Chapter Six: Return to the Manor
1006 Words
Dorian stood at the edge of the forest, the fog swirling around his feet like a living thing. The moon hovered low and heavy in the sky, casting silver shadows across the broken path leading up to the ruins. Evelyn stood beside him, heart pounding, trying to match his stillness, his quiet resolve.
The manor loomed ahead—black stone against a backdrop of bare trees. Half-burnt walls, shattered windows, vines creeping up through the cracks like time itself trying to bury what had happened here. Evelyn had seen it before, but never like this. Not with him.
“Is this where it happened?” Dorian asked, his voice barely above a whisper.
Evelyn nodded. “The fire. The m******e. Everything started here.”
He stepped forward slowly. The earth seemed to shift beneath his feet as if recognizing its heir had returned. The very air grew thicker, charged with something ancient. It was no longer just a ruin—it was a memory preserved in stone and ash.
As they entered the remains of the great hall, the smell of char lingered, even after all these years. The beams above were blackened, half-collapsed, and the floor was a minefield of broken tile and rotting wood. Yet Dorian moved like he had walked these steps a thousand times. As if the house remembered him too.
“This was the throne room,” he said suddenly.
Evelyn turned to him. “You remember?”
“Not with my mind,” he said, his hand brushing the edge of a fallen pillar. “But with something deeper. My blood. My bones.”
Evelyn took a slow breath. “What else do you feel?”
Dorian closed his eyes. “Pain. Screams. Someone carried me. A woman. She was bleeding. She hid me beneath the stairs… then there was fire. I heard a voice call my name. Then… nothing.”
He opened his eyes. They shimmered faintly, like moonlight on water.
“That woman was probably your mother,” Evelyn said softly.
He nodded. “She died here.”
A gust of wind blew through the ruins, sending ash into the air. It danced around them, then settled like snow.
Dorian turned toward a cracked mirror hanging lopsided on the wall. For a long time, he stared at his reflection—at the long hair, the sharp jaw, the eyes that didn’t quite belong to any man.
“I don’t look like a prince,” he murmured.
“You don’t look like anyone,” Evelyn replied. “That’s what makes you dangerous. That’s why they fear you.”
“Who are ‘they’?” he asked.
“The ones who ended your bloodline,” she said. “The ones who still hunt you. The prophecy threatens them.”
Dorian stepped closer. “Then I need to know what it says. The full prophecy.”
Evelyn hesitated. “I haven’t finished translating it yet. Some of the pages are coded. But there’s one line that keeps repeating.”
“What is it?”
She met his gaze. “When the child of fang and fire returns, the crown of shadows shall rise again.”
Dorian’s jaw clenched. “The crown of shadows.”
“I think it means you,” Evelyn whispered.
Silence settled over them like a heavy blanket. Dorian turned back toward the center of the room, the fog creeping in behind him. A sharp breeze fluttered the edges of Evelyn’s coat. Then the wind shifted. And they heard it.
Footsteps.
Not theirs.
Evelyn reached into her bag instinctively, fingers brushing the leather-bound pages of the prophecy. Dorian stepped forward, posture tense, eyes glowing faintly.
From the shadows of the corridor, a figure emerged.
It wasn’t a wolf. It wasn’t entirely human either.
He was tall, gaunt, with skin like stone and eyes the color of pitch. His clothes were dark, ceremonial—reminiscent of the old court but corrupted, twisted. He stared at Dorian like he was seeing a ghost.
“So,” the man said slowly. “The prince lives.”
Dorian said nothing.
The stranger’s lips curled into a cold smile. “The forest protected you too well. But you’ve made a mistake returning here. The bloodline was meant to die.”
“Who are you?” Evelyn demanded.
The man didn’t even glance at her. His focus remained on Dorian. “A servant of balance. One of many. We were tasked with ensuring the prophecy never unfolds. You should have stayed hidden, wolf boy.”
Dorian stepped forward, calm but dangerous. “You were part of the massacre.”
The man nodded once. “And proud of it. We ended a curse before it could rise. Or so we thought.”
Dorian’s voice deepened. “You failed.”
A strange tension filled the room. The stranger took one step closer—but the ground trembled.
Literally trembled.
The vines along the walls moved. The broken floor cracked. The forest had heard Dorian’s voice—and it answered.
The stranger narrowed his eyes. “You’ve awakened it.”
“I didn’t,” Dorian said. “It never slept.”
In one sudden, sharp motion, the man drew something from his coat—a blade, black and humming with power. Evelyn backed away instinctively.
But Dorian didn’t flinch. His hands remained at his sides, his eyes locked with the man’s.
“You can’t kill what was born from the forest,” he said quietly.
The stranger lunged.
Evelyn cried out—
But Dorian moved first.
Faster than a man. Faster than a wolf. In a blur of motion, he caught the blade mid-air. The metal sizzled in his hand, but he didn’t drop it. Instead, he twisted, and the stranger was on the floor before Evelyn could even blink.
The forest howled around them.
Dorian stood over the fallen man, his eyes glowing brighter now, silver streaked with fire.
“I remember now,” he whispered.
The prince had returned.
And he would not run again.
- Writer
