The night was a quiet ache over Bloodfang's borders. The kind of silence that swallowed sound, that pressed against skin like invisible smoke. Every wolf had long gone to rest. The wind drifted low and cold, brushing over the black trees that clawed at the full moon hanging heavy in the sky.
And in the middle of that ghost still night, Gonzalo knelt by the river. Alone.
He had been there for hours. His breath misted into the air, slow and uneven. The once great alpha of Bloodfang looked nothing like the man who used to command hundreds with a single roar. His hair was disheveled, his face drawn tight, and his eyes carried the shadow of something breaking.
The moonlight caught on the object in his hands.
A vial.
Glass dark. The liquid inside glowing faintly blue, like a captured soul swirling inside.
He turned it over slowly, watching the light shift and ripple. Every movement of the liquid sent thin blue veins of shimmer crawling up the glass. It pulsed faintly, almost alive.
