I dropped. The wind above my head exploded in a shriek. Frost sliced the air where I’d been standing, leaving a scar of shimmering ice on the nearest trunk.
Fenrir lunged, snapping at the blur. His jaws closed on mist; the thing dissolved into vapor and reformed further off, eyes like shards of moonlight.
“Run!” Kaelith shouted again, this time grabbing my arm. The contact burned—heat through layers of cold. We ran.
Branches shattered as the wraiths followed, voices like frozen glass breaking in chorus. The snow turned to light beneath their touch, each step leaving holes that smoked with frost. Kaelith’s sword left trails of silver flame as he swung, each strike slowing them but never stopping them. I could feel their hunger, sharp and endless, like a pull on my bones.
“Why are they after me?” I gasped.
“They sense change,” he said, slicing another down. “And fear it.”
The forest opened suddenly into a glade. The air here shimmered with faint gold—the same shade that had glowed beneath my mirror. The Dreamstone’s magic. It pulsed faintly through the snow, answering me.
I stopped. “Kaelith—”
“Keep moving!”
“I can’t. Look.”
The snow beneath my boots glowed brighter, rings of light spreading outward. Kaelith’s expression shifted from fury to disbelief.
The Frostwraiths recoiled at the light, their forms unraveling into mist before vanishing entirely. Silence dropped hard, like a curtain falling.
The only sound left was our breathing.
“What did I just do?” I whispered.
Kaelith didn’t answer. He stepped forward slowly, eyes on the light fading beneath me. “You woke it again,” he said finally. “The Dreamstone. It’s calling to you.”
His voice wasn’t warm, but something inside it cracked. He sheathed his sword, though his hands trembled slightly. “We need to keep moving before Torrin’s men catch our trail.”
“And the wraiths?”
“They’ll return. They always do.”
We started moving again, slower this time. The crimson aurora had dimmed, but the light it left behind clung to the snow, turning the Frostwood’s shadows strange.
Kaelith walked ahead now, every sense sharpened. I could see it in the set of his shoulders, the way his hand hovered near his sword hilt. The air between us felt thinner, stretched by all the things we hadn’t said.
When he finally spoke, his voice was low. “They were waiting for us.”
“The wraiths?”
He shook his head. “Torrin’s men. The wraiths were drawn to their fear.”
I frowned. “Then why not strike when we left the Hold?”
“Because this wasn’t a hunt,” he said. “It was a herding.”
A shiver ran down my spine. “Herding us where?”
He didn’t answer immediately. His gaze flicked upward to the glow shifting through the branches. “Somewhere I’d rather not go.”
The trees began to change ahead of us—no longer silver but black, their bark gleaming like obsidian glass. The air smelled faintly of iron and wildflowers. It was wrong. Winter shouldn’t smell like that.
“Kaelith,” I whispered. “What is this?”
He drew in a sharp breath. “Summer’s border.”
