Chapter 177

Richard

The wind burned sharper the farther north we rode. Smoke still hung over the trees like a bruise, and the dirt under our boots had the pale, crumbled look of ash long settled into the earth. We were days past the ballroom now, hours past the last confirmed sighting, and I couldn’t stop replaying the moment I saw her disappear, how fast it had all gone wrong, how the sound of that warped bell stayed lodged behind my teeth.

Nathan rode half a pace behind me, silent and watchful. He didn’t ask where we were headed anymore. He knew I didn’t have a solid answer. I only knew the direction the bond pulled me in, though even that was beginning to feel uncertain. It wasn’t broken or blocked, but dulled, like trying to hear through a locked door. And sometimes it was worse, like someone else had found the string and tied knots I couldn’t see.

The first village had been abandoned, eerily quiet, with everything overturned but not stolen. The second held bodies, slumped against scorched walls and still in their uniforms.

We buried what we could, most were wolves, scattered between collapsed beams and crumbling doorways. Their eyes had been left open, not out of haste but intention. Whoever did this wanted us to look back.

At the third outpost, a soot-covered boy said he’d seen a cage drawn by beasts that didn’t bleed. They came just before sunset, he told us, and vanished before full dark.

A woman screamed, but the sound was swallowed by the trees. When I asked where they went, he pointed east. When I asked if he was certain, he only said, “No one lies after a fire.”

We followed the trail anyway. It left the known roads and twisted through the trees until even the air felt different. Dusk had barely settled when we found the patrol.

Seven wolves lay in uniform, their bodies whole, their throats slit with surgical precision. There wasn’t a single claw mark or sign of struggle. Vampire sigils had been painted in their blood across the trees, but the strokes were too clean and too evenly spaced. Whoever did this wanted a message left, and they wanted the wolves to see it and respond.

Nathan crouched beside one of the corpses, his jaw locked tight.

“This is staged,” he said. “They’re trying to bait us.”

“They want chaos,” I muttered. “It doesn’t matter who lights the match, as long as it burns.”

He studied me. “You haven’t slept in nearly two days.”

“I’ll sleep after we find her.”

“And if we don’t?”

I didn’t answer. I walked away.

We made camp near the shell of a collapsed stone wall. Moss climbed over the edges, and vines tangled where doors used to be. I tried to sit but couldn’t. The firewood Nathan stacked never caught right, and I couldn’t stop pacing. My hands kept checking my belt, my pockets, and my weapons, anything to stay in motion.

My vision blurred if I stood still too long. Old breaks in my shoulder ached. I hadn’t eaten in over a day, and the idea of swallowing anything made me sick. There were moments I blinked and forgot where I was, caught between flashes of ballroom lights, a red dress, and the taste of blood that wasn’t mine.

The stranger came just after nightfall.

He didn’t make a sound. One moment the trees were empty, and the next, he was standing just beyond the firelight. Wiry and pale, he wore layers that looked more ceremonial than practical. His hair hung like dried bark, and his eyes no longer seemed capable of reflecting light. He left no scent and no trail. He was a vampire, but not recently fed.

“You’re the king,” he said, voice flat.

I didn’t lower my stance. “Who are you?”

“Eldric. Scholar. I came because she’s slipping too fast for you to follow.”

My fists clenched. “You want to try saying that again in a way that doesn’t make me put you through a tree?”

“I’ve read the stones she’s being walked across. They’re not just physical places, they’re ancient vampire sanctums used for blood rites and mental conditioning. They carry memory echoes from every ritual performed on them, and when someone like her walks over them, especially in a weakened state, those impressions don’t just linger, they invade. She’s being walked through them to destabilize her, to replace her memories and instincts with someone else’s. I’ve seen it done before. That bond between you two doesn’t burn anymore, it stutters and delays because they’re redirecting it. They’re not just blocking her, they’re rewriting her.”

“She’s alive.”

“She’s being rewritten.”

I stepped closer. “If you know how to stop it, say so.”

“They’ve taken her to a place thick with memory. A ritual site, old and psychic, designed to override the mind. They’ll drown her in memories that were never hers until she forgets which ones were. That’s the Correction Rite. You think you’re dreaming, and then you stop remembering that you ever woke up.”

I swallowed hard. “I’ve been trying to reach her.”

“And you keep feeling something, don’t you? But it’s off, familiar but not right.”

Nathan approached, eyes narrowed. “We’re supposed to take that as truth?”

Eldric shrugged. “No. You can take it as a warning. I came alone. If I were lying, you’d be dead already or sedated.”

He had a point. No scent trail, no backup. Either he was alone, or he was really good. Either way, he was all we had.

We moved at first light.

Eldric pointed out markers I never would’ve noticed: scratches in bark that weren’t random, stones arranged in symbols, and knots in the branches that mirrored glyphs he muttered like prayers. He didn’t always translate. Sometimes he just said, “Not hers,” or “They’re pushing the timeline.” Once, he laughed under his breath and said, “She’s adapting faster than they planned.”

He talked about a convergence, an ancient prophecy of a bridge between bloodlines, someone who would rewrite the terms that bound our races. He never said Amelia’s name. He didn’t have to.

They weren’t just holding her. They were rebuilding her into something else.

That night, we made camp higher in the ridges. The sky pressed close, and the air cut sharp. Nathan pulled me aside.

“You’re coming apart,” he said.

“She’s alive.”

“You keep saying that like it’s enough.”

“I don’t have the luxury of falling apart yet.”

“You’re past the edge already.”

“Then I’ll keep moving without a goddamn edge.”

Nathan didn’t respond. He just handed me a blanket. I didn’t use it.

I stood by the fire, my hand tight around the grip of my blade and my eyes locked on the tree line.

Then I heard it. Not a sound exactly, but a pull, a curl of breath that shaped itself into my name.

Richard.

My wolf’s hackles lifted. The bond snapped tight in my chest.

It’s not her.

I stepped forward anyway.

“Richard.”

Again, the voice was nearer and steadier.

The bond flared like a blade in my ribs. I staggered as heat spread through my chest, sharp and wrong. I bit the inside of my cheek hard enough to taste blood.

I shut my eyes. My pulse roared.

“I’m coming,” I whispered. “Wait for me.”

There was no answer, just wind.

But the bond stayed. It was hurt and warped, but still hers.

I didn’t sleep.

Tomorrow, we would move again, no matter what stood in our way. I didn’t care if we walked into fire. I would burn everything to get her back.