professor Marric was propped up on the mantle, arms crossed. Headmaster Arx stood behind his desk, not sitting, not speaking, only staring. Never a good sign. “Kellan,” he drawled that honeyed diplomat’s voice of his. “We’re glad you could make it on such short notice.” “I didn’t think I had a choice,” I said. Marric’s mouth twisted in something between a smirk and a snarl. “You don’t.” They hit the ground running. No chitchat, no posturing. A rapid-fire interrogation of facts about the corrupted sigil trap, what Ronan and I had seen, how we had survived, how long it had been active, and if it bore the symbol or tactic of the Interregnum. I answered each question as directl

I didn’t seek this out. Not at all. But trouble had its own radar and zeroed in on me anyway. News travels fast around Hawthorne House, and by the time I made my rounds in the early morning, it was already fermenting in the air. A glance or two too long, a muttered aside that cut off when I passed. The hint of pack unrest was almost imperceptible to my human senses—but not to my wolf. Old bloodlines, old alliances, old scores simmering under the surface in response to something none of them understood. Not that I could blame them. I didn’t understand it either. I’d barely slept the night before. Ronan’s face kept haunting me the way he had, a half-smile and eyes too