CHAPTER TWO: Blood in the Dust
The blow came fast—too fast.
Kael barely raised his arm in time to deflect the brunt of Garreth's strike. Claws tore across his forearm, shredding skin to the bone. Blood splattered across the ruins, soaking the broken stones beneath their feet.
Pain seared through him like fire. Human pain. Weak, slow, mortal.
Garreth grinned at the sight of it.
"No howl, no shift, no strength. You're just a man in a dead wolf's skin, Kael."
Kael's lip curled, a silent snarl forming even without his wolf. He twisted his body low, ducking under Garreth's next swing and driving his dagger deep into the creature's side. Garreth roared, but it was more fury than pain—his body already healing.
He's been feeding, Kael realized. On blood…
The thought sickened him, but he couldn't dwell on it now. Garreth lunged again, smashing Kael into the stone pillar behind him. The old structure cracked, dust and moss falling like ash. Kael hit the ground hard, the breath driven from his lungs.
Behind him, the girl screamed.
Garreth's head snapped toward her. "She's one of them, isn't she?" he growled. "A cursed child. A number. Another project of the blood lords."
"Leave her out of this," Kael hissed, forcing himself to his feet. "She has nothing to do with your betrayal."
"Oh, but she does," Garreth purred. "You should've let her die with the others. Now she's marked, Kael. And so are you."
He lunged again.
Kael dodged left—barely—and caught the back of Garreth's knee with a sweep of his leg. The werewolf stumbled, snarling, and Kael seized the moment to drive his elbow into Garreth's throat. The strike landed with a crunch, forcing the traitor back—but not down.
"You think that old alpha discipline is enough?" Garreth spat. "That moon-forsaken honor?"
Kael raised his blade, his breath ragged. "I think you talk too much."
Garreth charged again—only to be blasted back by a sudden force of wind that howled through the ruins like a scream.
Both men froze.
Even the child looked up, eyes wide in terror.
The wind circled them—sharp, unnatural, cold. It swept through the hollowed village and then stopped. Just like that. As if it had never come.
Kael turned his head slowly.
At the edge of the ruins stood a figure.
Hooded. Cloaked in raven-black.
And tall—unnaturally so. Its shadow stretched long across the ground even though the moonlight had dimmed.
Garreth stepped back, his snarl dying in his throat. "No… not now…"
The figure moved closer. Not with steps, but as if it glided, unbound by earth or law.
"I warned you, Garreth," came a voice like splintering glass. Male, but not. "The Alpha was to be delivered to Theron. Not killed. Not yet."
Kael's blood ran cold.
Garreth dropped to one knee immediately. "My lord—I didn't know he'd be here. I thought—"
"You thought?" the figure interrupted. "You do not think, wretch. You obey."
Kael's instincts screamed. This thing—whatever it was—was not a wolf. Not a vampire. Not anything he'd ever faced.
It was worse.
The girl clung to his side now, her small hands trembling.
Kael stepped in front of her. "If you want me, come take me," he growled.
The figure turned its hood toward him, though Kael saw no face beneath it—only shifting shadow.
"You're broken, Kael. Weak. A carcass of what once ruled. You don't need to be taken. You'll deliver yourself when the time is right."
And just like that, the figure vanished.
No flash. No sound.
Just gone.
The wind died.
The silence returned.
Kael stood frozen, blood still dripping from his wounds. Garreth was gone too—only a trail of deep claw marks in the dust remained where he had kneeled.
The girl clutched his arm. "What… what was that?"
Kael's voice came low, distant. "Something that shouldn't exist."
---
They didn't speak again until dawn.
Kael sat against a charred wall in what had once been the Hollowdeep Alpha's home—his home. Now, it was a shell, the roof caved in, the hearth filled with cold ash. He stared into the dying embers of the small fire they'd managed to build.
The girl sat beside him, wrapped in the fur cloak he gave her.
"What's your real name?" she asked quietly.
Kael blinked, slowly turning to her.
"You shouldn't be here."
She didn't look away. "But I am."
Silence stretched between them.
He finally sighed. "Kael."
"Kael," she repeated, as if tasting the name. "That… that thing said you'd 'deliver yourself.' What did that mean?"
Kael's jaw clenched. "I don't know."
But he did know.
He felt it in the marrow of his bones.
His return wasn't just something he wanted.
It was something they needed.
He wasn't the only one preparing for vengeance.
The enemy was too.
And whatever stood behind Theron… it wasn't done.
Not yet.
---
Later that morning, Kael stepped through the shattered stone arch at the edge of the ruins and found it.
A grave.
Untouched. Hidden behind the tangled vines of the garden his mate once tended.
He brushed the vines aside with trembling fingers.
The stone bore no name. Just a carved symbol—two crescent moons facing one another, with a single wolf eye in the center.
It was her mark.
Elira.
He dropped to one knee, head bowed.
"I'm still here," he whispered. "I haven't forgotten."
He closed his eyes.
"But they haven't either."
---
Far away, in the cold marble halls of the Black Fortress, a pale man stood before a long obsidian mirror. He wore armor stitched with the bones of wolves and bore a cruel scar that split his lip in two. His eyes—gold once—now burned with the venomous hue of power.
Theron.
Behind him, the hooded figure from the ruins knelt.
"The Alpha lives," it said. "And the child is with him."
Theron turned, a slow, wicked smile creeping across his face.
"Good."
He approached the mirror.
From it, a reflection not his own stared back.
A monstrous eye.
A voice echoed from within it.
"It begins."
---