I scanned the woods, muscles coiled, ready to run. The colorful leaves sparkled with rime beneath the pale sunlight, fleeting beauty in a world that didn’t allow for stillness. Not here. Not now.
I’d been tracking Madoc for a week, his trail growing colder with each step. I hadn’t expected him and my father to separate when I’d tried to follow. Madoc had been easier to track, but all signs of him had vanished near the fortress of Cairn Hold in Pendara. Now I was too close to the border, too exposed, and too alone. No sign of him. No sign he’d return this way.
Maybe it was time to stop waiting.
Maybe it’s time to give up.
The thought came unbidden, shame curling in its wake. My food stores had dwindled, and though I could hunt, water was harder to find this far out. I needed to move—to get closer to Viori territory, where I’d be safer. Where this hunter might think twice before stalking me.
But if I moved, I might miss Madoc.
The forest went still again, the unnatural hush pressing in. The hunter was close enough that I could almost hear its breath.
The frost crunched softly underfoot, and I winced. No sound escaped this oppressive quiet, not with something lurking so near.
I wasn’t easy prey. It would learn that soon enough.
Mid-step, I froze, the hair on the back of my neck prickling.
Crouched ahead in the frost-covered undergrowth—a man.
I gripped my dagger’s hilt, instinctively dropping into a defensive stance. His broad shoulders hunched, his attention fixed on something in the distance. The remnants of a tattered shirt clung to his muscular frame, stained dark with blood. Dirt streaked his arms, but the faint gleam of a tattoo beneath a sheathed sword on his back caught the light—crimson and black winding down the back of his neck, the unmistakable symbol of Pendara.
Curpiss.
I couldn’t see the full mark, but I knew its shape.
Father bore it too.
A Sealed Pendaran soldier. What in the gods’ name is he doing here?
The thought barely formed before he moved.
He surged to his feet in a blur of motion, turned, and then barreled toward me. I stumbled back, lifting my dagger, but before I could react, his arms were around me, his momentum slamming us both to the ground.
The impact drove the breath from my lungs. His forearms cushioned the worst of the fall, but his weight crushed me, pinning my dagger uselessly at my side. I thrashed, snarling, but his strength was overwhelming, his grip unyielding.
“Get off of me!” I hissed, twisting against him.
His hand clamped my mouth—large, rough, callused at the ridges where his fingers met his palm, the kind that had seen years of training. The arm around my torso held me taut. A sheen of coarse blond hair, streaked with blood and mud, covered his hardened, well-muscled forearm.
His deep voice was low, urgent.
“Keep still,” he said, the command sharp and clipped. “If you want to live.”
My pulse thundered in my ears, but his words gave me pause. I stilled, my senses sharpening. That’s when I heard it—the low, guttural growl that sent ice down my spine.
He pointed and I followed his gaze.
What in Nyxva?
An enormous wolf-like creature emerged from the shadows, its hulking form blending with the forest as though made of darkness itself.
A vuk.
Silver eyes gleaming, fangs bared, globs of saliva dripping from its maw. A ridge of sharp spines jutted along its back like a dragon, rising with each step, but thick black fur had concealed it against the tree line. The air thickened around it, oppressive and cold.
The man’s grip tightened. “Don’t move.”
