Chapter 8 - The Blood Ritual
The Order's high priest was an ancient man with skin like parchment and eyes that had seen too much death.
"So you're the Sterling heir," he murmured, studying Ivy with clinical interest. "I must admit, I expected more resistance."
"I'm saving my strength for later," Ivy replied coolly. "When it matters."
The priest laughed. "You think you have any power here? This chamber is enchanted to suppress all supernatural abilities. Even the mighty Lycan form cannot break free."
Ivy tested her power and found that he was right.
Her wolf was silent.
Her Lycan abilities were gone.
She was human.
Vulnerable.
"I told you," the priest said. "Now, let's begin."
The ritual chamber was designed for one purpose—to extract the power from the Sterling blood and transfer it to the Order's chosen vessels.
Ivy was strapped to an obsidian table, her wrists and ankles bound by silver chains.
The priest approached with a ceremonial blade, its edge etched with runes that glowed with malevolent light.
"This will hurt," he warned. "But it will also bring about the dawn of a new era."
He raised the blade to her chest, and Ivy braced herself for the pain.
But instead of the cold bite of silver, she felt something else entirely.
Heat.
Unbearable, searing heat that radiated from her very core.
She'd felt this before—the night she'd awakened.
"Something's wrong," the priest muttered, stepping back.
The runes on the blade began to burn, the silver melting in the priest's hand like candle wax.
"What have you done?" he demanded.
Ivy smiled through the pain. "I gave you what you wanted. My blood. But you forgot something important about the Sterling line."
"Which is?"
"We're not just powerful," Ivy explained, her voice taking on an otherworldly quality. "We're carriers of the ancient curse. The same curse that destroyed the original Lycans. And now it's going to destroy you."
The chains around her wrists began to glow red-hot.
The priest screamed as the curse surged through the ritual chamber, infecting everything it touched.
The Order's power was turned back on itself, consuming them from the inside.
Ivy watched as her enemies fell one by one, their bodies consumed by the very power they'd tried to steal.
But she wasn't without cost.
The curse demanded a sacrifice—a piece of her soul to fuel its hunger.
She felt it taking something essential from her, leaving an emptiness that would never fully heal.
When it was over, the chamber was silent.
May you like
The Order was gone.
And Ivy Sterling was alone.
