Chapter 10The Blood Memory

The drainage tunnel smelled of wet stone and rot. Rissa crawled behind Dorian, her knees grinding against gravel, the distant howls of the pack reverberating through the earth like a second heartbeat.

She'd heard that sound every night for three months. It used to mean safety. Now it meant they were closing in.

Dorian stopped at a rusted grate. Moonlight sliced through the bars, and beyond it, the compound rose against the treeline—stone walls, torches, shadows moving along the parapets. He pressed a finger to his lips and pointed.

Below the eastern wall, a door. Small. Iron-banded.

"Service entrance to the old holding cells," he breathed. "Fenris is two levels down."

"How do you know that?"

"I mapped every inch of this place while your pack thought I was just a drunk journalist asking too many questions."

She followed him across the open ground, staying low, feeling exposed. The door yielded to his lockpicks with a soft click, and they slipped inside.

The corridor was narrow, lined with cells that had held humans before the pack learned to dispose of them faster. Dust coated everything. But the last door—the one at the end—glowed with a faint blue light.

Moonstone ward.

Dorian tried his picks. They sparked. He cursed.

"Magic," he said. "The lock isn't mechanical."

Rissa stepped closer. The sigil pulsed, and she felt it—a pull in her chest, like the stone recognized her. Like it wanted her to touch it.

"Dorian. Cut my hand."

"What?"

"Pack blood. The ward is tied to it." She didn't know how she knew. She just did. The stone whispered it to her.

He hesitated. Then he drew a knife and made a shallow cut across her palm.

Blood welled. She pressed her hand flat against the sigil.

The ward flared hot, and for a moment, the stone screamed in her mind—*You could be more. You could be everything.* She gritted her teeth and pushed back with her own will, her own name, Elara's face.

The sigil dissolved.

The door swung open.

Fenris was chained to the far wall, his silver fur matted, ribs visible through his skin. But his eyes—yellow, sharp, furious—locked onto her the moment she entered.

"Another lamb for the slaughter," he rasped. "Or have you come to finish what the Moonstone started?"

Dorian shut the door behind them. "We came for the frequency."

Fenris laughed, a dry, broken sound. "The frequency. You think that's a song you can learn in a night? It's blood memory. Passed from alpha to alpha since the first pact." He tilted his head, studying Rissa. "But you're not bloodline. You're turned. The frequency would tear your throat apart."

"Then teach it to him." She nodded at Dorian.

"He's human."

"Teach it to both of us."

Fenris was silent for a long moment. Then he said, "Promise me something."

"What?"

"Destroy the stone completely. Not just shatter it. Burn the fragments. Scatter them in running water. Or the pack will never be free. The stone will regrow from a single shard." His chains rattled as he leaned forward. "Promise me."

Rissa thought of Elara, still in Vance's grip. Of the way the stone had whispered to her in the cave. Of Kellan's face as he'd lost himself.

"I promise."

Fenris closed his eyes. And then he howled.

It wasn't loud. It was low, a vibration that Rissa felt in her bones, a pattern of rises and falls that seemed to twist the air itself. Dorian's eyes widened. He pulled out a recorder, but Fenris stopped him.

"No device can capture it. You have to feel it. Let it settle in your blood."

The howl shifted, became something else—a language older than words, a resonance that made the walls hum. Rissa's wolf rose inside her, wanting to answer, wanting to sing back.

And then it stopped.

Fenris sagged against his chains. "That's the first half. The second requires the alpha's blood to amplify. Without it, you'll only crack the stone. With it, you'll shatter it completely."

"Vance's blood," Dorian said.

"His or his heir's." Fenris's eyes met Rissa's. "The stone will fight you. It will offer you everything you've ever wanted to stop you. Don't listen."

The cell door slammed shut.

Kellan stood on the other side, his eyes burning blue-white, his claws already lengthening. Behind him, the corridor filled with the sound of boots.

"Vance knows," Kellan said, and his voice was wrong—layered, like something else spoke through him. "He's waiting."

Dorian moved before Rissa could stop him. He lunged at his brother, tackling him away from the door, and they crashed into the opposite wall. Kellan's claws raked across Dorian's arm, drawing blood.

"Don't kill him," Rissa shouted.

"I'm not trying to."

But Kellan was stronger now, faster, the corruption feeding him. He threw Dorian off and turned on Rissa, his jaws snapping.

She caught his wrists, the force of his charge driving her back against the cell bars. His face was inches from hers, and beneath the blue glow, she saw him—the man from the photograph in Dorian's apartment. The brother who'd disappeared.

"Kellan." She said his name softly. "Your brother is right here."

The blue flickered.

"Remember the fishing trips. The river. He told me about the river."

Kellan's jaw trembled. The glow dimmed. And in that moment, Dorian hit him from behind with a rock wrapped in cloth.

Kellan crumpled.

Dorian stood over him, breathing hard, the rock still in his hand. His face was hollow. "He's still alive."

"Good." Rissa grabbed his arm. "We need to move."

They burst into the corridor—and found Lorna standing there, a gun leveled at Rissa's chest.

Her hand was shaking. Tears tracked through the grime on her face.

"Vance knows everything," she said. "He's using Mira as bait. He's already moved Elara to the Moonstone chamber."

"Then why are you pointing that at us?" Rissa asked.

"Because if I don't bring you to him, he'll kill them both before the ritual." Lorna's voice cracked. "I traded you once. I thought I could live with it. I can't."

She lowered the gun.

"There's a passage behind the third cell. It leads to the chamber's upper gallery. He doesn't know about it." She met Rissa's eyes. "But it's a trap. He knows you're coming. He *wants* you to come."

Rissa looked at Dorian. His arm was bleeding. His brother was unconscious behind them. The pack was howling in the distance.

She thought of Elara. Of Mira. Of the frequency settling in her blood like a promise.

"Good," she said. "Then let's make sure he gets what he wants."