Chapter 6
1360 Words
Liana remained silent as she made her way to the cave. Her wrist pulsed where the strange mark shone with silver and blue light. It didn’t go at all, in fact, it seemed brighter than before, almost like it had a pulse of its own. Like something inside it had woken up. She kept her hand hidden from Maelis as she stepped inside. But Maelis saw the glow instantly.
“Let me see it,” she said gently.
Liana sat beside the fire, slowly unwrapping the cloth from her wrist. She held it out without a word. Maelis leaned in and touched the skin with care, but immediately her fingers met the mark, she jerked back, her eyes wide with alarm.
“It’s started.”
“What is?” Liana asked.
Maelis’s expression was unreadable. “The curse.”
Liana froze. “What curse?”
“You were born with it. All the Seers were. But yours is different. Yours was sealed. Controlled. Hidden.”
“And now?”
“Now it’s not,” Maelis said. “Now it’s awake.”
Liana looked at her wrist again. “Is it dangerous?”
Maelis hesitated.
“Tell me the truth.”
“It can be,” Maelis said. “If left unchecked, it will burn through you. Your wolf. Your mind. It was created to silence Seers before they became too powerful.”
“Who created it?”
Maelis didn’t answer.
Liana stood. “You knew this the whole time?”
“I was trying to protect you.”
“By lying?”
Maelis sighed. “You were too young to know. Too broken.”
Liana turned away. Her chest felt tight. Her mark pulsed again, brighter. She bit her lip and whispered, “I saw something.”
Maelis looked up.
“A tree. Burned. Someone carved ‘Seer of the Silver Curse’ into it.”
Maelis’s face went pale.
“Someone knows,” Liana said. “They’re watching. They know what I am.”
Maelis’s voice was quiet. “Then we don’t have time.”
That night, Liana sat beside the stone pool in the inner chamber. She didn’t sleep. She just stared at the water’s soft glow. Her hand dipped into the surface. The mark flared. A sudden flash of silver light pulled her forward and she fell into a vision.
She was no longer in the cave. The world around her was ash and fire. She stood in a burning village. Screams echoed through the smoke. Wolves ran, shifted, died. In the center of everything stood a girl about Liana’s age, her eyes shining like silver, her hands lifted up. The villagers crowded around her, shouting the same word again and again, their voices rising like a storm.
“Curse bearer! Curse bearer!”
The girl looked up. She wasn’t afraid. She opened her mouth and silver fire exploded from her body. It swept across the ground, burning everything it touched. Not flesh marks. The magic. The bond. The Seer destroyed her own bloodline to stop what had been done to her. Then she vanished.
Liana gasped and pulled back, her knees hitting the stone.
Maelis was waiting nearby.
“You saw her,” she said.
“Who was she?”
Maelis stepped closer. “Your great-grandmother. The first one marked with the Silver Curse. She vanished after that fire. No one found her body.”
“She was like me,” Liana said.
“She was stronger than any Seer before or after,” Maelis said. “But the curse twisted her. It didn’t kill her it changed her.”
Liana swallowed hard. “Is that what will happen to me?”
Maelis didn’t answer.
Far away, Kael stood in the center of the Nightfall sparring ring, breathing hard. The warriors circled him. No one dared move. His wolf eyes were glowing too bright. His claws had half-shifted without command.
Dren stepped in, raising a hand. “Alpha, you need to stop.”
Kael didn’t blink.
“I said stop!”
Kael dropped to one knee, panting. Sweat ran down his back.
“It’s her,” he said. “She’s getting stronger. I feel it.”
Dren stared. “You’re sensing her now?”
“I saw the cave,” Kael whispered. “Not a dream. Not a memory. The walls. The pool. She was in front of me.”
Dren crouched beside him. “Kael, the council’s already warned you. If you lose control again”
“Let them try,” Kael growled. “I won’t stop till I see her.”
Back in the cave, Liana sat outside, the cool air of the night brushing her skin as stars shone silently above. She couldn’t close her eyes to sleep. Not with her skin still burning and her heart
She didn’t hear him coming.
Kade stepped out of the trees like a shadow given shape.
“You shouldn’t creep up on people,” she said, without looking back.
“I didn’t do that. You’re just not focused.”
She glanced over her shoulder. “Why are you here?”
“To finish what I started.”
Kade stepped forward and tossed something onto the dirt in front of her. A thin scroll. Sealed with silver wax.
“What is that?”
“History.”
Liana picked it up. Unrolled it. The first line caught her breath:
The Curse of the Seer was created by Alpha Teren Drenwick.
“Drenwick?” she whispered.
Kade nodded. “Kael’s great-grandfather. He bound the first Seer to him and carved the curse into her blood. When she resisted, he spread the curse to all her descendants. He thought he was protecting the packs from dangerous magic.”
“He cursed his own mate?”
Kade’s voice was flat. “She wasn’t his mate. She was his prisoner.”
Liana dropped the scroll. “Kael doesn’t know.”
“No,” Kade said. “But you do. And that changes everything.”
Liana confronted Maelis that night. She didn’t wait. Didn’t knock. The old woman was lighting candles when Liana stormed into the main chamber.
“You lied.”
Maelis didn’t turn. “I’ve lied about many things. You’ll have to be more specific.”
“Kael’s family. The curse. The history.”
Maelis lit the last candle, then faced her.
“Yes.”
Liana’s hands shook. “You should’ve told me.”
“You would’ve run.”
“I should’ve!”
Maelis stepped closer. “Do you think this is about love? About feelings? That boy’s bloodline built the chains around your throat. You can’t save him. You can’t fix this.”
“I wasn’t trying to save him.”
Maelis pointed at Liana’s wrist. “Then stop letting that bond speak louder than your own voice.”
Liana’s wolf stirred.
“You’re not the only one who lied,” the voice echoed in her mind.
Liana left without another word. She didn’t return to her bed. She went deeper into the cave, to the sealed chamber behind the well. The place Maelis always avoided. The walls were carved with names some she recognized from the Seer wall. Some scratched out. There was a small box tucked behind a loose stone.
She pulled it out.
Inside: a letter. Wrapped in cloth. Old. But her hands recognized the stitching on the corners—her mother’s. Her fingers trembled as she unfolded the parchment.
The moment it opened, her mother’s voice echoed in her, clear, steady and very familiar as day:
If you are reading this, it means you survived the awakening.
But survival is not the same as truly living.
You were never cursed, Liana. You were chosen. But the power they fear in you didn’t start with you.
It started with him.
The one who bears your mark.
The one whose eyes burn like gold.
The Alpha you were born to love and destroy.
Liana dropped the letter. Her wolf howled in her mind.
Last line, still sounding like her mother’s voice:
The person who loves you the deepest can still be the one who will hurt you the worst.
- Writer
