THE FORGOTTEN DEITY

THE FORGOTTEN DEITY

AYLA'S POV

There’s something about the old paper that makes my skin crawl. Maybe it’s the way it crackles when you touch it, or the way the ink fades just enough to make you squint. Or maybe it’s because every time we unroll one of these scrolls, we find something worse than the last.

I sit cross-legged on the floor, my back resting against a bookshelf. Thane’s beside me, one knee bent, elbow resting on it, eyes scanning the same brittle scroll I’ve been staring at for the past ten minutes. Garrick leans against the far wall with his arms crossed. He hasn’t said much yet, but he’s watching us all with that look like he already knows what this is, and he’s just waiting for us to catch up.

Leona’s the one actually reading. She sits at the center of the room, the scrolls spread out like a fan around her. Her lips move silently as she reads, her fingers tracing the symbols. Callum’s pacing behind her, mumbling things under his breath, the way people do when they’re trying to remember something important and it’s just out of reach.

“This isn’t just history,” Leona says suddenly, her voice breaking the silence like glass. “This isn’t just some warning carved into paper. This… is prophecy.”

Garrick exhales through his nose. “Yeah,” he mutters. “Figured.”

I look up sharply. “Wait, what kind of prophecy?”

Thane leans in a little, brow furrowed. “Leona. Start from the top. No riddles.”

She looks up at us, eyes serious. “It talks about a force, older than the packs, older than the witches. Something bound beneath the land, sealed there ages ago. Long before our kind even understood what it was. The scroll says it’s not evil… not exactly. It’s just power. Pure power. And it feeds off imbalance.”

“Imbalance?” I repeat. “What does that even mean?”

Callum finally stops pacing. “It means if the scales tip too far in one direction, too much darkness or too much light whatever this thing is, it wakes up.”

“Okay, so… like a battery that charges off chaos?” Thane says. “Or death?”

Leona nods slowly. “Not death. Energy. Life force. Magic. Rage. Grief. Power. Especially power tied to bloodlines. That’s why it never fully woke before. The balance always held.”

I glance at Thane, something cold spreading in my chest. “So… Nadira.”

“Exactly,” Leona says, pointing to one section of the scroll. “She wasn’t just using her own magic. She was borrowing it. This thing whatever it is it gave her power to tip the balance.”

“But she needed me to do it,” I say, voice low. “Because I was the other side of it. Light and dark.”

Garrick pushes off the wall. “That’s what she was doing all this time. Trying to drain you. She thought if she could take all of you, wipe out the light, the seal would crack.”

“But we killed her,” Thane says. “Shouldn’t that have stopped it?”

Leona shakes her head. “No. That’s the twist. Killing either side breaks the balance. It didn’t care if it was her or Ayla. As long as one of you died, the seal would weaken.”

There’s a long silence. You could hear a pin drop.

I rub my palms over my knees, trying to ground myself. “So we played right into its hands.”

“Pretty much,” Garrick mutters. “It’s been waiting for centuries. Just sitting there, biding its time. And now? Now it’s stirring.”

Callum lets out a low whistle. “What kind of entity are we talking about? A demon? A god?”

Leona shrugs. “It doesn’t say. Just calls it the Bound One. Or the Hollow Flame. Or the Echo. It has a few names, but no clear form.”

“That’s not creepy at all,” I mutter.

Thane shifts beside me, and when I look up, his eyes are on me, not just looking, but really seeing me. There’s something behind his stare that makes my stomach turn over. Worry. Maybe guilt. But also something else. Something I don’t know how to name yet.

“You okay?” he asks quietly, like he already knows I’m not.

I swallow hard and nod. “Yeah. Just… give me a second.”

Leona keeps reading, her voice softer now. “The scrolls say it’s tied to the land. Beneath the roots. Beneath the ruins. Wherever the packs built their first homes, they built them over something ancient. They didn’t know back then. But the bond was there. This thing watches. Listens. Waits.”

“And Nadira figured that out,” I say. “She always knew how to find cracks in things.”

Thane’s jaw tightens. “She didn’t care who she destroyed. Just wanted power.”

“She was desperate,” Leona says, and it makes me look up. “She wasn’t born evil. I think, at some point she made a deal. Or something close to it. And once she was in, there was no getting out.”

“Sounds like Sage,” I mutter before I can stop myself.

The room goes quiet again.

I feel Thane’s eyes on me, but I don’t look at him.

Leona clears her throat. “If this thing is waking up, we need to figure out what it wants next.”

“More imbalance,” Garrick says. “More chaos. That’s how it grows.”

“Then we can’t let it,” Thane says. “We rebuild the balance. Somehow.”

Callum frowns. “But Nadira’s dead. That leaves only Ayla. She’s still here.”

“Which means it’ll come for her next,” Garrick says grimly.

Thane’s whole body stiffens.

“Like hell it will.”

I reach for his hand without thinking, lacing my fingers through his. His grip is warm and strong, grounding. He doesn’t look at me, but his thumb brushes mine. That one small touch says everything.

“Can we stop it?” I ask. “Can we reseal it? Or is it too late?”

Leona doesn’t answer right away. She rolls up one scroll and reaches for another, her fingers moving quickly. “I don’t know yet. There are more pieces. More writing. It’s like a puzzle, but some of the pieces are missing. We need time.”

“We don’t have time,” Thane says, voice low.

And he’s right. We don’t. Something’s shifting. I can feel it. Like the air’s gone heavy again, like the ground’s holding its breath.

Callum rubs his face. “If it’s tied to bloodlines, maybe there’s a way to use that to bind it again.”

Garrick snorts. “You want to bind something we don’t even understand?”

“We have to do something though,” Leona says. “Maybe the old ways still work. Maybe Ayla’s power can…”

She trails off, eyes flicking to me.

I raise an eyebrow. “Can what?”

She hesitates. “Be a seal. If the power inside you is strong enough, maybe you can hold it back. Like a living barrier.”

Thane’s grip on my hand tightens instantly.

“Absolutely not.”

“You don’t even know what it involves yet,” Leona says gently.

“I don’t care. She’s not a damn sacrifice.”

“I didn’t say that,” Leona says. “But whatever’s coming… Ayla’s at the center of it. Like it or not.”

I don’t speak. I can’t. My mouth is dry, and my thoughts are going a million miles a minute. A living seal? A barrier?

So I live… but only to keep something else trapped?

What kind of life is that?

Thane’s staring at me now. Not saying a word. Just watching. He doesn’t need to say anything, though. I can feel the anger in him. The protectiveness. The fear.

I lean into him a little. I don’t want to be afraid right
I now. But I am.

“So what do we do next?” I ask, my voice barely above a whisper.

Leona finally answers.

“We keep reading.”