The wind whispered through the Silverwood, carrying with it the faint scent of damp earth and iron. Between the gnarled roots and the tangled undergrowth, a figure crouched low, eyes gleaming like coals hidden beneath ash.
He had followed the prince from the palace gates, silent as mist. Few guards questioned Kael's late-night wanderings—he was known to patrol the outskirts when restless—but none knew he had strayed into the healer's cottage. None but him.
The Watcher.
He was no man in truth, though he wore the shape of one. His limbs were too long, his shadow too sharp, and when he exhaled, the night itself seemed to bend around him. Cloaked in the veil of Varrow's sorcery, he was a spy woven from darkness, a thread of the Shadow King's curse.
Through the cracked shutters of the cottage, he saw them: the healer standing rigid, the prince close enough to touch. Saw the glow of embers flicker across her face, and the unspoken words trembling between them.
So. The healer was not ordinary.
A grin stretched across the Watcher's face, teeth glinting in the dark. He would bring this news to the Chancellor. And Varrow would know how to turn it into a blade.
But before he left, he pressed a clawed hand into the earth, whispering in a tongue older than the kingdom itself. The ground quivered. Roots shifted. From the soil crawled things that wore the skins of wolves but whose eyes burned with shadow. They slunk into the forest, spreading like a stain toward the village.
Inside the cottage, Isolde shivered. A coldness brushed her spine, though the fire still glowed. She glanced at the window, sensing eyes that should not be there.
Kael noticed too. His hand went to the hilt of his sword. "You feel it," he murmured.
"Yes," she breathed. "Something is out there."
Before she could say more, a howl split the night. Not the howl of any beast she had ever known, but a broken sound—part scream, part growl, threaded with hunger and rage.
The Watcher's work had begun.
Kael drew his blade, its steel catching the firelight. He turned to her, his expression caught between command and plea. "Stay behind me."
Isolde's heart raced, but she clutched her satchel of herbs and the small dagger she kept hidden in her skirts. "I will not cower while shadows hunt us."
The first shadow-wolf lunged against the door, splintering the wood with claws sharper than iron.
The healer and the prince stood shoulder to shoulder as darkness pressed in.
And beyond the trees, the Watcher melted back into night, already whispering the healer's secret into the current of shadow that would carry it straight to Varrow's ear.