Chapter 44
The watcher POV-
The blood moon rises.
I’ve been watching it climb for the last hour, waiting for the light to shift from pale gray to deep, arterial red.
It’s time.
The bone-fire crackles in the center of the clearing, flames licking at the night air with hungry blue-white tongues.
I built it myself, branch by branch, stacking them in the ritualistic pattern the grimoire demanded.
The wood is ancient, petrified timber blessed by something older than the beast in these woods.
I arranged the ingredients hours ago, following every instruction with the steady hand of a man who has nothing left to lose.
The vampire bat fangs are now a fine, chalky powder. The fire-glass glitters like crushed rubies in the heat. The black thorn sap has turned viscous, like syrup, and the spine oil from the drowned moth sits on the surface like a single, iridescent pupil.
The stag’s jawbone cracks in the flames, releasing a bitter, smoky scent that turns my stomach. I reach for the small crystal vial containing the lust-vein nectar. It glows with a twinkle of light, looking far too innocent for what it’s about to do.
I add the drops of Andrik’s blood I collected from her porch, dried and reconstituted with my own tears.
And lastly, his antler shards—small, jagged pieces that he left behind like breadcrumbs for a scavenger.
His essence.
His name
His form.
The elixir sits in a copper vessel at the edge of the flames, already beginning to simmer.
The grimoire lies open beside me, its pages fluttering in a phantom wind that doesn’t touch the trees.
The words glow with a sickly, golden light, shimmering like wet paint on the vellum.
“Exurit ad tempus sigillum animae, et fit vas vacuum- temporarily burns away the soul’s signature and becomes a hollow vessel.”
I repeat the words, committing them to memory one last time.
The elixir begins to change. Black-red at first—thick, sluggish, like old blood.
But as the bone-fire grows hotter, it shifts.
The surface ripples, catching the moonlight and turning into a beautiful rainbow. It’s like watching a dying star.
It’s ready.
I lift the vessel, cradling the copper in both hands. The heat sears my palms, the smell of my own blistering skin rises to meet me, but I don’t let go.
This is it—this is everything.
I bring the rim to my lips and pause. The scent isa nightmare—burnt earth, iron, a cloying floral sweetness from the belladonna, and something under it all that smells of rot and old graves. My stomach rolls, my body urging me to drop it.
For her, I think, my eyes fixed on the red moon.
I tip the vessel back and drink.
The first sip is liquid fire pouring down my throat. It scorches everything it touches. My mouth blisters instantly—skin peeling, bubbling, splitting away from the bone. I taste copper and ash... then nothing at all.
I choke, gasping for air that tastes like smoke, but I can’t stop. The grimoire was clear: You must consume it all. Every drop. Or the transformation will fail. I drink again.
And again.
The pain is unbearable. My throat is raw, seared from the inside out. My tongue feels like a piece of charred meat. Tears stream down my face, leaving paths through the door on my cheeks, but I keep drinking.
The elixir burns its way into my chest until the vessel is empty.
It spreads like poison through my veins. My heart slams against my chest, like a panicked bird trapped in a cage of bone.
The world falls silent. In the next heartbeat, I’m on my knees, gasping, hands clawing at my throat as if I could reach inside and pull the fire out. The blisters are a swarm—burgeoning inside my mouth, racing down my esophagus, bubbling across my lips like a disease.
My breath comes in wet, shallow hitches until each one feels like it’ll be my last.
And then the pain shifts. It’s no longer burning; it’s metamorphosing.
I feel it—my soul, the core of who I am, starts to peel away, layer by layer. It’s like being flayed from the inside out, my identity stripped from my bones like it was never there.
I scream. The sound rips from my throat, a raw, animal noise that echoes off the ancient trees. My body convulses, my back arching into a bow, my hands dig into the dirt, nails snapping against frozen roots.
My bones shift. I hear the sickening grinding pops of vertebrae realigning, my spine stretching to accommodate a height that isn’t mine.
My jaw unhinges, a slick popping sound as my teeth shift in their sockets to form the predatory alignment of a beast. Blood floods my mouth as my skull reshapes itself.
The world blacks out as my face drops to the frost.
I’m not myself anymore. I’m hollow. Empty.
A vessel waiting to be filled.
Andrik’s essence floods into me like water filling a dam: his form, his scent, his shape. Agonizing pressure spreads through my temples as his jagged crown of antlers erupts from my own skull.
My skin prickles with a thousand needles as white fur pushes through the pores covering my body.
I stagger to my feet, my center of gravity entirely new. I stumble toward the edge of the clearing, where I propped up a mirror.
I don’t recognize the monster staring back.
It’s him. The chiseled cheekbones. The broad, powerful shoulders. The ice-blue eyes that look like frozen lakes.
“Lumi,” I rasp.
My voice—his voice—vibrates in my chest.
The blisters are already knitting shut. The grimoire’s dark promise holds true; as the transformation finishes, the trauma heals, leaving the skin smooth and whole.
I flex my hands, watching the way moonlight catches on the white fur.
The bond between us—the one I’ve been trying to sever—feels so much more powerful than I ever could have imagined.
I can feel her heart beating against mine.
I sprint through the trees, toward the cabin... toward the girl I love.
Let her think I’m him. Let her sob into my chest and beg for my touch, believing she’s whispering his name into the night. By the time the sun rises, it will be too late. She will be mine in every way that matters.
Far off, buried in the heart of the forest, a raw, desperate scream echoes. It’s Andrik—the real one.
He can feel me in his skin. He’s fighting the hibernation spell, trying to claw through the sludge of dark magic, but he’s fighting a losing battle.
I’m already on the way to claim my queen.
I’m the king of this forest now.