Isla
I stood by the window, staring out at the trees beyond, where shadows shifted in ways they shouldn’t.
Raul stood behind me, quiet, thoughtful. The map of our journey—the one we’d pieced together from Mrs. Hawthorne’s journals and the pages of her old grimoire—was spread out on the wooden table. Beside it sat the list of ingredients for the ritual that would bind and banish the Marrow Born. One by one, we’d checked them off. But now we’d reached the final, most dangerous task.
Salt from the haunted shore.
“I’ve only heard of it in fragments,” Raul said, his voice low and steady. “A place they call Black Hollow Beach. It was said to be sacred once… before the veil tore.”
I turned from the window and leaned against the frame. “Do you think it’s real?”
He nodded slowly. “If Mrs. Ha
