The pine canopy deepened until the sky was no more than a thin green haze above them. The air was colder here, the damp pressing in as if the forest itself wanted them gone.
Kael kept them moving in a tight column — him in front, Elara in the middle with the boy, Halric guarding the rear. The moss underfoot was thick, muffling sound, but it also made the forest feel eerily still.
Too still, the abyss murmured. It waits.
Kael ignored it, but his grip on the sword tightened. Every shadow seemed to stretch longer than it should.
The first sign came in the form of trees.
Not broken — bent. Massive trunks bowed inward, their tops snapped and hanging like torn limbs. The wood was stripped bare in places, gouged deep by something with claws the size of Kael's forearm.
Halric muttered, "Big one."
"Big doesn't cover it," Kael said.
The boy's voice was barely a whisper. "She's here, isn't she?"
Kael didn't answer.
They crossed another stream, the water running red-brown from soil churned upstream. Kael crouched, dipped his fingers in — it was warm. Not naturally warm.
"She passed here recently," he said.
They pushed deeper. The ground rose into a ridge, the slope littered with bones — deer, boar, bear, all gnawed clean. Some were fresh enough to glisten.
Elara's hand brushed his arm. She pointed ahead.
A clearing lay beyond the ridge, the moss stripped to bare earth. In the center was a massive depression, as if something huge had lain there.
Before they could move closer, a sound rolled over them — low at first, then building into a deep, rumbling growl that made the ground tremble.
Kael motioned them back into cover, but it was too late.
The mother came.
She stepped from the far treeline with the slow, deliberate grace of something that feared nothing. Her scales were black as wet stone, glinting faintly where the weak light touched them. Smoke coiled from her nostrils, the scent of char and blood thickening the air.
Her head swung slowly, nostrils flaring. Then she froze — facing them.
Kael knew she couldn't see them in the shadows. But she could smell them.
The abyss surged in his veins, urging him forward. Strike first. Make her bleed.
Halric whispered, "We can't take her here."
He was right. The trees would trap them as surely as they'd trap her. If her fire caught, there would be nowhere to run.
Kael motioned them back, step by careful step. The mother's head followed the sound.
Then she moved.
It was not a charge — it was worse. She advanced slowly, each step deliberate, as though she already knew they couldn't escape. Her claws sank deep into the earth, tail swaying like a pendulum.
The boy clung to Elara, trembling.
Kael's mind raced. Open ground — they needed open ground. Somewhere she couldn't pin them in. He scanned the ridge behind them and spotted it: a break in the trees leading to a stony outcrop.
"Go," he mouthed.
They moved as one. Halric kept between the mother and the group, shield raised, never turning his back.
The growl deepened into a rumble that vibrated in Kael's bones.
Then fire came.
It wasn't a torrent — just a narrow blast, but it cut through the pines like a blade, igniting moss and bark in an instant. The air filled with smoke and the sharp crack of splitting wood.
They broke onto the outcrop, the stone slick with moss. Kael turned, sword ready. The mother followed, her massive body forcing the trees apart as she came into the open.
Here, there was no cover. Only stone, sky, and the predator that filled both.
Kael planted his feet. The abyss was in full roar now, black heat flooding his limbs, sharpening the world into knife edges.
Yes, it whispered. Now we feed.
The mother's head lowered, smoke curling from her jaws.
And Kael stepped forward to meet her.