Nothing. No trace. No lingering essence. It’s like he was never here.
But I know better.
Those silver eyes tell me exactly where he’s from. And more importantly? I have no doubt that he knew who I was.
Otherwise, he wouldn’t have run.
Word of the prophecy is already spreading, and so will my presence.
They can talk all they want, run back to their masters with whispers of the hybrid Hollowborn and her alpha protector. It doesn’t matter to me.
I might have walked away from my pack and the council, abandoning their politics and their thrones, but my mark? It’s been burned into this world.
And I welcome anyone foolish enough to test me.
I prowl back toward the manor, staying in wolf form now, my senses sharp and rage humming through every step.
This won’t be the last.
They’ll come again. Stronger. Smarter. More desperate.
Let them.
If they don’t run like this one, their blood will be mine.
That’s a promise I know I’ll keep.
Because I’m not leaving NightShade. Not until Rowan’s safe.
Not even if she asks me to.
Not even if I have to find a way to kill Iris Prescott, once and for all.
Chapter 7
ROWAN
Darkness wraps around me like a weighted blanket with a grudge, and the first thing I register—besides the pounding in my skull—is the deep ache in every single one of my muscles. I groan, wincing at the sound of my own voice, and try to piece together the scraps of last night’s dreams. Well, nightmares are more like it.
At least I hope they were.
With the last one, I’d been running through the forest, moonlight slicing through the branches above, silver and cold on my skin. Wolves at my back, teeth snapping, claws tearing into the earth, and preparing to rip me to shreds.
Yet, I wasn’t afraid.
I was faster than them, stronger even. My lungs burned, but in that satisfying, runner’s-high kind of way.
The freakier part? I wasn’t alone, and the one running beside me wasn’t who I would have everexpected. That detail still has me rattled enough that my first thought upon waking is to reach for my ferret.
“Archie?” My hands fumble across the mattress, patting at the sheets before reaching for the light, but a sudden realization slams into me.
“I’m right here, Ro,” an accented voice says, closer than I anticipated.
Oh, hell.
Or, as Iris would say—shifter shits.
Not everything I’m remembering was, in fact, a dream.
