The whisper from the ruins stayed lodged in my skull long after we left the collapsing stone behind. It slithered around the edges of my thoughts with slow, deliberate movements. Not loud. Not forceful. Almost patient.
Eidos is building his new body.
Hazel kept glancing over her shoulder as we moved into the forest. Zack stayed close to her. Jax stuck to my side, silent and alert, one hand wrapped around his blade and the other never far from reaching for me.
The forest felt wrong the moment we entered it. Wrong in a heavy way. Wrong in a way that made my lungs tighten.
Shadows flickered between the trees like shapes not fully committed to existing. Not animals. Not spirits. Not the hybrid. Something else. They moved like silhouettes that had forgotten how to be solid, drifting between
