The streets of Kithra blurred around me—tall stone walls, shadow-choked alleys, watchful windows. None of them gave answers.She was gone.
I'd turned away for mere moments. A vendor's stall. A distraction. She hadn't wandered far—she never did. But when I looked again, she was gone.
No scream. No struggle. No sign.Just silence.
And that silence was breaking me.
I shoved through the crowd, shoulder-first, ignoring the curses that followed. My broadsword weighed heavy at my side, but not as heavy as the twisting thing gnawing at my insides—that heat. That power. The tattoos on my arms burned again, glowing faint beneath my sleeves. Reacting to my pulse. To my panic.
I clenched my fists, willing the sensation to fade. It didn't.The last time it flared, I blacked out. When I came to, the monsters were dead, and the air reeked of ash.
I couldn't lose control again—not here. Not with her missing.
I ducked into an alley, heart pounding. Auralia's name ached on my tongue, but I didn't call it. Not yet. Whoever took her might still be close. Watching.
Think, Eiran.She's smart. She's trained. She wouldn't go without a fight. Unless—
A glint caught my eye. Something on the wall. Scratched into soot-stained stone—three short marks. Vertical. Almost invisible unless you knew where to look.
Auralia.
I pressed my palm to the wall. A sign. Subtle. Deliberate. Rogue's code.She was alive. On the move. Maybe escaping.
Relief stung behind my eyes.
But it didn't last. Because if she was running...Something powerful had taken her.
And I had let it happen.
The air shimmered, heat rising from my skin like mist. The runes on my arms pulsed—not as armor, but like veins of fire, raw and cracked.
I stumbled to one knee, slamming a hand to the cobbles to keep from falling. My breath came in gasps. The world tilted, colors bleeding at the edges of my vision.
"Get it together," I growled. "She needs you."
But it was too late.The magic was clawing free.
A flicker of light burst from my palm, splintering the stone in a web of cracks. People screamed. Somewhere, a bell began to toll.
I stood, swaying.
If I didn't find her soon…Something was going to break.This cursed city.Or me.
The echo of the bell was still ringing in my skull when I felt it—A pull. Not quite physical. Not quite magical. Something deeper. A thread in me gone taut.
And when I looked up—he was there.
White hair. Pale skin. Same eyes—calm, unnatural. But he wasn't a child anymore.Taller than me now. Lean. Poised. Cloaked in a gray coat that didn't belong in the grime of Kithra.
He looked… wrong.Like reality had bent just slightly to let him through.
I stared. "You—"
He didn't answer. Just turned.And walked.
I hesitated only a moment before following.
We wound through the city—down alleys I didn't know, tunnels I'd never seen. The crowds faded behind us. The buildings aged, crumbling like they'd been forgotten by time. He never spoke. Never looked back. Somehow, I knew I had to follow.
The tension in my chest loosened. Not gone—Auralia was still missing—but this felt… right. Guided. Fated.
The air grew colder as we descended. Fog curled at our feet, rising from vents in cracked stone. We passed silent towers, shuttered homes, and doorways bleeding shadows.
Kithra had a skeleton and we were walking through its ribs.
Then, he stopped.
Before us stood a rusted gate, twisted into the maw of what might've once been a manor. Or a temple. It loomed like a forgotten god above the slums.
And from somewhere inside, I heard it—
A voice.Hers.Auralia.
Faint. Struggling. But alive.
I turned to him, questions burning on my tongue.
But he was gone.
No sound. No trace.
Only the path forward — and the rising fire in my veins
The moment I heard her voice — faint, strained, terrified — something inside me snapped.
It wasn't just fear. It wasn't even rage.
It was instinct — primal, ancient, hungry.
My breath hitched. My heartbeat thundered once, then vanished beneath the rising pulse of raw energy screaming in my blood. My tattoos flared to life, no longer glowing, but burning — white-hot etchings across my skin, crawling with power too vast to name.
I staggered forward, hand reaching out to the iron gate, and it melted beneath my touch.
Not burned. Not shattered. Melted — like wax to a flame, twisted and curling away from me in slow motion.
A sound tore free from my throat — not a scream, not a war cry, but something else. A roar that didn't sound human. That wasn't human.
The ground trembled.
And then the world detonated.
A wave of force erupted from my body in every direction, raw power cracking stone, shattering glass in nearby buildings, and peeling centuries-old paint from the surrounding walls. Flame licked across the broken gate, devouring the path ahead in a serpentine blaze.
Somewhere beyond the destruction, I felt her — still alive, still fighting. But the moment our connection clicked into place, all reason was gone.
I ran, barely aware of my feet on the ground. The ruined threshold of the manor parted before me like a wound splitting open, the power inside me still pulsing in fits and starts — explosive, uncontrollable.
I didn't care.
Auralia was in there.
And nothing — man, beast, god, or vampire — was going to keep me from her.