The sky bled silver that night.
The full moon rose over Eldenmere, huge and distorted, shining through clouds that refused to move. The entire town lay under its glow, too bright, too silent. The air had weight—like something old was leaning close to listen.
On the rooftop of the old museum, Thane Hollow aimed his field scope at the horizon. The tremors had stopped, but the readings from the dam still made no sense. Magnetic distortions spiked every thirty minutes, perfectly synced with his own heartbeat.
He hadn't told anyone that last part.
He just watched the woods, trying to ignore how the wind kept whispering in patterns that almost sounded like words.
Then, through the lens, he saw it: movement.
Five figures in long black coats walked out of the treeline. They moved like soldiers—precise, wordless, coordinated. Moonlight flashed off silver weapons.
The one leading them—a woman with white hair cut short and a scar across her jaw—stopped in the open field and raised a strange compass-shaped device. Its needle spun wildly before snapping toward the church ruins.
Thane whispered, "You're not locals."
He zoomed in. The group spread out. One knelt, pressing a blade into the ground. A faint blue flare pulsed outward in a perfect circle. It wasn't technology. It was something older.
Then the leader looked up—directly toward him. Their eyes met through the scope. She smiled.
Thane jerked back. When he looked again, they were gone.
---
Aira sat in the passenger seat of the stranger's car, the town shrinking behind them. She hadn't spoken for nearly an hour.
Rain streaked the windshield, illuminated by the soft glow of the dashboard. The radio was dead—no signal, no static. Just silence.
Finally, she said, "Where are we going?"
"Somewhere safe," he replied.
"That's not an answer."
He didn't look at her. "Answers are dangerous right now."
She turned toward him. "You said they'd smell my blood. What does that even mean?"
He exhaled slowly, eyes still on the road. "It means what's waking beneath this town isn't supposed to wake alone. When one bloodline stirs, the others feel it."
"Others?"
"Vampires. Witches. Lycans. Banshees. Things your world stopped believing in."
She laughed once, hollow. "You expect me to believe that?"
He finally looked at her, and his eyes glowed faintly again—gold like molten sunlight. "You already do."
Aira stared back, heart pounding. For a moment, the mark on her wrist glowed in response to his gaze. A wave of dizziness hit her.
He reached out, catching her arm before she fell. His hand was cold—colder than ice—but his touch steadied her.
"The blood remembers," he murmured. "And it remembers me."
---
Back in Eldenmere, the hunters reached the ruins.
The white-haired woman knelt before the shattered altar, brushing away dust to reveal the old seal—runes carved deep into the stone.
"Unbound," she said. Her voice was low, steady. "The cage is cracked."
One of the others stepped forward, a man with iron-gray eyes and a wolfish grin. "Then we're too late."
She looked up at the sky. "No. He's not fully awake. But the scent is spreading. Someone's carrying it."
Her hand closed around the compass. The needle swung northwest, pointing down the road out of town.
She smiled faintly. "Found you."
---
Aira woke to a sudden jolt.
The car had stopped. They were parked in front of an abandoned motel on the outskirts of town—half-swallowed by vines, roof sagging under the weight of rain.
"Stay here," he said, stepping out.
But curiosity got the better of her. She followed him to the lobby, where he pried open a door that led down into a basement.
What she saw below stole her breath.
It wasn't a basement—it was a chamber. The walls were covered in the same runes she'd seen beneath Saint Corvin's. In the center stood a circle of seven mirrors, each glowing faintly.
The stranger moved between them, whispering something in a language she couldn't understand. The air shimmered.
Aira felt a pull toward the nearest mirror. Inside it, she didn't see her reflection. She saw him—the man from the coffin. The same pale hand, the same eyes.
He whispered her name, though she'd never told him.
"Aira…"
The glass rippled. A hand pressed outward.
The stranger spun, grabbed her wrist, and pulled her back just as cracks split the mirror from edge to edge.
"What were you doing?!" she shouted.
"Keeping him from reaching through!"
"Who is he?"
He looked at her, eyes cold and sad. "The first one. The one even angels feared to chain."
---
In the forest beyond Eldenmere, the hunters moved like shadows.
The white-haired woman stopped as the wind shifted. She closed her eyes, breathing deeply. "She's close."
The man beside her chuckled. "The girl or the ghost?"
"Both."
She opened her eyes again, pulling a curved dagger from her belt. "If the Blood of Eternity truly flows in her veins, she's the key to ending him. And if she's not…"
The man smirked. "Then she'll feed the soil."
They vanished into the mist.
---
In the motel chamber, the stranger stood before the fractured mirror, his reflection now splintered into a dozen faces—each one older, darker, wearing crowns of bone and flame.
He whispered, almost to himself, "He's already reaching through the cracks."
Aira wrapped her arms around herself. "You said he's waking because of me. Why? I didn't do anything."
"You bled in the chamber," he said softly. "Blood calls to its origin."
She blinked. "My blood isn't… his, right?"
He didn't answer. And that silence said more than words could.
Aira's pulse quickened. "You said I have to leave, but they'll follow, won't they? Whoever those hunters are."
He turned toward her. "They're called the Sanctum Order. They've been killing his descendants for centuries. You're the first to survive the awakening mark."
"So I'm supposed to just… run?"
He smiled faintly. "For now."
"Then what about you? Why help me?"
He paused for a long moment before saying, "Because I swore once to protect your bloodline. And because… if they find you first, he will rise unchallenged."
The mirrors flickered again. One showed the hunters approaching through the fog.
Aira stepped closer. "They're coming."
He drew a blade from beneath his coat—black metal etched with golden runes. "Then let them."
---
Outside, the moon hung unnaturally low.
The wind howled through the trees, carrying the scent of iron and smoke.
In the distance, the first howl of a werewolf split the silence—long, mournful, and too human to be an animal.
The stranger looked up. "The balance is breaking already."
Aira gripped her bag tighter. "What happens now?"
He looked at her, eyes like dying suns. "Now, the world begins to remember what it tried to forget."
And as the first of the hunters stepped into the motel parking lot, the moon above Eldenmere turned blood-red.