Chapter 65: The Boy’s Fire
"Camille!" Beckett’s voice tore through the thick curtain of trees, echoing against the craggy hills that bordered the estate’s northern edge. His boots crunched over frostbitten roots as he moved faster, eyes scanning every twisted shadow that dared to shift in the underbrush.
No answer. Just wind, cold and cruel, whispering through the pines like a warning.
His chest heaved as he stopped on a ridge, snow melting on his skin beneath the layers. "Camille, if you can hear me, say something!" The sharp mountain air cut at his throat, but he didn’t care. Hours had passed since she vanished. Hours since Savannah had placed the torn journal page in his hand and whispered, She didn’t leave. She was taken.
He’d known where to look. He’d traced the small path Camille used to walk when no one else was watching , the same trail she’d once shown him as her "thinking spot." The one that led nowhere and everywhere at once. But this time, it felt different. The silence wasn’t peaceful. It was loaded. Laced with something that made the hairs on his arms rise and his wolf claw beneath his skin.
Branches snapped. Low, to his right. Instinct moved faster than thought. He dropped into a crouch, pulling the blade from his boot just as the figure lunged.
A blur of black and gray, no scent until it was too late.
Claws slashed across his shoulder, burning through coat and flesh alike. Beckett roared and rolled, landing a boot to the attacker’s side, sending them crashing into the snow-dusted brush. He rose instantly, blood soaking through the wool at his collarbone.
Not a rogue. Too fast. Too quiet.
Syndicate.
The figure stood. The mask slipped, revealing a male face painted in white ash, eyes pupil-less, gleaming like polished bone. "You shouldn’t have come alone," he hissed, flexing clawed fingers dripping with something green.
Poison.