The Feral Pact

ated within her bones as if it were meant only for her. Her heart raced, pumping adrenaline through her veins as the hairs on the back of her nec

whatever would come from the darkness. The shadows seemed to writhe around her, twisting and shifting in ways that were i

dows. His eyes never left the darkness, his expression unreadable, yet something in the air between them had changed. T

ut filled with a sense of inevitability that made So

are they?" she demanded, her voice rough, thick with th

rrow mixed with an almost imperceptible fear. It was gone before she could understand it, buried beneat

elen said after a beat, his voic

y lost in time, drowned out by the noise of the present. She had never known them to be real. She had never known anything to be real except for her survival

idn't. Sh

t in her throat. It wasn't the growl of a lone creature, hungry and isolated. This was something different-

and his jaw clenched. "They are here," he mu

l, one beast-it was a chorus of them, rising from the deep like a warning bell. Solara's mind raced, trying to proc

ilent, moving like a wraith through the darkness. The figure was followed by others,

dy tensed, her instincts screaming at her to

oice urgent. "They're no

olara's breath hitched in her throat. The face beneath the hood was obscured by shadows, but she could fee

and deep, reverberating through the cavern like a dis

ords hit her, slicing through the uncertainty in

narrowing, the energy around him crackling with an

shadows stretching longer as if responding to its command. "You no longer have a say, Ebon Watcher," the voice said, its to

her bones. The Pact. The Broken Pact. She had heard the term before, but it was always in passing, always whispered aro

fear clawing at her insides. She wasn't some pawn in a game she didn't

terrible crossing its features. "You have no choice in the matter. Your blood

g beneath her feet, and for a moment, the shadows themselves seemed to pulse with life, throbbing in time with her heartbeat. She s

pressing down on her from all sides. She could feel the energy of the Pact, that a

ping against her nerves. "You cannot fight what is already

was a sound so primal, so filled with rage, that the very air seemed to freeze in its

hed as he turned to face the source o

round seemed to tremble beneath her feet. And then,

e smoke. Its eyes burned with a sickly green light, glowing in the dark as it locked onto Solara. It was no beast, no mindless monster. This

ound that reverberated through her che

ed to Solara. "It's the Feral One. The creature

deep within her soul. The broken Pact was no longer just