Page 41 of Definitely Dead

The scent of damp moss and rotting wood swirled on the wind, along with something sickeningly sweet he couldn’t quite place. It lingered, saturating the air, and every breath pulled the odor deeper into his lungs, stinging his nose and making his stomach roil.

He didn’t know how long he’d been wandering the forest, but it felt like eternity, and he had yet to encounter another soul. Still, he swore he heard footsteps—creeping, stalking, keeping pace with him from somewhere within the trees. Twice, he’d caught a flash of green, a pair of glowing eyes, but when he’d stopped to investigate, they had vanished from sight.

Back in the village, he had heard murmurs about a place called the Tombs, spoken in only hushed tones like a story told around a campfire. It was a place of damnation, of punishment, reserved for only the most wicked. A place where hope went to die.

People feared it, and for good reason, but he had never heard them speak about the Whisper Woods. Maybe they didn’t know of its existence. Or maybe they pictured it as more of a slap on the wrist, a timeout given for bad behavior.

They’d be wrong.

While not physically painful—a fact for which he was immeasurably grateful—he didn’t know how long he could withstand the psychological torment. Constantly on edge, paranoia had already started to pollute him, making him suspicious of every creak and groan of the forest.

Rounding a bend in the path, he came to a sudden stop, his heart thundering inside his chest when he felt a familiar presence pushing at his mind.

“Tyr? Tyr, can you hear me?”

His only reply was the constant whispering of the leaves.

Sunne sighed and shook his head. Of course, Tyr wasn’t there. While he had no doubt his mate would come for him if he could, he didn’t think the Whisper Woods was a place the shifter could follow.

Sighing, he rounded his shoulders against the rain and started walking again.

Still, no matter how much he tried to convince himself that he had imagined it, the familiar feeling stayed with him, pressing against him with a comforting weight. It built, growing stronger with each step, until he couldn’t ignore it any longer.

“Tyr!”he shouted inside his mind.“Tyr! Where are you? I can feel you. I know you’re here. Please answer me.”

Again, he was met with only silence.

Maybe it was a trick of the forest, a mimicry designed to elicit a flicker of hope, only to extinguish it. To make him think someone was coming for him, when in fact, Tyr probably didn’t even know where he’d gone. Cunning, cruel, and highly effective as a means of torment.

Then, when he thought things couldn’t get worse, the Whisper Woods once again proved him wrong.

A frigid wind howled through the trees, cutting through his jacket and stinging his exposed skin. Rain whipped around him, pelting his face like tiny shards of glass, and a dense, impenetrable fog rolled out of the forest to swallow the trail. It swirled around his ankles and up his legs, rising from the ground and dispersing until it blanketed everything in its path.

The icy fingers of fear crawled down Sunne’s back, and his heartbeat pulsed in his throat, but he kept going, compelled deeper into the unknown. He moved slower now, every step uncertain, but he never stopped, driven by a desperate need to find something—or someone.

“Tyr!”he tried again, still grasping to his last shred of hope.“Tyr!”

This time, he was met with not silence, but a crackling buzz, like static on the radio.

His breath caught, and he spun in a circle, squinting through the fog, but he could make out only the blurred shadows of the surrounding trees.

“Tyr! Can you hear me? Tyr!”

“I hear you,lelien. There’s no need to shout.”

A sob tore from his throat, the sound deadened by the fog, and his legs trembled, threatening to give out from under him. By some miracle, he managed to remain upright, stumbling forward blindly with renewed determination.

“Where are you?”

“I’m coming for you,”Tyr promised.“Stay on the trail. I’ll find you.”

Sunne clung to the promise as he stumbled through the fog, his mind a wild, vibrating tangle of emotions. Cold water seeped into the denim around his ankles as he splashed through the deep puddles. It sloshed inside his sneakers, numbing his toes and making every step echo with an uncomfortable squelch.

“What if you can’t find me?”he asked, giving voice to his clawing anxiety.“What if we’re both trapped here forever?”

“Just stay on the trail,”Tyr repeated. He sounded calm, confident, leaving no room for niggling doubts.“Iwillfind you.”

Suddenly, a low, rasping growl pierced the quiet, reverberating through the mist and sending chills down Sunne’s spine. He froze, his breath hitching, his eyes darting frantically in search of the source.

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