Chapter 22 Chapter 22: The Scavengers of the Void
The Tundra had become a nightmare of violet light and static. The sky wasn't just dark; it was bruised. The violet moon hung like a bloated eye, casting shadows that didn't move with the wind. Beneath its gaze, the snow had turned to a gritty, grey salt that crunched under my boots like the bones of birds.
I had walked for hours. My feet were numb, my breath coming in shallow, ragged stabs of ice. Without the golden heat of the child or the silver vitality of the bond, I was a mortal girl in a world that had forgotten how to be kind to mortals.
The only thing keeping me upright was the vibration. Deep in the pit of my stomach, where the child had once been, a phantom cold throbbed in time with the violet moon. It was Fenris. I could feel his spirit being stretched, used as a bridge for the Void to pour into our world. Every step I took felt like I was walking away from him, yet the deeper I went into the wastes, the louder his silent scream became.
I reached a ridge overlooking a shallow valley. Below, the wreckage of a caravan lay scattered across the grey snow. It wasn't the High Priest’s golden wagons or the Council’s iron carriages. These were simple wooden carts, their covers shredded, their horses long gone.
And around the fires—dying, sputtering flickers of blue flame—were the survivors.
I didn't see Alphas. I didn't see the proud warriors of the Blackwood or the Crag. I saw wolves who looked like they had been hollowed out. Their fur was patchy, their eyes wide and bloodshot. They weren't shifting; they were huddled together, shivering in their human forms, wrapped in moth-eaten furs.
As I descended the ridge, a low, weak growl echoed from the shadows of a tilted wagon.
"Stop right there, stranger," a voice rasped. It was a woman’s voice, but it lacked the command of a pack leader. It sounded like dry leaves scraping on stone.
A woman stepped into the blue firelight. She was tall, her face scarred by frostbite, holding a jagged piece of obsidian tied to a stick. Behind her, three men rose, their movements sluggish and heavy.
"I’m not a stranger," I said, my voice cracking. I pulled back my hood.
The woman’s eyes widened. She dropped the spear. "The Bride," she whispered. "The one who broke the Altar."
"I am Nina," I said, standing as tall as my trembling legs would allow. "And I am looking for the path to the Root of the Moon."
A man with a mangled arm let out a bitter, hacking laugh. "The Root? You’re standing on it, girl. The whole world is becoming the Root. Look at the sky. The Void is drinking the light, and your 'King' is the one holding the cup."
"He’s not holding it," I snapped, a spark of my old fire returning to my eyes. "He’s the prisoner. The child... and my sister... they are using him."
The woman, whose name was Vane, stepped closer. She sniffed the air, her nostrils flaring. "You smell like ash. There’s no fire in you anymore. No wolf, no Ancient. Why should we help a ghost?"
"Because I’m the only one who knows how to break the bridge," I said, stepping into the circle of their fire. I looked at each of them—the broken remnants of the Northern packs. "You’re waiting here to die. You think that because your Alphas fled or turned into God-Slayers, you have no pack left. But the Void doesn't care about your rank. It will eat the Alpha as easily as the Omega."
Vane looked at the violet moon, her jaw tightening. "The God-Slayers are hunting us. They say the new King—the Obsidian Child—is calling for all Lycans to join the Void. Those who refuse are... changed."
"I saw what they did to my sister," I said softly. "I saw what they did to the Sun-Forge. If you stay here, you are just waiting for the hunger to find you."
"And if we go with you?" Vane asked. "To the Root? No one comes back from the Underworld, Nina. It’s where the first sins of our kind are buried."
"Then we go to exhume them," I said. "I need to reach the Cracked Crown. If I can find the First Mother’s fire, I can give you back your strength. I can give Fenris back his life."
Vane looked at her companions. They were desperate, starving, and terrified. But in the mention of the First Mother, I saw a flicker of something that the Void hadn't quite managed to extinguish: hope. It was a small, fragile thing, like the blue flame in their hearth.
"We have no horses," Vane said, picking up her spear. "And we have very little meat. But we know the tunnels beneath the Tundra better than any Council spy."
"That’s all I need," I said.
Suddenly, the blue fire turned black.
The air grew still, the wind dying in an instant. From the darkness beyond the wagons, a sound emerged—a wet, rhythmic squelch, like something heavy being dragged through mud.
"They're here," Vane hissed, her eyes turning a panicked yellow. "The Chained."
Out of the violet gloom, three figures emerged. They were Lycans, but their limbs had been elongated and fused with jagged shards of obsidian. Chains of black smoke wrapped around their necks, trailing back into the darkness. They didn't growl; they emitted a high-pitched, vibrating hum that made my teeth ache.
They were the child’s hounds.
"Nina, get back!" Vane yelled, thrusting her spear forward.
The first Chained lunged. It moved with an unnatural, stuttering speed, its obsidian claws tearing through the wooden wagon as if it were paper. Vane’s spear snapped like a toothpick.
I felt the cold shard in my pocket—the ice-crystal from the Frost-Collector. I pulled it out. It was a pathetic weapon against a monster of the Void, but as the Chained turned its eyeless face toward me, the phantom vibration in my stomach roared.
“Kill... them...” The voice wasn't the child’s. It was Fenris. For a split second, the bond flared—not with power, but with a desperate, agonizing direction. He was fighting them from the inside. He was slowing them down.
The Chained froze, its obsidian limbs trembling.
"Now!" I screamed at Vane’s men. "The throat! Hit them now!"
Encouraged by the monster’s sudden paralysis, the two men lunged with their stone knives. They buried them in the creature’s neck. Instead of blood, a thick, black smoke poured out. The creature dissolved into a pile of ash and jagged stone.
The other two Chained hissed, the smoke chains around their necks tightening as if they were being whipped by an invisible master. They lunged again, but the opening had been enough. Vane and her scouts fought with the desperation of cornered animals, finally bringing the monsters down.
As the last of the Chained vanished into smoke, Vane turned to me, her chest heaving, her face splattered with black soot. She looked at the ice-crystal in my hand, then at the violet moon.
"He’s still in there," she whispered. "The King. He’s fighting for us."
"He’s fighting for me," I said, my voice steady for the first time. "And I’m going to get him out."
Vane nodded, a grim set to her shoulders. She turned to the survivors. "Pack what’s left! We move for the Sinkhole at dawn. We’re going to the Underworld."
I sat back down by the dying fire, clutching the ice-crystal. The violet moon watched me, cold and hungry. I knew the Chained were just the beginning. My son was hunting me, and my sister was leading the pack.
But I wasn't the kitchen-girl anymore. I was a Queen without a throne, leading a pack of ghosts into the heart of the dark.