Page 62 of Mate Night Snack
"Planning something."
"Yeah." She opened her eyes to meet his worried gaze. "Something big."
He was quiet for a moment, processing the information.
"We need to tell Varric," he said. "If you can track their movements, that changes everything."
"Does it? Because I'm not sure I can control this." She gestured to the mark, which pulsed brighter as if responding to her emotional state. "The visions are getting harder to distinguish from reality. What if I can't tell the difference anymore? What if I see something that hasn't happened yet and react like it's real?"
"Then we figure it out." His voice was steady, certain. "Like everything else."
Before she could respond, another vision slammed into her consciousness. This one was different, sharper, moreimmediate. She was seeing through someone else's eyes, someone who was watching the cabin from the treeline. Watching them through the bathroom window.
Yellow eyes filled with hunger and ancient malice. A voice like rusted metal whispering words that made her blood turn to ice.
"Soon, little seer. Soon you'll understand what you're truly meant for."
She jerked back to awareness with a gasp that was half scream, her body going rigid with terror. Emmett caught her as her knees buckled, his arms coming around her like a shield against the lingering horror of that alien gaze.
"They're here," she whispered against his chest. "Not just in the forest. Here. Watching us."
Every muscle in Emmett's body went taut, his wolf rising so close to the surface she could feel its presence like heat from a furnace. "Where?"
"Treeline. Eastern side." Her fingers clutched at his shoulders. "We need to move. Now."
He didn't question her assessment, didn't waste time asking for details. Within seconds he was pulling her toward the bedroom, gathering clothes with efficient movements while his senses swept the cabin for immediate threats.
"Get dressed," he said quietly, his voice carrying the kind of calm that came before storms. "We're going to Miriam's. She's got better wards."
Katniss pulled on jeans and a sweater with hands that shook only slightly, muscle memory taking over while her mind tried to process what she'd seen. The malevolence in those yellow eyes had been unlike anything she'd encountered, a darkness so complete it seemed to swallow light.
"Emmett," she said as they moved toward the door, "there's something else. Something I saw in the earlier visions."
"What?"
"Ashwin doesn't just want to hurt me. He wants to use me." She paused, hand on the doorknob, turning to meet his eyes. "He's done this before. Captured seers, twisted their abilities to serve his purposes. That's how he's stayed hidden for so long, how he's avoided the Council's tracking efforts."
Understanding dawned in his expression. "He's been using their magic as camouflage."
"And he thinks I'm going to be his newest addition to the collection." She opened the door carefully, checking the porch before stepping outside. "The girls who disappeared, the ones whose souls are still trapped... I think he's been feeding off their power all this time."
They moved quickly through the darkness. The mate mark continued to glow softly, a beacon that both illuminated their way and marked her as something precious and hunted.
"Whatever he's planning, whatever twisted use he thinks he can make of your abilities, it's not happening."
"I know." And she did know, with a certainty that came from more than just faith in his protective instincts. The bond between them was strong, growing stronger every hour. Whatever Ashwin had done to break other couples, other wolves, he'd never faced anything like what they were building together.
But Katniss couldn't shake the feeling that the real test was just beginning. The mark pulsed steadily, a reminder that her power was growing, changing, becoming something neither of them fully understood.
And somewhere in the darkness behind them, yellow eyes watched their retreat with patient, predatory satisfaction.
The hunt had begun.
26
EMMETT
Emmett crouched beside a fallen log, studying the deliberate scratches carved into its moss-covered bark. Four parallel lines, too deep and too precise to be accidental. Beside him, Maeve examined a patch of disturbed earth where something heavy had been dragged through the undergrowth, leaving a trail that disappeared into the thick stand of Douglas firs beyond.
