Chapter Eleven: The Gathering

The old ruins of Tagavishta lay beneath the silver eye of the moon, cradled by cliffs and thick mist. The forgotten city, once teeming with temples and high-born blood rituals, now served only the memory of its bones. Wind moaned through hollow archways, carrying echoes of forgotten tongues.

But tonight, it breathed again.

Paws thudded softly against cracked stone as wolves entered the city one by one. They came from far coasts and frozen forests, from the hollows of mountain ranges and the blackened spines of old Europe. Shaggy, massive, and silent, the packs gathered in the open square at the city's heart, a broken amphitheater once used for ancient rites.

Above them all stood Ethan, neither fully wolf nor man, but something between. Cloaked now in human form, his shoulders bore the tension of command. His silver eyes surveyed the growing crowd beneath the moon, and though he remained motionless, the pulse in his jaw betrayed the weight of what he carried.

Rufik moved to stand beside him, his fur still damp from the night run.

"They've come," Rufik said, breath misting.

Ethan nodded. "Good."

"How many?"

"More than I expected. Less than we'll need."

Below, the wolves began to shift. Bones cracked and fur receded as they returned to human form. Some were cloaked in leathers, others near-naked from their transformation. Scarred, lean, and brutal, they looked not like men but soldiers molded from claw and grief.

A murmur rose as more filed in. Then a howl from the east, another pack arrived.

The gathering had begun.

Ethan stepped forward and raised a hand.

"Brothers," he called. "Sisters. Blood of the Old Moon."

Silence.

"Dracula stirs beneath the veil. You felt it, as I did. We all did."

More nods. Eyes flared with remembered fear.

"But something is wrong. The path to this place was not quiet."

A grizzled alpha from the Thuringian Wastes stepped forward. "We were ambushed. Two of ours didn't make it. Vampires. Daywalkers."

A murmur of growls rippled through the crowd.

"Same," said a younger she-wolf from the Montenevra Circle. "Near the river crossing. They smelled... old."

Ethan's gaze narrowed. "They were not meant to rise yet. Dracula's sleep has not fully broken."

Another spoke,lean and gaunt, eyes haunted. "Unless... he's stirring them before he stirs himself."

"That would mean coordination," Rufik said. "Purpose."

Ethan looked toward the cracked altar behind him, a slab of obsidian etched with sigils that no tongue had spoken aloud in centuries. Then he turned to the gathered wolves.

"There's a witch," he said. "Her name is Helena of Narnish. Some of you know the name."

Gasps.

"She walks the shadow-paths. Her bloodline traces back to Parlvana Coltrez, the one who bound herself to the vampire courts before Dracula's fall."

"Witch-blood," someone spat.

Ethan ignored the sneer. "She knows the old ways. The signs. If vampires now move in force, she'll know why."

"And if she's with them?" Rufik asked quietly.

Ethan's eyes glittered like blades. "Then we deal with her as we do all who stand against the living."

"But she may not be an enemy," he added. "She's one of the few who knew the mind of Dracula before the sleep. We find her. We ask. Then we act."

The wolves grumbled their assent.

Ethan turned again to the square. "The rest of you,protect the humans. Keep the old roads guarded. I want eyes on every gate and whispers in every shadow. If the dead march early, we cannot be blind."

He stepped down from the altar and Rufik followed.

"When do we leave?" the alpha asked.

"Now," Ethan said. "The longer we wait, the closer he comes."

---

Meanwhile, far from Tagavishta, within the cold halls of the Ordo Nocturne's monastery, Elara moved like a shadow.

She had waited until the monks finished their chants. Waited until the tolling of the bells masked her steps. Cloaked in a gray robe she had stolen from the novice's quarters, she slipped through the winding corridors, heart racing.

Since the dream, that dream,her blood had not stopped humming. She had seen him, the wolf-man with the silver eyes. Ethan. Half-born. The one from the prophecy she didn't remember learning.

Now, the monks watched her too closely. They whispered too often. And the air of the sanctuary felt no longer sacred but like a cage of stone.

She turned a corner, nearly ran into Brother Mikel — but the old monk was dozing, wine-heavy and mumbling to himself.

She pressed onward.

Outside, the wind howled. It welcomed her.

The forest loomed beyond the walls. And though it was not safe, it was freedom. Her only chance to find answers before they found her and tried to seal them away.

Her fingers curled around the charm at her throat, the one she'd been born with. Shaped like a drop of blood, encased in silver.

She had never known why it was given to her.

Now she felt it pulse.

Elara ran into the woods.

And the night watched.

---

Back in Tagavishta, the wolves who remained lit pyres around the city's edges. Fires to guard, to watch, to remind the dark that it would not go unchallenged.

Ethan moved through the embers with Rufik and four of the fiercest from his traveling pack. Their path was clear,east, toward the Valley of Narnish. Toward Helena.

He thought of the dream.

Of her — Elara.

Of the twin heartbeats.

And as the moon sank lower, and the mist thickened over the stones of the ancient city, the Half-Born whispered into the wind:

"It begins."