"Maybe, Everett only said he did. Maybe you should talk to the Archmage yourself."

Irene's words tickled my ear as I shuffled my way down the sidewalk, heading in no particular direction.

Would Everett really lie to me to keep me in Whisper Valley? I wondered to myself. If anyone in town would know how to reverse this mark, it seems like the Archmage would. The way people talk, it's like he knows everything. Or at least that's what everyone seems to believe — except maybe Armand and Hen.

I paused in my trek and glanced back towards the diner, my lips twisting and my brow furrowing.

What is it between Hen and her dad? Something has always seemed off there. Something that Armand and Irene apparently know about, but I don't.

My gaze penetrated the chrome plated restaurant as I considered the conversation that unfurled at breakfast. However, no amount of time alone with my thoughts would solve that minor mystery, and the longer I stood out in the sun, the more my skin burned. Well, it got hotter at least. I needed to sit directly in the sunlight for the entirety of the day for any chance at developing a burn. Even then, whatever red I gained would be gone by morning. Just another benefit of rapid regeneration. That, however, didn't change the temperature and the August sun felt like it had reached a boiling point.

I resolved to ask Irene about Hen and her dad later. Whatever was between father and daughter was of little note when it came to me finding out how to reverse this process. Whether Everett was honest or not about the Archmage's lack of knowledge, it wouldn't hurt anything for me to go see him myself. In the few instances I'd encountered him, he seemed pleasant enough. Of course, we only seemed to bump into each other whenever he was officiating a complicated ritual or I needed to be saved by possessed zombies.

I took a deep breath and scanned my location. Darkened shop windows, empty streets, and distant fields surrounded me. At high noon, the section of town catering to the vampires is silent and deserted. In the daytime, it often gave off an uneasy ghost town feeling, but in that moment, it provided a comfortable escape. There were no eyes to watch my steps and judge my every move. I breathed easier and my shoulders lightened. Of course, the sun still enflamed my skin and I was no closer to finding a solution to my problem.

Despite the mages taking up the majority of the town's population, I knew surprisingly little about their inner workings, including where I might find their Archmage, Graham Winchester. Wherever he spent his days, it likely wasn't lurking around in a closed down vampire boutique. I could head back to the diner and ask Hen, but the asphalt radiated with heat and my feet itched to find shade. Wandering around in the oppressive summer sun, looking for a mage that may or may not have an answer for me, didn't sound as appealing as I hoped. However, that didn't mean the day had to be a complete waste. There was still another avenue worth exploring. One that would take me to the cool embrace of a shaded canopy.

I turned away from the town's center and, instead, angled myself towards the farmlands. Somewhere within the distant woods was a boundary drawn with runes and wards. Somewhere the town of Whisper Valley ended and the human world began. Somewhere there was a road that would lead me back into the city where there was family that knew nothing of my transformation. They had loved me even when no one else would, and maybe they still would if I finally returned home.

I swallowed hard as a knot formed in my stomach. Did fear clench my chest or did something else weigh my feet down? The first and foremost rule instilled upon my arrival in town was that I could not leave Whisper Valley. If I tried, I'd be killed. However, that was back when I was fully human. As a human, I didn't have personal incentive to keep quiet about this reclusive paranormal town. But, now I had a stake in the game. Now I was...inhuman. Technically there was nothing holding me there any longer, even if everything inside me fought my feet from their progression towards the tree line. If no one had answers for me in Whisper Valley, wasn't the best option to leave and find my humanity elsewhere?

Once I made it past the last string of shops along the roadway, my legs picked up speed and sent me racing down the road. With wolf-imbued endurance, my muscles propelled me past the wooden fencing that enclosed the cornfields and pastures full of cattle. The air whipped my skin, cooling the sweat that dewed along my hairline and dampened my limbs. The scent of fresh cut hay drying in the field and manure steaming in the sun, mixed together into an oddly floral stench that burned my nostrils and coated the back of my throat. I pumped my legs, pushing them to the limit to escape the suffocating air.

I sprinted up the dirt driveway to one of Antonov's farms before darting around the sturdy barn that sat inside a stretch of acreage dedicated to cow pastures. I hopped the fence in one leap, a feat previously unheard of prior to the now deceased Mrs. Antonov's bite. I figured he wouldn't mind my trespassing all things considered.

I skirted past the meandering cattle munching on the crispy, scorched grass that carpeted the field. One lowed a long, deep greeting as I neared the back fencing and the small strip of wildflowers that buffered the farmland from the woods.

Though a string tugged around my heart, threatening to yank me back into the safety of the open pasture, I kept the momentum in my stride and hurled myself past my fears as I glided over the railing without a second's hesitation.

A smile peeled apart my lips, my mouth wide with exhilaration. I charged through the tree line, darting around the underbrush so not even a twig managed to scratch the exposed flesh on my legs. Inside me something sang, my heart howling with reckless enthusiasm as I snapped the threads pulling me back to town.

I followed my feet, allowing them to carry me deeper and deeper into the woods. I wondered if I'd feel myself pushing through the magical veil that the mages maintained around the town, but that consideration only spurned me on. A twist of pleasure rose my cheeks so my teeth shined in a wide grin. Their boundaries could not hold me now. Nothing could hold me. Nothing ever had. Nothing except myself.

"Delilah."

The word traveled on a whisper carried along the wind, yet it was powerful enough to halt me in my tracks, sending me head over foot in a graceless tumble upon the cluttered ground. I gritted my teeth against the rocks and twigs scratching my skin. After the initial burn of discomfort, the wolf inside me healed the wounds and I found my feet again. Rolling my shoulders and stretching my neck, I peered through the forest dappled with sunlight.

"Who's there?" I asked, my words firm though tentative. My nerves may have been tempered in several paranormal fires at that point, but there was still so much I didn't know about the wondrous world around me. Anything could be calling me, or perhaps nothing at all. My mind certainly wasn't above self-sabotage.

"Delilah."

I whipped around, my nostrils flaring in an attempt to pick up the source's scent upon the air. It felt strange to consider such a response, but my body continued to act upon an instinct that felt both natural and foreign.

Sage, I thought to myself, even though I had previously been unable to identify even the most basic ingredients of food and drinks. Another gift from the wolves.

"Come find me."

"Nothing good has ever happened to me in these woods. I'm not about to go chasing a disembodied voice. Who are you?"

"Yet, you're here. Have you not come because it is change, it is answers that lurk in these woods?"

"Who are you?" I demanded, spinning in circles in a desperate search for where the aroma of sage, now mixed with rosemary and lavender, lurked.

"Come find me at the bone chapel."

"The what?"

I grew dizzy with the aromatic scents encircling me and my footing stumbled, sending me backwards into a willowy tree. Or so I thought.

"Ms. Cross, what a surprise to see you here."

I whipped around and stepped back so I gained distance between myself and my new companion. Despite his low stature, grey hair, and withered expression, he still exuded confidence and authority. Something in me rumbled and my hairs raised along my arm. However, I knew enough to keep my composure and show my respect.

"Uh, good afternoon Mr. Winchester."

"Please," he said with a hollow smile, "call me Graham."

***

There's one clan in Whisper Valley that hasn't seen much light in the series thus far. It's time the mages step into Del's life. Who is the voice on the wind and what do you make of Graham's surprise arrival?

Thank you all for your patience as I battled writer's block! How I can have a detailed outline, but still fail to progress through the draft is beyond me... But here it is and we're moving into the meat of the story, which I hope will keep the words flowing. Thank you all for your support, you mean the world to me! <3