The forest wept.

  Bck sap oozed from the trees, pooling in the crevices of bark split open like old wounds. The air hung heavy with the stench of rotting earth and burnt sugar, so thick Zerith could taste it on his tongue. Seraphine walked beside him, her fingers brushing the consteltion tattoo on her wrist. The star beled Veyne had cracked, its light reduced to a faint, sickly glimmer.

  “It’s getting colder,” she murmured, flexing her hand.

  Zerith adjusted his grip on Stormhowl, the bde’s edge still nicked and dull from their st skirmish. “The Blight or Veyne?”

  “Both.”

  A branch snapped.

  They froze. The woods had fallen silent—no birds, no wind, just the low, rhythmic drip of sap hitting the forest floor. Then the trees began to breathe.

  The stag emerged from the shadows, its antlers twisted into jagged wire, eyes glowing venom green. But it was the voice that stopped Zerith’s heart.

  “Zerith.”

  The stag’s mouth didn’t move. The sound came from everywhere the creaking branches, the shuddering leaves, the earth itself. Veyne’s voice, warped and yered with an ominous echo.

  “Don’t listen,” Seraphine warned, her hands glowing silver.

  “You left me Zerith,” the woods hissed. “You let them take me.”

  Zerith's mind started unconsciously questioning himself, "Was it my fault? Am I the reason for him to leave?"

  The stag attacked with a dash.

  Stormhowl cleaved the air, but the stag dissolved into mist, re-forming behind him. Its antlers sshed his arm, drawing blood that sizzled where it hit the ground.

  “It’s not real!” Seraphine shouted, her light fring.

  The stag charged again. Zerith tried to dodge it this time, but roots erupted from the soil, tangling his legs. Seraphine’s light seared through the vines, her scream raw as the Blight recoiled.

  “You’re too te,” the stag crooned, circling them. “He’s ours now.”

  Seraphine’s tattoo bzed. She pressed her palm to the earth, and silver fmes erupted in a ring around them. The stag shrieked, its form flickering revealing a hollowed out carcass, ribs stuffed with writhing bck moss.

  Zerith struck the stag.

  The bde bit deep. The stag colpsed, its final breath a rasping ugh that echoed like Veyne’s.

  Silence fell.

  Seraphine slumped, her gloves torn to shred, the skin beneath blistering. Zerith caught her arm, “You’re burning yourself out.”

  She yanked free. “And you’re reckless. Charging in like that what if it was him?”

  “It wasn’t.”

  “You don’t know that!”

  The trees groaned. Above them, the crimson star pulsed, its light refracting through the sap coated branches like bloodied tears.

  They found a vilge at dusk.

  Or what was left of it.

  Houses stood frozen in pools of amber like resin, faces trapped mid scream behind the translucent walls. Seraphine reached out, her reflection warping in the sludge.

  “Don’t touch it,” Zerith said.

  Too te.

  The amber moved. A hand burst free, cwing at her wrist skeletal, Blight-rotted, its fingers snapping like twigs as she stumbled back.

  “We need to go,” she whispered.

  Zerith didn’t argue.

  That night, Seraphine dreamed of Veyne.

  He stood in a hall of shattered mirrors, the crown’s thorns digging into his skull. “Find me,” he begged, blood trickling from his eyes. “Before I forget you, come save me Sera.”

  She woke to the taste of metal, her tattoo icy against her skin.

  The Veyne star had split in two.