They had been tracking the shadow for weeks—a trail of exsanguinated livestock and villages silenced by a terror that left no tracks. This wasn't Dracula; this was something more feral, a remnant of the Old World that even the Order of St. Dumas whispered about in hushed tones.
Beside him, Carl—the friar whose nervous energy was the only thing keeping them awake—tripped over a jagged root. "Technically, Gabriel, it’s leagues. And if my map is even remotely accurate, which, given the cartographer was a madman in a dungeon, is a coin toss, we are still three days from the Borgo Pass."
Van Helsing didn't look back. He was watching the way the mist swirled in the valley below. It wasn't moving with the wind; it was pulsing, like a slow, grey lung. He knew that rhythm. It was the breath of something ancient, something that didn't need to breathe at all. "We don't have three days," Van Helsing said.
"Miles and miles," he muttered, his voice a gravelly rasp. "It’s always miles and miles."