The Gray Hollow wasn't on any map.
It didn't need to be.
Its memory lived in whispers passed through teeth and trembling lips—witches warned their daughters with ghost stories, and wolves circled wide around the place with their tails tucked low. No one went there.
And no one came back if they did.
Yet that's exactly where we were headed.
Kaelen leaned heavily against me as we crossed the thinning woods. His skin was hot, feverish. The rune down his spine still pulsed with sick light, crawling toward his heart like a slow dagger. His strength faltered more with each mile.
But he hadn't let go of my hand once.
I didn't speak. Not because I had nothing to say but because I didn't trust my voice not to crack.
He was breaking.
And if we didn't find the relic soon, I would lose him again this time for good.
"We're close," he rasped as we passed under a dead tree, its branches twisted like claws.
I frowned. "How do you know?"
He didn't answer immediately. Instead, he touched his chest, just above his heart.
"It's humming," he said finally. "Like it's calling to the thing inside me."
The curse was guiding us.
Which meant we were walking into the mouth of whatever birthed it.
The trees vanished suddenly like we had stepped through a curtain of silence.
We stood before a wide clearing, shrouded in gray mist.
No birds.
No wind.
No sound.
Even our breathing felt wrong here, like the air filtered grief and gave it back to us heavier.
The Gray Hollow.
It looked like nothing and yet I could feel it. Every stone, every root, every inch of this cursed place watched.
A vast stone structure loomed ahead, half-buried in the earth. Ivy crept along its ruined walls, and ancient symbols were etched in the crumbling stone.
A temple? A tomb?
Both.
"This is it," Kaelen whispered.
I nodded, tightening my grip on his arm. "Then let's find the relic."
Inside, the air was thicker.
It wasn't dust or age.
It was memory.
Pain-soaked memory.
Each step echoed like we were walking through someone else's scream.
I lit a flame in my palm, casting shadows across the walls. Paintings were carved into the stone witches bleeding into bowls, wolves howling at a splintered moon, a child with eyes like fire and fangs like knives.
"A hybrid," I muttered. "From before."
Kaelen nodded slowly. "The first attempt."
"What happened to them?"
He pointed ahead.
We followed the corridor into a wide chamber. In its center stood a stone pedestal, cracked but standing. A faint red glow pulsed beneath the dust.
The relic.
It was a shard of bone, wrapped in bloodstained cloth, etched with a rune so old even my magic didn't recognize it.
Kaelen stumbled toward it like it was the only thing keeping him upright.
"No," I said quickly, pulling him back. "Let me. We don't know what it'll do."
He didn't argue.
He was too tired to fight me now.
I stepped forward alone, my heart hammering.
The moment my fingers touched the relic, the world vanished.
A vision tore through me.
I stood in the middle of a war.
Witches screaming. Wolves turning on their own. Blood raining from the sky. And at the center two figures locked in an embrace that wasn't love.
It was survival.
A witch with wild red hair. A werewolf with a crown of bone. Mates. Cursed. Chosen by fate, broken by blood.
They stood before a gathering of Elders, begging for peace. But fear won.
The curse was born in that fear.
The hybrid child that came after the one that could have united both sides was slaughtered in its cradle.
The blood rune was carved from its remains.
And that piece of bone in my hand?
It wasn't a relic.
It was a baby's rib.
I screamed and dropped it.
Kaelen caught me before I hit the ground.
"What did you see?" he asked, voice ragged.
I shook my head, unable to speak.
Not because I didn't want to.
Because my tongue had gone numb.
The vision's weight was still pressing down on me, crushing the breath from my lungs.
The relic had shown me truth.
Not just about the curse.
But about us.
The curse wasn't trying to destroy our bond.
It was trying to fulfill it.
To finish what that first pair of mates couldn't.
To force peace through possession. Through control.
Through blood.
Kaelen touched the relic.
His eyes rolled back.
But he didn't scream.
He didn't collapse.
He stood still. Silent. Then looked at me.
"It's inside me now," he said.
I moved forward. "What do you mean?"
"I don't feel the curse anymore."
I blinked. "That's good, isn't it?"
He turned his hand palm-up.
The rune had vanished from his back.
It was now carved into the center of his palm glowing, waiting.
"I think," he said slowly, "this is just the beginning."