Page 103 of Echoes From the Void
This isn’t corruption given form.
This is their father.
The Eredar.
“Holy shit,” Leo breathes, his usual levity absent as his shadows curl defensively. “Is that...”
“Yes.” Bishop’s voice carries carefully controlled awe. “The original shadow beast. The one that-”
The Eredar’s attention never leaves me as it moves with impossible grace through the destruction spreading across campus. Each step it takes seems to ripple through reality itself. My predator instincts recognize the movement—not fleeing, but leading. Calling us to follow.
“Follow,” I command, already moving. My pack falls in behind me without hesitation, our bonds humming with shared purpose as we chase the massive beast through Shadow Locke’s disintegrating grounds.
The world warps around us with each tremor. Buildings twist into impossible shapes as the void’s corruption seeps upward. My enhanced senses catch every detail of wrongness—the way shadows move against light, how stone flows like water, the taste of reality unraveling on my tongue. My fangs remain extended, body coiled and ready despite knowing this isn’t a threat we can fight.
We’re not going to make it in time.
The knowledge burns like acid in my throat, but I push harder, faster. Behind me, I hear Leo’s breath coming in sharp bursts while Bishop mutters Guardian wards under his breath. Dorian’s frost spreads in our wake, trying to stabilize the deteriorating ground beneath our feet.
The Eredar leads us toward the cafeteria, each massive stride eating distance with prehistoric grace. We’re halfway there when the first wave hits.
Shadow beasts—dozens, then hundreds—pour from widening cracks in the earth. But these aren’t the corrupted ones we know how to fight. These are ancient things, creatures thatexisted in the void before time had meaning. They flee in blind panic, caring nothing for what stands in their way.
“Form up!” Bishop shouts, his Guardian marks blazing as he takes point. Years of training click into place—Leo and Dorian flanking while I guard our rear, the four of us moving as one unit through chaos.
The beasts pour around us in an endless tide. My enhanced vision catches details that make my predator nature recoil—bodies rippling between shadow and void-stuff, too many limbs moving in impossible geometries, eyes that have seen the birth of shadows themselves. The air reeks of ancient power and blind terror.
My fangs flash as I tear through anything that gets too close, predator instincts fully unleashed. Beside me, Leo’s shadows cut precise paths while Dorian’s frost freezes beasts mid-leap. Bishop’s Guardian magic carves us forward, but for every beast we put down, ten more emerge from the depths.
“There!” Leo’s voice cuts through the chaos. Through a gap in the fleeing creatures, I catch a glimpse of the cafeteria—or what’s left of it. The building warps like melting glass, its foundations crumbling into a widening maw of pure darkness.
The Eredar doesn’t slow. It moves with singular purpose toward that darkness, toward where I can feel Frankie’s bond growing fainter by the second. The connection stretches tissue-thin, like she’s moving further not just in distance, but in reality itself.
A beast larger than the others rears up before us, its maw gaping with void-dark hunger. Before any of us can react, the Eredar simply... looks at it. The beast freezes, then sinks into a bow so deep its head touches broken earth. My predator nature recognizes the display of dominance, the ancient hierarchy at play.
“Well that’s new,” Leo manages, his attempt at humor strained through our bond.
More beasts fall back as we pass, ancient instinct making them yield to their king. But not all of them. Some are too corrupted, too mad with fear to remember proper hierarchy. Those, we fight—my fangs and claws working in perfect sync with my pack’s powers.
The ground heaves again. A chasm splits the earth between us and the cafeteria, so deep my enhanced sight can’t find its bottom. Through it pulses waves of pure entropy—the void itself reaching up with hungry fingers. The scent of it burns my enhanced senses, wrong in a way that makes my predator nature want to flee.
And at its heart...
“No,” the word tears from my throat as I finally see them. Frankie and Finn float suspended in that impossible darkness, their powers already beginning to merge. Light and shadow spiral around them in a double helix of pure energy.
The Eredar roars—a sound that shakes the foundations of reality itself. Every beast in sight freezes, their forms quivering with recognition of their king’s command. My own predator nature responds instinctively to that display of absolute dominance.
But it’s not enough.
Nothing’s enough.
Through our bond, I feel the exact moment Frankie commits to sacrifice. Her love crashes through our connection—fierce and bright and absolute. Next to her, Finn’s light blazes to match her shadows, their combined power creating something that makes even my enhanced vision blur with its intensity.
“Frankie!” Leo’s scream holds decades of sunshine turned to desperation. He lunges forward, but Bishop catches him as the chasm widens. My own muscles coil with the need to leap afterthem, predator instincts warring with the knowledge that we can’t reach them.
“We have to-” Dorian’s voice cracks as his frost patterns fracture with stress. “There has to be a way to-”
But we all feel it through our bonds. The inevitability. The terrible weight of prophecy coming due. My fangs cut into my own lip as I fight back a roar of frustrated rage.
