46: The Shadow In The Woods
By dawn, the storm had passed — but it left behind silence. A silence too deep for morning. The air smelled of wet earth and pine, but beneath it lingered something faintly metallic — the unmistakable tang of blood. Damon was the first to reach the clearing. Two scouts knelt near a shallow stream, their faces pale and tense. One of them looked up as the Beta approached, his voice trembling. “Alpha Damon, you should see this.” Damon’s boots sank into the mud as he stepped closer — then froze. The body lay half-submerged in the water. Or what was left of it. The man’s chest had been carved open, the mark of a crescent moon burned into the flesh. The same mark that once glowed on Darius’s skin. Damon knelt, jaw tightening. “Who was he?” “Patrol guard from the eastern border,” one
- Writer
