CHAPTER 55: The Blood-Stained Path
CHAPTER 55: The Blood-Stained Path
Ella’s POV
Silence. It pressed in from every side, thick and suffocating. The kind of silence that comes after a scream so loud the world hasn’t recovered yet.
Lyra’s scream.
I could still hear it, still feel it echoing inside my bones like a warning carved into my soul.
Alex held me against his chest, his arms shaking as much as mine. His heartbeat was fast, wild, uneven. He wasn’t just injured. He was terrified.
“We’ll get her back,” he repeated, voice hoarse, but stubborn. “Ella, look at me.”
I didn’t want to move not yet but he gently tilted my face up anyway.
His golden eyes were dim, almost dull from exhaustion, but they held that same fierce promise.
“We are not leaving her to that thing,” he said.
I nodded weakly. “But how…? Alex, he walked through walls. He didn’t even have” My voice cracked. “He didn’t even have a real body.”
Alex’s jaw tightened. “Shadow kings didn’t need bodies. They were born from magic, from old curses and old wars. But even they have limits.”
“Do you really believe that?”
He hesitated. And that was enough to break something deep in me.
I pulled away from him, pacing, my hands trembling. “She begged me,” I whispered. “She begged me to kill her. She knew something was wrong. She knew she wouldn’t come back.”
Alex pushed himself to his feet, though his legs shook violently. He grimaced, holding his ribs.
“Ella, listen…”
“I left her,” I said, the words barely audible. “I let him take her. Again.”
A tear slipped down my cheek. I wiped it away angrily.
Alex stepped closer. “You didn’t let anything happen. That thing, whatever he is, took her by force. You fought. You stayed. You held onto her until the last second.”
“It wasn’t enough.”
“It was everything,” Alex said firmly. “And Lyra knows that.”
My throat tightened so hard I couldn’t breathe.
For a moment, Alex simply stood there, quietly watching me crumble. Then he reached out and took my hand slowly, carefully as if he was afraid I might break.
“We’re not done,” he whispered. “This isn’t the end.”
I swallowed hard. “But we don’t even know where he took her.”
“We will.”
His confidence was almost unnatural. Unreal.
I frowned. “How?”
Alex knelt beside the spot where Lyra had floated, where her body had pulsed with light and touched the ground. His fingers brushed over a faint scorch mark, a circle burned into the stone.
A symbol. A crescent, A star. A jagged line through both.
My skin crawled. “What is that?”
Alex stared at it, face draining of color.
“It’s a Blood Moon sigil.”
My breath caught. “But…Blood Moons haven’t existed for centuries.”
“They have.” Alex’s voice dropped. “They just haven’t been awake.”
I shivered.
“And Lyra…” Alex continued softly, “…Lyra was marked by them. That wasn’t a Seer’s curse. It was a summoning mark.”
“A summoning for what?” I whispered.
Alex’s gaze lifted to me.
“To bring back their king.”
My stomach churned.
But before the panic could swallow me whole, Alex suddenly stiffened. His nostrils flared.
“Someone’s coming.”
My spine jolted. “Blood wolves?”
“No.” His eyes sharpened. “Not wolves. Something else.”
The cave trembled lightly footsteps echoing from the entrance.
Alex moved in front of me instantly, still injured, but shielding me anyway.
The shadows near the entrance shifted.
A figure stepped inside.
Not a king. Not a monster but A woman.
Her cloak was dark green, the hood pulled low. She carried a staff carved from bone and stone, and her boots barely made a sound on the ground. When she lifted her head, her eyes glowed faint silver.
Alex stiffened. “A Seer.”
My breath caught. “Lyra’s Seer?”
“No.” The woman’s voice was calm, almost gentle. “The one you saw before was a child. I am her elder.”
She stopped three steps away, her eyes resting on the scorch mark.
“He has awakened,” she whispered.
Alex growled softly. “You Seers did this. You marked Lyra. You pushed her into this.”
The woman shook her head slowly. “We warned her. She chose her path. We only allowed it.”
Alex’s fists tightened. “Allowed it?”
“She wished for power to escape her father’s control. She wished to matter. To be something other than a pawn.” Her gaze lifted to me. “And desperation opens doors that should remain sealed.”
My heart cracked. “And now she’s being ripped apart.”
The Seer’s expression softened. “Not yet. The king cannot take her completely, not until the next Blood Moon rises.”
“When is that?” Alex demanded.
The Seer hesitated.
“Forty days.”
So soon, Too soon.
“What do we do?” I whispered, voice barely steady.
The Seer stepped closer. A faint light pulsed from her fingertips as she touched the burned sigil.
“You hunt him,” she said. “You track the king. You follow his darkness through the woods of the old world. You reach the Blood Moon altar before he completes the bond.”
“And then?” Alex asked.
The Seer looked between us.
“Then you choose who dies.”
My blood turned to ice. “What?”
“The king cannot be banished without a sacrifice,” she said quietly. “A life for a life.”
“No,” Alex growled. “No one dies.”
Her eyes met his.
“One of you must.”
The cave fell silent again.
But this silence wasn’t hollow, It was final.
Deadly, And full of prophecy.
Alex tightened his grip on my hand.
“We’ll find another way,” he said through his teeth. “There’s always another way.”
The Seer gave him a long, pitying look.
“Hope is not a strategy, Alpha.”
Then she turned to leave.
But before she stepped out of the cave, she looked back at me.
“Ella,” she said softly. “The king took Lyra because she is marked. But he hunts you because you are not.”
A chill ripped through me.
“What does that mean?” I whispered.
The Seer’s voice was quiet, but it hit like a blade.
“You are the true threat.”
Then she vanished into the darkness outside.
Alex pulled me close immediately. His forehead pressed against mine.
“We’ll stop this,” he whispered.
But for the first time, I wasn’t sure.
Because forty days wasn’t long, Because Lyra was fading. And because the king was coming for me next.