Page 76 of The Hyena’s Guardian

Waiting.

Matt shifted beside Theron without taking his eyes off the corridor ahead. “Please tell me they’re not learning teamwork.”

“They are not hunting,” Theron said.

Vale kept her rifle raised. “That is somehow less reassuring.”

The hungry ones did not react to the weapons pointed toward them. That unsettled Theron more than if they had charged.

Because the hungry ones had lost all patience. The corruption had stripped that from them long ago along with memory and restraint. They hunted on instinct alone. Unless something stronger guided them.

Theron felt the First King moving behind their stillness like pressure beneath deep water. Watching through them. The thought tightened coldly beneath his ribs.

One of the younger wolves near the rear shifted nervously. The movement echoed faintly through the corridor. Instantly every hungry one turned toward the sound at once. The motion happened with horrifying precision.

Matt went very still beside him. “Okay,” he said softly. “I officially hate that.”

The hungry ones continued staring for several long seconds before their attention shifted back toward Theron. Not the group. Him.

The bond tightened sharply beneath his skin in warning.

Then one figure near the center of the corridor went completely still. Theron felt it the instant their eyes met across the darkened corridor. She did not freeze in surprise or confusion, but with the terrible certainty of instinct recognizing something it had been searching for. Whatever lingered beneath the corruption knew him. It reached for him without thought or words, like a wound remembering where it had begun.

The recognition came from corruption rather than memory. The same darkness that had consumed the hungry ones had spent centuries trying to claim him.

The creature tilted her head, studying him with something disturbingly close to familiarity. Not predator and prey. Kin recognizing kin.

A cold pressure settled in Theron’s chest because, for the first time since entering the mountain, he understood something with absolute clarity. None of his centuries beneath the mountain had truly been survival. They had been a slow transformation.

Another tremor rolled through the mountain beneath their feet. Dust drifted from the arches overhead while distant stone groaned somewhere far below them.

The figure stepped forward into the light. Female. Or what remained of one.

Fragments of old armor still clung to portions of her body beneath the corruption while blackened veins spread visibly beneath pale ruined skin. One arm had fully transformed into elongated claws years ago, but her face remained disturbingly intact compared to the others.

Theron recognized her. The realization hit so hard that for a moment the corridor blurred around the edges.

Matt felt it through the bond at once. “Theron?”

The hungry one tilted her head toward him. And smiled. Not naturally.

Like something half-forgotten beneath the corruption was struggling to imitate the memory of being a person.

Several wolves raised their weapons higher.

Theron lifted one hand sharply before anyone could fire. “Do not.”

Vale’s voice hardened. “Explain quickly.”

Theron could not stop staring at the figure ahead.

He remembered her laughing beside underground firelight during watch rotations. Sparring in the training halls. Arguing strategy long into the night. The last time he saw her, corruption had already begun climbing beneath the skin of her throat, and she had insisted she could still fight.

He had sent her deeper into the prison because he believed they still had time. The hungry one took another slow step toward them. Matt glanced carefully between Theron and the creature ahead. Understanding settled across his expression in painful silence. “You knew her.”

“Yes.”

The word barely left Theron’s throat. The hungry one’s silver eyes remained fixed entirely on him now. For one impossible second, recognition flickered there.