The night felt wrong.
Grimm lay curled beneath the low-hanging branches of a dead yew tree, his two tails twitching with agitation. The forest had gone too quiet. Not even the wind dared speak through the needles anymore.
He could feel her. Both of them.
Therrin's soul shimmered like frost in moonlight—pure, unsure, fragile. And Ari burned beneath it like blackfire, relentless and wild. Together, they pulsed with a rhythm that didn't belong to this world. Not entirely. Not anymore.
Grimm's mismatched eyes—one molten gold, the other deep violet—blinked as he stood and padded toward the glade where he knew they rested. Or tried to.
He could sense the shift before he saw it. The glade's edge shimmered like heat rising from stone, the air growing thick and weighted. His fur bristled.
Too soon. It was all happening too soon.
"Stupid girls," he muttered, though there was no venom in it. Only sorrow.
He found Therrin sitting with her back against a rock, breathing shallowly, her head tilted upward like she was listening to something far off. Her white lashes were fluttering, and her fingers trembled as if holding on to a dream that threatened to swallow her whole.
She wasn't alone in there. Ari had taken root again. He could feel her growing louder.
Grimm hopped onto the rock beside her and curled his tails around his paws. "You feel it, don't you?" he said softly. "The veil thinning. The pull of something darker."
Her lips moved, but she said nothing. Ari was in control now, and that meant wariness.
Grimm sighed and looked up at the moon, half-obscured by clouds. He hadn't meant to speak of it yet. The prophecy. The truth about why Nyx had marked them both. Why the forest recoiled when they were near. Why he, of all things, had been sent to guide them.
"You want to know why you were born the way you were," he said, not waiting for her to answer. "You want to know why one soul wasn't enough."
Ari stirred behind Therrin's pale eyes. "You were supposed to tell us earlier," she said, voice quiet but edged with a threat.
"I was supposed to tell you when you were ready," Grimm snapped, eyes narrowing. "You're not. But the shadows don't care about that."
He leapt down in front of her and began to pace, tail flicking. "There's a reason Nyx watches you so closely. Why the ground changes when you fight. Why the moon bleeds red when you dream."
Her breath caught.
"You weren't just born with two souls. You were born between worlds. A bridge. A flaw. A weapon. Nocturnae blood runs through you, but so does something older. Something that remembers the dark before gods."
Therrin flinched. Ari did not.
Grimm stopped and looked up at her, his voice growing soft. "The prophecy was never about saving you. It was about surviving you."
Silence wrapped around them like fog.
"There are creatures," Grimm continued. "Shadowspawn. Born from the spaces in between—where dead things go when even the gods turn away. They felt your awakening. They know your scent now. And they will come."
Therrin's throat moved in a slow, fearful swallow.
"Why us?" she whispered—herself this time. Grimm could feel her reclaiming space from Ari, just enough.
He closed his eyes. "Because your soul is like a key. Two halves that were never meant to be whole. And keys open doors."
"And what's on the other side?" she asked.
Grimm didn't answer right away.
When he did, his voice was barely audible. "Things that want to be let in."
Ari surged again, angry. "You've known this the whole time?"
"I've known only pieces," Grimm snapped. "Nyx doesn't give full truths. She gives riddles and shadows. I only know what I feel in my bones—and what I saw when I looked into the Pool of Ebon."
He looked up, eyes glowing now. "You have a choice, girls. But not much time to make it. Stay divided, and the shadows will devour you. Fuse too fast, and you'll lose yourselves."
Therrin leaned back, breath trembling. "And what about Dion?"
Ah. There it was. The final piece.
Grimm hesitated. "He's your anchor. Your balance. But he's also your risk. If he loves one more than the other…" He trailed off.
"He'll break us," Ari finished grimly.
Grimm nodded. "Or be broken himself."
A howl rang in the distance. Low. Wrong. It didn't belong to any living thing of this forest.
Grimm stiffened. "They're close."
He turned back to Therrin, softer now. "You have strength, both of you. But you need each other. And you need him."
"But what if he can't?" Therrin whispered. "What if he can't love us both?"
Grimm stared at her. "Then you burn. And the world burns with you."
He leapt up onto the rock once more and looked into the shadows beyond the trees. "Rest while you can. The next chapter of your story has teeth."