Blackwood Falls Ghost Town Novels & Stories

I swung my legs out of bed. "My father died in that fire," I said. My voice trembled slightly. "I saw the body. I smelled the burning flesh. But if there is even a one percent chance that Thorne was right... I need to know." Kael sat up. He looked at the scars on his chest from the battle. He looked at me with fierce determination. "Then we dig," Kael said. The Blackwood Cemetery was located in a quiet valley behind the Pack House. It was a sacred place. Ancient oak trees stood sentinel over rows of gray headstones.

Or is this just another cage? ​He didn't answer. He just looked back out the window as we turned onto a private road that wound upward into the mist shrouded hills. ​Blackwood was nothing like the glass and steel penthouse. It was a sprawling, Gothic revival estate made of dark stone and ivy that looked like it had been clawed into the side of the mountain. It looked ancient, imposing, and deeply lonely. As the gates creaked shut behind us, I felt a strange shiver crawl down my spine. This wasn't a home, it was a monument to a legacy that had claimed too many lives already.

Timothy leaned back in the kitchen chair, the black fedora shading his eyes as he stared at the woman across from him. Lydia Blackwell—Gideon’s sister and the high-society frost queen of the Sopttyi District—was currently explaining why Timothy’s existence was a smudge on the family crest. "Little boy," Lydia purred, her diamonds catching the overhead light. "You’ll mind your manners in my company. You're a street-level ghost from Saati Town. A step above a stray."

“That’s him.” Nathan Blackwood. I recognized that face instantly. CEO of Blackwood Industries, headquartered in New York. The man was always in the news. His face was plastered all over the business magazines I loved to read. He was tall, like his cousin, Julian—handsome, with the kind of presence that commanded attention, even in a photograph. And his fiancée—Kimberly—she looked exactly like me. I swiped back to her picture with trembling fingers, my stomach twisting in confusion and disbelief.

It was parked in a derelict alleyway in Queens, far from the polished marble of the Blackwood estate, serving as a mobile command center for the Jackals. ​Inside, Arthur Blackwood sat on a folding metal chair, his expensive wool coat looking out of place against the rack of tactical vests and submachine guns. He was no longer drinking. The bourbon had been replaced by a sharp, jittery clarity—the kind of adrenaline that only comes to a man who has finally cornered his ghost.

With a powerful thrust she launched herself into the abyss streaking toward the Blackwood valley like a falling star. As she flew through the clouds, the scale of the disaster became clear. The entire valley was blanketed in a silver mist that glowed with a predatory light. She could see the fires of the Blackwood villages but they were not the orange of hearth-fires, they were the cold blue flames of lunar combustion. She landed in the center of the Blackwood square, the spot where her contract had supposedly ended.. The square was a scene of death and destruction. The Silents were everywhere herding the terrified pack members toward the iron gates.

He thanked Alistair and hurried out the door. Alistair took a slow sip of his port, listening to the heavy doors click shut. The dead man was walking again. —————— The Blackwood Estate was nestled deep in the Hudson Valley, entirely isolated from the frantic pulse of Manhattan. As the Rolls-Royce Phantom glided down a private, tree-lined avenue, the ancient oaks seemed to swallow the sunlight, casting long, elegant shadows over the road. Sitting in the back seat, I felt my phone vibrate. A heavily encrypted message from Olivia flashed on the screen.

Suddenly— she stood somewhere else. Children. Dozens of them. Running through Blackwood's gardens. Not the dark forests surrounding the mountain now. Gardens. Flowers stretched across the hillsides. Fruit trees. Vegetable plots. People singing while they harvested herbs. Dogs sleeping in the afternoon sun. Blackwood had once been beautiful. Not dramatically beautiful. Comfortably beautiful. A place people lived. Not merely survived. She watched a little girl fall while chasing a butterfly. Before she could cry— three different adults reached her.

"I’m sending 2 full units of Shadow Fang elites to the Williams border stream. We build a wall. If Silent Fang tries to cross, we wipe them out." "And Blackwood?" Richard asked. "If they collapse, the whole north falls." Damian’s eyes turned to ice. "If Blackwood falls, it’s Christopher’s fault. My only job is making sure his fire doesn’t reach Sarah." --- Meanwhile, 40 miles away at Blackwood, the fire was already burning. The dining hall was silent like a tomb. Outside, dusk painted the windows grey and purple. Christopher sat alone at the long table. A half-full glass of whiskey sat next to his untouched dinner. The room was dead quiet. Where families used to laugh, now there were only em