Chapter 2The Stone's Secret

The cave smelled of wet stone and copper. Dorian's blood pooled dark against the rock floor, and Rissa pressed her palm harder against his shoulder, trying to stem the flow. He winced but didn't pull away.

"You're going to bleed out if I don't stitch this," she said.

"Then stitch it."

She tore a strip from her shirt, the fabric damp and cold. "The Moonstone. What do you really know about it?"

Dorian's jaw tightened as she worked the makeshift bandage into place. "It's not a gift from the old spirits like your pack claims. It's a fragment. A meteorite that hit this valley two hundred years ago."

Rissa's hands stilled. "That's not possible. The Moonstone has always been—"

"Always been what? A source of power?" He laughed, but there was no humor in it. "Power that comes with a price. The land around it is dying. The trees are blighted, the water turns sour, and the wolves who feed from it—" He stopped, his breath catching. "They go mad. Slowly. But surely."

She thought of the old ones. The way Elder Marcus had started talking to shadows. How Marta had attacked her own mate during the last full moon, her eyes white and empty. Everyone said it was the stress of pack life. But what if—

"You're lying."

"I wish I was." He reached into his jacket with his good hand, pulling out a worn leather journal. The pages were yellowed, the binding cracked. "My brother's. He was a cleaner, like you. But he started asking questions. Tracking the changes. Mapping the blight."

Rissa took the journal, her fingers trembling. Inside were sketches of dead trees, measurements of ash content in the water, dates marked with crescents and full circles. The last entry was dated six months ago.

*The frequency is the key. I've heard it in the rituals—a vibration beneath the chanting. If I can reproduce it, I might be able to weaken the stone. But I need to get closer. I need to be in the chamber during the next feeding.*

The words stopped mid-sentence. A smear of blood across the page.

"What happened to him?"

Dorian's eyes met hers, and she saw the grief he'd been carrying like a wound. "Vance found him. Made an example of him. Told the pack he was a traitor who tried to steal the Moonstone's power for himself."

"And you believe the journal?"

"I believe my brother. He was a scientist. He didn't believe in magic or curses. He believed in evidence." Dorian pointed to a crude diagram on the next page—a series of wavy lines that looked almost like sound waves. "This is the frequency. He calculated it from the vibrations he recorded during the rituals. If we can generate it near the stone, it might disrupt its connection to the pack."

Rissa stared at the diagram. The lines reminded her of something. A chant she'd heard during the last blood moon. The way the air had hummed, the stone pulsing in rhythm with their voices. She'd thought it was a song of power, but what if it was a song of control?

"I've heard it," she said slowly. "The vibration. During the ritual, when the pack chants together, the stone resonates. I always thought it was the stone answering us, but..." She traced the lines on the page. "What if we're answering it?"

Dorian's expression shifted—something between hope and fear. "Then we can break the connection."

A howl cut through the night, close enough to shake the cave walls. Rissa's wolf stirred beneath her skin, recognizing the voice. Vance's beta, Elias. He was less than a quarter mile away.

"We need to move," she said.

"Where? They're blocking every path out of this ravine."

Rissa looked at the journal in her hands, at the diagram that promised a way to hurt the Moonstone. Then she thought of her sister, chained in Vance's compound, sick with a disease that nobody could name. A disease that had started when the blight began.

"There's a way into the compound," she said. "An old drainage tunnel that leads to the Moonstone chamber. The pack doesn't use it anymore—they think it's collapsed."

Dorian sat up, ignoring the fresh blood that seeped through his bandage. "You know this how?"

"Because I was the one who mapped it. When I was still a cleaner, I found old blueprints in the logging office. I thought they might be useful someday." She met his eyes. "I need to get to my sister. You need to get to the Moonstone. We can do both."

"You're not ready to destroy it."

"I'm ready to see it burn." She said it with more conviction than she felt, but the words tasted true. "But I'm not doing this blind. If we're going to do this, we do it together. You help me get my sister out, and I'll help you reach the stone."

Dorian studied her for a long moment. "And then?"

"And then we figure out how to use that frequency before the pack tears us apart."

He extended his hand. His fingers were cold against hers, but his grip was steady. "Temporary alliance."

"Temporary," she agreed.

They gathered what little they had—the lantern, the journal, a half-empty canteen. Rissa was tying the bandage tighter around Dorian's shoulder when a voice echoed from outside the cave.

"Rissa."

She froze. The voice was familiar, low and measured, carrying the weight of years.

"Rissa, I know you're in there. I'm not here to hurt you."

Lorna.

The pack elder stepped into the cave's entrance, her silhouette outlined against the moonlit sky. She looked older than Rissa remembered, her silver hair unbound, her hands raised in a gesture of peace.

"Don't trust her," Dorian whispered.

"Rissa, listen to me." Lorna's voice was soft, almost gentle. "Vance has your sister. He's moved her to the Moonstone chamber. He plans to use her blood in the next feeding."

Rissa's heart stopped. "Why?"

"Because she's sick. And the Moonstone needs the weak to feed." Lorna took a step closer. "I can help you. I know the tunnels. I know the guards' rotations. But you must come out now. Elias is two minutes away, and he has orders to kill."

Dorian grabbed Rissa's arm. "This is a trap."

"It might be." Rissa looked at Lorna, at the elder's tired eyes and the tremor in her hands. She thought of the journal, of the frequency, of her sister's pale face in the infirmary.

Then she thought of the howls. Closer now. Right at the ravine's edge.

She stepped toward the cave entrance.