Page 103 of Bitten, Marked, Obsessed

The room beyond is empty. Mostly.

But every one of us feels it—theabsence. The space where somethingwas.You know how a bed still holds a person’s shape right after they leave it? This place feels like that. But darker.

There are sigils on the floor—ripped, marred, burned at the edges. Whatever power was here? It wasripped out.

Callum steps beside me.

“This is it,” he says softly. “The weapon Elias said the Brood is using. The Hollowed. Or where it was anyway.”

My mouth’s dry. “How do you know?”

He kneels, runs his fingers along the carved floor. “Elias said it rearranges things. Power. Identity. The wards here—they were containment. Not protection.”

“For who?”

He meets my eyes. “Notwho.What.”

Something stirs inside me. Like a memory that doesn’t belong to me.

Callum stands. “This place was built to hold something that wasn’t supposed to wake. You opened it. That means?—”

“I’m part of it,” I whisper.

He steps in close. Not touching me, but close enough that I can feel the pull between us, like a current.

“You’re not the weapon,” he says. “You’re thekey.”

Suddenly I’m not cold anymore. Because this moment is too full of fire.

Me. Him. The others watching but not reallyseeing.Just us, on the edge of something neither of us understands, but both of usfeel.

And I don’t care how dangerous that is.

I care that he’s here. That his hand is near mine. That he’s not running away.

“I don’t want any part of this,” I whisper.

“I know.”

His throat works already sensing my hesitation at the danger we all may be in. “I’m not going anywhere.”

I believe him. But the moment’s already gone.

Because Ridge steps forward, eyes sharp. “We need to move. If the Brood’s already got whatever was in here, they’re ahead of us now.”

Callum nods. “Let’s get topside.”

I stare once more at the empty space before I turn away.

It takes longer to climb back out.

The path feels longer and denser now. Like the air’s grown thick with ghosts.

We’re halfway back to the surface when I feel it—the wrongness. There’s something out there now that wasn’t there when we descended.

We hit the treeline near the upper exit and stop dead.

There, standing in a crooked half-circle like they’ve beenwaitingfor us, are Gideon’s Torch.

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