They should never have left her alone.
The ashes of the pyre were still warm when the first c***k appeared.
At dawn, the sacred grounds were empty no guards, no priests, no mourners lingering in defiance of protocol. Only a single set of footprints remained in the blackened earth, leading straight into the forest.
Ivy’s.
By nightfall, the forest began to die.
Leaves curled into ash while still clinging to branches. Streams thickened into dark, unmoving glass. Animals fled in frantic waves, howling, screeching, trampling one another in blind terror. Even the oldest wolves refused to cross the tree line.
Something had claimed the woods.
Something grieving.
Something furious.
Inside the dead heart of the forest, Ivy knelt in a clearing where the ground had split open like a wound.
H
