The Devil's Insight

The paralyzed scouts lie scattered around the dead ritual circle. Huarti lifts the stolen ward bundle, and his arcane sight bites into each soul at once. Most are dim with fear, but one burns with a jagged, blackened seam.

Huarti turns on the Lead Scout, pinning him with his presence. The man cannot move, cannot plead, only stare as Huarti sinks his black fangs into his shoulder and drinks.

Vitality drains into Huarti, and the ward patterns in his hand flare hot, then steady. Through the scout's fading pulse, the Matron's hideout sharpens in Huarti's mind, a warded hollow beyond the western wash, wrapped in red crescent shadow and old frost.

The scout goes slack. Around him, the other collapsed bodies twitch faintly under the spell's aftershock, while the stolen map twists toward the same hidden path, as if eager to lead Huarti there.

Now Huarti knows where Veyra waits. To secure the nursery, he must take the hollow before her magic reaches the brood.

Huarti lowers his head to the first scout. His bite lands as a dark, precise claim, not a meal.

Red threads of force sink through the scout’s chest, then knot outward into a steady, binding pulse.

The fallen body stirs. Breath returns, eyes clear, and the scout kneels as if answering a command long before spoken.

One by one, the remaining scouts are taken in the same way, each marked with the same red gleam at the throat.

When the last one rises, the wash feels quieter, as if the rocks themselves have accepted a new watch.