"What dies in silence can rise in screams."
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Dawn never came.
The sky remained dim, as though the sun was too afraid to rise over the forest soaked in Oldblood blood. The trees whispered warnings in their rustling leaves, but Selene wasn't listening anymore. Not to them. Not to the fear. She walked at the front of the trail now, cloak soaked, hair matted with dried blood, her blade sheathed but her power close beneath her skin like lightning just beneath the clouds.
Behind her, Kai moved like a silent shadow, the predator with a promise, his eyes never leaving her. Riven followed with blades sharp and quiet, watching the rear. Every now and then, she looked at Selene like she didn't fully understand what she was walking beside anymore.
And Selene didn't blame her.
Neither did she.
They'd traveled west through the Witherwoods, chasing the lead from the Oldblood's last words. The howl had been heard. The ancient ones were waking. Selene could feel it—each step drawing her closer to something vast and terrible. Something inside her.
"We're close," Kai said at her side.
She looked over. "You feel it too?"
He nodded. "It's in the ground. The pull. Like gravity. But twisted."
"Like death," Riven muttered.
They reached the edge of a blackened clearing—no trees, just scorched earth. A circle burned into the world itself. The scent of sulfur hung heavy, mixing with the stench of rotting fur and forgotten bone. Skulls littered the edges like a warning. Selene stepped into it without hesitation.
A heartbeat passed.
Then two.
The air changed.
The shadows deepened.
And then… she heard them.
Whispers.
Soft at first, then louder—howls not of wolves, but of souls.
The ground beneath her feet trembled. The soil cracked. A low groan echoed through the earth like something ancient waking from a long, angry sleep.
Then they rose.
Six figures. Wrapped in bone and blood. Wolf-like, but not. More phantom than flesh. More memory than beast. Their eyes were black. Their mouths split with fangs that had not tasted life in centuries.
Selene didn't move.
Kai shifted into half-form beside her. "Spirits."
"No," Riven corrected, blades raised. "They're worse."
The creatures circled them. One of them stepped forward, towering over Selene, its voice hollow and layered, as if a thousand dead spoke at once.
> "Moonborn... Blood-called... Do you seek your throne?"
Selene's throat dried.
She didn't speak.
"Answer it," Kai said, voice taut.
"I don't want a throne," she replied, steady. "I want to kill the ones who burned my family. Who hunt my name. I want revenge."
The creature growled. The circle of ghosts stepped closer.
"Then you must take the blood oath," it hissed. "You must become what you were buried to forget."
The air thickened. Riven took a step back. "This feels like a trap."
"No," Selene said. "It feels like a door."
She stepped forward.
The creature extended a claw. "Bleed. Speak. Bind."
Selene didn't hesitate. She raised her palm, sliced it across with her dagger, and let the blood drip into the blackened soil.
> "I am Selene of no pack. I howl not for mercy, but for war. I do not kneel. I do not beg. I rise."
The earth drank her blood.
The sky cracked open.
A howl—long, violent, eternal—erupted through the clearing.
The six figures screamed and burned into ash, devoured by the vow she had just made.
And Selene?
She did not fall.
She stood taller.
Kai stared at her, jaw clenched. "What did you just do?"
Riven whispered, "You bound yourself to the dead."
Selene turned, and for the first time, her eyes shimmered—not silver, not gold—crimson.
"I made sure they don't rise against me," she said, voice lower, rougher. "They rise with me."
Far in the distance, horns sounded—harsh and metallic.
Selene turned toward the sound.
The Ravenscourge were coming.
This time, in force.
With leaders. With armies. With the blood debt of the three dead packs owed to them.
She didn't flinch.
She smiled.
"Let's welcome them."