The wind howled. Not a deafening gust, but one that warned that night was close.The group kept walking; perhaps they had been at it for hours.The forest, thick and buried under dense fog, felt larger than it should.
"We should head back," Velkari said, turning to Grumblin. "I can't feel his trail anywhere. What if Snow-hair already returned to the caravan?"
"That's true," Gundar answered. "If he's back and can't find us, he might go looking again."
Hurried footsteps approached through the mist.
The group, alert at the sound, immediately went on guard.Vairon adjusted his gloves and stepped forward, shifting his weight to his front leg. His right arm rose—almost parallel to his face—shielding his chest, neck, and head, while his left stayed close to his torso, tense, ready to react.
Alaric slid his hand toward his rapier, gripping it with an almost ceremonial precision. The posture was not mere preparation; once drawn, his wrist could twist just enough to carve a horizontal cut with the tip, fine as a needle grazing living flesh—an instinctive gesture, more learned by feel than by training.
"Finally! I found you!" Cecilia's voice tore through the quiet, almost an insult against the fog. She emerged holding her lantern high, the glass fogged by her own breath.
She froze at the sight of them, as if the world had jerked.
The group, recognizing her through the pale vapors, lowered their guard at once; tension drained from shoulders and backs.
"I've been looking for you for like twenty minutes!" she protested, offended.
No one answered at first. Silence thickened, awkward.
"Did you say twenty minutes?" Velkari cut her off before she could explain. "We've been looking for hours!" he snapped, his voice edged with rough impatience.
They resumed marching, driven by the distrust hanging in the air.Their steps were heavy, almost clumsy; Cecilia's lantern barely bit into the fog a hand's span ahead, casting scars of light across their faces that came and went, like moving through a dream not their own.
Vairon slowed. He drew in a deep breath, as if something in his throat demanded it.
"The air…" his voice cracked slightly, "is colder."
He didn't need confirmation.The damp current licked at their tongues with a metallic taste, ferrous, clinging to the palate. It wasn't moss or rain; it was something raw, as if the earth bled beneath their feet.
Velkari's back tensed. His ears—sensitive, proud—twitched restlessly, sniffing shadows where nothing physical lay.
"I don't like this."
A muffled grunt escaped when Grumblin tripped over a twisted root no one had noticed.
He shook his foot, muttering,"This forest… folds in on itself."
"It does," Gundar replied, barely raising his voice. He didn't need to. "Three gnarled oaks. We passed them twice already."
Cecilia raised the lantern at him. The light scraped his thick beard like crystal teeth.
"Are you saying we're lost?"
Gundar held her gaze without blinking."I'm saying it doesn't want us out."
Velkari scoffed by reflex, as if pride forced him to deny superstition.
"Dwarven nonsense…"
But his disdain cracked at the edges of his eyes.He looked around without rest, as if every shadow hid real weight. Everything repeated: the same bare branches, the same wet crunch beneath boots, the feeling that the light refused to advance and that each step returned them to where they began.
Cecilia tightened her grip on the lantern until her knuckles whitened.She was convinced: she had walked for twenty minutes.Her body said so; her legs didn't burn, her breath wasn't heavy.But the sky—still, with no hint of time—suggested a different truth, unmoving, almost mocking.
"It can't be," she whispered. "It wasn't that long."
From the rear, Alaric let out a short laugh, humorless.
"Twenty minutes, four hours…" he shook his head. "This forest doesn't know the difference."
Fog slithered between the trees like a slow beast deciding when to show itself, when to swallow everything. Sometimes it opened a faint clearing; a second later, it devoured it again.
Suddenly, Velkari stopped and raised a hand.
Silence.
Their march died instantly, as if someone had bitten the sound.Only the distant crack of a branch giving way… the wind brushing trunks, faint, timid…
And then—nothing.
No crickets.No wings.No leaves whispering against each other.
The emptiness had an edge.It cut.
Grumblin wet his lips, swallowing thick air.
"This smells bad…"
Vairon leaned slightly, as if his body could listen better than his ears.
"Animals don't go silent for fun."
No one had to say it, but the same thought crossed all their minds:
The tharn wolves.
Tall as men. Fast. Cruel.No barking, no warning.They slipped through undergrowth in successive waves, each closer than the last, until something—someone—fell.
Velkari crouched wordlessly.He cleared damp leaves, heavy as if they had cried.There, among black roots, he revealed deep tracks: long toes, claws that pierced the mud with precise strength.He brushed two fingers along the edges, feeling where the mark ended and living soil began.
"Very recent," he whispered. "Just under an hour."
Cecilia stepped back without realizing it.Her lantern trembled, glass clinking against its metal frame.
"How sure is that?"
Velkari didn't look up."As sure as that you hate admitting when you tremble."
Cecilia clenched her jaw. Words crowded behind her tongue—ready to burst—but none escaped.Vairon cut through the moment with a low murmur, expectant:
"Not now, Callen. Ears open."
The half-orc turned slowly, scanning the haze as if searching for something he already knew was there.His stance was calm, but his jaw betrayed him: muscles quivered beneath the skin, tense, ready to tear through doubt.Instinct growled warnings none of them needed spoken aloud.
Cecilia's lantern faltered; the flame shrank and leaned, as if something had brushed past without leaving trace. The air, once still, seemed to swallow its own breath.
Gundar lowered the hammer from his shoulder.He gripped it with both hands, firm, as if the weapon weighed less than the need to use it.
"A fire," he said, voice deep. "It would keep the beasts away."
Alaric answered without looking at anyone.His rapier slid from its sheath with a brief hiss, unhurried, as if it recognized the moment.
"Or call them."
The metal gleamed for a heartbeat before the fog consumed its light, as if the forest refused to reflect it.
Velkari wrinkled his muzzle; his ears flattened, restless.
"The brat should've stayed put."
"You're the one who sent him," Gundar growled.
Velkari looked away, rough."I needed a break."
Cecilia stared coldly."Your 'break' lasts hours."
The half-orc's pupils sharpened—narrow blades.His back straightened.
"You think I don't know?" he spat, hoarse, each word tugging something inside. "I'm looking for him."
Tension coiled like a spring ready to snap.
Vairon stepped forward; only his raised hand and voice were needed.
"Enough."
Cecilia turned her face aside, fuming in silence.Velkari closed his eyes briefly, chewing rage so he wouldn't spit it.
Meanwhile, Alaric was already kneeling by the tracks.He brushed the compressed mud, reading the earth like a map.
"Not all are the same," he whispered. "Some are deeper."
Gundar frowned."And?"
Alaric looked up, attentive to the mist swirling without wind.
"One stayed to watch."
A branch snapped.
Not loud.Precisely because of that, everyone turned at the same time.
Cecilia's hand trembled, lantern with it; its light fractured into nervous flashes.The fog parted for just a moment, like a frightened eyelid. Enough.
A silhouette stood in the dim.
Large.Too large.
Two yellow eyes floated in the dark.Then two more.And more.
The night breathed.
Vairon felt his heartbeat hammering in his ears, as if his own body tried to warn him before his mind.
"Pack."
The air thickened instantly.
The forest, once humid and alive, became a tomb.
Nothing moved except the slow drip from leaves, each drop falling like a countdown.
Velkari folded in on herself; a feline body under skin trembling with tension.Claws exposed, tail low, sweeping wet earth again and again.
"At the signal."
One wolf stepped from the fog, unhurried, as if it had been there all along.Dark fur, almost oily; its back bristled like a field of thorns.Wide shoulders, too long to be natural.It walked nearly upright, brushing two meters.Its breath vibrated in a continuous, cavernous growl.
Cecilia lifted the lantern, as if fragile light could negotiate.
"By the árkhon…"
Gundar adjusted his grip on the hammer."Still."
The beast did not leap.Did not roar louder.
It simply watched.
Analyzing.
Measuring.
As if it already knew who would die first.
Vairon stepped half a pace forward.Hand open, calm barely held.
"We are not here to hunt."
The wolf tilted its head—curious, or mocking.
Its growl deepened, heavy with a warning that needed no language.
Then something else: rustling leaves, a short pant, too close.
Velkari turned toward the sound.
The shadow arrived before thought.
The first wolf crashed onto Vairon.
The impact was brutal, dry.Vairon jammed his forearm against its neck; even so, the force dragged him several steps, his feet sinking into mud.His muscles tightened so hard they carved his skin while the jaws snapped for flesh.
"Now!" he roared.
Alaric moved without hesitation.
The rapier pierced the wolf's side with surgical precision.Not enough to drop it, but enough to force it to release.
Around them, the other wolves slipped between trunks, surrounding them like a silent tide breathing where nothing should breathe.
Gundar didn't take his eyes off the forest.
"They're waiting their turn."
Velkari bared her fangs; fresh blood traced lines between her fingers.
"Then let them grow tired."
Cecilia set the lantern down with trembling hands.She raised the other, murmuring soft, serrated words belonging to a language that did not sound human.
A blue light burst between her fingers, then spread to her feet, forming a pale ring on the wet earth.
"It will keep them back… for a while."
The glow flickered, almost liquid, spasmodic.
The wolves stopped just behind the line, as if hitting an invisible wall. They didn't approach, but they didn't leave; their growls merged with the wet breathing of the fog.
Vairon looked at Velkari."If we stay, they'll box us in."
Grumblin swallowed."And Eden?"
No one spoke.
Silence fell thicker than the mist.
Cecilia took a deep breath, leaning on the wavering light."If we follow the wind, we'll reach the river. It can't be far."
Velkari nodded; his tense ears revealed a worry his face refused to show.
"We move. No one strays."
They walked slowly, as if the blue ring were a fragile rope guiding them.Wolves followed unseen but present: soft steps, snapping twigs, wet breaths blending with fog.
No one dared speak.
Each had just enough control to keep fear out of the way.
At last, Grumblin broke it.
"Think he's alright?"
"That boy is tougher than he looks," Alaric said. "His hands give him away. Not house hands."
Velkari clicked his tongue."Hope so."
The lantern swayed, throwing shadows that walked backward, reluctant to follow.
Behind them, the fog closed, swallowing their tracks.
Far away, a howl tore through the forest.Long, deep.
A call.A sentence.
Cecilia clenched her jaw."They found us."
Vairon lowered his head, resigned."I know."
Gundar muttered a guttural prayer, more to hold himself together than out of faith.
The woods closed around them again: no wind, no insects, no echo.
Only shared breathing and fear stained with sweat.
The lantern began to die.
Cecilia's blue light faltered; it shrank as if the fog sucked its strength, until finally, it went out.
She gasped."I can't…"
"Good," Vairon said. "We're close."
Velkari sniffed the air, nose twitching."Smoke. Faint… but there."
"Eden's?" Grumblin asked.
They sped up.
Moisture swallowed their steps, as if the forest wanted to keep the sound.
Scattered eyes gleamed between trunks, tracking them with patient hunger.
Suddenly, the fog receded.
A small clearing awaited.
At its center, a weak fire burned, fed with broken branches; the flame danced clumsily, just enough to outline a circle of blackened stones.
And then something spoke.
"You're having fun… right?"
The voice wasn't a voice.
It was a dissonant murmur made of several tones, as if someone had tried to imitate a human without understanding what sound was.
It didn't come from any one place; it slid from everywhere at once, scraping and cutting skin and chest alike.
Their bodies stiffened.
Even the wolves fell silent.