The Moon Monastery loomed against a steel-gray sky, its spires jagged as teeth. A cold wind curled around the cliffs, carrying the scent of pine and sage... and something else. Something spoiled.
Decay.
“Child.”
The voice rasped out of nowhere. I spun around.
An old woman stood just beyond the gates, cloaked in ash-colored robes. Her face was hidden, but her eyes gleamed like molten silver beneath the hood. Her scent wasn’t wolf. Nor human. Nor vampire. It was… wrong.
“Beware,” she whispered, her cold hand closing around mine. “You are light, but the dark has tasted you now. It will not stop until it devours you whole.”
I pulled my hand free, pulse quickening. “Who are you?”
Her mouth twitched. “The one who remembers what you’ve forgotten. Beware, daughter of moonsilver. The shadows know your scent.”
Before I could press her further, she turned and melted into the forest mist.
Uneasy, I shook it off and climbed the monastery steps. The heavy doors loomed ahead, carved with the sigils of the Moon Priesthood. I reached for the iron handle—
—and something slammed into the back of my head.
Darkness swallowed everything.