Whatever was coming wasn’t chaos for chaos’s sake. It had shape, direction, and intent. We just needed to find out what was going on before the Priestess interfered.
And as much as I wanted to believe we’d earned a pause after ending the Hunger Path, Stonewick had never worked that way.
The Silver Wolf met my eyes, her expression solemn but steady.
“You needed to know,” she said. “All of it.”
“I’m glad you told me,” I replied. “Even if I don’t like what it means.”
Lady Limora smiled faintly. “Welcome to leadership, dear.”
I sighed. “I was hoping it came with better timing.”
The Academy lights brightened again, as if amused.
Around us, the vampires murmured more quietly now, their restlessness shifting into something more focused. The clans, somewhere beyond the Wards, were listening and waiting….for what, we didn’t know.
And standing there between my parents, the Silver Wolf, and a centuries-old vampire matriarch, I understood one thing with absolute clarity.
Whatever had replaced the Hunger Path wasn’t finished forming.
And Stonewick was once again standing right at the center of it.
Twobble arrived upside down.
That was the first clue that whatever news he carried was either extremely important or only moderately important but delivered with maximum theatrical flair. He tumbled out of the corridor vent feet-first, landed in a crouch, popped back up, and brushed soot off his vest like this was a perfectly normal way to enter a room.
Skonk followed at a much more reasonable pace, ducking through the opening with his usual solid inevitability, buthis expression already suggested he’d had quite enough of Twobble’s antics for one evening.
“We bring tidings,” Twobble announced grandly.
Skonk sighed. “Information.”
“Tidbits,” Twobble corrected. “Possibly relevant ones.”
I folded my arms and raised an eyebrow. “From where?”
“The UnderSoot,” Twobble said, then gestured vaguely downward. “And the UnderLoom. And one very disgruntled tunnel auntie who hasn’t been wrong since the Great Root Collapse.”
Skonk nodded once. “It’s not confirmed. But it’s consistent.”
That got my attention.
“All right,” I said. “Talk to me.”
Twobble hopped onto a nearby bench, legs swinging. “So. Orcs.”
“Yes,” I said patiently. “The large, burly, greenish problem currently marching north.”
“Hey now,” Twobble said. “Green is a range.”
Skonk shot him a look.
“Right,” Twobble continued. “Anyway. Turns out, they didn’t just wake up one day and decide to go sightseeing. Something’s wrong back home.”
My chest tightened. “Wrong how?”
“That’s the tricky part,” Skonk said. “No one’s been able to get close enough to see directly. Orc lands aren’t exactly welcoming to outsiders, especially not now.”
