No one moved.
Darkness swallowed the hall so completely that for one long heartbeat, all I could hear was breathing.
Mine.
Draven's.
The frightened breaths of an entire pack.
Then the torches burst back to life.
Not all at once.
One after another.
The flames burned differently now.
Instead of warm orange, they flickered with streaks of pale blue before slowly returning to normal.
An uneasy silence settled over the room.
No one spoke.
No one wanted to be the first.
Voss finally broke it.
"It reached us."
His voice was barely more than a whisper.
Mara's face tightened.
"No."
She stared at the stone floor beneath her feet.
"It tested us."
A chill crawled down my spine.
The mark on my wrist throbbed again.
Once.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Like a heartbeat that wasn't mine.
Dra
