26: The Return Of The Shadow Wolf
734 Words
It started with whispers in the wind.
Soft at first, almost beautiful — a low hum that twined through the trees when the moon was high. Damon thought it was nothing more than the forest shifting back to life after so many years of darkness. Darius knew better.
He could feel it — the same pulse that had once marked the prophecy’s curse. Only this time, it came not from the heavens, but from beneath the earth.
The valley was quiet now. Too quiet.
The wolves patrolled the borders, but there were no rogues, no movement, no scent but pine and rain. Still, every night Darius woke from the same dream — a forest bathed in crimson light, a shadow wolf standing at its center, eyes burning red.
And every time, he heard my voice calling his name.
“Selene.”
He whispered it like a prayer, even when he was awake.
Sometimes, when the wind shifted, I answered.
From the heavens, my voice brushed his thoughts — a faint echo, a pull across the bond that should have been severed. I shouldn’t have spoken, but I couldn’t stop. I felt him slipping further into silence each day, guilt eating away at the part of him that still believed he deserved to live.
And Damon…
He carried the weight of both our worlds.
His days were spent leading, rebuilding, pretending the ache inside him was just exhaustion. His nights were different. When he thought no one saw, he stood beneath the moon and spoke to me — quiet words carried by the wind.
“I know you’re out there,” he would whisper. “I can feel you.”
He was right. My light still touched them both — faint, but there. Yet the more I reached, the weaker the barrier between worlds became.
And something else had begun to reach back.
⸻
That night, the moon turned the color of frost.
Damon was in the council chamber when the fire dimmed. The walls trembled, a low hum spreading through the stones. Every candle went out at once.
Darius entered, eyes glowing faintly silver. “You felt that?”
“Yes,” Damon said. “It’s the same energy from the eclipse.”
“No,” Darius murmured. “It’s colder.”
Before Damon could reply, a whisper slid through the air. Not words, just sound — like breath against their skin. The temperature dropped. Frost crept along the floor.
Then, from the shadows near the door, a shape began to form — not solid, but smoke and memory. A wolf, enormous, its outline flickering, eyes like two dying stars.
Damon’s wolf surged forward inside him, growling. Darius drew his claws, half-shifted. But the shadow only watched, unblinking.
And when it finally spoke, the sound was almost familiar.
“You stole her from me.”
Both brothers froze. The voice wasn’t theirs — and yet it was. It sounded like both of them blended together, twisted by something ancient.
“You tore the balance apart. You thought love could rewrite fate. But every act of light breeds a shadow.”
The form began to ripple, its body splitting, duplicating — until two identical shadow-wolves stood before them, mirror images of Damon and Darius themselves.
“You are your own undoing.”
The creatures lunged — and the brothers’ world dissolved into chaos.
⸻
From above, I saw it all.
The Moon trembled beneath my feet, light flickering like a dying flame. I reached for them — but the Goddess appeared beside me, her expression grave.
“You should not interfere.”
“I can’t just watch!” I shouted. “It’s the curse reborn!”
“No,” she said softly. “It’s not the curse. It’s you.”
Her gaze met mine, steady and sorrowful. “When you refused to choose, you split your soul. That shadow is the part of you that was left behind.”
The air left my lungs. “No…”
“Yes. The darkness that loved them both has found form. The Shadow Wolf is not your enemy, Selene. It is your reflection.”
Below, Damon and Darius fought themselves — one bathed in gold fire, the other in black flame — while I, torn between them, felt the truth settle like ice in my chest.
I had saved them.
But in doing so, I had cursed myself.
- Writer
