Page 63 of Tethered In Blood

19

Eden

RESTLESSNESSSANKDEEPERintomy stomach with each step toward the crop field. A thick decay filled the air, its putrid stench clinging to the back of my mouth and burning my nostrils. It surpassed the smell of dead plants. The rot didn’t stem from the failed harvest, but from something far worse. The damp soil beneath us felt unstable, ready to give way at any moment. My mind attempted to reason through it, seeking a logical explanation, but instinct screamed louder. This place exhibited more than mere abandonment; it had been tainted.

I hesitated before stepping forward, but just as I moved toward the gap in the broken fence, an arm shot out, blocking my path. I blinked up at Oberon in confusion. His stance remained rigid, with his shoulders wound tight. “Don’t walk through it,” he commanded. It was worse than I wished to know if he was being this careful. I frowned but didn’t argue.

Could he sense magic here? Or was he heeding the Lord’s warnings?

“What if it’s a body?”

He scanned the field with intense focus, as if he noticed something I couldn’t. Silver flickered in his eyes like a glimmer of storm light in the darkness. “It is,” he said.

“What?”

“But it’s not in the field.” His posture grew tense and wary. “Stay close.” His tone made me roll my eyes before I could stop myself. He was so protective for someone who pretended not to care.

His head whipped toward me so fast that it spilled adrenaline through my veins. “Dilthen Doe,” his voice curled low and lethal. “Roll your eyes one more time, and I will make them roll back into your fucking skull.”

Goosebumps prickled along my arms. The words should have unnerved me, perhaps even scared me, but they sent a thrill through me—a reckless exhilaration that compelled me to push him further.

Fighting the smirk that threatened to break free, I concealed it behind my sleeve and murmured, “Alright, alright.” Then, more quietly, “So dramatic.” His gaze burned into me, yet he didn’t take the bait. I stepped behind him, wrapping my arm around myself to quell the gnawing unease. I remained silent after that—not out of discipline, but because my stomach twisted in knots.

We hadn’t eaten, which was a good thing because—

I halted.

A young man’s body lay twisted in the dirt, discarded with limbs bent at unnatural angles. His skin had become a sickly pale, creeping in a slow, insidious decay. His mouth gaped as if he had died mid-scream, with his lips cracked and frozen in eternal terror. His eyes struck me cold—the void-black pits that stared up at nothing, endless and empty. Dried blood stiffened his clothes, dark patches spreading in shadows across his chest and arms. His fingers curled inward, claw-like, as if he had tried to grasp, fight, and hold on to life.

A lump formed in my throat.

“Oh, gods.” The words were a breathless whisper, lost in the early morning. Oberon moved around the body with precision, his stance that of a predator, his boots pressing into the dirt with confidence. Though his expression remained unchanged, his focus sharpened, and tension coiled beneath his skin.

My arm tightened around my waist.What was he thinking?“Is there any trace of magic?” My sleeve muffled my voice as I pressed it harder against my face, trying to block out the stench of death.

Oberon crouched next to the corpse, examining every detail with clinical precision. He didn’t rush, blink, or breathe for a long time. Without looking up, he answered simply, “No.”

A pit formed in my stomach. No magic meant no explanation.Then what was he looking at? How had he known it was a body? Or where it had been lying?

I shifted my weight. “How do you think he died?”

A hollow, shrill screech ripped through the silence.It curled through my ears, drilled into my skull, and scraped against my ribs. The marrow in my bones felt scooped out and left hollow and brittle under the pressure of the sound. My body locked up, my muscles tensed, and my breath was strangled in my throat.

Oberon grabbed my wrist, yanking me behind him with a forceful tug. His other hand hovered near his sword, fingers poised and ready. His irises burned silver, flickering as he gazed toward the trees—the dark, endless expanse of them, the void between the trunks—searching. Hunting.

My heartbeat thumped in my ears, echoing the disjointed rhythm of my breath. The sound emanated from everywhere and nowhere, winding around us and disappearing as quickly as it had arrived. The lifeless body at our feet was insignificant compared to whatever was alive out there.

Movement.

A shadow flickered between the trees, yet the branches remained still. The underbrush lay motionless. It glided through the mist, a presence that didn’t belong in this world. Oberon’s grip on my wrist tightened, his fingers digging into my skin in silent warning: stay close.

A second screech split the air closer than before.

Then silence. Thick, suffocating silence.

My shaking hands curled into fists, nails biting into my palms.

Where was it?

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