Page 44 of Love At First Roar
He finally turned, eyes scanning her face. “Last chance to change your mind.”
“I need to see it again.”
He held her gaze a second longer than necessary. Then he nodded once and motioned her forward.
The relic site sat in a shallow glade surrounded by bone-white trees. The air grew colder with every step they took. The moss beneath her boots felt damp and angry, as if the earth itself bristled at their approach.
It hadn’t looked like this a week ago. Now, the clearing pulsed faint red—subtle but constant, like a heartbeat rising from the soil. The runes glowed softly. Not gold. Not the silvery shimmer of Hollow Oak’s wards. This was the color of raw magic and old wounds.
Callum stepped ahead of her, hand resting near his hip like his claws might come without asking. “I’ll circle the edge. Keep watch.”
She nodded, throat dry, and stepped into the circle of trees.
The moment her foot crossed the outer ring of old carvings, her breath stopped. The pressure hit like diving too deep. Her ears rang, her vision blurred and then she felt the pull.
Magic wrapped around her ankles, slid up her calves. Her knees buckled. She hit the ground with a gasp. Her palms pressed into the dirt, and the scent of iron flooded her nose.
“Cora!” Callum’s voice tore through the haze, rough and panicked.
“I’m okay,” she choked out. “Just—something’s happening?—”
The site flared. The world shifted.
Suddenly she stood barefoot in another glade, the same altar looming, but now it bled red mist that curled like smoke. The trees wept sap that looked like blood. Overhead, the sky cracked open, spilling shadows instead of light. Her heart stuttered.
Chains snapped tight around her wrists.
She looked down and saw her arms were bound. Red veils swirled from the altar and coiled around her legs like silk and smoke. Her mouth opened to scream, but no sound came.
And then she saw him.
Elric stepped from the edge of the trees, cloak soaked with crimson, smile as cold as winter wind. His eyes gleamed like polished obsidian.
“I found you,” he murmured.
Cora tried to back away, but her feet stayed rooted. The red veil wrapped tighter around her chest, her throat, her ribs. She couldn’t breathe.
“You always did run,” Elric said, circling her like a predator admiring his prize. “But I’m very good at finding things that belong to me.”
“I don’t,” she rasped, though her voice sounded muffled under the veil. “I don’t belong to you.”
His laugh was slow and low, like thunder far off. “You said my name in your sleep, dove. The spell remembers. And now, so do you.”
The altar cracked open behind him, spilling blinding red light. From it rose ghostly versions of herself—dozens—each wrapped in veils, each collapsed in chains. A thousand moments of what-ifs. A thousand versions of failure.
“No,” she whispered, stumbling back.
“Yes.” Elric’s smile widened. “You always fall. And this time, I’ll be the one to catch you.”
Suddenly, gold light flared at the edges of the vision. An unhuman roar shook the trees. She turned and saw Callum standing near the dream-glade, glowing with lion magic. His eyes burned bright, his fists crackling with power.
“You don’t touch her,” he snarled.
Elric looked bored. “You’ll break too, lion. Just like the last one.”
Callum stepped forward and the vision cracked.
The red light shattered. The veil tore away. The altar screamed and Cora collapsed.
