“Something’s coming.”
A scream rips the silence open like a knife.
Guttural.Panicked.Real.
We move fast.
Through the gates.
Past the broken fountain.
Up the creaking mansion steps—and that’s when I see him.
A boy.Sixteen at most.
Floating inches above the cracked lawn.
Pale skin.Veins glowing with black light.His eyes rolled white.
Ghostlight twists down from shattered second-story windows, snaking into his chest like cursed IVs.
And behind him?
Crypt.Arnold.The ghost.The revenant.
Wreathed in black mist, flickering like static.Somehow freed.
“Oh my god,” I breathe.“He’s using the kid—feeding on him.”
“Possessing him,” Owen growls, teeth lengthening.His voice is no longer fully human.
Delilah skids up, breathless.“That’s Albie Rourke.Grandma was a Crypt.Illegitimate line.Never claimed—but enough blood to make him the perfect host.”
I step forward instinctively.
“We have to pull him out?—”
Owen grabs my arm.Claws out.Fur blooming along his forearm.
“No.It’s too dangerous.”
“He’s a child, Owen!”I shout.“I’m not leaving him!”
But then—Crypt sees me.
He turns his flickering gaze right on me.
Albie’s body convulses.Blood drips from his nose.His spine arches back at an impossible angle as more tendrils lash into his chest.
“I feel her,” Crypt hisses, voice layered like overlapping screams.“The anchor.The girl who sees.”
A scream tears from my throat, psychic power flaring.
And that’s when Owen snaps.
He doesn’t shift into just a Wolf.
He becomes somethingmore.
