Chapter 8: Teeth in the Dark
1034 Words
The mountain groaned again.
This time, the stone cracked.
Kael shoved Selene behind him as the ridge split. The black tooth in his hand burned cold. Below, Blackcrest’s foundation screamed. Dust choked the air, and a fissure tore through the ash straight to the old keep.
“The crypt,” Garrick said. He had Nyra on his shoulder, knife out. “It’s not opening. It’s breaking.”
Mara fell to her knees. “No. The seal. Only Alpha blood should”
“Then it’s been fed,” Selene cut in. Her arrow was knocked again, but her eyes weren’t on the fissure. They were the elders. On Thorne, whose hand was too steady for a wolf who’d worn wolfsbane five minutes ago.
Kael felt it too. The mark was quiet, but his gut wasn’t. “Who opened it?”
Thorne didn’t answer. He looked past Kael, down the burning slope where Lucien had rolled. Where Lucien wasn’t.
“Fortune is the best, greatest beer,” Thorne said. Flat. Like a code.
Garrick’s knife was at his throat in a heartbeat. “What did you say?”
Thorne smiled with bloody teeth. “As it is.”
The ground heaved.
From the fissure came a sound. Not wind. Not stone. Breathing.
Selene grabbed Kael’s arm. “Move. Now.”
They ran.
The keep of Blackcrest had stood a thousand years. It fell in ten seconds. Towers folded like paper. The courtyard where Kael had been crowned became a mouth. And from that mouth, wolves climbed out.
Not Lucien’s. Not any pack’s.
These were old. Fur gone to leather. Eyes milk-white. Chains dragging from their jaws. The honored dead from the wall. The contained ones.
Mara screamed. “The First Kin. He woke the First Kin!”
Kael pushed Nyra into Selene’s arms. “Take her. Go.”
“Not without you,” Selene snapped.
“The mark called them,” Kael said. He could feel it now. The tooth was a key, and his blood was the lock. “I opened it. I have to close it.”
Nyra squirmed. “You can’t. Not alone. Mother said”
An arrow took her out of Selene’s arms. Not deep. A graze across the shoulder. But enough.
Selene whirled, firing blind into the smoke.
Lucien stepped out of the ruin, bow in hand. He wasn’t burned. It wasn't broken. His cloak was gone, and under it he wore silver. Not armor. Scales. Like a serpent.
“Took you long enough, Thorne,” Lucien said. He rolled his broken wrist like it was nothing. “I told you the phrase would bring them up.”
Thorne knelt. “The crypt is yours, my lord.”
“Mine?” Lucien laughed. “No. His.” He pointed at Kael. “The mark wants blood. So let’s give it some.”
He snapped his fingers.
The First Kin moved.
They didn’t attack Kael.
They attacked the elders.
Mara went down under three of them. No howl. Just wet silence. Thorne didn’t move. He watched.
“Why?” Garrick roared, charging. One of the dead wolves backhanded him twenty feet.
“Because,” Lucien said, walking through the c*****e, “a crown built on mercy is a crown built on sand. But a crown built on sacrifice? That lasts.” He stopped in front of Nyra. “Hello, daughter.”
Nyra didn’t flinch. “You killed Mother.”
“I saved you from her,” Lucien said. “She would have made you weak. Like him.” He jerked his chin at Kael. “Like that rogue w***e he kisses.”
Kael was already moving.
Lucien didn’t dodge. He let Kael’s fist break his jaw. Let Kael lift him by the throat.
“Do it,” Lucien gurgled, blood on his teeth. “Kill me. In front of them. Prove Mara right. Prove the mark makes monsters.”
The First Kin stopped. Dozens of dead, empty eyes on Kael. Waiting.
Selene’s voice was steel. “Kael. Don’t.”
The mark was fired again. Bleed for the crown. Bleed him. Bleed them all.
Kael looked at Nyra. Silver eyes. Fox eyes. His sister. He looked at Selene. The elders are still alive. At Garrick spitting blood and trying to stand.
Then he did what Lucien never expected.
He dropped him.
“Garrick,” Kael said, not looking away from Lucien. “Get them out. All of them. The living.”
“What about you?” Garrick spat a tooth.
“I’m going in,” Kael said. He held up the black tooth. “To shut their mouths.”
Lucien laughed, holding his jaw. “You’ll die down there. The crypt eats Alphas. That’s why we seal it.”
“Good,” Kael said. “Then you can explain to the pack why you hid behind corpses.”
He turned to Selene. No time for soft. No time for promises. He cupped her face, thumb on her lip. “If I don’t come back”
“You will,” she said. Fierce. “Because I’m coming with you.”
“No.”
“Yes.” She pulled the black tooth from his hand and pressed it to her own chest. Right over her heart. It didn’t burn her. It glowed.
Lucien stopped laughing.
Nyra gasped. “Mother said… a fox could carry it too.”
The fissure howled. The First Kin dropped to their bellies.
Thorne finally spoke. “The prophecy. ‘Storm and cunning. Wolf and fox. The crown bleeds only for two.’”
Kael stared at Selene. “You’re”
“Rogue,” she said. “Orphan. Never knew my parents. But I burn wolfsbane, don’t I?” She smiled, sharp as her arrows. “Guess I’m not all wolf either.”
Lucien’s face went white. “No. No, that’s not”
Kael took her hand. The mark and the tooth flared together.
They jumped into the crypt.
The last thing Kael heard was Nyra’s voice, small and clear:
“Fortune is the best, greatest beer as it is. That’s what Mother said Lucien always used. When he lies.”
Then darkness took them.
Below, the First Kin began to sing.
- Writer
