The forest groaned beneath the weight of ice.
Each branch sagged low, creaking like tired bones. Snow drifted down in lazy sheets, soft as feathers—beautiful, if you weren't trying to survive it. Aryelle pulled her cloak tighter and pressed on, her boots crunching frozen earth.
They'd been traveling for three days through the Frostwood. No roads. No sun. Just endless white and trees like skeletal fingers.
Halric grunted behind her. "Still no sign of your shadowy boyfriend."
Aryelle didn't turn around. "He's not my—"
"I know, I know," Halric said, smirking. "You're just marching us toward a murderer because of a dream and a few campfire rumors. That makes so much more sense."
"If you're scared," she said, "go home."
"And miss the dramatic confrontation between the exiled queen and the blade-wielding death myth? Never."
Aryelle rolled her eyes but smiled faintly. She'd grown up around noblemen who praised her smile like it was a sunrise. Halric, a disgraced knight who drank too much and cursed even more, never noticed it unless it was at his expense.
They made a good team. Or a terrible one. She hadn't decided.
But even his jokes couldn't hide the truth: something was wrong.
The wind had changed.
The birds had vanished.
And twice now, she'd seen figures in the trees—too far to call out, too quick to catch. Watching.
They weren't alone.
Aryelle halted suddenly, hand on the hilt of her dagger. Halric tensed, reaching for his sword.
"What is it?" he whispered.
Then they heard it.
A low growl, deep and guttural, echoing from the woods ahead.
"Wolves," Aryelle muttered.
"Big ones," Halric added. "That's not hunger. That's hunting."
The growl was answered by another. Then another. Surrounding them.
Shadows moved between the trees—lithe, white-furred beasts, almost invisible against the snow. Not normal wolves. Icefangs. Their eyes glowed with pale blue fire, and their teeth dripped frost.
Aryelle drew her dagger. Halric raised his longsword.
"Circle formation?" he asked.
"I thought you hated that."
"I hate dying more."
The first Icefang lunged from the brush.
Aryelle spun and slashed, her blade carving a shallow cut across its snout. The beast shrieked and recoiled, snow exploding beneath it.
Two more attacked from the side. Halric met them with a roar, sword cleaving through fur and frost. One dropped. The other sank its teeth into his arm.
He cried out—but before Aryelle could move, a shadow passed through the trees.
No footsteps. No sound.
Just a blur of black smoke—and then a clean, wet slice.
The wolf's head hit the snow.
Aryelle blinked.
He was there.
Tall. Cloaked in black. A blade of curved metal in his hand that shimmered like glass dipped in ink. His face was half-shadowed, silver and black eyes catching the moonlight like twin stars.
Kael.
"You've made quite the mess," he said, voice cold and dry. "These woods were peaceful until you started bleeding everywhere."
Aryelle didn't lower her weapon. "You're him."
He tilted his head slightly. "And you're late."