The Gray Hollow wasn't on any map.
It didn't need to be at all .
People only spoke of it in whispers. Witches told their daughters ghost stories about it to scare them away and wolves kept their distance with their tails tucked low. No one went there.
And no one came back if they did.
Yet that was exactly where we were headed, my heart pounding so hard against my chest I could literally hear it in my ears
Kaelen leaned on me as we walked through the thinning woods. His skin was burning,as his temperature rise.
The mark carved down his spine still glowed faintly, moving closer to his heart, with every step he grew weaker , but he never once let go of my hand.
I didn't say anything. Not because I had nothing to say, but because I was scared my voice would break.
He was dieing
And if we didn't find the relic soon, I was going to lose him. This time for good.
"We're close," he said in a low tone , I almost didn't hear as we passed under a dead tree with its branches tilting towards us
I frowned as I answered him. "How do you know?"
He didn't answer right away as he pressed his hand pressed against his chest, right above his heart.
"It's humming," he said. "Like it's calling something inside of me."
The curse was our guiding, Which means we were walking right into the place it came from.
Then, suddenly, the trees were gone. It was like we had stepped through a curtain.
silence filled the atmosphere as we stood in a wide clear area drowned in gray mist.
No birds
No wind.
No sound.
Nothing!
Even breathing felt wrong at the moment Like the air carried grief and forced it back at us.
The Gray Hollow.
It looked empty, but I could feel it.
Every stone, every shadow, and everything felt alive and it was watching us
A massive stone building stood ahead of us half-buried in the earth with Ivy crawling across its broken walls and old symbols carved deep into the crumbling stones.
Is this suppose to be a temple or a tomb? I said in a loe tone . Or Maybe both.
"This is it," Kaelen whispered.
I gripped his arm tighter. "Then let's find the relic."
Inside, the air felt heavy and suffocating. It wasn't just dust or old stone. It was memory ,sharp and soaked in pain.
Every step we took echoed so loud like we were walking on a metal surface
I lit a flame in my palm casting Shadows across the walls. My eyes caught the Carvings stretched along the stones : witches bleeding into bowls, wolves wailing at a broken moon, a child with fire in its eyes and fangs in its mouth.
"A hybrid," I muttered. "From before."
Kaelen nodded slowly. "The first attempt."
"What happened to them?"
He pointed ahead.
We followed the corridor until it opened into a wide chamber. In the center stood a stone Altar, cracked but still standing. A faint red glow pulsed beneath the dust.
The relic.
It was a shard of bone, wrapped in bloodstained cloth. Marked with a symbol so old, even my magic didn't recognize it.
Kaelen staggered toward it like it was the only thing keeping him alive.
"No," I said, pulling him back. "Let me. We don't know what it'll do."
He didn't argue. He was too tired now.
I stepped forward with my heart racing. The second my fingers brushed the relic, the world ripped away.
A vision slammed into me.
I stood in the middle of a war.
Witches screamed. Wolves turned on each other. Blood rained from the sky. At the center, two figures clung together not in love, but in survival.
A witch with wild red hair then A werewolf with a crown of bone , they were Mates but the were also Cursed. Chosen by fate but destroyed by blood.
They begged the Elders for peace, but fear won.
That fear gave birth to the curse.
The child that came after a hybrid who could have united them was killed in its crib.
And blood symbol was carved from its tiny body.
And the relic in my hand?
It wasn't just a relic.
It was the rib of that child.
I screamed and dropped it.
Kaelen caught me before I hit the ground.
"What did you see?" His voice was raw.
I couldn't answer. Not because I didn't want to but because I couldn't. My tongue was numb, my breath skipped under the weight of what I had just seen
The relic had shown me the truth.
Not just about the curse but about us.
The curse wasn't trying to tear our bond apart.
It was trying to finish it.
To complete what the first mates couldn't.
To force peace through control and through blood.
Kaelen reached for the relic.
His eyes rolled back.
But he didn't scream. He didn't fall.
He stood still. Silent. Then he looked at me.
"It's inside me now," he said.
I moved closer. "What do you mean?"
"I don't feel the curse anymore."
I blinked. "That's good, isn't it?"
He turned opening his hand palm wide
The mark was gone from his back.
It was now in the center of his palm instead, glowing and waiting.
"I think," he said slowly, "this is only the beginning."