ATASHA’S POV
55 vouchers
I tightened my grip on the dagger I took from Jack, the familiar weight grounding me even as the tension built with every passing second.
Pressed against the cold, damp boulder, I slowly shifted my gaze to the children. They were huddled close together beneath the overhang, backs ttened against the moss–covered stone, faces drawn and pale.
Despite the fear in their eyes, none of them made a sound. Not a whimper. Not a breath too loud. Survival had aged them overnight.
Aries and Rico, the Alpha blooded child, crouched closest to the boulder’s edge. Both had des in their hands, stolen during the chaos. They were small, curved daggers not meant for children, but they held them with a steady grip.
Rico’s face was smeared with mud and streaked with dried blood, but it was the sharp focus in his
eyes that unsettled me. He was just a boy, barely taller than my shoulder, and was, ready to fight, ready to kill if he had to.
yet here he
I heard it again, the subtle rustling of undergrowth shifting beneath boots, the soft crunch of damp leaves under careful, deliberate steps. The sounds werefaint, but unmistakable. Someone–or several–were nearby.
Earlier, this people disapeared but it looked like they immediately came back.
There were voices too, not loud or careless, but hushed and almost rhythmic, weaving through the trees like a current of wind that didn’t belong. They weren’t calling out or shoutingmands. They weren’t in a hurry.
They weren’t chasing. They were waiting.
Listening.
And watching.
There was no panic in their movement, no fumbling through the brush or reckless stumbling. I could hear the distinct snaps of small branches beneath slow. Whoever was out there wasn’t trying to avoid detection because they didn’t need to. They were confident. And that was more terrifying than if they’d charged directly at us.
They were clearly taking positions. But what I couldn’t figure out was whether they were trying <i>to </i>surround us or waiting for someone else to arrive. A part of me believed they hadn’t discovered our exact location yet. But that could change at any moment. We were running out
of time.
:
<b>80 </b>
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I strained to make out the words, but they were too soft. Not the careless banter of mercenaries or raiders. These whispers were soft and coded, maybe even signed. It hit me then. These people might be wolves trained in covert operations. Assassins. Or worse, the elite
trackers.
My heart thundered against my chest as I thought of the Nightfall pack.
This ce isn’t that far away from their border. Was it possible that… that they were able to track us overnight? Did they know about the fire? Was it possible that my father knew it was Cassian and I who saved the kids?
The thought made my stomach tighten.
No. That’s not it. I was almost certain that the fire would spread outside of the cave and straight into the pack house and mansion. He wouldn’t have the time to chase after me.
I let out a soft sigh, not letting my guard down. Apparently, I had been unconscious for one or two hours, enough time for the storm to lighten.
Enough time for these people to creep closer. The children told me they’d heard the rustling shortly after I passed out. Aries had wanted to wake me immediately, but the others insisted on letting me rest. They knew I was still too weak after dragging Cassian from the fire and miasma. They had waited, hoping the danger would pass. But instead, the voices multiplied.
The threat hadn’t moved on.
It had grown.
I looked toward Cassian. His body was still motionless, buried beneath a loose covering of leaves, ferns, and wet soil. We had smeared mud on his skin to mask his scent, mud thick with ash from the earlier fire. It was a gamble, a desperate attempt to trick the heightened senses of any werewolf out there. But it was the best we had.
Earlier, I’d tried to heal him. My hand had rested against his chest, ready to repair broken tissue, mend internal bleeding, or force his heart back into rhythm. But I’d found… nothing. No ruptures. No injuries. No magical bacsh. Nothing that exined why he wouldn’t wake.
He looked like he was sleeping.
But I knew better.
He was unconscious, and not naturally so. Something had taken hold of him, something deeper. And I feared what it would mean if I couldn’t wake him soon.
Just like Cassian, the children had all rubbed mud along their arms, faces, and even hair.
Some used leaves to cover their scent. Aries had done the same.
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Now, his eyes flicked toward me. His jaw clenched. Before he mouthed. “Someone’sing.”
My entire body went still.
I turned my head slowly, just in time to catch a flicker of movement, a shadow slipping between the trees. There were no footsteps, no voices this time. Just an unsettling silence pressing in from all sides.
But I felt it. We all felt it.
Something–or someone–had found us.
And it wasn’t alone.
A branch cracked.
“Aha! Found you!”
Every muscle in my body seized. I turned, instinctively shielding the children with my body as a figure pushed through the foliage.
It was a man, though calling him that felt generous. He looked more like something pulled from a nightmare. His teeth were ckened, jagged like broken ss. His lips peeled back in a twisted grin that didn’t reach his eyes, eyes that were pale and clouded like spoiled milk. Long, matted hair clung to his face and shoulders, soaked from the rain and streaked with dirt and what looked like dried blood. His skin was grayish and torn in ces, like he’d wed at
himself.
His gazended on Rico first.
“No wonder<i>,</i>” the man rasped as the smile on his lips widened. “Alpha Blood. Someone with Alpha Blood is actually here! Hahaha we got lucky!”
I gripped my dagger, stepping forward before he could move another inch.
But I didn’t get the chance to strike. A blur of motion swept past me, so fast it barely registered.
And then-
sh.
A sickening sound tore through the clearing. Blood sprayed across my face.
The man let out a startled gurgle. His head twisted, severed from his neck.
:
His body dropped with a wet thud. The children gasped, frozen in ce.
And standing exactly where the man had been a second ago was Cassian.
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His bare chest rose and fell with slow, deep breaths. His face was soaked with rain and mud and blood that was clearly not his own. His right hand hung low, still gripping the severed head by the hair, blood dripping down his forearm and sshing into the mud at his feet.
His eyes were open now. They burned with an unnatural red glow, piercing through the dim light like fire slicing through fog.
His starended on me first, but it wasn’t the look of a man checking if his consort was safe. It was something else entirely. Something darker. For a breath, I saw it, something feral, monstrous, slithering just beneath his skin.
The Cassian I hade to know, was still there, but buried beneath something colder. Hungrier.
His lips curled upward into a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. It was cruel, controlled, and full of quiet malice. It reminded me of a smile like a predator who’d just walked into the trap it had designed.
“Wrong.” A deep voice rumbled out from him.
With a sickening squelch, he dropped the severed head to the ground, letting it roll to a stop in front of the stunned children like a grotesque warning.
“I wasn’t the one being hunted,” he said, stepping forward, the blood on his hands still dripping in steady rhythm. “I was hunting.”
Then he turned toward the shadows in the trees, toward the whispering monsters that thought they could stalk us in silence.
“And I just… found my lovely little prey.”
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