Page 84 of Unveil

My heartbeat stutters.

“What?” I ask, breathless, looking around with new eyes.

Fog crawls heavily through the meadow, and dark stones reach from the ground like skeletal fingers. My pulse slows, my machete going slack at my side, suddenly too heavy to hold.

“Shame it’s all overgrown,” she continues, not realizing my vision is tunneling and I’ve gone still. “I hate seeing them go without care. It’s sad, you know?”

“I… I know where we are,” I whisper.

“Oh really? Where? That means we’re close to some kind of civilization, right?” she asks lightly in that stream-of-consciousness way again, brushing off more moss that’s collected for six years. “Wow, the stone is even blackened. Like there was a?—”

“Fire,” I finish softly, staring blankly at the charred tree trunk, crumbled to ash and no longer blocking the fence’s only outlet. “It burned… everything.”

Her hand freezes over the headstone, where she was tracing the last name I already know is there. The energy that’s ridden her all morning goes calm. Her gaze rises, cautious now.

“Orion,” she whispers. “How did you know there was a fire here?”

I stare at the stone my family has avoided for six years.

“Because this is where my momma died.”

Ididn’t realize how loud the wilderness was until it went completely silent.

Late-season cicadas buzzed in waves, the wind rustled dying green and gold leaves, and rain was still pitter-pattering onto rocks and pine needles.

But that all stops at the edge of this graveyard, nature itself going quiet, paying its respects to death, the ultimate predator.

The surname FURY is etched into the gravestone as clear as day, but moss is embedded in the first name, and I can’t bring myself to peel it back. I’m afraid to after what he just said.

“It’s not her,” Orion answers my unspoken question. “My aunt is buried there. Flora Fury. My dad’s sister. We were visiting her grave that day.” Grief grates his voice like gravel, so raw it hurts my throat.

“Flora Fury,” he repeats, his voice unwavering. “Names are important around here. Say them aloud and they live on forever.”

“Flora Fury,” I echo softly.

Deep pain slashes across his face, replaced by rage and sorrow that carve his features and etch into his bones, dragging his shoulders down.

“The graveyard at Whitby Rose Chapel is neutral ground. Always has been. Wildes and Furys buried our dead here for generations, even before the feud began. The only place kept sacred.” His jaw tightens before he spits, “But it became her pyre.”

He shudders, then steadies, chin raised and machete fisted at his side. “We scattered most of Momma’s ashes on Fury land, so she could be close to King. The rest,” he gestures to his aunt’s grave, “we left here beside her best friend.”

He scans the abandoned graveyard, shaking his head. “I guess no one’s come back since.”

I bite my tongue to keep my racing thoughts from flying free, waiting, listening.

“It was supposed to be a normal visit. Like always. Just in case…” He chokes like he’s drowning in a memory. “I was supposed to be the lookout.”

My breath hitches.

Orion, no…

“At seventeen, I was old enough to protect us. But Dash was hanging with me while I learned the new crossbow she’d given me for my birthday. I was distracted.”

His scarred hands curl tighter at his sides. In his next ragged breath, I can almost feel the moment everything went wrong.

“We heard glass shatter. Then a scream.” His voice breaks. “She and Hatch were attacked.”

“A mom and her child?” My chest strangles the words out. “Why?”