SELENE’S POV
I knew something was wrong the moment we crossed the tree line.
The land changed first not abruptly, but subtly, like a breath held too long. The air grew thinner, sharper, stripped of the steady hum of order I had grown used to in Dante’s territory. There was no boundary marker carved into stone. No sentries hidden in the shadows. No wards humming beneath the soil. Just forest that looked untouched and wrong in its emptiness. There was just no way that this was it…there had to me..more.
Lucas walked ahead of me with easy confidence, as if the absence of structure was not a warning but a feature. He seemed at ease and this indicated this was the ‘structure’ that he was used to. This is what he knew and treasured and it was what I had picked.
“This is it,” he said over his
