Chapter 1
The first time the dead whispered my name, I was seventeen.
I was standing barefoot in the kitchen, holding a chipped mug of tea, when someone whispered—
Elara.
I froze.
The mug nearly slipped from my fingers.
The cottage was silent.
Beyond the windows, rain tapped against the glass, and the old clock above the fireplace ticked steadily.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
“Hello?”
Nothing.
I slowly turned toward the doorway.
Nobody stood there.
I exhaled shakily.
“Okay,” I whispered to myself. “I’m officially losing my mind.”
Then the whisper came again.
Elara.
This time, it came from outside.
I set the mug down.
My mother had always warned me never to go outside after dark.
Not because of wolves.
Not because of thieves.
Because of the forest.
The Blackwood began less than half a mile from our cottage, stretching across the northern edge of the kingdom like an endless wall of twisted trees.
People disappeared there.
Hunters.
Travelers.
Children who wandered too far from home.
Nobody ever found them.
And everyone knew better than to ask why.
I walked toward the window.
The rain had become heavier.
Through the glass, I could barely make out the forest beyond the fields.
Then I saw it.
A figure.
Standing between the trees.
A woman.
She was completely still.
My heart stopped.
I blinked.
The figure disappeared.
I stepped backward.
“No.”
The room suddenly felt colder.
A strange pressure settled over my chest.
Then—
Elara.
I spun around.
The voice was inside the house.
“Who’s there?”
Silence.
I reached for the kitchen knife my mother kept beside the cutting board.
It wasn’t exactly a weapon, but it was better than nothing.
I moved through the cottage slowly.
The living room was empty.
The hallway was empty.
My mother’s bedroom door was closed.
I approached it.
“Mother?”
No answer.
I pushed the door open.
Empty.
My heart began pounding.
She’d been in the garden less than an hour ago.
She should have been home.
I turned toward the front door.
It was open.
Rain blew across the wooden floor.
“Mother?”
I ran outside.
“Mother!”
Nothing.
I hurried through the rain, searching the garden.
Then I saw something lying beside the old apple tree.
A scarf.
My mother’s scarf.
I picked it up.
It was soaked.
“Mother?”
A branch snapped behind me.
I turned.
Nothing.
Another whisper drifted through the darkness.
Run.
My blood turned cold.
Then the forest moved.
Not the trees.
The shadows between them.
They shifted like something alive.
I stumbled backward.
A voice spoke from the darkness.
“She’s awake.”
I couldn’t breathe.
A second voice answered.
“We have to find her before they do.”
I couldn’t see anyone.
But they were there.
Watching.
Waiting.
I ran.
I didn’t stop until I reached the cottage.
I slammed the door and locked it.
Then I pressed my back against it, gasping.
The house was dark.
Too dark.
The fireplace had gone out.
The candles had extinguished themselves.
And on the wooden table in front of me was something that hadn’t been there before.
A black envelope.
My name was written across it in silver ink.
ELARA VEYNE.
My hands trembled as I picked it up.
There was no seal.
No explanation.
Only three words written beneath my name.
You are remembered.
I opened it.
Inside was a single piece of parchment.
I read the first sentence.
And everything inside me went still.
When the mark appears, do not trust the crown.
My fingers tightened around the parchment.
The mark?
What mark?
I looked down at my arms.
Nothing.
Then pain exploded across my chest.
I cried out and dropped the letter.
Something burned beneath my skin.
A strange black symbol began appearing over my heart, spreading outward like ink through water.
I fell to my knees.
The room blurred.
Voices surrounded me.
Hundreds of them.
Thousands.
Some whispered.
Some screamed.
Some begged.
And beneath all of them was one voice.
Deep.
Male.
Calm.
Terrifying.
We finally found you.
The front door exploded inward.
I screamed.
Four figures stood outside in the rain.
The first wore black.
The second stood beside him with golden eyes.
The third had blood-red markings glowing faintly along his hands.
And the fourth smiled.
Not kindly.
Not cruelly.
Almost as though he’d been waiting years for this exact moment.
The man in black stepped forward.
His eyes met mine.
For one impossible second, the entire world seemed to disappear.
Then he whispered—
“Mate.”
I stared at him.
“What?”
His expression changed.
For the first time, the coldness disappeared.
He looked shocked.
Almost afraid.
Behind him, the other three men stared at me with the same realization.
The golden-eyed man whispered something in a language I didn’t understand.
The red-marked man went completely still.
And the smiling man stopped smiling.
I looked between them.
“Who are you?”
The man in black stepped inside.
Rainwater dripped from his coat onto the floor.
“My name is Kael Draven.”
He looked at the mark glowing beneath my skin.
“And you’ve just awakened something the world has spent centuries trying to destroy.”
I swallowed.
“What?”
His eyes lifted to mine.
“The last bloodline of the First Queen.”
The room went silent.
Then somewhere beyond the cottage—
the forest screamed.
