Chapter 29. The Seer’s Warning

The forest had no path this far out. Just shadow. And smoke.

The trees here were older than memory—trunks thick as tombstones, bark twisted and swollen into knots like ancient fists. Some bore black stains that ran down their sides in greasy streaks: the old scars of lightning and fire. Their branches clawed the sky, weaving the canopy into a cage. The undergrowth was so dense, every step Neriah took had to be careful and deliberate, her bare feet sinking into a carpet of sodden leaves and moss.

The air was heavy, choked with the scent of decay and something sharper—ash and copper. No birds sang. No wind moved. Only silence, broken by the faintest hum beneath her skin, a tremor just below the surface, guiding her forward.

Neriah moved as if in a dream. Her limbs felt hollow, shot through with nerves. The panic from the clearing still jittered inside her bones, an aftershock that wouldn’t let go. The kiss still lived behind her lips—soft and sudden, Caius’s mouth o