Chapter Seventeen
Shaw Black
“Keep up, shifters,” Zola said. “Come on, we’re almost to the trading post. We need to find a safe place to make camp before night sets in.”
Neera and I shifted into our animal forms, but still, Zola was faster. She leaped from the shadows, keeping a lookout on the route ahead while Neera and I fanned out behind her, taking note of tracks and the scent of humans, hunters, and mages.
The forest changed as we ran deeper into the woods. The trees here seemed older, their trunks wide and dark with moss, roots clutching at the earth like buried claws. I padded beside Neera, our paws and hooves whispering over damp leaves in a familiar rhythm. Above us, jumping in the shadows, Zola was little more than a pale blur, her silhouette glinting through the canopy like a phantom.
But something didn’t feel right.
I slowed, nostrils flaring. The breeze carried hints of smoke and iron. It was unmistakably human, faint but recent.
Neera caught it too. She veered closer, her deer form silent.“You smell that?”she asked.
I gave a low growl in reply.
Zola dropped from a tree ahead, landing in a crouch. Her shadows curled around her before vanishing. “What is it?”
“Humans,” I said, shifting back to two legs, voice low. “A patrol passed through here not long ago. Half a day, maybe less.”
Neera shifted as well, her midnight hair tumbling over her shoulders, eyes bright and wary. “They’re heading southeast,” she said softly. “I can feel the churn in the ground—their boots trampled the fresh moss over here.”
Zola’s mouth tightened. “Then it isn’t safe to rest for the night in the trading post.”
“We could head south,” I said.
Zola looked at me. “Straight to where we know they are instead of where they might be?”
I nodded. “It’s what we came here to do, isn’t it?”
My mate’s gaze sharpened. “Lead the way.”
I turned, muscles rippling as the change took me again—bones morphing, senses alert until the forest came alive in color and sound. Behind me, Neera’s hooves clicked lightly as she followed, with Zola sprinting ahead and jumping to the shadows along the treetops once more.
The scent of humans thickened as we crept closer: smoke, sweat, iron, and oil. But laced through it was something older, colder. A shimmer of power that raised the hair on my arms.
The trees thinned until the forest peeled back to reveal a ridge overlooking a broad clearing. From our vantage, the human stronghold spread below like a wound in theearth. Torches flared along its perimeter, throwing orange light over sharpened stakes, spiked barricades, and rows of tents arranged with methodical precision.
Neera crouched beside me in her deer form, her eyes wide and glinting in the dark.“That’s not just a patrol camp,”she whispered.“That’s a stronghold.”
She was right. Siege carts waited near the far side—massive constructions of oak and iron, their wheels half-buried in mud. Each cart held a battle ram, its head forged like a wolf’s snarl. Above them, half-built towers rose on creaking scaffolds, ready to give archers the high ground.
And then, at the center of their camp were the cursed abominations of the wilt. I swallowed heavily, watching the creatures float across the grounds, black tendrils of mist clinging to them. They hollowed out faces a mask of terror that still sent chills along my spine, even from a distance. My jaw nearly dropped as I watched a group of human soldiers pass by a fallen, giving it a wide berth, as it seemed to drift between the tents.
Neera’s sudden inhale told me she’d seen it too. She was frozen beside me, her eyes wide with shock. I could almost feel the fear bleeding off her, quiet and pure, the kind that comes from realizing the stories were real after all.
A shrill cry rang overhead, followed by the sound of wings, as a harpy swooped over the canopy, landing at the northern line of tents.
Neera flinched.“They shouldn’t be here,”she said, voice trembling.
I tightened my grip on my emotions, forcing down the familiar weight in my chest.“No,”I said.“They shouldn’t. But they are.”
Zola crouched ahead of us. Her breathing was steady despite the flicker of apprehension I could sense through our bond. She turned, eyes sharp with a silent command.
“Stay here,” she signed, then slipped away into the dark. In seconds, she was gone, only a faint shimmer in the air where she’d been moments before.
Neera leaned forward. Her gaze was fixed on the camp below.“There, see the carts? Two, maybe three. And those towers, they’re braced for height. They’ll carry at least thirty archers each.”
