Chapter one
The morning light always felt harsh in the valley of Oakhaven, but for Elora, it felt like an outright assault.
She pressed the back of her hand to her forehead, wincing at the dull, rhythmic thrumming behind her eyes. It was the third time this week she had woken up before the dawn bells, her skin slick with a cold sweat and her throat burning as though she had swallowed ash.
"Elora! The morning delivery won't carry itself!"
Her mother’s voice carried up the narrow wooden stairs of the apothecary, sharp and pragmatic as always. Sarah Vance was a woman sculpted by hard labor and quiet silence—a woman who rarely looked Elora directly in the eyes for more than a few seconds at a time.
"I'm up, Mother," Elora called back, her voice raspy.
She swung her legs over the side of her cot. As her bare feet touched the cold stone floor, a sudden spike of heat flared in her chest. She gasped, gripping the wooden edge of the frame. For a split second, the quiet sounds of the village below—the iron shoe of a blacksmith's horse striking cobblestone two streets over, the heavy breath of a sleeping stray dog in the alley—roared in her ears with terrifying, crystal-clear precision.
Then, as quickly as it had surged, the sensory flood vanished, leaving behind only the mundane hum of the morning.
Elora rubbed her temples, writing it off as another dizzy spell brought on by the late-night brewing sessions. She tied her long, dark hair back with a leather strip, threw on her worn apron, and headed down to the shop.
The apothecary smelled of dried lavender, crushed roots, and sulfur. Sarah was already behind the counter, grinding dried rowan berries with a heavy stone mortar. She didn't look up as Elora entered, but her hands froze for a fraction of a second when Elora walked past.
"You look pale," Sarah said, her tone flat, devoid of panic but laced with an unyielding tension that had presence in their house for as long as Elora could remember. "Take the medicinal tonic to the northern boundary. Old Man Miller’s cattle are sick again."
"The northern boundary?" Elora paused, picking up the satchel of glass vials. "That’s right near the edge of the Sunken Woods. You told me never to cross the stone markers."
"You won't cross them," Sarah said, finally raising her eyes. They were dark, shadowed with exhaustion. "Deliver the vials to the fence, take his copper, and come straight back. Do not stop to talk to the travelers from the high pass. Do you understand me?"
"I'm nineteen, Mother. I know how to avoid road traders."
"Do you?" Sarah’s voice dropped, carrying a chilling gravity that made the room feel suddenly colder. "Obey me, Elora. The world outside this valley is full of eyes that look without seeing, and things that hunt without noise. Keep your cowl up."
Elora took the satchel, the glass clinking softly against the leather. She wanted to argue, to ask—for the hundredth time—why they lived like fugitives in a town that barely knew their names, why her mother checked the iron deadbolts three times every night, and why Elora wasn't allowed to attend the seasonal festivals.
Instead, she simply nodded, pulled her dark woolen cloak over her shoulders, and pushed open the door into the crisp morning air.
She didn't notice the tall figure standing in the shadow of the tavern across the street—a man wrapped in a heavy velvet coat despite the lingering summer warmth, his eyes fixed intently on the way her shadow stretched across the dirt road.
Nor did she notice the raven perched on the roof of the church above, its eyes milky white, seeing through the vision of an old woman miles away in the deep, dark woods, who whispered a single sentence into the quiet gloom:
"The blood has begun to sing."
