The stench of iron clawed at Lyra’s throat, choking her with every breath. Smoke drifted through the cracks of the den’s stone walls, curling like sinister fingers into the chamber. Beyond the shattered doorway came the sound of boots crunching against gravel, the click of weapons being drawn, and the murmur of male voices humming with hunger.
Hunters.
Her blood iced over. She had been small the night they came for her family, but she remembered it with terrifying clarity: wolves screaming, flames devouring their home, the smell of blood thick in the air. She remembered her mother’s body falling, the way her father’s howl had ended too soon. And the hunters, always the hunters, faceless and merciless.
Now they were here. For her.
Kael’s body shifted in front of hers, broad shoulders te
