Chapter 36 The link
"These things are connected to a golden trail," I finally said, before he could stop me. "I saw a path amidst the destruction. It wasn't a place… it was a direction."
Conrad frowned.
"Direction to where?"
I shook my head.
"To something hidden. Where the light doesn't reach." The words left my mouth with a certainty that wasn't just mine. "A book."
The silence that settled was heavy enough to crush any hope.
"Can a book stop these creatures?" the alpha asked in a whisper.
"I don't know," I replied. "I only know that if we don't find it, what I saw won't be a vision. It will be the future."
Conrad moved closer to me, resting his forehead against mine.
"Then we will follow this trail, even if it leads us to the heart of hell."
And for the first time since that morning, I had the distinct feeling that the peace I had experienced in the garden was now part of a past that would never again belong to me.
The journey back to the castle was silent. Conrad kept one hand on my thigh, as if he needed to confirm every second that I was still there, whole, and not reduced to dust like the wolves of that pack.
I watched the road through the window, but I saw neither trees nor mountains. I saw the golden trail cutting through the world like an open wound.
When the castle gates finally closed behind us, I felt the air change. It wasn't relief. It was alert.
"Take the queen to her chambers," Conrad ordered the guards. "And allow no visitors."
"Conrad…" I tried to protest.
"Please." He touched my face with too much care for someone who ruled an entire kingdom. "Just for today."
I nodded, even knowing that this request tasted like farewell.
My rooms were exactly as I had left them. The white curtains danced in the gentle breeze, the scent of flowers still lingered in the air, and for a moment I almost believed that nothing had changed.
But it had.
As soon as the door closed behind me, the warmth pulsed again beneath my skin.
The golden trail was no longer distant.
It began beneath my feet.
I took a step back, startled, and stumbled over the small table where I used to place ordinary books, old novels, empty notebooks. The impact caused something to slide out from the side of the furniture.
A compartment I had never noticed before.
The wood creaked slightly, as if it were being opened after centuries.
I knelt on the floor, my heart nearly leaping from my throat, and pulled out the false bottom.
Inside there was no gold or jewels.
There were pages.
Yellowed pages, hand-stitched, covered in symbols I had seen before… in the flame of the ceremony, in the petals of the bouquet, in the swirling wind that only I had felt.
The book.
My hands trembled so much I almost dropped it.
When I touched the cover, the golden trail exploded in light around me, drawing the same symbol in the air: three moons intertwined by lines that looked like roots.
And then I heard the voice.
Not inside my head.
Behind me.
"So you finally found it."
My whole body stiffened.
The voice wasn't Conrad's. Nor any of the guards'. It was feminine, low, as if it had traveled centuries to reach me.
I turned slowly.
A woman stood near the window, enveloped in a shadow that didn't belong to the light of the room. Her hair was white as ash, but her eyes shone with a deep gold, the same as the path I had been seeing since the night of the party.
"Who are you?" I asked, barely recognizing my own voice.
"I've been called many things." She tilted her head slightly. "But, for you, I am the last memory of what we were."
My heart raced.
"You can't be here. No one came in."
She smiled sadly.
"I don't come in. I awaken."
I looked at the book in my hands, and understood even before she said it.
"You are… a hybrid."
"I was." Her voice faltered for the first time. "Before they hunted us like we were a plague."
The air in the room began to vibrate, the curtains rippling as if an invisible wind passed through them.
"The black cloaks…" I whispered. "They are the same ones I saw."
"They are the Void Hunters." The woman approached, and each step seemed to leave small fissures of light on the floor. "They don't kill bodies. They erase existences."
I closed my eyes for a moment, feeling my stomach churn.
"That's what's left of the hybrids. Dust. A cloak." My voice faltered. "They didn't die… they were erased."
"Exactly." She stopped before me. "And now they've returned because of you."
"Because of me?" I raised my head, shocked.
"Because you are the Link." She lightly touched the symbol that now burned beneath my skin. "The last bridge between what we were and what can still exist."
I looked at the closed door, imagining Conrad on the other side of the castle, believing I was merely resting.
"I didn't ask for this."
"No." The hybrid replied softly. "But the Moon asked for you."
The book in my hands opened by itself, revealing pages I had never seen before. Names began to appear, one after another, written in liquid gold.
Hundreds.
Thousands.
Some of them shone brighter than others.
"They still live." She said, pointing to the shimmering names. "Hidden, fragmented, waiting for someone to call them a people again."
A lump formed in my throat.
"What if I fail?"
The hybrid raised her gaze, firm as stone.
"Then the world will forget that hybrids ever existed."
Silence fell like a sentence.
On the other side of the door, I heard footsteps approaching.
Conrad.
The doorknob turned.
I slammed the book shut, almost tearing the golden pages from my mind. The room returned to normal in the blink of an eye—still curtains, heavy air, ordinary silence. The woman was no longer there.
But the symbol under my skin still burned.
Conrad entered carefully, as if afraid to wake me from a nightmare.
"Are you alright, my love?" He approached slowly. "The guards said they heard some noises. You're pale."
I nodded, trying to reorganize the thoughts that were still screaming inside me.
"I was just muttering about some confusing parts of the day." I lied again.
Conrad closed the door behind him and came to me, placing his hands on my shoulders.
"I know you better than that." His eyes scanned my face. "Since yesterday you've had the same look you have when you're about to sacrifice yourself for something you haven't told anyone."
My chest tightened.
"I just don't want to ruin anything." I replied softly.
He sighed, resting his forehead against mine.
"You don't ruin the world, Maya. You change it."
I swallowed hard, remembering the hybrid's words.
The Bond.
The last bridge.
"We need to go back to the alpha's room." I murmured. "That… cloak isn't just a remnant of an attack. It's something alive".