They returned to camp to find chaos.
Smoke rose from several cabins, thick and black, but there was no smell of burning wood. Instead, the air carried the sharp tang of ozone and something else, something ancient and bitter. The smoke was not from fire but from some kind of magical residue, a purple-gray mist that clung to the ground and swirled around the feet of those who walked through it. Wolves and vampires stumbled through the ruins, their eyes dazed, their movements sluggish, as if they had been drugged or enchanted. Some sat on the ground with their heads in their hands. Others wandered in circles, muttering to themselves.
And at the center of it all, a figure stood waiting.
She was ancient, impossibly so. Her skin was the color of old parchment, cracked and fragile, stretched o
