The rain didn't stop.
By midday, the forest floor was a sucking mire that clung to every step. Mud pulled at their boots like it wanted to keep them. Kael pushed the pace anyway, knowing the hunters wouldn't rest just because the weather was against them.
Elara walked with the boy close to her side, his small boots sinking deep into the muck. Halric took the rear, eyes constantly scanning the trees, his grip on his hammer never loosening.
"They're not tracking us by sight," Halric muttered after the third time Kael had stopped to check their trail. "Our prints are ruined in this mess, but I can feel them behind us. Like a draft on my neck."
Kael didn't answer right away. He'd felt it too — that prickling awareness, like cold fingers brushing the back of his skull, a presence without sound.
The abyss whispered. They follow the echo.
"What echo?" Kael asked under his breath.
The wound you carry. The tear in the weave where I entered. To them, it is a beacon.
Kael's jaw tightened. "Can I hide it?"
You could feed it. Make it stronger. Swallow everything until it drowns their sense in the noise.
"That's not hiding," Kael muttered. "That's—"
"Elara," Halric cut in from behind, "you see that?"
Through the veil of rain ahead, the forest opened into a shallow basin, the ground slick with black water. The air smelled faintly of rot, the kind that clung to your throat.
Kael motioned for them to wait, then stepped forward, crouching by the edge. Something moved in the water — long, sinuous, barely breaking the surface.
Then he saw the tracks. Not human. Not drake. These prints were wide, with three talon marks at the fore, each as long as Kael's hand, sunk deep into the soft ground.
"Not the hunters," he said.
Elara's voice was tight. "Then what?"
Before Kael could answer, the water rippled. A pale shape rose slowly from the center of the basin — a head, elongated, with teeth like jagged glass. Two eyes burned faintly gold in the gloom.
The creature slid forward, body uncoiling like a serpent, but with limbs that ended in hooked claws. It moved with a predator's patience, every ripple deliberate.
Halric muttered a curse. "Marrow-lurker. Haven't seen one this far north in years."
The abyss thrummed with interest. Eat it.
The lurker moved faster than it had any right to, splashing through the shallows toward them. Kael stepped in front of Elara and the boy, sword drawn, feet sinking into the mud.
When it lunged, the world narrowed to a single point — the line of its jaw, the arc of its claws. Kael sidestepped, slashing at its neck. The blade bit deep, but the hide was tougher than it looked, the strike glancing off bone.
Halric waded in with his hammer, swinging low to smash its knee. The lurker shrieked, a high, wet sound, and spun toward him, teeth bared.
Elara's arrows thudded into its flank. They stuck, quivering, but didn't slow it much.
The abyss whispered again. Let me through. We can end this in one strike.
Kael gritted his teeth. He didn't want to. He knew the risk. But the thing's claws were inches from Halric's throat, and there wasn't time for hesitation.
He let go.
It wasn't like opening a door. It was like being shoved through one. Power surged up his spine, black and cold, every nerve alight. His next step was faster than it should have been; his swing heavier, the air around the blade trembling.
The sword tore through the lurker's chest in a spray of dark ichor that steamed against the rain-chilled air.
The creature convulsed, eyes flaring gold one last time — then went still.
Kael stood over it, breathing hard. The abyss urged him to kneel, to drink the fading life. The hunger was a living thing inside him, curling up his throat.
He almost did. Almost.
Instead, he wrenched the blade free and stepped back, forcing the hunger down until his hands stopped trembling.
Halric gave him a long look but said nothing, though his grip on the hammer had gone white-knuckled.
They skirted the basin quickly, leaving the carcass to sink into the mire. Rain tapped against their hoods, but it didn't wash away the feeling of being watched.
By the time the trees closed in again, Kael could feel that cold-fingered sensation at the back of his neck once more.
"They're still on us," he said quietly.
Elara's voice was low. "If they can track that… echo… then we can't outrun them."
Kael's thoughts turned over fast. "Then we give them something else to follow."
Halric's brow furrowed. "You're thinking bait?"
Kael nodded. "Something carrying enough of my… mark to fool them."
The abyss purred. A drop of blood. A whisper of my breath. They will chase it until the world ends.
Kael hated how easy it sounded.
But as the rain deepened and the forest darkened, he began to think it might be their only chance.
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