I follow him into main passage. Wolves clearing breakfast halt, studying us: Alpha wrapped in resolve, oracle armored in crystal. A she-wolf pup approaches, eyes huge. She extends small ribbon of braided grass.
“For safe,” she whispers.
I kneel, tie ribbon around wrist just above crystal vein. “Safe received. Thank you.”
Her tail wags, then she retreats to older wolves. Pack tension thaws, replaced by tentative hope riding fresh snow scent that drifts from entry shaft.
Kylan leads me up spiral ramp carved through rock, torches receding. Daylight spills from mouth and we emerge into courtyard rimmed by pallisade walls. Sun crests eastern ridge, painting peaks blush. Breath feathers air.
Rowan waits with two scouts—those I met before—both whole. The injured cousin sports bound ribs but stands tall. They bow. Rowan hands Kylan a parchment map with new markings, then me a small sachet. “Powder ground from moonwort and ironbark. Smear over lattice when pain spikes. Slows weave.”
“Your healer is swift.”
“Pain in pack slows everyone. We innovate.” He clasps forearm in traditional farewell. I mirror gesture; his grip is firm, accepting.
Gate creaks open. Beyond, the ridge glitters under sunlight. Pockets of shimmer still warp horizon, but less menacing.My compass needle, secured at waist, twitches then aims true toward shrine.
Kylan shifts partially—irises burning gold, nails lengthening into talons ready for snow scramble. “Step where I step,” he rumbles.
I smile despite fear. “Time to bind futures.”
We stride into morning, wolves howling encouragement behind. Snow crunches, sunlight gleams, and somewhere ahead, carved into frost-veiled cliffs, the dragon shrine holds secrets large enough to mend or break worlds.
For the first dawn in many, I feel less like a dying star and more like a blade tempered for one final, precise strike.
6
KYLAN
Moonrise paints every ice ridge silver, yet no light touches the gash of trail we follow. The path corkscrews through granite spires and corniced snowfields, a place born from winters that never thaw. Wind slices low across the slope, combing fresh drifts into knife-edged dunes. In that wind I taste iron and star-ash—Carmilla’s magic weaving small currents around her like wary birds.
She walks three paces behind, keeping to the prints I leave. The new harness I crafted sits snug across her shoulders, leather straps cradling pack weight so the crystal lattice on her chest hangs free of pressure. Even so, every other breath catches—quiet, controlled, but I hear it.
We left the den at midday to exploit the ridge’s calm window, then pressed forward as daylight bled away. Now the world has settled into the blue hush between dusk and true night. We’ll reach the cliff that marks the last solid ground before the shrine’s ascent within the hour. If the oracle falters, that’s where we decide whether to push or camp.
Snow crunches under our boots, rhythm steady, until her voice threads through air. “Ley pulse quickens. Something ahead stirs.”
I grunt acknowledgment, sliding my senses out. The stone underfoot vibrates, not steady hum, but flaring pulses—two, pause, two, pause. Predator heartbeat.
“Keep your hand near your sigils,” I say without looking back.
“My hand is there.” Tone calm, almost amused. She has nerve; respect coils tighter in my chest.
Minutes later the ridge narrows to a beam six wolves wide. To the right, a ravine plummets so far no moonlight reaches its bottom; a living darkness pulses there, hungry. The left rises into a wall of wind-blasted stone. A perfect place for an ambush—one direction to fall, the other to smash.
I slow near the brink where snow gives way to bare rock. Carmilla halts beside me, breaths drifting like spun glass. A thin fissure glows beneath the cliff lip—ley vein exposed by seismic warping. Its rhythmic light matches the pulse pattern we felt, brightening and dimming.
“This is the boundary,” I say, voice kept low to avoid echoes. “Past this point I know the ground, but ley currents bite harder. I lead; you match pace, no sprinting ahead to catch visions.”
She studies the glowing fault, then me. “Agreed. In return, we stop once tonight so I can quiet the shard.” She nods to the pouch at my belt where the obsidian keeps its infernal warmth. “If we let it feed on grief much longer, it may call worse than shadows.”
“Location must be defensible.” My eyes scan the rock wall—ledges, angles, lines of advance. “And ward-stone radius.”
“I can anchor runes into ice. Ten minutes.” She lifts her gloved hand, sparks fluttering around fingertips, tasting the air like moths.
“Ten, no more.” I step forward, boots grinding grit. She follows.
The trail tilts upward, hugging the cliff. In places, wind has scoured the snow to reveal black stone streaked with veins of deep blue quartz. Our breath plumes white. I let senses drift again—earth-scent of old basalt, clean ozone, and something faintly metallic. Blood? No, molten ore. My shoulders tense.
