Marked by the last white heir

Veins of the Rift

Drex slipped out of the library through a side service door moments after Alya returned to her notebook. He had murmured something about checking a reference in the main stacks, then let the shadows between the tall shelves swallow his steps. No one glanced twice; to any observer he simply blended into the late-afternoon flow of students heading out.

Once outside, the restless itch from the storeroom encounter sharpened, Halden’s third eye, the wrongness in his movements, the way the air had thickened with scorched rot. Drex needed to finish what the creature had started before nightfall.

He tracked the professor’s scent across campus, a faint trail of ordinary cologne undercut by something fouler. By early evening the light had faded to bruised purple. Drex moved along the tree line near the old farm sheds, muscles tight, the partial shift already humming just beneath his skin like coiled wire ready to snap.

Professor Halden, or the thing wearing him, waited in the hollow behind the rusted equipment shed. The man stood unnaturally still, head c****d as if listening to voices only he could hear. When he turned, the polite lecture mask had cracked; his smile stretched too wide, and shadows flickered at the edges of his fingers.

“You followed,” Halden rasped, voice layered with something guttural. “Curious about the rites… or about what slips through when lines weaken, my friend?”

Drex didn’t answer with words. The wolf surged. Bones creaked and lengthened with wet, deliberate sounds. Muscles swelled and shifted, pulling skin taut. Fur prickled outward along his arms and neck in a white wave. His jaw ached as teeth sharpened; eyes burned silver at the edges, vision cutting through the gloom until every blade of grass stood razor-sharp. A low, primal growl rolled from deep in his chest, raw power vibrating the air, heavy with the scent of hot blood and wild pine. The ground itself seemed to press harder under his paws.

The creature lunged first. Jagged shadows whipped from its hands like living smoke. Drex met them head-on, twisting inside the reach and driving his forearm up to block. They collided in a blur of claws and tore at each other. Halden’s elongated fingers scored burning lines across Drex’s ribs, hot blood soaking through his shirt in sticky warmth. Pain flared bright, but Drex pressed forward, grappling in the tight space until he pinned the thing against the shed wall, one hand locked around its throat. With a savage wrench, something vital snapped inside the stolen body. Halden convulsed once, the third eye fluttering shut as the face went slack. Dark fluid leaked onto the dirt, carrying the sharp reek of rift-rot.

Drex stepped back, chest heaving, fresh gashes stinging with every breath. He dragged the Rotting body deeper into the annex shadows, then slipped out a rear service exit before any alarms could sound. The campus night swallowed him as he moved behind the old farm sheds three blocks from the dorms, the weight of the corpse heavy across his shoulders. He covered it hastily with loose tarps and broken crates. His hands left bloody prints on the fabric. The wolf’s energy still thrummed in his veins, leaving his muscles trembling and the wounds itching as they slowly began to knit.

A twig snapped in the nearby thicket.

Two college students, voices breathless with reckless desire, had slipped away from the main paths. Ralph pulled Lexi down behind dense bushes near the fence line. “No one’s around. Just us.” Fabric rustled. He pressed her to the ground, hand clamping over her mouth as her breathing quickened into muffled, frantic sounds. Fear widened her eyes, not entirely from the moment.

Ralph sensed the sudden heavy presence and turned. Drex could not risk witnesses spreading details that might lead security straight to the hidden body or draw more attention to the farm. A controlled growl ripped from his chest as he lashed out, claws grazing the side of Ralph’s face just enough to drop him without killing. Ralph crumpled with a choked gasp, blood welling hot across his cheek.

Lexi’s hand slipped free. Her scream tore through the night. “Ahhhhhhh!!!!”

The campus security alarm blared to life, shrill lights flashing across buildings and slicing through the trees.

Drex forced the shift back down, breath sharp and controlled, and melted deeper into the shadows. He circled wide toward the far edge of the farm fields, ribs burning with every step, blood still seeping warm down his side and soaking into his waistband. The gashes pulled painfully, but he kept moving, silent, jaw clenched against the fatigue settling into his bones like lead.

Security guards reached the thicket minutes later. Flashlights swept the ground in steady arcs. One knelt beside the pair while the other scanned the disturbed earth near the fence. “Lexi’s clothes are everywhere… Ralph’s out cold, face looks like something clawed it open. Blood’s still fresh.”

The senior guard straightened, rubbing his jaw. “This is turning into straight Red Axe s**t, there's a rotting smell in the air and raw earth. Get them inside, keep it quiet for now. We’ll call the chief at first light and sort the rest. No sense waking the whole campus over whatever this mess is.”

Far from the rising voices and sweeping lights, Drex paused in a shallow hollow where the tree line met open fields. He leaned against a thick trunk, pressing one palm to the gashes along his ribs. The wounds were closing, but slowly, leaving streaks of drying blood on his skin and a deep ache that radiated with every breath. Sweat cooled on his neck in the night air. He had bought time by ending the creature wearing Halden, yet the eastern woods felt heavier now, the silence between the trees too watchful.

A low sound rolled from the darkness ahead, not a howl, not laughter, but something wet and layered that carried the faint echo of the professor’s fractured voice. It tasted the blood in the air and found the trail.

And it was already moving closer, hungry for whatever came next.