Prologue
The road to the village was nothing more than dirt and scattered stones, cutting through the thick greenery of the South African wilderness. Inside the rattling jeep, Josephine Langdon sat beside her husband, Marcel, her arms crossed as she watched the landscape blur past. The village ahead was one of the last untouched by modern civilization, an archaeologist’s dream.
She should have been excited. This was why she became an archaeologist—to uncover lost histories, to explore the mysteries of ancient civilizations. And yet, a pit of dissatisfaction lingered in her chest. Perhaps it was the weight of her family name, or perhaps it was the fact that her sister, Mariah, had chosen to chase a legend in Japan instead of accompanying her here. A cursed samurai temple, no less. Josephine scoffed under her breath. Mariah always did have a flair for the dramatic.
“You’re sulking,” Marcel muttered beside her.
“I’m thinking,” she corrected.
He didn’t press further, and she was grateful.
The village emerged from the trees like a relic of the past—mud-brick houses with thatched roofs, narrow pathways winding between them. The people welcomed them warmly, as they had arranged months prior. The chief himself oversaw their arrival, giving them a modest house to accommodate her, Marcel, and the rest of the team—Jacob Dougherty, Malik Brown, Aris Tan, and Michael Asher.
That night, inside their shared room, Marcel leaned against the doorway, arms folded. His eyes bore into her. “Did you ever love me the way I loved you?”
Josephine, peeling off her jacket, hesitated for only a moment. “No.”
His jaw tensed, but he wasn’t surprised. “And you still won’t let me have a child with you.”
She turned to him, her expression unreadable. “Because I despise what the Langdon's stand for. The blood purity, the obsession with lineage. I won’t bring another child into that.”
Marcel exhaled sharply. “Yet you’re fine using me when it’s convenient.”
A beat of silence stretched between them. Then, “You knew what this was,” she said, voice quiet but sharp.
The fight that followed was inevitable. Heated words, accusations, a slammed door. Josephine stormed out into the night, needing space, needing air.
Her feet carried her toward the excavation site on instinct. The village sat atop a vast underground cave system—one filled with ancient temples and carvings left behind by those who came before. This was the real reason she was here.
She moved carefully along the stone pathways, her lantern casting flickering shadows on the walls. The carvings mesmerized her—scenes of life, of rituals, of gods she did not recognize. And then—
The ground crumbled beneath her feet.
A sharp gasp, the sensation of falling, then darkness. Her body hit something hard. A sharp pain exploded in her skull, her vision blurring at the edges.
Just before unconsciousness claimed her, she saw it. A towering, hulking figure emerging from the shadows, firelight flickering off his skin. Hyper-masculine, primal—his face blurred by her fading consciousness.
And then—
Darkness...
