Malachai's POV.
Fifteen years ago.
The sky had been a deep, blameless blue. Birds sang overhead, and the wind whispered gently through the trees like a lullaby. I was only twelve. My biggest worry being how to sneak extra marshmallows into my pack without my mother noticing. My father walked ahead with his usual commanding stride, my mother beside him, laughing at something that my little sister had said.
And then - the forest changed.
The air turned wrong. The birds stopped singing. The wind went still. I felt it first - a crawling dread that skittered up my spine like insects. My father stopped. His eyes scanned the trees.
"What is it?" My mother had asked.
That's when it came.
A blur of gray and red exploded from the treeline. One moment, my father was standing. The next, he was
