Page 39

39

KENDALL

T he wind shifts just before we move out.

It carries a copper and something sharper—like old bones cracking under the weight of something rising.

Callum doesn’t flinch, but I know he smells it too. We're not the only ones here anymore.

The rescue team is small, but solid. Five shifters and three werewolves—all loyal to Callum from the backroom meetings he’s been pulling together for weeks. Reformists. Fighters. Ones who still believe we’ve got a shot at surviving this shit together.

There’s something about seeing them all—shifters with jagged tattoos, werewolves with scarred arms and suspicious eyes—standing side by side that makes my chest tighten.

Hope’s not dead. Not yet. They also don’t know I’m Bolvi. Not officially. But I see the looks. The sideways glances. The subtle scent tests in the air when I walk past. They don’t say anything, but I’m not stupid.

They feel it.

I’m trying not to let it shake me. I’m trying to be more than what’s in my blood.

Callum leans in close as we move out. “You good?”

“Define good.”

“You’re not running again, are you?”

I glance at him. “Would you chase me?”

He grins, but there’s no heat behind it. “Every time.”

I nod and turn back to the trail.

Dad’s blood scent is faint now, but the sigils are showing up more often—scratched into trees, burned into stone, even smeared in what might be blood on the side of an abandoned delivery truck we pass by the tracks.

“This is old magic,” one of the wolves mutters. A guy named Ridge, all jaw and nerves. “I thought the Brood didn’t mess with this kind of shit.”

“They don’t,” Callum says. “Not unless they’re desperate.”

We’re all desperate now.

The farther we go, the darker it gets—even though the sun’s still high. The light here feels dimmer. Thinner. Like something’s sucking it out of the air. That’s when it happens.

The first one hits hard.

A flash—sudden and hot, like lightning behind my eyes.

I stumble.

“Kendall?” Callum’s already at my side, grabbing my arm.

“I’m fine,” I lie. “I just?—”

But the second one slams in before I can finish.

I don’t remember stumbling, not really.

One second I’m upright, eyes fixed on the trail, and the next I’m grabbing onto the moss-slick bark of a tree, my knees going weak like someone just unplugged me from the earth.

Everything pulses—like my heart’s beating somewhere outside of my body.

“Kendall?” Callum’s voice cuts through the fog, but I can’t look at him. I can’t even see straight.

Because something else is crowding into my vision. Like a second world overlaying this one.

A long corridor—circular and alive, made of stone that breathes with every step. Roots slither across the ceiling like veins. Carvings twist and move when I try to focus. The walls are whispering in a language I’ve never heard but somehow understand .

And at the end of the corridor is a door.

Bone. Ash. Blood. Etched with my name.

Kendall. It doesn’t shout. It doesn’t beg. It summons .

I gasp, collapsing to one knee.

“Fuck—Kendall!” Callum’s arms are around me before I hit the ground fully.

“Don’t—” I whisper. “Don’t pull me out. It’s showing me something. ”

I hear movement behind us—boots crunching leaves, claws half-drawn.

“What’s happening to her?” Ridge growls.

“She’s not attacked,” Callum says. “She’s channeling. ”

“Channeling what?”

“I don’t know,” he snaps.

I press a palm to the dirt. The ground feels warm. Almost like it’s breathing.

“She’s shaking,” one of the younger shifters mutters. “Is she seizing?”

“No,” I whisper. “I’m seeing. ”

I finally lift my face to them. My voice is hoarse, my bones feel hollow, but there’s no fear in me anymore.

“There’s something underneath us. Not just tunnels. Not just ruins. Something alive. I’m not sure how I know, I just—” I choke on the next words. “It knows me.”

Silence.

Then Ridge, gruff and uncertain: “You said you have no clan ties. Nothing special.”

“I thought that was true,” I say. “It’s not.”

They shift. I feel the unease ripple through them. I see it in their eyes. They don’t know what I am. Not really. And whatever I’ve become… It’s not all monster.

Callum looks at them, voice steady. “I trust her.”

Ridge exhales through his nose, reluctant as hell. “Yeah. Yeah, alright. Lead the way, glowy girl.”

Another shifter nods. “Better to follow her than die standing still.”

And just like that, we move again.

Not because I gave an order.

But because whatever’s calling from below has already made one thing clear.

It’s not done with me.

It gets worse the deeper we go.

Every few hundred feet, another sigil.

Every few sigils, another flash.

The visions start overlapping—images of a city beneath the city. Tunnels that shouldn’t exist. Voices that speak in dead languages but still make sense in my bones. I don’t tell the others. Not yet. I’m barely holding it together.

But Callum knows.

He keeps close. One step behind me, every time. Just enough to catch me if I fall.

He doesn’t ask. He doesn’t push. He just is. That’s more comfort than I expected.

We reach an old drainage tunnel covered in vines and barbed wire. The entrance is warped, like something clawed its way out of it instead of in.

That’s when I hear it again.

This time, out loud.

Kendall.

Everyone hears it.

Half the team draws weapons.

Ridge growls. “Tell me that was just the wind.”

Callum doesn’t move. His jaw tightens, but he looks at me. Not with panic. With something heavier.

“You recognize it?” he asks.

“I don’t know,” I say. “But I think... it knows me.”

“You think it’s Edmund?”

“No,” I whisper. “I think it’s older. ”

We move in closer.

Every step feels like I’m walking toward something I buried in another life. My hands shake. My pulse won’t slow.

And still, I go.

Because if Dad’s anywhere, he’s here. And if the thing calling my name is part of what I am, it’s time I found out what it wants.