The sun was setting over Silver Creek, painting the sky in shades of orange and red that reflected across the quiet streets of the town. Sigvar growled in my mind, his instincts on edge as we ran toward Hil’s house. Mara was at my side in human form, her wound along her flank still closing, a silvery shimmer spreading across her ebony skin that reminded me far too much of Eva. The Bloodhowl forest was behind us, the attack on Mara’s residence left in fire and blood. Gunthar—or whoever was truly behind it—had interrupted the ceremony, but in the pandemonium we had escaped. Now my only priority was Hil. Get her out of here, her and her parents, and disappear forever. Far from Bloodhowl, from Mara, from everything.
We reached the street where Hil lived, the house she had rented, a place that
