The quiet routine they had built began to crumble before they even understood why. For days the watchers had stayed far away or barely visible. Cole and Elara had kept every rule exactly the same believing consistency was their strongest shield. But they did not know that those distant checks were only the final search steps of something much larger and much more dangerous.
The Black Ring was the name Elara had tried so hard to leave behind. It was the tight powerful group she had once been part of before she stepped away and hid herself in plain sight. Marcus Hale led them from the center. He was not a man who let people walk out or stay lost forever. After weeks of tracing small clues and following faint trails his scouts finally reported back. They had found exactly where Elara was and
