Chapter 30
Kaldrek had never traveled this far south.
He had hunted along Centaro’s borders, patrolled the forests that edged Ironwolf territory, stood guard beneath its familiar skies, but this was different.
This was human land. Not the eastern territories where magic was acknowledged and woven into daily life, where shifters and witches walked openly and humans either respected them or kept a careful distance.
Velenshire was different from everywhere else.
He had not truly known it existed, had certainly never seen it, and yet it had once been his mother’s home before exile drove her from it.
The thought of crossing into lands ruled by covens who despised his bloodline made something cold settle deep in his chest. If they recognized him, if they looked at his face and saw the woman they had cast out, what would follow?
Would they feel her blood in him? Would they know what he was, and where he came from?
According to Evelyne, magic there had been hidden for generations.
Centuries. The Solwyn Tree’s power kept secret from humans to preserve the fragile peace between the covens and the southern nobility.
Magic concealed not only from mortals, but from other beings who might seek the sacred tree for themselves.
Perhaps the most powerful source of magic in the world.
Kaldrek did not trust hidden things. So he let Alaric take the lead as they skirted behind the trading outpost, careful to keep the pack from alarming the humans within its timber walls.
Only seasoned tradesmen dared pass through the forest regularly, traveling from post to post all the way to Wrenford.
And even then, according to Alaric, it was the same small rotation of disciplined men his father had hand-selected.
Men who would report threats only if they endangered trade.
It was why Alaric had been sent in the first place.
The thought tightened Kaldrek’s jaw. A father dispatching his son into darkness and naming it duty was not something he could understand. Protecting one’s young was instinctive. Unquestioned. Woven into the bone. But perhaps humans did not feel it the same way.
The closer they came to the riverbank, the thicker the scent of smoke grew, carrying hints of stew, herbs, and root vegetables.
The wind off the Mokkahli River blew it toward them, and his stomach answered with a low growl.
It would have been easy to stop, to claim warmth and food, to let the pack sleep beneath a roof rather than trees and open sky.
But there were too many of them, and too many wolves in human skin would never pass unnoticed.
Movement ahead caught his eye.
Alaric knelt again, laying his hand flat against the dirt and stone as though feeling for something beneath it.
He had done this more than once now, touching the ground, then guiding them with small shifts in direction, a little left, a little right.
It was strange, but Kaldrek was beginning to suspect this was how Alaric found his way through the land.
This time, when he stood, something in his face was different.
“What is it?” Kaldrek asked quietly.
“I… I know we’re going the right way,” Alaric murmured. “But something isn’t right.”
“Wrong how?” Holden asked, stepping closer.
Alaric shook his head as if the answer lay just beyond his grasp. Then he crouched again and scooped up a handful of mud, lifting it to his nose.
“This,” he whispered. “It feels wrong. Smells wrong.”
“What do you mean the mud smells wrong?” Holden muttered. “Is it shit? Because that I understand.”
Kaldrek ignored him and moved forward, gripping Alaric’s wrist before the mud slipped from his hand. He leaned down and inhaled.
At first, only wet soil.
Then—
A too-familiar metallic smell. Fuck.
“Get us out of here. Now,” Kaldrek commanded.
Alaric wiped the mud from his palm against his trousers and moved immediately.
Is everything all right? Evelyne’s soft voice slipped into his mind.
I’m not certain, he answered. But we can’t remain here. Keep everyone moving. Quickly.
Silence lingered between them for a heartbeat. He could almost feel her weighing the urge to press him further, to demand the truth.
All right, she replied at last. Let’s move.
Gods, he loved her for that.
He knew she would ask later. Likely scold him for withholding what he sensed, but she trusted his judgment. And that trust anchored him more than she knew.
“Cut behind these trees,” Alaric said, already adjusting their course. “It’ll bring us out on the far side of the post without drawing attention. We’ll stay in the shadows, but it may slow us a few minutes, getting everyone through quietly.”
He muttered under his breath as he picked his way around fallen branches and broken stone, studying the ground as though it told him something.
Kaldrek kept a close watch on him. Alaric had a sharp instinct for finding paths others might overlook, and in unfamiliar territory that was too valuable to ignore.
Following his lead was no longer a matter of ease, but of necessity.
One by one, the pack filtered along the narrow trail, elders steadying their steps, younger wolves careful to keep silent.
The outpost lanterns flickered through the trees, close enough now to taste the smoke in the air.
Once they cleared the back of the trading post, Kaldrek did not allow them to slow.
“Keep moving,” he ordered.
He could see the exhaustion settling over the pack, in the older wolves and the young alike, but stopping was not an option.
He knew that metallic scent too well. It was the same foul trace that had filled the tunnels near Nerathar, the unmistakable scent of blood magic, and it had never once meant anything good.
***
A cool breeze brushed the back of Evelyne’s neck, raising a shiver across her skin. She kept her eyes on Kaldrek as he walked ahead with Alaric and Holden, the three of them bent into low conversation while the pack pressed on at a brisk pace.
His shoulders were too stiff. Something was wrong. She could feel it through the bond, the tension he was trying, and failing, to keep contained.
“I’m going to catch up with Kaldrek,” she said, aiming for casual. “See what the plan is.”
“Can’t you just ask him through the bond?” Heidara asked.
“I can…” Evelyne hesitated. “But he hasn’t answered.”
The half-lie tasted bitter. He had answered, just not fully, and she did not want Heidara catching the spike of fear bleeding through their bond.
“Well then go,” Heidara said with a faint sigh. “And make sure he tells the rest of us. I would very much like to rest before I collapse.”
Evelyne offered a tight smile and quickened her pace, weaving forward through the moving bodies until she reached Kaldrek. He turned just before she reached him, the corner of his mouth lifting as if he had known she wouldn’t wait much longer.
“I tried my best,” she murmured beneath her breath. “Now please tell me what’s going on.”
No one answered. Instead, Alaric dropped suddenly into a crouch, scooping up a handful of mud. He lifted it toward her face.
Evelyne frowned, then inhaled.
It was faint, but she knew the scent at once. The same smell of bloodroot veins winding through stone, of bat-faced creatures peeling themselves from tunnel walls.
Her stomach turned. “Why can’t we scent it in the air?” she asked quietly.
“Because I think it’s under—”
Kaldrek froze.
Another gust swept over them, colder than the last, and Evelyne knew at once it was no ordinary breeze.
The sun had already slipped beneath the horizon, and her wolf-sight sharpened to meet the dark.
That was when she saw them. Not shadows cast by the trees, but living ones, moving in thin black tendrils across the ground, threading between roots and stone, curling toward them with clear intent.
Hide the young. Draw your daggers.
Kaldrek’s command rang through her mind and she knew it was not meant for her alone. The entire pack shifted into readiness in a heartbeat.
Evelyne’s pulse thundered as she scanned the line behind them. Cillian walked beside his horse, the animal whining and stamping, eyes rolling white with panic. She moved to run—
Holden’s arm locked around her waist, stopping her mid-stride. Kaldrek was already moving ahead, disappearing into the dark to assess the perimeter.
Why was he going alone?
“We have to go with him!” Evelyne shoved against Holden’s grip, fury and fear colliding in her chest.
“Not yet,” Holden bit out. “This is what he does. He’ll signal when it’s time.”
Signal? But she could feel the shadows tightening around them.
“And let me guess,” she snapped, struggling again, “he ordered you to protect me.”
Holden’s brows lifted in silent confirmation.
Evelyne groaned in frustration and glanced back. Heidara was already at Cillian’s side, blade drawn.
A familiar howl split the air. Kaldrek.
Holden’s grip released instantly. “Shift,” he ordered.
Evelyne did not hesitate. Bone cracked, heat surged, and fur rippled over her limbs in a rush.
Then she was moving. A scream rose somewhere behind them, female and terrified, but she did not turn.
Kaldrek was ahead. Her paws drove into the ground, mud kicking up beneath her as she ran, while vicious whispers slithered through the trees and coiled into her ears like smoke.
Noskari.
They were surrounded.
Holden skidded to an abrupt stop in front of her and Evelyne collided into his hind leg with a sharp yelp, her snout striking bone. Before she could demand an explanation, Kaldrek’s voice tore through the bond.
It’s a trap. Turn around. Help the others.
Where are you? she sent back, panic splintering her thoughts.
I’m fine. They drew me out on purpose. I’m coming back to you.
But her attention had already swung behind them, to her brother, to Alaric, to the elders and the young, some of them still in human form and screaming.
Oh gods. She wheeled at once and tore back toward the pack with Holden at her side, her heart hammering against her ribs as rage and terror crashed together so violently it left her lungs burning. And as they drew closer, she saw it.
A dense knot of shadow, pulsing and writhing as though the dark had gathered itself into flesh. It moved like fog, but no true fog had ever held such purpose. It loomed larger than any cloud she had seen, hanging low over the ground like something poised to devour.
She cut left to circle around it, but the mass answered at once. It billowed outward into a wall with no fixed edge, only living seams of black that opened and closed, peeling apart only to knit themselves together again.
Then it hit her. It wrapped around her forelegs, cold and slick as oil-soaked vines, before creeping higher over her haunches and locking tight around her middle.
The surface writhed and opened in places, and each split exposed something waiting underneath: black eyes without souls, mouths unfolding in narrow seams, needle-like teeth clicking together as though savoring her scent.
She snarled and thrashed, trying to bite through it, but her jaws caught only shifting resistance, like trying to tear through smoke that had learned how to fight back.
The sound was unbearable, like thousands of layered voices speaking over one another and scraping across her mind.
The shadows tightened and wound around her neck, her ribs, her hind legs, constricting like a living noose.
Beside her, Holden whimpered—a raw, pained sound she had never heard from him before.
What is happening? she tried to send down the bond. Kaldrek, I—
The thread to him felt distant. Frayed. As though something clawed at the connection between them, thinning it, stretching it to breaking.
I’m coming! His voice reached her faintly.
Her lungs tightened. The Noskari shifted again, and one of the creatures pushed farther out from the writhing mass.
Its gray face hovered near her forearm, its mouth opening.
The stench of decay hit her full force—old blood, rot, and root, just like the creatures in the tunnels. Nausea rose hard in her throat.
Then its teeth sank into her.
Pain flashed white, and almost at once a terrible cold began to spread through her as it fed.
Her blood streamed toward its narrow, hungry mouth, drawn in as the creature held tight.
Her wolf form wavered. Fur receded. Bones cracked and slid back into place.
She was human again, though she did not remember choosing it.
Her body sagged in the tightening coils of shadow. Time warped. The world dimmed.
But the whispers only grew louder.
Her arm burned where the creature fed, warmth spilling from her body with every passing second. Her fingers had gone numb. Her heartbeat slowed to dull, heavy thuds. She was so tired. Too tired to keep fighting.
Then the bond stirred, faint but living, and Kaldrek’s fury broke through the dark.
Evelyne—
Her name reached her just as her vision began to blur. The Noskari’s jaws tightened one last time.
And Evelyne let her eyes close.