The road out of Valewatch felt different.
When they had arrived, the settlement had felt like a strange, uncertain place— hovering between civilization and ruin, a last, desperate foothold before the land turned dark. Now, leaving it behind, there was more to it. It was a threshold. A barrier, not built to keep people in but to hold something out.
A last, fragile wall against whatever waited beyond.
The land ahead was still green, the trees still standing, the rivers still flowing clear. The soil was not yet poisoned, the air not yet thick with rot. But there was a weight to it now, something pressing against their skin, humming at the edges of what felt normal. As if the further they went, the less the world would remember what it was supposed to be.
No one talked much as they traveled.
The only sounds were the steady rhythm of hooves against dirt, the occasional rustling of leaves in the wind, and the faint clinking of the enchantments they wore.
Merris’s protections felt cold against their skin— thin bracelets woven with iron and dried herbs, small, carved wards strung on leather cords, salves with a bitter, clinging scent rubbed into their pulse points. The old witch had loaded them up with as many possibilities as she could gather, topping them off with a charm— a drop of blood suspended in resin— that each carried. Even Gorgoloth had his tied around his midsection. The smell of them lingered, sharp and unpleasant, like something both alive and dead.
As many as they bore, they were all untested. But they were all they had.
They made camp near a narrow stream, where the last echoes of Valewatch’s presence still clung to the air. The land was quiet, but not empty.
Annemarie drifted toward the western edge of their camp, her hands curled into fists at her sides. The pull was stronger here— a slow, insistent tide tugging at something deep within her. It was not a command, not a call, but an inevitability.
She felt the moment she stepped too close.
The resistance was immediate. Not a physical barrier, not something she could see or touch, but a pressure against her very existence. Like stepping into a place where she was not meant to be.
Brenna’s voice cut through the thickening dark. “Annemarie. You feel that?”
She nodded, her throat dry.
The trees ahead were too still. Their branches didn’t move, even when the wind passed through. Shadows stretched at unnatural angles, bending away from the firelight as if recoiling from its warmth.
Night fell. The fire flickered, its light weak, its reach uncertain.
And then, the whispers began.
At first, they were only impressions— soft shapes of sound just beyond comprehension. Then they grew. Not words, not entirely, but echoes of voices. A phrase half-remembered. A name spoken in the wrong voice. Fragments of memories that didn’t belong to them.
Something was waking.
Melissa gritted her teeth. “Okay, yeah, we’re officially in fuck this territory.”
Brenna hummed in agreement and, with the confidence of someone who had long since given up on conventional problem-solving, picked up the nearest loose object— one of their remaining cabbages— and lobbed it past the perimeter of their camp.
The moment it crossed the unseen threshold, it withered.
Not slowly. Not over minutes or even seconds. It collapsed into itself, rotting from the inside out in the span of a breath. The stink of decay hit them instantly.
No one spoke. No one needed to.
Then Brandon let out a slow exhale. “So that’s what we’re dealing with.”
Brenna studied the remains of the cabbage with a mix of fascination and unease. “That’s not just corruption. That’s rejection.”
Julia’s gaze flickered toward Annemarie. “If Callista made it through... she might not be able to come back.
Annemarie swallowed hard, looking toward the dark.
The trees shifted.
And the whispers drew closer.
The fire wasn’t enough.
It burned brightly, but the light barely reached past the circle of their camp, swallowed by the unnatural dark. The night pressed close, thick and cloying, stretching the shadows in ways that defied logic. The trees no longer seemed fixed in place. Their shapes shifted, elongated, as if adjusting to new positions whenever the group wasn’t looking directly at them.
The whispers hadn’t stopped.
They curled at the edges of hearing, just below comprehension. Not voices, not entirely— fragments of thought, memories stretched too thin. Sometimes, they almost sounded familiar. Sometimes, they used the wrong voices.
“Brandon?” Annemarie’s voice was barely above a whisper, but in the suffocating quiet it cut through like a knife.
Brandon turned, his brows furrowing. “Yeah?”
She shook her head, her grip tightening around the edges of her cloak. “No. I heard—” she cut herself off, pressing her lips together. It wasn’t worth saying.
Because she had heard him. His voice, low and tired, murmuring something just beyond her understanding. But he hadn’t spoken. He was sitting by the fire, staring at the treeline like he was expecting it to blink.
The horses were uneasy. Their ears flickered back and forth, hooves shifting against the dirt. The charms Merris had given them glowed faintly, a pulse of dim light every time the wind stirred.
It wasn’t just the horses that were unsettled.
Melissa had her arms crossed, watching the darkness with barely masked irritation. Julia was sharpening a blade that didn’t really need it, her jaw set tight. Brenna was the only one still openly curious— poking the remains of the cabbage with a long stick, watching the way it sunk further into itself and liquified into something foul.
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“Well,” she said after a long silence. “That’s horrifying.”
“No shit,” Melissa muttered. “You’d think if the universe was going to throw us into a nightmare, it could at least be clear about what it wants from us.”
The fire flickered.
A presence was gathering.
The air shifted, the scent of damp earth giving way to something sickly sweet— like rot buried beneath flowers. Then came the pressure. A slow, insidious weight settling against their skin, as if the night itself was watching them.
Julia stilled, her fingers tightening around her dagger. “Do you feel that?”
“I’d rather not,” Melissa replied.
Annemarie’s breath hitched. The pull was stronger now. Not just a sensation— an imperative. Something was calling her forward, latching onto her bones, her blood.
And something else did not want her to answer.
The resistance slammed into her like a physical force. She gasped, stumbling backward as if she had run into an invisible wall.
Brandon caught her, his hands gripping her shoulders. “Hey— hey, I’ve got you. What’s wrong?”
She tried to focus, tried to find words for the feeling unraveling inside her. “It’s—” her throat tightened. “It’s pushing back.”
Brenna frowned. “Pushing back?”
Annemarie swallowed hard. “Like I don’t belong here. Like I’m not supposed to be here.”
Brandon’s grip tightened slightly. “Is it like last time?”
She shook her head, frustrated. It wasn’t like before. Not entirely. The pull toward the west was still there, a slow and steady drumbeat in her mind— but now there was something else. A weight dragging her back. Holding her in place.
Like something was fighting over her.
The trees creaked. The whispers grew louder. And then— the fire collapsed.
Not out. Not entirely. It didn’t vanish, didn’t die, but it dropped— as if something had sucked the heat from it, leaving only a weak, guttering ember. The darkness surged forward, pressing at the edges of their camp.
And this time, when the whispers spoke, they carried names.
Julia.
She flinched, eyes snapping to the dark. That voice had been her father’s.
Melissa.
A whisper, right against her ear, and she whirled— but nothing was there.
Annemarie.
She stiffened. That voice—
Callista.
It was hers. It was her own voice, calling from the trees. Annemarie’s blood went cold.
The horses reared, suddenly panicked, their shrieks cutting through the night like splintering glass. The group barely had time to react before the shadows moved.
The trees shifted.
And something howled.
The darkness twisted.
At first, it was only the feeling of movement— a distortion at the edges of their vision, the way shadows bent and curled unnaturally. Then came the eyes.
Pale silver, reflecting the fire’s dying light. Unblinking. Watching.
The first shape stepped forward, and the fire flared just enough to reveal it. A wolf— at least, the shape of one. But its body was wrong. Too long in places, its limbs stretched as if the bones beneath were bending to an unnatural will. Its fur wasn’t fur at all, but something shifting and unsubstantial. Like smoke barely held together in the form of a beast.
Its teeth, however— glistening white, too many, too sharp— were very, very real.
The growl it loosed was not a sound made by any living thing. It was the whispering of wind through dead trees, the creak of something breaking just beyond sight.
Then the others emerged. One. Three. Five. A half-circle of shifting, inky shapes surrounding them, low and crouched, waiting.
Brandon drew his sword, stepping instinctively in front of Annemarie. Melissa unslung her bow in the same breath, jaw clenched tight. Brenna, hand already at her satchel, muttered, “Knew I should have prepped something for shadow-born abominations today.”
Julia didn’t wait. With a flick of her wrist, she sent a dagger flying. It caught one of the creatures in the throat— or would have, if the creature had a solid throat to catch. Instead, it rippled around the blade, its body swallowing the steel like mist before reforming, completely unharmed. “Oh shit,” Julia hissed.
The wolves lunged.
The first leapt for Annemarie, teeth snapping inches from her arm before Brandon shoved her out of the way and took the hit instead. He grunted as claws raked across his side, tearing through fabric, but not deep enough to be lethal. He swung wildly with his sword, the silver sheen of it carving through one of the beasts.
The wolf shrieked, its body distorting— but it didn’t die.
Brandon barely had time to process that before another crashed into him, driving him to the ground.
Melissa reacted fast. Her bow loosed with a sharp twang and the arrow struck true— piercing a wolf clean through the chest. For a breath, the beast convulsed, flickering like a flame caught in the wind. Then to her horror, the arrow vanished, swallowed by the darkness, and the wolf barely staggered.
“Are you kidding me?” she snarled.
Brenna, ducking under the swipe of another beast, skidded to a stop near the fire. “Alright, plan B.” She reached into her satchel, fingers curling around a flask of oil. With a practiced motion she hurled it at the nearest wolf. The glass shattered against the creature’s form, drenching it in slick liquid.
Then she grabbed a burning stick from the fire and threw.
The wolf ignited.
It didn’t burn like flesh— it burned like paper, like something not meant to hold form. The creature howled, thrashing as it began to come apart, body peeling away in strips of shadow until it collapsed into nothingness.
“Fire works!” Brenna shouted.
Julia was already moving. She dropped to a knee beside Brandon, who had managed to wrestle his attacker off him. One quick slash of her dagger— a different one this time, a rather expensive blade etched with runes— sliced through the wolf’s leg.
This time, the wound stayed. The wolf recoiled, its shape flickering like a dying candle. “Magic works,” she amended. “Brandon, get up!”
Brandon rolled to his feet, gripping his sword tighter. “Gladly.”
Another wolf lunged for Melissa, but she was ready. Instead of firing another useless arrow, she did something far more reckless— she ducked, grabbed a burning log from the fire, and swung.
The flaming wood caught the wolf in the ribs. It shrieked as its body distorted, fire eating away at the edges of its form until it, too, crumbled into darkness.
Annemarie, panting, stumbled back as the last two wolves circled.
The pull in her chest was unbearable. She could feel the thing that had made these creatures. It didn’t just want to stop them— it wanted them gone. Unmade.
A deep, humming energy built beneath her skin. Her pulse thundered in her ears. And then—
The fire flared brighter. Not from the wood. Not from anything physical.
From her.
A wind whipped through the camp, and the fire bent toward Annemarie— rushing toward her, swirling at her fingertips as if drawn by something ancient and familiar. She barely had time to think before she threw it.
The wave of flame slammed into the remaining wolves, consuming them. Their howls of rage and agony echoed through the clearing before they, too, dissolved into nothingness.
And then, just like that, it was silent.
The wind stilled.
The fire crackled softly, back to its normal, flickering self.
Brandon turned to Annemarie, breathless. “You—” he swallowed. “You threw fire.”
She blinked down at her shaking hands. The warmth of the magic still tingled beneath her skin. “I—” her voice wavered. “I didn’t mean to.”
He stared at her frankly, openly, before opening his arms and pulling her into an embrace. “It was incredible.”
Brenna let out a low whistle, rubbing a soot-streaked hand across her face. “Alright. So next time we face nightmare wolves from hell, we know the rules.” She gestured vaguely. “Fire, magic, and not stabbing them with regular weapons.”
Melissa, still gripping her makeshift flaming club, sighed. “Fantastic. Anyone else wanna call it a night? Gorgoloth is still hunting but I think he’d forgive us.”
Julia wiped soot from her cheek, glancing toward the trees. The darkness was still wrong. The air still felt watched.
She exhaled sharply. “We won this round,” she muttered. “But I don’t think we’re done yet.”
And as the trees shifted ever so slightly, the whispering began again.
