Luna's:
The pulse of the golden seal reflected off the damp stone, painting Roran's face in shifting light.
Elias stepped in front of me, but I could still see the way Roran's jaw tightened—too calm for someone who'd just "happened" to cross our path.
"How did you know we'd be here?" Elias's voice was even, but it carried that undercurrent I'd only heard once before the one that meant he was ready to kill if he didn't like the answer.
Roran smiled without warmth. "You think the Alpha King doesn't have eyes everywhere? You vanish from the capital with her " his gaze cut to me like a blade"and you expect the royal police not to notice?"
He took a slow step forward, boots crunching against the gravel. "Word's already reached the throne. You've been branded as deserters… and traitors."
My pulse thundered in my ears. Not because of his words because of the subtle shadow shifting behind him. Something darker than the tunnel's blackness. Watching. Listening.
"Who else is down here with you, Roran?" I asked, my voice steady even though my spine was prickling.
He tilted his head, feigning confusion. "No one you'd see coming."
That was when the golden seal flickered—just for a second like something had pressed against it from the other side.
Elias glanced at me, and I knew we were thinking the same thing. The vault wasn't empty.
And whoever was in it… might not be here by choice.
.....
Elias didn't blink.
He kept his body angled between me and Roran, but I could see the way his fingers flexed' measuring distance, calculating.
"I don't like games," Elias said.
"Neither do I," Roran replied, stepping closer, voice dropping to something colder. "But the King does. And he's playing one now on both of you."
The weight of those words sank into the air between us.
I moved, just enough for Roran's gaze to slide toward me. "If you're here to drag us back, you'll have to do more than make threats."
His smile returned, slow and sharp. "Who said I'm dragging you anywhere? My orders were to… observe." He gestured to the shadows like they were his allies. "And report."
A shiver traced my spine, not from fear, but from the realization that this wasn't just about Elias or me. This was about every step we'd taken since leaving the capital, every choice, every conversation. Someone had been pulling threads in silence.
Before Elias could speak, a faint clang echoed through the tunnel behind Roran. Not loud enough for alarm just enough to make him glance over his shoulder.
That's when I caught it.
The shadow that moved wasn't his.
.....
The shadow slid along the stone like smoke, soundless but deliberate.
Elias didn't notice not yet. His eyes were locked on Roran, reading every flicker of movement. I, on the other hand, couldn't look away from that creeping silhouette stretching across the wall.
My pulse thudded. The tunnel's air felt heavier, damp with something metallic... blood or the memory of it.
Roran straightened, oblivious to the thing stalking just outside his awareness. "The Alpha King thinks you've gone rogue," he said to Elias. "And if I tell him what I've seen… well, he'll make sure you're not just replaced he'll erase you."
Elias's jaw tightened, but he didn't rise to the bait. "You always did talk too much, Roran."
The shadow drifted closer, pooling at Roran's boots. It was wrong—too dense, too alive to be the product of any torchlight. I opened my mouth to warn him
and stopped.
Because in that instant, the shadow shivered. And in the faint flicker of the torchlight, I could've sworn it turned its head… toward me.
Not Roran.
Me.
A cold ripple traveled down my spine, coiling in my gut.
I forced my voice steady. "We're not alone."
Roran's smirk faltered, just for a fraction of a second. He glanced over his shoulder and the torchlight sputtered, plunging us into a sudden, suffocating dark.
That's when the sound came.
A low, wet hiss too close, far too close.
.....
The darkness swallowed the tunnel whole.
I couldn't see my own hands, couldn't even tell if Elias or Roran was still in front of me. The air felt thick now, every breath dragging like smoke in my lungs. Somewhere ahead, a boot scraped stone slow, deliberate.
"Elias?" My voice came out low, testing.
No answer.
Then, off to my left, Roran's voice tight and clipped. "Light. Now."
A spark flared. For an instant, Elias's face was lit from below, eyes sharp, mouth a hard line. The flint in his hand scraped again, but the flame refused to catch.
That's when I heard it behind me.
A whisper. Not words. Not breath. Something else.
I spun, my back hitting the cold wall. The sound slithered closer, but every time I tried to track it, it was… somewhere else.
"Move," Elias ordered.
We did. Or tried to. But the moment we stepped forward, the shadow moved too sliding ahead of us, shaping itself in the dim flicker like it was choosing where to stand.
Roran finally drew steel, the blade ringing far too loud in the stillness. "Show yourself," he snapped.
The shadow did not.
It laughed.
Not a human laugh—lower, rougher, like the grind of stone on stone. The kind of sound you feel in your bones before your ears catch it.
And then
It spoke.
Not clearly, not fully, but enough for me to hear the syllables that would stitch themselves into my nightmares:
"Too… late…"
.....
The words echoed through the stone as if the tunnels themselves had mouths.
"Too… late…"
Roran swore under his breath, the blade in his hand trembling only slightly but I saw it. His courage was a mask, and the cracks were already showing.
Elias didn't flinch. His head tilted, like he was listening to the words the way a wolf listens to the wind. "It knows we're here," he muttered, more to himself than to us.
My chest tightened. It? Not he. Not she.
It.
The flame finally caught on the flint, a pale glow spilling over the walls. But instead of comfort, it revealed what I wished had remained unseen.
The stone wasn't bare.
It was carved.
Symbols spirals, runes, jagged lines gouged deep into the rock glimmered faintly as though the light itself bent around them. They weren't just old markings. They pulsed.
And that whisper, the one that had slid into my ears a moment ago, now came from the carvings themselves.
"They watch," Elias said, his voice flat, but I noticed his grip on the torch tighten until his knuckles whitened.
"Who?" I asked, though I wasn't sure I wanted the answer.
"Not who." He looked back at me then, shadows cutting his face into something sharp, almost cruel. "What."
The air grew colder. Breath plumed before us.
Then came the sound I dreaded most.
Not the whisper.
Not the scrape of stone.
The howl.
Low, mournful, but wrong—too deep, too layered, as if more than one throat screamed inside a single mouth.
Roran pressed his back to mine instinctively, his voice a growl. "We move. Now."
But Elias didn't move. He stayed perfectly still, his gaze fixed on one symbol near the floor. A spiral cut into three rings, dripping with something darker than shadow. His jaw clenched.
"Elias!" I hissed, shoving at his shoulder. "We have to go—"
And that's when I saw it.
Not a wolf.
Not a man.
A figure of living shadow unfolding from the wall itself, its shape bending like smoke, its eyes if they were eyes. burning faintly crimson.
The whisper came again, louder, sharper, and this time it spoke his name.
"Aezrel…"
.....
That whisper didn't belong here.
Didn't belong anywhere.
It slid into the marrow of my bones, curling under my skin like ice water. I froze not because I was afraid of the shadow before us, but because it spoke a name I had never once heard slip from Elias's lips.
Aezrel.
Elias's jaw twitched, his torchlight trembling as though the flame itself recoiled. He didn't look at me. He didn't look at Roran. His eyes were locked on the shadow.
It leaned forward, red eyes searing through the dim. Its body wasn't flesh, wasn't spirit. it was absence, the shape of something that should not exist.
"Say it again," Elias whispered. Not to me. Not even to Roran. But to the thing. His voice was low, dangerous, almost daring. "Say my name."
The shadow hissed, and the runes on the walls pulsed brighter, feeding it. I stepped back, but Roran's hand caught my wrist, pulling me in closer to the safety of his blade. He didn't ask questions, but his eyes storm-dark flicked between Elias and the monster as though he was connecting something I wasn't meant to see.
"You knew," Roran muttered under his breath, the words sharp as steel.
Elias finally tore his gaze from the shadow. His eyes found Roran, then me. The torchlight made his features crueler than usual, hiding any softness I thought I'd once glimpsed in him. "Not here," he said.
"No." I stepped forward before I could stop myself, anger prickling hot in my chest. "Not here, not later, not when some demon crawling out of the walls knows a name you've hidden from us all. Who are you, Elias?"
His lips curved half bitter, half broken. "That's the wrong question, Luna."
The shadow's whisper grew louder, splitting, multiplying, until the air thrummed with it. Aezrel… Aezrel… Aezrel…
The name struck the walls like a curse, the tunnels shaking as dust rained down.
And for the first time since I had met him, Elias—no, Aezrel flinched.
The torch sputtered, the flame shrinking.
Roran growled, pushing me behind him, sword raised. "Whatever this is, end it. Because if you don't…" He lifted his blade at Elias. "I will."
Elias—Aezrel—smiled then, but it wasn't joy. It wasn't cruelty.
It was resignation.
"You think I brought you here by accident?" he asked.
And before either of us could answer, the shadow lunged.
....
The world went black as the shadow lunged. Torchlight guttered, swallowed whole, leaving only the sickening glow of those crimson eyes.
Steel rang Roran's blade slicing through empty air as the creature dissolved and reformed around him. Elias—Aezrel—moved like lightning, faster than I'd ever seen, dragging me back against the wall. My breath caught. His hand was steady, but his eyes weren't.
The shadow's whisper filled the cavern. Not one voice. Hundreds.
He's lied to you.
He's used you.
He's the reason you bleed.
The words didn't come from its mouth they came from inside me, clawing at my ribs, as if every dark thought I'd buried was being dragged to the surface.
Roran staggered forward, his blade nearly slipping. "Stop stop talking " he growled, his voice shaking with rage. "Luna, don't listen!"
But I was listening. My chest burned with it. Because the shadow wasn't whispering lies. It was whispering truths I didn't want to face.
"You knew," I hissed, rounding on Elias. My voice cracked, too raw, too sharp. "From the very beginning you knew this place, this thing "
He grabbed my shoulders, hard enough to hurt. "I didn't want you here." His voice broke, almost human. "Do you understand me? I never wanted you to see this."
The shadow's laughter slithered through the stone. The runes pulsed faster, brighter, feeding it until its form stretched, towering above us. Its voice became a chant:
Aezrel, betrayer. Aezrel, oathbreaker. Aezrel, murderer.
Roran's blade faltered mid-swing. He looked at Elias then—no, at Aezrel with something I had never seen in his eyes before. Recognition.
"You," he whispered, horror dawning across his face. "It was you?"
Elias's grip on me loosened. For one fraction of a heartbeat, I saw it the fear in his eyes. Not fear of the shadow. Fear of us.
The cavern shook, stone splintering overhead. The shadow's arms unfurled into claws, reaching toward us.
But it wasn't aiming for Elias.
It was aiming for me.
.....
The shadow's claws swept down, cold as death, but they weren't meant to kill me they were meant to trap. Darkness wrapped around my wrists and throat, and suddenly the cavern wasn't stone anymore.
I was standing in the great hall of the palace.
Blood stained the marble. My father's crown lay bent in the fire. And there on the steps stood Elias. His face wasn't hidden this time. His eyes glowed the same red as the shadow's.
"You were always meant to break," he said, voice smooth and cruel. "I only pushed you closer to the edge."
"No—" I staggered back. "This isn't real"
But Roran was there too, appearing out of the smoke, his blade lowered. He looked at me with disgust. "You've doomed us all, Luna. For him."
I tried to scream, but the shadow tightened its hold. My voice cracked. My chest burned.
Elias—the realElias slashed through the dark bindings, hauling me back into the cavern. His face was pale, his jaw clenched tight. "Don't believe what it shows you!" he barked.
But then the shadows twisted around him. His body flickered, doubled until I was staring at two versions of him. One with desperate eyes. One with blood dripping from his hands.
The false Elias spoke first. "She'll never trust you, no matter how you beg." He turned to me, smirking. "You've already seen it, haven't you? The truth in his eyes."
The real Elias roared and charged, his blade cutting through the doppelgänger. But when the illusion bled, the blood sprayed across me. Warm. Sticky. Real.
I staggered back, choking on bile.
And then it was my voice in the chamber. My own words echoing back to me.
"Kill him, Luna. Before he kills you."
The shadows weren't just feeding on doubt. They were multiplying it. Roran was shouting something, slashing wildly into the dark, but I couldn't hear him. The air was too thick with lies. With visions. With truths I didn't want to admit.
Because part of me. part of me did wonder.
Was Elias here to save me?
Or was I the last loose end he needed to silence?
The shadow howled, splitting the cavern stone. And as its illusions closed in, each version of Elias bloody, cruel, pleading surrounded me in a tightening circle.
Only one was real.
And if I chose wrong…
We'd all die here.