The wind had shifted.
It wasn't the kind of shift most would notice—not at first. But Ivyra did. She always did. It was in the hush between leaves, the way the trees had stopped breathing naturally. Birds no longer sang from the branches. Instead, there was a brittle stillness to the air, like a page torn from a book mid-sentence.
She stood at the edge of the healer's hut, arms crossed tightly over her chest, watching the village slow beneath a clouded morning. A low mist clung to the ground, pooling at the villagers' feet as they moved between homes with hunched shoulders and darting eyes. The chatter and laughter that had usually begun at sunrise were absent, replaced by short nods and murmurs passed like contraband.
A mother ushered her daughter back inside a cottage, pulling the door closed behind her with a thud that made Ivyra flinch.
Elynn emerged behind her, apron damp and streaked with green. "You feel it too," she said softly, handing Ivyra a warm cloth. "It's like something's holding its breath."
"It's watching," Ivyra murmured, not moving to take the cloth. Her silver-flecked eyes scanned the tree line. "Something just beyond where we can see."
Elynn frowned but didn't argue. "There were three crows lying on the roof this morning. No wounds. No cries. Just dead."
A pause.
"No blood?" Ivyra asked.
"None."
Ivyra said nothing, but her gaze drifted upward. The clouds sat too low, swollen and unmoving, like a bruise hanging in the sky. They hadn't shifted since dawn.
From the distance, the clanging of metal startled both women. They turned to see two of the village boys—Jano and Pell—struggling to steady a makeshift barricade along the path leading to the northern woods. Their hands trembled. Ivyra noticed the leather wraps on their spears had been reinforced recently, new bindings glinting with oil.
The village elder arrived not long after, trailing smoke from a carved pipe. Two men walked behind him, but their attention wasn't on the forest—they were watching Ivyra.
"We'll be doubling the night watch," the elder said gruffly, chewing on the stem of his pipe. "Scouts found claw marks. Deep. Fresh."
"Claw marks?" Elynn's voice tensed.
"On birchwood. Clean through." His eyes lingered on Ivyra. "No ordinary beast."
Ivyra said nothing, though the air around her seemed to pulse faintly.
"No one wanders tonight," the elder continued. "Keep your wards lit. And you—" his finger aimed directly at Ivyra, "—no tricks. If something comes, we won't have illusions clouding our judgment."
Ivyra stiffened. "I haven't used any illusions."
"Not yet," he muttered. Then turned away.
As the small group marched off, the tension they left behind stayed. Villagers glanced over their shoulders at Ivyra as they passed. Even those who once greeted her with cautious nods now averted their eyes. Children were called indoors faster when she walked by.
"They're afraid of me," Ivyra said as she stepped inside the healer's hut, her voice level but distant.
Elynn sighed, moving back to the worktable. "They're afraid of what they don't understand. Same thing, really."
Ivyra was about to respond when something cold brushed her ankle.
She looked down.
A crow.
It lay at the threshold—its wings snapped mid-fold, beak open but silent. Its eyes still gleamed.
"How…" Ivyra crouched, but didn't touch it. "It wasn't here before."
"No one heard it fall," Elynn whispered behind her.
"No one ever does," Ivyra murmured.
She looked out again toward the trees. The mist had thickened.
And something—just beyond the reach of her magic—was breathing.
---
Night came too fast.
Not with sunset, but with the unnatural way the sky dimmed long before the sun touched the treetops. The mist, thick as wool, bled into every corner of the village. Torches hissed and flickered, their flames guttering in windless air. Even the wards—runes etched in chalk or bound with dried herbs—seemed dimmer than usual.
Ivyra stood near the old well, her breath fogging in the growing cold. She had gone to fetch water, but something in her gut stalled her hand each time she reached for the rope.
Elynn had stayed inside. Her joints were aching again, and Ivyra hadn't pressed her. The woman needed rest.
A sharp snap echoed from the woods beyond the fence.
Ivyra's head jerked up.
Another snap. Then a soft, dragging sound. Something was moving. Something heavy, slow.
She dropped the bucket and stepped away from the well, eyes narrowing. Her pulse slowed—intentionally. Her magic stirred in her bones, cold and precise. She reached for it, not to cast, but to listen.
There.
Not one creature. Two. Maybe three.
They weren't speaking. Weren't snarling. Just breathing—like they were tasting the air. Searching.
A shrill whistle cut across the silence—one of the scouts' signals.
Then it was followed by a scream.
Ivyra spun toward the north path, already sprinting.
By the time she reached the edge of the village barricade, torches had been knocked over and the dirt was torn in wide, clawed grooves. A figure was crouched beside one of the watch posts—Jano, bleeding from his arm, his blade trembling in his grip.
"What happened?" she demanded, kneeling beside him.
His eyes were wide, bloodless. "It—it looked like a deer, but… wrong. Its eyes. No reflection. No sound." He grabbed her wrist. "It didn't make sound when it moved. Not even leaves crunching. Like it was floating—no, stalking."
Ivyra rose, scanning the tree line.
And then she saw it.
A shape—not quite animal, not quite spirit. It shimmered faintly as it stepped from the woods, limbs too long, head lowered unnaturally. Where a stag's antlers should be were jagged, branching thorns, dripping something that steamed where it touched the ground.
It didn't charge.
It just stared.
Ivyra's magic pulled taut in her veins, and her fingertips glowed faintly. But she didn't move. She knew. If she moved first, it would respond.
The silence stretched.
The creature tilted its head—slowly, as if mocking a curiosity it didn't possess.
Then…
It turned.
And vanished back into the trees without a sound.
Not a crunch. Not a breath. Gone.
Ivyra didn't chase. She waited, long enough to be sure it wouldn't return. Then she looked down at the spot where it had stood. The grass had turned gray. Brittle. Like it had been drained.
"Get the elder," she said quietly to Jano. "And light every ward we have."
He didn't ask why.
---
Ivyra walked back alone.
She didn't take the main path. Her feet followed a curve between houses, weaving through the smaller alleys where the torchlight didn't quite reach. She moved like a ghost — just another shadow in a night already heavy with them.
Windows were shut. Curtains drawn tight. Even the wind seemed to hold its breath.
She could feel it.
The watching.
Not just from the woods.
From them.
Villagers who had once nodded in awkward politeness now lowered their eyes or didn't meet hers at all. A pair of boys who had once run past her hut on dares to pluck at her herbs now crossed the road without looking back.
It didn't bother her. Not in the way it once might've.
But something inside her was tightening. Like thread being pulled around her ribs.
She reached the door to her hut and paused. For a breath. Maybe two.
Then pushed it open.
The warmth inside was muted — one of the candles had gone out. The pot of stew Elynn had left simmering over the low fire was untouched, now crusting at the edge.
Her mother lay curled on the sleeping mat, a woven shawl drawn up to her chin. Her eyes were closed, but Ivyra knew she was awake.
"You didn't come back with the water," Elynn murmured, voice rough.
"There was something in the woods," Ivyra replied, quietly pulling off her cloak. "It got past the wards. Got close. Close enough to mark the ground."
That made Elynn sit up.
Her skin was pale, and the lines around her mouth deeper than they were yesterday. "Was anyone harmed?"
"Jano. Scratched. Shaken more than hurt." Ivyra sat beside her, running a hand through her damp, wind-kissed hair. "I didn't fight it. I don't think it wanted a fight. It just… looked."
Elynn's brow furrowed. "What kind of look?"
"Like it recognized me."
A silence bloomed between them. Thick. Familiar.
Then Elynn reached out and touched her daughter's hand. "You've been glowing in your sleep again."
Ivyra looked down.
The veins in her wrist were faintly silver.
Not white. Not moonlight. Not soft.
Silver — like something older. Like the glint of a blade just before it's drawn.
"I know," she whispered.
"And your dreams?"
"I don't remember most of them. Just—" She hesitated. "I keep waking up with words in my mouth. Words I've never heard before."
"You speak them aloud?"
"No. They burn too much when I try."
Elynn didn't look surprised. But her worry was a living thing beneath her stillness. She squeezed Ivyra's hand once, then let go.
"The elders called for a meeting," Ivyra said suddenly. "They want to talk about strengthening the boundaries. About moving the children deeper into the valley."
"And about you?"
"I don't think they'll say it out loud. Not yet. But yes. They'll talk."
Elynn's lips thinned. "Let them. Let them whisper and worry and pretend you frighten them. But when something worse comes to their door, who will they beg first?"
"They don't see it that way."
"No. Because they see what you survived. And that scares them more than the creature."
Ivyra stood, moving to the small shelf where dried leaves and bark were stored in clay pots. Her fingers brushed them absently, choosing none.
"They think I brought it here," she said.
Elynn said nothing.
"I felt it tonight. The way they looked at me." Ivyra turned to face her mother. "I wasn't even near the fence when it broke through. But they'll find a way to turn it."
"They always do," Elynn said bitterly.
Ivyra's hands balled into fists.
"I could have killed it," she said softly. "I wanted to."
"But you didn't."
"No."
"You chose not to burn the forest down for a single flame," Elynn said. "There is strength in that."
"But fire keeps people warm," Ivyra muttered. "And it keeps beasts away."
Elynn watched her with an unreadable gaze. "And it consumes the innocent with the guilty."
---
The hall of the elders stood at the heart of the village, older than the houses around it, built from blackwood so ancient it seemed to drink in the light. Its doors groaned open for Elynn and Ivyra not with welcome, but with obligation.
Inside, the elders sat in a rough circle, all save one wearing furs and woven scarves, their faces marked by the wind and years. The firepit in the center smoldered low, casting more smoke than heat.
Elynn stood tall despite the fatigue in her shoulders. "We came in peace," she said. "You let us in. And yet you would blame us for what passed this dawn?"
An elder with a silver braid that nearly reached her waist lifted a hand. "No one is naming blame, healer. But peace does not explain what followed your daughter."
"She called it to us," another elder muttered, not hiding the suspicion in his tone. "That creature—we've never seen the likes. It came for something, and it came through her."
Ivyra stood silent beside her mother. She had grown used to being spoken about, not to. But the air in the hall pricked against her skin, heavy with fear too long buried.
"Is she cursed?" someone asked.
"She's marked, certainly. Something in her blood draws shadows."
Elynn's voice cut sharp. "What draws shadow can also draw light. You wanted my healing, not my daughter's truth."
The braided elder considered this, then sighed. "We'll not drive you out. Not yet. But you'll stay to the outer edge of the village. And the girl—she does not leave the lane without you."
Elynn did not bow. She only nodded once, turned, and walked Ivyra out before the whispers could begin again.
That night, Ivyra could not sleep. The cot beneath her felt too narrow, the walls too thin. Her mother had long since stilled, breath deep and even, but Ivyra's eyes remained open to the rafters.
Then came the sound. Not real, but memory—or dream. A whispering, low and musical, like wind through hollow bones.
She blinked. The roof above her shimmered, vanished.
She stood beneath a sky torn with stars, the ground beneath her not soil, but glass veined with flame. Before her stretched a forest of silver trees, their branches dripping with ash instead of leaves. And in the distance, a howl—not of a beast, but of something ancient and unchained.
A shape moved between the trees. Too large. Too luminous.
She took a step toward it. Her seal, hidden beneath her night tunic, seared her skin, and the world shattered—
She woke gasping. The rafters were there again. Her mother still asleep.
But the sound of the howl lingered.
And outside, the air had shifted—just slightly. As though something had scented her across great distances, and now began to make its way closer.