Chapter 2. Duskwrath Territory
1614 Words
The Duskwrath stronghold rose like a shadowed fortress above the frostbitten pines, carved into the bones of the northern cliffs.
Built by the blood of Lycans long forgotten, its black stone towers stood tall against the howling wind, warded with ancient sigils and shrouded by mist that never quite lifted.
Below the keep, the valley thrived with life, wild and disciplined, just like the pack that ruled it.
The wind howled outside the stone walls of the fortress, but I barely heard it.
I sat alone in the war room, fingers curled around a chipped glass of ale. The flames in the hearth crackled low, casting jagged shadows across the stone table, the maps, and the old claw marks in the granite, reminders of wars long buried and never forgotten.
“Still brooding?”
The voice hit me before the scent did, frost, ashwood, and that damn herbal soap she always used. I didn’t need to look to know it was Veyra.
I smirked faintly. “You say it like I ever stopped.”
She stepped up beside me on the balcony, wrapping her fur-lined shawl tighter as the wind rolled over the keep. I felt the nudge of her shoulder against mine, casual, warm, familiar. The kind of thing only she could get away with.
“You’ve been restless again,” she said. “The guards said you didn’t sleep. Zerg said you were pacing like a storm-wolf with a thorn in its paw.”
I kept my eyes on the treetops below. Duskwrath territory stretched in every direction: peaks and pines and snow-glinted stone. Beautiful. Dangerous. Ours.
“I’m always restless,” I said, leaning forward against the railing. “Price of peace, with the High Circle breathing down our necks.”
“Liar.”
The word cut with affection.
She knew me too well.
I didn’t answer. There wasn’t a point.
Veyra’s silver-streaked hair danced in the wind as she tilted her head, watching me. Our mother’s eyes looked back at me through hers, soft, sharp, unreadable.
“You’ve been dreaming again,” she said.
The dreams started months ago-just after the last Blood Moon.
At first, I thought they were just that. Dreams. But they kept coming, night after night, creeping in like mist under a locked door.
They were strange. Fragmented. I'd find myself standing in a forest drowned in silver fog, the air thick with silence, too still to be natural.
Time didn’t exist there. Neither did sound, not really. Only whispers. Rustling wings overhead. Voices speaking in a tongue no wolf has spoken in centuries. And always… always, those eyes.
Silver.
Glowing.
Watching me from the dark.
They weren’t frightening. Just… familiar. In a way that rattled me more than fear ever could.
Whoever she was… she was something else. Someone else. I didn’t have the words for it.
But my wolf knew.
Every time I woke, it was growling, low and restless, pacing beneath my skin like it had been robbed of something sacred. Like something just out of reach was calling, pulling at the bond meant for us and us alone.
Frayed. Raw. Waiting.
Waiting for her.
Whoever she was… she was real.
And she was getting closer.
Still, I said nothing.
She didn’t press.
She never did.
That was the thing about Veyra. She didn’t try to fix me. Didn’t ask for explanations or reasons I couldn’t give.
She just… stood there. Present. Unmoving. The only soul alive who made the silence feel less like a burden.
“You remember what Mother said about dreams, don’t you?” she murmured.
I finally turned to her, brow raised.
“If they come like a tide, they’re meant to carry you somewhere,” she said. “Not drown you.”
A gust of wind snapped through the air, tugging at our cloaks.
Somewhere below, a pup barked in the training yard, and a sharp command followed, probably the Gamma shouting someone into the snow again.
I looked back toward the woods. Toward the dark. Toward whatever the hell was calling me from inside it.
“I don’t know where it’s carrying me,” I admitted, quietly.
Veyra smiled, just barely. “That’s why you don’t go alone.”
And for a second, just a second, the weight on my shoulders didn’t crush quite as much.
I blinked, pulling back from the edge of thought. The snow still fell in lazy spirals beyond the balcony, cloaking the Duskwrath stronghold in silence. But I wasn’t fooled. Quiet never meant peace. Not here.
Before I could answer, the scent of jasmine and moonrose hit the air, too sweet, too intentional. My jaw clenched before I even turned.
“Alpha Kade,” came Lilia’s voice, soft, velvety, and too familiar.
I didn’t have to look to know she was dressed for effect. She always was. I turned anyway, if only to be polite.
She stood in the archway, wrapped in midnight-blue silk that clung to her figure, golden curls braided over one shoulder. Her violet eyes glittered like polished amethysts in the firelight.
“Kade,” she said again, stepping forward like she belonged here.
She didn’t.
“I thought I might find you here,” she continued, her gaze flicking between me and Veyra like she expected one of us to be pleased.
Veyra stiffened at my side, but said nothing. She never liked Lilia, though she’d never said it outright. I didn’t blame her.
“I brought you something,” Lilia added, holding out a small glass vial. “Zale brewed this,it’s supposed to help with… well, everything you refuse to talk about.”
“I’m fine,” I said, more curtly than I meant.
“You don’t look it,” she said softly, eyes lingering longer than they should.
Veyra shifted her weight beside me, crossing her arms. “He never looks fine. Comes with the job.”
“I’m not here to fight,” Liliah said, turning her smile toward my sister. “I just worry.”
Her fingers brushed mine as I took the vial. I didn’t flinch, but I didn’t thank her, either.
“You’re not my mate, Lilia,” I said quietly.
“I know that.” Her eyes flashed with something, pain, or maybe pride. “But I could still matter.”
Before I could respond, before the weight in my chest could settle, boots crunched against the stone behind her.
Zerg’s voice cut through the air like a drawn blade. “Am I interrupting something?”
Perfect timing.
Lilia stepped back, just enough to make it look effortless. “Beta Zerg,” she greeted coolly.
Zerg didn’t bother returning it. His eyes, storm-dark and unbothered, locked on mine. “We have a situation,” he said.
I raised a brow. “What kind of situation?”
“There’s been an incident”. Zerg cleared his throat. “From the East border. Wyrm Spine Ridge. Patrol caught a scent, a wolf from Bloodfang. Alone.”
My pulse spiked. Veyra tensed beside me.
Veyra’s brow creased. “A spy?”
Zerg shrugged. “Could be. Or another banished one trying to slip away unnoticed,”.
“Didn’t smell like a patrol. No sign of backup. Lone wolf, limping. Injured, maybe. Young.”
I didn’t speak for a long moment. My fingers tightened around the mug. The wolf in me stirred again, louder this time. Agitated. Restless.
Not just any wolf, then.
“She smelled… strange,” Zerg added. “Like the storm before a moon fall. Hard to explain.”
Veyra’s eyes met mine. “The dreams?”
I didn’t answer. I didn’t need to.
Something was pulling her here. Or maybe she was running from something worse.
Liliah reached out, fingers brushing my wrist. “Kade. You don’t really think this is about...”
“I don’t know what I think,” I snapped. The words were harsher than I intended. She recoiled slightly.
I exhaled. “Just… go back to the hall, Liliah. Please.”
She didn’t argue. She never did. Not with me.
But she didn’t look at me again when she left, the silk of her dress whispering down the corridor behind her like a fading hope.
Something clicked into place inside me, deep and ancient.
The dreams. The pull. The way my wolf had been howling inside my skin for nights on end.
Silver eyes. Shadows.
The call was getting louder.
And now, a stranger from a hated pack limping toward our border?
This wasn’t coincidence.
It was beginning.
I glanced at Veyra. She was already watching me, her face hard with understanding.
“I want the Gamma to double patrols near the Wyrm Spine,” I told Zerg. “And I want whoever crossed that line found. Alive.”
Because I already knew.
Whoever crossed that border wasn’t just lost.
She was the storm I’d felt coming.
And she was mine.
***
Later that night, I stood on the balcony of the high keep. Snow drifted slow and silent. The moon was almost full, pale and cruel.
I could feel something.
Not in my head.
In my bones.
In my wolf, Lynx
He clawed at the inside of my skin, restless and caged.
“A storm is coming.”, he said.
“Yes” I echoed back. One that would wake up the old blood, the kind even my ancestors feared.
I didn’t know how. Or when.
But I felt it. And it's close.
And when I closed my eyes,
I saw her again.
The girl with silver eyes.
Running through trees. Her fur dark as void. Her voice whispering a name I’d forgotten.
- Writer
