Chapter 26 Darius
DARIUS
The moment we step back up from the chamber, the air in the house feels wrong. It’s the kind of wrong that sits under your skin, humming, like the static before a lightning strike, and it’s carrying scents I haven’t caught here in years.
They’re faint, distant enough that whoever left them is long gone, but the meaning is the same. Someone crossed onto our land. Multiple someones. Wolves, at least two. A lynx shifter. And something else I can’t quite place, sharp and resinous, like pine burned down to ash.
They came close enough to make sure we’d know they’d been here, then left before I could track them. A message without words.
Mary catches it too. She pauses halfway down the hall, inhaling sharply, eyes narrowing as she turns toward me. “They know.”
I don’t have to ask what she means. A bond between two shifters isn’t subtle, not when it’s sealed the way mine and Tessa’s is now. The scent of it radiates outward like heat from a fire, and once it’s in the air, every predator worth the name will follow the trail.
“They’ll come,” I say. “Some to test it. Some to break it.”
Mary glances past me, toward Tessa, who’s standing just outside the study door. She’s quiet, her eyes distant, but I can tell she’s not just listening. She’s feeling it, the same way I am.
“Tessa,” I say, and her gaze snaps to mine.
“It’s… louder,” she murmurs, her voice softer than usual but steady. “Since we bonded, I can feel them more. The ones who were here. I can almost… see them in my head, even though they’re gone.”
I step closer, lowering my voice so only she can hear. “That’s your witch blood.”
She doesn’t flinch at it now, not like she did when Mary first said the word. “It’s stronger since you marked me,” she says, like she’s been turning the thought over and is only now letting it out. “Like something woke up.”
Mary’s watching us, arms crossed, but she doesn’t interrupt.
I cup Tessa’s jaw lightly, letting my thumb rest just under her ear. “Then you’ll learn to use it. You’ll need it.”
Before she can answer, the front door rattles.
Not with a knock, but with the slap of something hitting the wood.
A weight, small but deliberate. I’m moving before the sound fully registers, pulling the door open to find a plain envelope lying on the porch boards.
No scent of a messenger, no fresh trail.
Whoever left it knew how to mask themselves.
I tear it open, my eyes scanning the single line written inside in a hand I know better than I’d like:
The war begins now. – R
Roman.
The paper crumples in my fist, my wolf rising hard enough that I have to take a slow breath just to keep my voice level when I speak. “Mary. Ward the perimeter. Tonight.”
She doesn’t argue, which tells me she knows just how bad this is. She turns and disappears down the hall.
Tessa steps closer, her hand brushing my arm. “He’s not bluffing.”
“No,” I say, meeting her gaze. “He’s not.”
The last time Roman moved like this, the bodies didn’t stop falling for months. He doesn’t just fight, he corrodes. Turns allies into enemies, enemies into corpses, and he does it with a smile like it’s all a game he’s playing better than anyone else. And now he’s marked the first piece.
“We can take him,” she says, and I almost smile at the steel in her voice. Almost.
“It’s not just him,” I tell her. “This won’t be a fight with one fox. He’s going to pull the old grudges into the open. Call in debts. Stir every rival we’ve ever had, and plenty who never cared until now. He’ll make it a war on all fronts.”
She looks at me for a minute, then says, “Then you can’t fight it alone.”
I want to tell her I’ve been fighting wars longer than she’s been alive, that I know the weight of what’s coming and I’ll carry it without asking her to bleed for it—but I can’t.
Not after what I saw in her tonight. Not after the way she touched the Seal and came back with a vision I’ve tried to pretend was impossible.
“You saw them,” I say quietly. “The Pact.”
She nods. “Together. Whole. And you were at the center.”
The words dig in deeper than I want them to.
I’ve spent years avoiding that place, that role.
I left it because I thought leading meant dragging everyone I cared about into the grave with me.
But if Roman is moving like this, if the others are already circling…
then staying fractured is going to get us all killed.
Mary returns, wiping her hands on a rag, the scent of salt and iron on her from the wards she’s laid. “Perimeter’s set, but it won’t stop him if he’s determined.”
“It’s not supposed to,” I say. “It’s supposed to slow him long enough for us to be ready.”
She studies me, reading the thing I haven’t said yet. “You’re thinking about calling them.”
“I’m thinking,” I answer, “that if we don’t put the Pact back together, Roman’s going to pick us off one by one, and when he’s done, there won’t be anything left worth protecting.”
Mary’s mouth tightens. “They won’t all come willingly.”
“They don’t have to. They just have to show up.”
Tessa steps between us, looking at me like she already knows I’ve made up my mind. “You’re going to lead them.”
It’s not a question. And I don’t deny it.
Because the truth is, the second I read Roman’s message, I knew there was only one way this ended.
And it sure as hell wasn’t with me standing still while the war came to my door.