The forest did not welcome us.
At dawn, mist clung low to the ground, curling around broken roots and jagged stones like grasping fingers. The air was thick too still, too watchful. Even the birds had abandoned this place, leaving behind a silence that pressed against my ears until it rang.
I adjusted my grip on Luna as we moved deeper between the trees. She leaned heavily against me, her steps uneven, breath shallow. She tried to hide it, but I felt every tremor in her body.
She was lighter than she should have been.
That terrified me more than the shadows.
Twenty years alone had taught me how to survive. How to kill. How to disappear.
It had not taught me how to protect someone else.
"Stop," she murmured suddenly.
I froze.
My senses sharpened instantly, the curse beneath my skin stirring like a coiled beast. I scanned the trees, the undergrowth, the space between breaths. Nothing moved. No footsteps. No distorted breathing. No monsters.
"What is it?" I asked.
She pressed a hand to her wrist, fingers curling over the dark symbol burned into her skin. The mark pulsed faintly beneath her touch.
"It's… waking up."
The symbol flared.
Luna gasped, her knees buckling as pain ripped through her. I caught her before she hit the ground, lowering her carefully against a fallen tree. Her skin burned beneath my hands not fever, not injury, but something deeper. Something wrong.
The mark throbbed now.
Not just heat hunger.
It behaved like a mouth.
Each pulse sent a violent tremor through her body, stealing her breath, arching her back as if something inside her was trying to claw its way out. I had seen curses before watched them rot men from the inside out but this was different.
This mark wasn't killing her.
It was calling.
"Does it ever stop?" I asked quietly, pressing my thumb just below the symbol, careful not to touch it directly.
She shook her head, teeth clenched. "It listens. Sometimes it sleeps. But it never forgets."
A curse that remembers.
Something ancient twisted in my chest.
The forest answered.
A low growl rolled through the trees, vibrating through the ground beneath our feet. Shadows stretched unnaturally long, pooling between the trunks, thickening, taking shape.
I stood, drawing my blade in one smooth motion.
"Stay behind me," I said.
She laughed weakly. "You say that like I have a choice."
The first creature emerged from the mist humanoid, but wrong. Its limbs bent at impossible angles, skin stretched too tight over bone, eyes glowing with a sick, hungry light. Then another. And another.
They weren't circling us.
They were converging on her.
The mark on Luna's wrist burned brighter.
"So it's true," I muttered. "You're a beacon."
The creatures lunged.
The curse surged through my veins, hot and violent, sharpening my senses until the world narrowed to movement and intent. I met the first monster head-on, blade flashing as I severed its arm at the elbow. Black blood sprayed across my face, warm and sticky.
Another slammed into me from the side. Its claws sank into my shoulder, tearing through leather and flesh. Pain exploded but I welcomed it.
I laughed.
The sound startled even me.
Pain fed the curse. It sharpened it.
I drove my blade upward, splitting the creature from groin to throat. It collapsed in a heap of twitching limbs, dissolving into smoke before it hit the ground.
More came.
I fought like something unchained every strike precise, every movement lethal. Blood coated the forest floor like spilled ink. My arm burned, my ribs screamed, but I didn't slow.
I couldn't.
Because every time I glanced back, Luna's face was paler. Her breaths shorter.
A monster broke through my guard, slamming me backward into a tree. The impact knocked the air from my lungs. Before I could recover, it lunged for her.
"No!"
I moved on instinct.
The blade left my hand, spinning through the air as I threw myself between them. It pierced the creature's skull with a wet crack. I crashed to my knees, gasping, blood pouring freely down my arm.
And then I saw Luna fall.
She collapsed against the tree, the mark blazing like a brand fresh from the fire. Her scream cut through the forest, raw and broken.
Something inside me snapped.
I ripped my blade free and charged, tearing through the remaining monsters with a fury I hadn't felt in years. Bone shattered. Flesh split. Blood soaked into the earth until the ground itself seemed to recoil.
When the last creature dissolved into shadow, silence fell again.
This time, it was worse.
I staggered to Luna's side, dropping to my knees. My hands trembled as I checked her wounds there were none beyond the mark, but her pulse was wild beneath my fingers.
"You stayed," she whispered, eyes fluttering open.
"Of course I did."
"No," she insisted weakly. "You could have run. You didn't."
I leaned forward until my forehead rested against hers. "I don't run anymore."
Her fingers tightened in my shirt, anchoring me there. For a moment a dangerous, fragile moment the world felt quiet. Almost peaceful.
That scared me.
Peace never lasted.
The mark dimmed but not fully.
It pulsed once more, slower now, deliberate. As if acknowledging a decision made somewhere beyond flesh and blood.
Then a voice echoed through the trees.
Soft. Amused.
"Still protecting what isn't yours."
My blood turned to ice.
The shadows parted, and he stepped forward as if he had always been there.
Mark.
He hadn't changed. Not really. Same calm smile. Same cruel eyes that looked at suffering like it was entertainment. The man who murdered my mother. The man who ruined my life.
And now hers.
Luna stiffened. "Him," she whispered. "That's him."
Mark's gaze flicked to her wrist, lingering on the mark. "You carry it beautifully," he said. "Even better than your father did."
I rose slowly, placing myself between them.
"Touch her," I said quietly, "and I will tear you apart."
He chuckled. "You've always been dramatic."
His eyes met mine, sharp and knowing. "But you already know the truth, don't you?"
The mark flared again.
"She doesn't belong to you," Mark continued. "She belongs to the curse. And the curse… belongs to me."
The shadows thickened.
And I realized, too late, that this was only the beginning.