CHAPTER 59: CLOSE TO SAFETY

He was dead.

The brown-furred wolf that had nearly torn me apart lay broken in the snow, neck snapped cleanly by the coil of shadow that had struck like a serpent.

The sight was sickening.

I was relieved that I survived, but the relief was short-lived.

Shapes moved through the white haze, wolves tearing through the battlefield, their eyes fixed one direction.

They weren’t slowing. They were coming for me.

I staggered backward, my boots slipping against the snow. The shadows swirled around me, thickening, curling like storm clouds given form.

Through their veil, I could still see the wolves closing in. Too many, too fast.

My pulse hammered, and my breath clouded the air in sharp bursts.

I spun, searching for him. If the shadows were here, then Rion had to be close. He had to be watching.

But there was no silver hair glinting in the frost, no crimson or ocean eyes burning through the mist.

Only shadows, endless and suffocating, hemming me in.

And then his voice slid into my head. Low and smooth.

"After you left me, you’re looking for me now?"

I froze, my chest seizing. He wasn’t anywhere near me, but he was inside my head.

His words brushed through my mind like they belonged there.

I bared my teeth, whispering through gritted anger as I ran, the snow crunching beneath every desperate step.

"You traded me off."

The shadows kept pace, flowing effortlessly around me, striking at the wolves that lunged too close.

Their howls of pain echoed behind me, and still I kept running, breath burning, lungs clawing for air.

"I gave you a choice," Rion replied coolly.

"You tricked me!" I snarled, my throat raw, the words tearing free like claws.

Why was he saving me now? Why bother shielding me when he’d already bartered me away like a trinket in exchange for some ancient relic?

His motives intrigued me, really.

"Where are you?" I cried into the snowy clearing, my voice trembling as much from rage as exhaustion. "Why are your shadows here? Were you following us all this time?"

If he had been trailing us, watching from the dark... why? For what?

The shadows gave no answer, only tightened their circle around me. They didn’t hinder me, in fact they seemed to guide me.

Wherever I stumbled, they seemed to nudge me forward, their coils brushing lightly against my legs, as though directing me down a path only they could see.

The sound of pursuit grew louder. More wolves had broken from the fight. Their snarls snapped across the clearing like thunder, their paws thundered against the frozen ground.

I barely had time to flinch before shadows whipped backward like lances.

Screams filled the air—harsh, guttural, cut short. Pain bled through their growls, the kind of agony that only ended in silence. Then came the thuds of bodies falling, heavy and final against the snow.

I didn’t look back.

I didn’t need to look back. The sounds alone were enough for me to know. Wolves cut down, their lifeless forms littering the path behind me.

Once, I would have felt something. Sympathy. Guilt. At least a flicker of pity. But not now. Not after the blood I had seen, not after deaths that clung to me like a second skin.

I only ran.

And ran.

Each step grew heavier. The cold gnawed at my bones, seeping through my coat, numbing my fingers until I could barely feel them.

My breath came in ragged gasps, sharp and uneven, scraping the back of my throat raw. My legs screamed, each movement slower than the last.

And still, I pressed forward, because to stop was to die.

But in the end, my body betrayed me.

I stumbled, knees buckling, and collapsed into the snow.

The icy ground swallowed me, its chill biting through the layers of fur and fabric, sucking the strength straight from my limbs.

I lay there, gasping, staring up at the misty sky where flakes drifted down lazily, so soft, so careless against the chaos of my world.

My scent was everywhere now, smeared across the ground in a trail of desperation.

Any wolf who survived the fight could track me without effort.

And I had nothing left to give.

"If you stop running, they’ll be right on your trail sooner than you think," Rion’s voice whispered into my mind again.

"Then you kill them with your shadows."

The words left me like a challenge, sharp and reckless, but I couldn’t pull them back.

For a heartbeat, there was silence. Then a low chuckle stirred through my mind, dark and soft, almost sweet.

It wasn’t mocking, not quite. That would have been easier to stomach. No, it was worse, it was amused. And it felt... intimate.

"You even have the audacity to command me now?"

My breath caught. Heat flared in my throat, shame rushing hot beneath my skin.

Why had I said that? Why had I let weakness slip through, even for a second? After all the curses I’d hurled at him earlier, after all the walls I’d tried to build, I had just admitted—no, demanded—that I needed him.

But I didn’t take it back.

I couldn’t.

Because as much as I hated him, as much as I wanted to claw at his face until his smirk bled, I was relieved.

Relieved that his shadows came to save me. Relieved to hear his voice in the middle of all this chaos.

The shadows pressed closer, curling around me like a shroud. Their chill slid across my skin, seeping deep, but instead of freezing me, it steadied me. It dulled the ache in my limbs, numbed the fire of exhaustion.

Slowly, almost unnervingly, the cold ebbed away. What replaced it wasn’t warmth from fire, nor breath, nor life... it was something stranger.

A quiet warmth radiating from the darkness itself. From him.

I closed my eyes for just a moment, too weary to resist the pull, and the sensation brushed close to comfort. Close to safety.

Then his voice came again, softer now, coaxing, dangerous in its gentleness. "Come back, Vivien."