Page 11

Chapter

Eleven

I roll over and bump into something, the restricted movement waking me.

My father is like a boulder, taking up half the tent between Harek and me.

I don’t know what Einar’s so worried about.

Harek and I aren’t very affectionate. We toe the line between friends and something more, neither wanting to ruin our lifelong companionship while imagining how good a relationship could be.

It could be better than good. It could be amazing.

It could also ruin a bond I treasure beyond measure. The last thing I want is to mess up what we have with romance.

Einar mumbles something before sitting. Hopefully, he goes back to sleep because that’s what I want to do. After talking with Serel last night, it took me forever to fall asleep. I tossed and turned, going over the conversation at least a hundred times.

Both of my bloodlines are in danger and pose threats. My father and I will be forced to fight to the death if we don’t find a loophole for the hunter’s curse. Harek’s parents and my siblings are also at risk from the “something” Serel warned us about.

I still can’t believe my brother already triggered his werewolf.

That’s not true. I can believe it. Leif has always been temperamental, and he is Gunnar’s son.

More than any of my siblings, he adores his father, and of all of them, he’s the most likely to have killed someone.

But it doesn’t make it any easier. No matter what, he’s my younger brother, and I hate the vengeance- and violence-filled path he’s chosen.

While there isn’t anything I can do for him, I can still work to protect my siblings and Harek’s parents. Not to mention the pack members we don’t know but are, in a way I don’t fully understand, extended family.

Einar speaks, pulling me from my thoughts and back to the tent. “We have to eat then set off. Finding a mysterious something that hunts your pack isn’t going to be an easy task.”

I force myself to sit, exhaustion tugging at me. Tonight I need to sleep more and think less. On the other side of my father, Harek pulls his blanket over his face.

Einar pulls it from his grasp. “We don’t have time to waste. There’s still the hunter curse to deal with in addition to this new quest.”

We go our separate ways to hunt for a filling meal. Unsurprisingly, Harek is the first to catch something. As archers, his parents taught him to use a bow as soon as he could walk.

After feeding ourselves and the dragons, we take off on foot. Sapphire and Vash stay close behind, as if they sense danger. Einar and I both check our palms, but they don’t light, so we must be far from any evil fae.

I’m not sure if that’s good or bad. Part of me wants to rip apart the ones behind all of this.

It seems like it all has to be connected.

My parents meeting and having me couldn’t have been an accident.

Not when things appear to have been working toward a boiling point that meets at the intersection of…

me. The first huntress, the werewolf who can shift at any time, and the keeper of secrets.

If only I could decipher what the etched message on the sword means. It’s hiding something, but I don’t know what. Yet another thing to keep me up at night when I need rest.

The forest around us changes. It begins subtly—a hush deeper than silence, a breeze that carries no sound. Then the trees shift, their bark darkening to silver-veined obsidian. Moss blooms in luminous blue, and petals the size of my palm drift from unseen branches, landing without sound.

It’s beautiful.

It sends a chill down my spine.

Sapphire and Vash both growl low behind us. Even they sense it.

The woods open ahead to a glade—circular, untouched, and impossibly bright. Sunlight pours down in tense beams, catching on suspended pollen that glows like gold. A small spring trickles in the center, its water clear.

At the heart of it all stands a tall and imposing man who reminds me of the nobles of the fae council in the city.

He doesn’t look much older than Harek and me, but he gives off an energy of someone much older.

His robes shimmer with hues that change as he shifts, turning green one moment, midnight the next.

His skin is dusky bronze, his eyes a stormy jade that flicker faintly, like bioluminescence caught beneath ice.

Unmoving, he simply waits.

My father puts out his hands, indicating for Harek and me to stay where we are. “Who are you?”

A slow smile creeps across the stranger’s face. “Lysandros.” He turns to me. “You’re Eira. Daughter of the Secret Keeper. And more importantly, the blood-bound huntress.”

My hand tightens on the hilt of my sword, and it flares beneath my fingers. Golden light pulses along the etchings, yet my palm remains unchanged.

Harek steps closer to me, protective.

Einar draws beside me, wary, ready. “How do you know her, Lysandros?”

“I’ve been waiting. Searching. Studying the ancient tomes. Everything is coming together as predicted so long ago.”

His words make my skin crawl.

“Why?” my father demands.

Lysandros doesn’t acknowledge the question. He makes no effort to hide his interest, staring at me with an intensity I don’t know what to do with.

Harek steps slightly in front of me. “How do you know so much about her? Or think you do?”

He gives Harek an almost bored glance. “Who are you?”

Harek’s muscles tense. “We should be asking you the same question.”

“I already told you. I’m Lysandros.” He glances over at me. “She can call me Lys. You two can’t.”

An angry grunt escapes from Harek. “Who are you?”

“Her ally. Reluctantly yours too, as you’re on her side.”

Harek takes a step toward him, his face flushing with anger.

I yank him back. “Stop.”

Lysandros smirks at Harek. “You’d be wise to listen to your girl.”

Einar steps in front of both of us. “What do you know about Eira?”

“I already told you.”

“You haven’t told us anything. If you’ve been studying her in ancient tomes, you’re leaving out a lot of important details. Spill them.” My father whips out his sword in one quick motion, pointing it at the noble fae.

He doesn’t so much as flinch. In fact, he appears annoyingly amused. Then he turns to face me, his expression not mocking, but rather expectant. “It begins.”

My grip tightens around the hilt, and the sword’s glow fades. “Stop talking in riddles.”

“I’d hoped it would recognize me.” His voice is as smooth as still water. “But it seems you’ve claimed it completely.”

“What are you talking about?” I step closer to him, but my father puts a firm hand on my shoulder. I shirk away from his grip.

Lysandros tilts his head. “Tyra did love her secrets.”

I hesitate. “You knew her?”

“I watched her. There’s a difference. She never let anyone close.” He turns his attention toward Einar. “Or did she? Things changed when she met that horrific human.”

My father growls, bristles. “She left for good reason.”

Lysandros offers a faint, sharp smile. “Of course she did. The curse doesn’t like the company of another curse. You two never could’ve been together, could you?”

My pulse quickens. “You called me blood-bound. What does that mean? Bound by the curses that both my parents gave to me?”

He walks a slow arc through the glade, hands behind his back. “It means you’re tied to a choice older than your bloodlines. Older than the courts, older than war.”

“I’m not interested in your riddles.”

“And yet the riddles seem interested in you.”

I glare at him. “If you know something about the curse, then say it. That’s why you’re here, isn’t it?”

He stops in front of the spring, and his reflection dances like it doesn’t quite belong.

“You’re not cursed, Eira. Not exactly. You’re the lock that was meant to keep the curse contained. Your birth was the final seal. And now…” He looks up, meeting my eyes. “…the key is waking.”

The hairs on my arms rise.

Harek appears at my side, his face even redder now. “What does that mean? She told you to stop talking in riddles!”

Lysandros ignores him. “Courtsview stirs. They now call the once gleaming city a dead and broken city. Its darkness recognizes you, and it’s calling you.”

It takes me a moment to recall the fae city I heard about when Harek and I arrived in Mirendel. The place people whispered had fallen to shambles because of the hunter—my father—weakening because of me coming into my powers.

“What do we do?” My voice is barely audible.

Lysandros glances between Einar and me. “You have to try something no one ever has.” He nods toward Einar. “Fight together, not against each other to the death.”

Einar’s jaw tenses. “You’re playing with prophecy like it’s a game board.”

“I’m not playing. I’m surviving. Just like you.”

“You said we should fight together,” I cut in. “Why?”

He steps away from the spring, circling slowly. “Because when the hunter line was first born, it wasn’t a curse. It was a pact. A binding of two bloods—one to guard the realm, the other to walk in shadow and root out the rot.”

Einar frowns. “There’s no record of that. You’re making it up.”

“No.” Lysandros shakes his head. “Because the first time the pact broke, it broke hard with a betrayal and a stolen heir. The wolf claimed the blade, and the magic unraveled. The blood was never meant to inherit the power. It was meant to share it.”

I go still. “A wolf was involved in the hunter curse?”

He turns to me, expression unreadable. “You’re not just the echo of your parents’ power, Eira. You’re its convergence. The curse has tried to split you between wolf or hunter, but your body refuses. You’re both. If the curses are to break—you’re the answer.”

The wind brushes through the glade like a whisper.

“Two bloods will rise,” Lysandros says, “but one must lead.”

“And if they don’t?” Harek asks.

Lysandros ignores him and keeps his focus on me. He lifts a hand and gestures east, past the glade’s edge. “To the broken city of Courtsview. Once radiant, now devoured from within, a wound that never healed.”

A tug pulls in my chest, deep and cold. Recognition without understanding. Something stirs, something familiar. “What’s your part, Lysandros?”

“I told you to call me Lys.”

Again, Harek tenses next to me.

“Fine,” I say. “ Lys , what’s your part?”

“I’m here to help you. This is bigger than you—both of you.” He quickly glances at my father. “It remembers the line that once kept its hunger in check. But the hunter’s weakening has awakened something in its depths. And it’s hungry for the lost crown.”

I stare at him. “The what?”

He smiles, almost gently. “It’s not your strength that Courtsview fears, mighty huntress.”

The light shifts. His form blurs, then he simply disappears.

The silence he leaves behind is heavier than his presence. For a moment, none of us moves. The light in the glade dims slightly, as if the magic is exhaling now that its guest is gone.

Near the spring, in the patch of wild grass where Lys stood, rests a glowing rune etched faintly into the ground. A fragment of the hunter’s crest, but reversed. Mirrored.

Like a reflection of something I haven’t yet become.

Einar crouches beside it, his brow furrowed. “I’ve never seen this variation. Not even in the ancient books.”

I draw in a deep breath. “He wanted us to find this. It’s a message.”

Harek kneels as well. “I think it’s a challenge.”

My fingers tighten around the hilt at my side. The sword pulses once. “He thinks we can stop the curse by working together. That if we don’t, Courtsview will be more than a warning, it’ll be a grave.”

Einar straightens, silent.

“This points toward the loophole,” I continue. “It fits with my idea that if we fight together, we can beat it.”

His eyes search mine—hardened, wary, uncertain. But not closed. At last, he nods. “Then we’ll try.”

The trees sway softly as we step back from the rune. The glade lets us go without resistance, but I feel its memory cling to my skin.

As we pass into the trees, the sword pulses again in my grip.

Not as a warning, but as recognition.