Elara's POV
I stared at my phone, my hands shaking so hard I almost dropped it.
Stay away from Thornwood Manor, little girl. Or what happened to your parents will happen to you.
The threatening voice echoed in my head. My heart hammered against my ribs like it wanted to escape.
Someone knocked on my door again.
I jumped, nearly screaming. Was it the person who just called? Were they outside right now?
"Miss Thornwood?" Thomas Greyson's calm voice came through the door. "Are you alright? I heard something fall."
Right. The lawyer. He was still here.
I looked at the folder he'd given me, still clutched in my other hand. Inside were pictures of Thornwood Manor—my childhood home that shouldn't exist anymore.
The knocking came again, harder this time.
I wiped my eyes and opened the door. Thomas stood there, his gray eyebrows pulled together with worry.
"What's wrong?" he asked. "You look terrified."
"Someone just called me," I whispered. "They told me to stay away from the manor. They said—" My voice broke. "They said what happened to my parents would happen to me."
Thomas's face went pale. He pushed past me into my apartment and locked the door behind him.
"Did you tell anyone I came here?" he demanded.
"No! I don't even know what's happening!"
He pulled out his phone and made a call. "We have a problem. They know she's been contacted." He paused, listening. "Yes, immediately. We can't wait."
He hung up and turned to me. His expression was deadly serious.
"Miss Thornwood, we need to leave. Now."
"What? I'm not going anywhere until you explain what's going on!"
"There's no time—"
Glass shattered. My apartment window exploded inward. I screamed as something dark and twisted crawled through the broken glass. It looked like smoke, but smoke didn't have glowing red eyes or sharp teeth made of shadow.
"Get behind me!" Thomas shouted.
He pulled something from his jacket—a small silver coin that glowed bright blue. He threw it at the creature. When the coin hit the shadow-thing, it shrieked and dissolved into black mist.
But more were coming. Three more shadow creatures squeezed through my broken window, hissing and clicking.
"The back door!" Thomas grabbed my arm. "Run!"
We bolted through my tiny apartment. I snatched my backpack from the couch as we passed. Thomas threw another glowing coin behind us. I heard the creatures screech.
We crashed through the back door and down the stairs. Thomas's fancy black car sat in the alley, engine already running. A woman in a dark suit sat in the driver's seat.
"Get in!" she yelled.
I dove into the back seat. Thomas jumped in beside me. The car roared forward before he even closed his door.
"What were those things?" I gasped, looking back. The shadow creatures poured out of my apartment building, but they stopped at the edge of the property. They couldn't follow us.
"Shade wraiths," Thomas said grimly. "Minor demons. Someone sent them to scare you—or worse."
"Demons? This is insane!"
"Your parents died protecting you from exactly this kind of attack," the driver said. She had a sharp voice and cold eyes in the rearview mirror. "I'm Margaret Chen. I work with Thomas. And you need to listen very carefully, Miss Thornwood, because your life depends on it."
My head spun. Demons. Magic. My parents. Nothing made sense.
"Why is this happening?" I asked. "I'm nobody. I work at a café. I'm broke. I don't have anything anyone would want!"
"You have everything someone wants," Thomas said quietly. He opened the folder and pulled out a document. "Thornwood Manor isn't just a house. It's a gateway. For centuries, your family has guarded a barrier between our world and another realm—a place full of magic and dangerous creatures. That barrier is weakening. Without a Thornwood guardian, it will break completely."
"That's impossible."
"You saw those creatures," Margaret said. "Still think it's impossible?"
I couldn't argue with that.
Thomas handed me the document. It was covered in old-fashioned writing and strange symbols. At the bottom was my mother's signature.
"Your mother made preparations before she died," he explained. "She knew someone might try to kill you to break the guardian line. So she hid the manor. Made it look destroyed. She sent you away to keep you safe until you were old enough to inherit."
"Twenty-seven," I whispered. "That's today. My birthday."
"Exactly. The moment you turned twenty-seven, the manor's protection spell lifted. It appeared again. And everyone who wants its power knows you exist now."
The car sped through London's dark streets. Rain started falling, making everything look blurry and wrong.
"So what am I supposed to do?" I asked.
"Go to the manor," Thomas said. "Accept your inheritance. Learn to use your power. If you don't, the barrier will collapse, and things far worse than shade wraiths will flood into our world."
"And if I do accept it?"
"Then you become the guardian. You protect both worlds. And you gain access to magic that's been in your bloodline for a thousand years."
Magic. Me. It sounded like a fairy tale. But those creatures had been real. The terror in Thomas's eyes was real.
"There's something else," Margaret said from the front seat. Her voice was tight. "Someone in your family wants you dead. Someone close."
"What? I don't have any family left. Just my aunt, and she's in France—"
"You have a cousin," Thomas interrupted. "Adrian Thornwood. Your father's nephew. He believes the inheritance should be his. And he's been working with very dark forces to make sure he gets it."
My stomach dropped. "Adrian? But I haven't seen him since I was a kid. He sent me a Christmas card last year!"
"He's been watching you," Margaret said. "Waiting. And now that you've inherited, he's making his move."
The car turned onto a highway heading north. Toward Yorkshire. Toward the manor.
"We're taking you there tonight," Thomas said. "It's the only place you'll be safe."
"Safe?" I laughed, but it came out too high and scared. "You just told me people want to kill me!"
"The manor has protections. And—" Thomas hesitated. "There's someone there who can help you. Someone who's been waiting a long time for your return."
Before I could ask what he meant, Margaret cursed.
"We've got company."
I looked out the back window. Three black cars were gaining on us, driving impossibly fast. The rain around them seemed to bend wrong, like reality itself was breaking.
"They found us quicker than expected," Thomas muttered. He pulled out more of those glowing coins. "Margaret, lose them."
"I'm trying!"
Our car accelerated. The speedometer climbed past ninety, then a hundred. But the black cars kept gaining.
Then I saw something that made my blood freeze.
In the lead car's passenger seat sat a young man. Even from this distance, even through the rain, I recognized him.
Marcus. My ex-fiancé. The man who'd stolen my money and destroyed my life.
He smiled at me through the window. His eyes glowed the same red as the shadow creatures.
"That's not possible," I breathed. "Marcus is in Barcelona. He's human. He's—"
"He was never human," Thomas said grimly. "He was planted in your life. Someone sent him to keep you weak, broke, and broken. To make sure you'd never claim your inheritance."
The black cars pulled alongside us. I saw Adrian in the second car. My cousin. The last real family I had.
He raised his hand. Lightning crackled between his fingers.
"Hold on!" Margaret screamed.
Adrian's lightning hit our car. We spun wildly. Metal shrieked. The world turned upside down.
We crashed through a guardrail. For one endless moment, we flew through the air.
Then we hit water.
The car sank fast. Water poured in through broken windows. It was freezing and black and rising fast.
"Out! Everyone out!" Thomas shoved me toward a broken window.
I struggled through. The current grabbed me, pulling me under. I couldn't see anything. Couldn't breathe. My lungs burned.
Strong hands grabbed me. Pulled me up. I broke the surface, gasping.
"I've got you." A voice I didn't recognize. Deep and urgent and somehow familiar.
Someone dragged me to the shore. I collapsed on muddy ground, coughing up river water.
Through blurry eyes, I saw Thomas and Margaret stumble out of the water. They were alive.
But standing over me was someone else.
A young man with dark hair and storm-gray eyes. He wore old-fashioned clothes—a white shirt and black pants that looked like they came from a different century.
He was the most beautiful person I'd ever seen.
And I knew him.
"Cassian?" I whispered. "But you're dead. You died ten years ago."
He knelt beside me, his hand gentle on my face.
"No, Elara," he said softly. "I've been waiting for you."
Then his eyes shifted to look past me. His expression changed to something dark and deadly.
"They're coming," he said. "And this time, they're bringing an army."