Chapter Eighteen
Connor
The forest didn’t welcome them. But it watched.
Branches hung too still. The air held a tension that prickled across Connor’s skin as he led the way down the narrow path into the northern woods. Moss muted their footsteps, but every other sound, every breath, and every shift of weight felt loud enough to carry miles.
Xiathen glided behind him like a shadow given form, his robes brushing the fern-covered ground without a sound.
Adrian held the charm, and he walked at Connor’s right shoulder, Max at the left, with Fraser pacing a little behind
Whatever or whoever had taken Irial had left nothing but a smear of fading rend energy along the boundary of the woods. An energy Xiathen said shouldn’t exist this close to Glengáill. Not now. Not this soon.
Connor stopped beneath the skeletal arm of a pine, sniffing the air. “She’s close,” he murmured. “Her scent’s here. Recent.”
Fraser crouched beside him, touching the disturbed earth. “Aye. Someone stepped here. Light feet. Running, maybe.”
Adrian frowned, scanning the dark undergrowth. “She wouldn’t run without purpose.” He checked the charm. “We still appear to be on the right path.”
Xiathen tilted his head, eyes distant. “Something called to her.”
Connor stiffened. “Called?”
“A pull,” Xiathen said softly. “Something familiar to her. Something she feared, yet could not ignore.”
Max muttered under his breath. “Brilliant.”
They moved deeper. The charm beckoned, drawing them quietly through the mist-laden trees and grass, guiding them like a pulse beneath the earth, steady and insistent.
A faint glow shone in Adrian’s palm, threads of pale light spilling between his fingers and creeping across the ground in thin, wandering ribbons.
Adrian kept close to Connor. His breath held tight in his chest as the fog thickened around their ankles.
Max and Fraser flanked them, alert and tense, blades low and ready.
Xiathen moved at the front, robes whispering over the moss, eyes half-closed as he listened to something none of the others could hear.
“It’s leading us true,” Xiathen murmured. “Her magic clings to the charm. Like a memory carried on the wind.”
Connor grunted, pushing aside a branch wet with dew. “Aye, well, let it hurry. We’re losing light because of this damn mist.”
The mist curled thicker, swallowing the trees until they looked like pale ghosts standing shoulder to shoulder. The charm brightened, its pulse becoming quicker and sharper, almost urgent.
Adrian’s skin prickled. “It’s reacting.”
Connor saw Fraser tighten his grip on his knife. “Aye. Something’s ahead.”
The forest began to change. The air grew cold.
The sound of the world dimmed. The birds had gone silent, the branches no longer creaking as if the wind held its breath.
The canopy thickened, swallowing the last of the weak afternoon light.
A cold hush settled over the glen, and Adrian felt the Valour bond tug faintly against his ribs.
Xiathen raised a hand. “Stay still.”
The forest trembled. Not with movement, but with sound. Soft, brittle, and unnatural.
“Nightwrought?” Frasier asked.
Xiathen said, “A lone scout. Wounded, perhaps. Weak, but not harmless.”
“Irial could be with it,”Max stated.
“Or running from it,” Adrian said.
Connor’s jaw set. “We find her. Now.”
They moved again, quieter, tighter. Connor led them through a break in the trees to where the ground dipped into a hollow. A bowl of shadows. The strange sound pulsed again, low and sharp as a splinter of cold air.
Xiathen lifted their hand sharply. “Stop.”
Everyone froze. The charm flared. The fog in front of them shivered, then peeled aside, as though split by an unseen hand. Then they saw her.
Irial knelt at the base of an ancient oak, hands wrapped around her head, shoulders shaking.
A thin, fractured shimmer clung to the tree trunk beside her, , writhing with the distortion of a Nightwrought’s presence.
The creature was half-formed, clinging like a stain to the bark, its shape rippling like torn cloth caught between two worlds.
Adrian took a step forward, but Connor’s arm shot out, stopping him. “Wait.”
The Nightwrought turned and surveyed them not with eyes, but by angling the fractured dark toward them, as if mimicking a gaze it had learned from watching others. The sound sharpened, creating a soft rupture in the air, delicate and brittle.
Irial whimpered, pressing herself tighter against the bark.
Xiathen stepped forward, calm as winter. “It is weak. It has been trying to anchor itself but cannot hold form. It will fade.”
“Fade faster,” Connor growled. “Adrian, left. Max, right. Fraser, on me.”
They moved before the last word had even settled in the air.
The Nightwrought recoiled, its shape thinning into a veil of fractured shadow. The air shivered around it, a brittle ripple running through the clearing. It surged, twisting awkwardly.
Connor didn’t wait. He lunged, boots tearing across moss and dirt, blade arcing in a sharp, decisive strike. The creature flared, scattering like smoke caught in a windstorm, but not fast enough. “Now,” he barked.
Connor watched as Adrian darted left, cutting off the creature’s escape path.
His silver knife caught the faintest glint of starlight as he swept it through the air, forcing the Nightwrought back.
Max closed in from the opposite side, his broad shoulders lowering into a defensive stance, ready to intercept.
The Nightwrought spasmed. A pulse of cold ruptured out of it in an almost-sound, sharp and unnatural.
Fraser barrelled through it, teeth bared, momentum carrying him into a sweeping kick that disrupted the creature’s attempt to reform. “You’re not going anywhere,” he snarled.
The Nightwrought shuddered violently, as if its own shape were betraying it, edges fraying, dark veins peeling away from whatever held it together. It tried again to surge up, re-forming a single jagged limb. But Connor was already there. He brought his blade down hard and precise.
The strike cut through the unstable mass, splitting it cleanly. Shadows split like torn cloth, unravelling, scattering into shards of cold light and brittle static. A second pulse rippled like a thin, sharp frost cracking along a windowpane.
The Nightwrought collapsed in on itself, dissolving into a dying shimmer. A soft, fractured sigh drifted through the clearing, and it vanished. Completely.
Silence rushed in behind it like a held breath finally released. Connor lifted his blade, chest rising and falling from exertion.
Take that, you little fucker.
Adrian glanced around the clearing. Max lowered his stance. Fraser shivered, muttering, “Ugly bit of magic, that.”
Xiathen nodded, sorrow and warning in his eyes. “It will not be the last.”
Then Irial sobbed. Adrian reached her first, kneeling beside her, hands hovering cautiously. “Irial, look at me.”
She lifted her head, eyes wild and shimmering with exhausted magic. “It called,” she whispered. “Not with sound, with memory. My memory. I thought… I thought it was someone I’d lost. Someone I missed.”
Xiathen exhaled shakily. “They should not be able to reach you like this.”
Fraser crouched beside her. “Let’s get you home.”
Connor stepped forward. “You’re safe now, lass.”
Irial collapsed, and Connor caught her without hesitation. She clung to him, shaking as if thawing from deep frost. “We’re here,” Connor murmured. “We’ve got you.”
Adrian rose. “We need to move quickly. That one was weak. Others might follow the rip.”
Xiathen nodded. “Irial is bound to the emotional heart of the village. If they are reaching for her, they are reaching for all of us.”
Connor tightened his grip around Irial. “Then they’ll answer to us.”
Max swept the woods with a final glance. “Let’s take her home.”
Together, with Connor carrying Irial, Adrian supporting Xiathen through the thickening dark, Max and Fraser shielding their flanks, they left the hollow behind. The forest closed in with a hush that felt almost grateful.
Behind him, the ancient oak stood silent once more, and the last echo of the Nightwrought’s brittle, shattering sound faded into the cold Highland air.
***
Adrian
They reached the outskirts of Glengáill as the mist began to settle again, rolling between the cottages like slow breath. The lanterns outside The Dry Pig flickered with their usual warm, amber glow. Yet tonight, even that familiar light felt fragile.
Irial stirred in Connor’s hold, her head lifting weakly from his shoulder. “Home,” she whispered, her voice thin as frost smoke.
“Aye,” Connor said softly. “You’re safe now.
” Adrian opened the inn’s door before Connor could reach it.
Heat spilled out as firelight, soup, and the scent of herbs met with it the low murmur of frightened voices.
Word had already spread. Piper was the first to reach them.
“Oh Irial.” She pressed a trembling hand to her mouth before gathering the young woman into her arms. “You scared us all half to death.”
Irial sagged into her, exhausted. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. I thought I heard—” Her voice cracked. “It felt like someone I knew. Someone long gone.”
Xiathen stepped forward, his expression as gentle as moonlit water. “It is no fault of yours. Nightwrought prey on longing. On grief. They reach where the heart is weakest.”
A ripple of unease passed through the room. Adrian’s gaze flicked to Connor, quiet, steady, grounding, and for a moment, Adrian felt the Valour bond hum in recognition, a pulse of shared certainty. We will protect them.
Moira emerged from the kitchen with a blanket in hand and a face set like carved stone. “Bring her to the fire. She needs warmth, not questions.”
Connor nodded, helping guide Irial to a cushioned bench beside the hearth. Flames crackled softly, throwing gold across her pale face. She leaned toward the heat like a flower toward the sun.
Fraser stood watch near the door, arms crossed, scanning the windows and corners as if expecting the shadows to move again.
Max positioned himself beside him. “Whatever that thing was,” he muttered, “it wasn’t there by chance.”
“No,” Xiathen said quietly. “It was sent. Or stirred.”
Adrian’s voice was low. “By the Council?”
Xiathen hesitated before answering. “Perhaps not directly. But their influence—their hunger—echoes through smaller things. Scouts. Tethers. Echoes of their will.” Xiathen’s eyes grew troubled. “Tonight was a warning.”
Connor set his jaw. “Then consider it received.”
The townsfolk had gathered. Frightened, whispering, and watching Irial with wide eyes. Children clung to their parents. The elders huddled close, speaking in low murmurs. No one dared raise their voice.
Adrian sat beside Irial, offering her a warm cup of something herbal. “Drink,” he urged softly. “Just a sip.”
She obeyed. Her hands shook, but her breathing eased. “I thought it was him,” she whispered. “The voice felt familiar. Like family. Like home.”
Xiathen crouched before her. “Nightwrought do not speak. They mimic echoes, emotional shadows left in your memory. It was not your brother. It was never him.”
Irial’s eyes filled with tears. “I know. I know now.”
Connor placed a steady hand on her shoulder. “You’re safe. We’ll not let anything take you.”
Around them, the mood shifted. Not in relief, not yet, but a fragile thread of hope.
Adrian stood, addressing the room quietly but firmly. “Listen to me, all of you. Tonight proved something important. Glengáill is not prey. You are not helpless.”
Connor stepped beside him. “We face this together. Brannigan and Gauthier. Town and clan. No one here stands alone.”
At that everyone in the room exhaled. Piper straightened. “Then we watch out for each other.”
Moira nodded. “We keep lanterns lit.”
A murmured agreement swept through the inn.
Irial, wrapped in her blanket, managed a tired smile. “Thank you,” she whispered. “All of you.” She motioned Adrian closer. “You pulled me back,” she murmured. “Thank you.”
He swallowed hard. “We were terrified. You didn’t answer for so long, not really.”
“I was elsewhere,” she said, her voice drifting like a thought half-remembered. “And now I’m not the same. The Nightwrought didn’t only take from me. They also left something behind, and I took it.”
Before he could ask, she reached into the pocket of her torn cloak.
Her fingers curled around something, then withdrew a small, dark stone no larger than a thumbprint.
It pulsed once, faintly, like a heartbeat.
“I found this where I was,” she said. “It’s a sigil stone. I’ve imbued it with my essence.”
She placed it in his hand, and the moment his skin touched it, warmth bloomed up his wrist, threading into his chest like a tether pulling taut. Adrian startled. “Irial?”
“It won’t hurt you,” she said quickly. “It can’t. It’s bound to my power, but you shape it. You decide when it wakes, when it listens, what it becomes. I merely lend the spark.”
The warmth steadied, settling like a second pulse against his own. “Why me?” he asked, his voice low.
“Because you’re the one I trust to use it only when you truly need it.
And because I’ll feel it, no matter where I am, when you’re in danger.
” She stepped closer and looped a thin leather cord through the carved groove of the stone, lifting it to his neck.
Her fingers brushed the hollow of his throat as she fastened it.
“And what will you feel, exactly?” he murmured.
Irial’s expression softened with something ancient and new all at once. “Your intention,” she whispered. “Your fear. Your hope. Your will calling mine. Enough that I can reach you, lend power through the bond. But only you can direct it. Only you can choose what it becomes.”
The sigil stone warmed again, responding to something in him. Adrian closed his hand around it. “Then I’ll use it wisely.”
“I know,” she said, her eyes brightening a little. “That’s why I made it for you.”
For the first time since stepping out of the forest, she looked almost like the Irial he knew.
But only almost. There was a magnitude in her now of something vast, humming beneath her skin that made even the mist keep its distance.
And Adrian understood something he hadn’t before.
Irial had come back to them. But the girl they’d rescued was not the same one who had been taken.
Connor squeezed her shoulder gently. “Rest now. Tomorrow, we figure out what comes next.”
Adrian caught Xiathen’s gaze. The Mystic’s expression was calm, but beneath the calm lay something sharp, something ancient and unsettled.
“This is only the beginning,” Xiathen murmured.
“Aye,” Connor replied quietly. “But they’ll have to come through us.”
And for the first time that night, the fire in the hearth didn’t seem small at all.