Prologue: Falling Stars

A Chronicle of the First Shardfall

The sky bled fire.

In an age before kingdoms, before the Concordat of Stars, before men and Elvari and dwarves divided the land with borders and blood, the heavens wept stone. They descended in burning arcs, great shards of cosmic power, screaming as they sundered the firmament, their brilliance eclipsing the moon. The night became as day, but not with the sun’s warmth—this was the light of devastation, a radiance that set forests ablaze and sent waves crashing against the shores.

The first of the starshards crashed into what would become the Sylvan Reaches, turning lush woodlands into a sea of emerald flame. Trees older than time itself howled as they twisted and grew unnaturally, roots drinking deep from the magic in the soil. The Elvari, still primitive then, emerged from their burrows in awe and terror, their skin taking on the faint glow of the shardlight. Those who dared touch the emerald stones saw their lifespans stretch beyond mortality, but their dreams were filled with whispers—whispers that would shape their society for eternity.

In the high mountains, where the Ironcliff Dominion would one day rise, another shard fell, embedding itself deep within the heart of the rock. The impact shattered the peaks, sending avalanches tumbling into the valleys below. The first of the dwarves, those who lived like beasts in the caverns, crawled toward the silver shard’s glow, their hands blistering on the hot metal. They did not die; they became something more. Stronger. Wiser. The first forgemasters, molded by the fire of the gods, emerged from the caves and built their cities within the stone.

Across the golden plains where the Aureum Kingdom would later stand, an amber shard landed in the ruins of an ancient civilization. The light it exuded seeped into the very bones of the land, awakening the long-buried dead and breathing new life into the soil. But life was not all it granted. Those who lived near the shard began to hear the thoughts of others. Whispers of desire. Whispers of fear. In time, the ruling houses of Aureum rose, their power built not just on gold, but on the insidious magic of the mind.

The Tidemarsh did not escape the falling heavens. A sapphire shard plunged into the ocean, sending tidal waves across the coasts. The ancestors of the Tidecallers watched as their waters turned strange, their depths darker and deeper than before. And then came the visions. The sea spoke to them in riddles and prophecy, gifting them sight beyond sight. They learned to read the water as one might read the stars, their fates forever tied to the tides and the voices in the deep.

But not all shards brought enlightenment.

The Ashlands were born in fire when a black shard, unlike the others, slammed into the earth with such force that it blotted out the sun for a year. The land cracked and burned, and those who survived were twisted by its corruption. For centuries, the Ashborn wandered the wasteland, untouched by the magic of the other shards, immune to their whispers. They alone remembered the first warnings—warnings that the other realms, drunk on power, had long since forgotten.

For a time, there was balance. The world shaped itself around the power of the shards, and civilizations rose from the ashes of the cataclysm. The shards were studied, worshiped, feared. They gave life. They took life. They became the foundation of all magic, the cornerstone of all power.

Yet beneath it all, something remained unseen.

Deep within the oldest texts, in the crumbling records of scholars who had long since turned to dust, there were hints of a truth too terrible to acknowledge. That the shards were not mere stones, not simply gifts from the stars. That they were fragments of something greater. Something alive.

And that something was watching.

It had always been watching.

And now, after millennia of silence, it was stirring once more.

Chapter 1: Star-Crossed

Royal Observatory, Aureum Kingdom

The air in the observatory was thick with the scent of burning oil and starshard incense. The great dome of polished brass and onyx loomed overhead, its mechanisms whirring softly as the massive telescope adjusted with slow, deliberate movements. Below, a congregation of nobles—adorned in shimmering gold-threaded silks and perfumed with rare spices—lounged on velvet cushions, sipping crystalline goblets of spiced wine.

Elian Aurellis stood apart from them, his back pressed against a cold marble pillar, fingers trembling as he lifted a small glass vial to his lips. Inside, a fine amber powder glittered like crushed sunlight. He inhaled sharply, the shard-dust burning through his sinuses, sending a surge of warmth through his veins. His heartbeat quickened, his vision sharpened, the dull ache in his skull receding into something tolerable.

Just enough to function. Just enough to forget.

“Lord Aurellis,” a voice murmured beside him. Master Tellus, the kingdom’s astronomer, stepped into the shadows. His long, ink-stained fingers gestured toward the telescope, his bearded face creased with the weight of knowledge. “A once-in-a-lifetime event, my lord. You should witness it before you drown yourself in distractions.”

Elian exhaled slowly, forcing a smile. “Must you always ruin a good evening, Tellus?”

The old man’s pale eyes glinted behind the brass-rimmed spectacles perched on his nose. “Only when the world demands it.”

A flicker of unease crawled up Elian’s spine, though he ignored it and followed Tellus toward the platform where the telescope stood. The other nobles, too absorbed in their own revelries, paid them no mind. The observatory was meant to be a spectacle—a gathering for the most powerful families of Aureum to flaunt their wealth and intellect.

Yet Tellus was no fool. He had not invited them here merely for their amusement.

Elian leaned forward, peering through the telescope’s gilded eyepiece. At first, all he saw was the endless sprawl of the heavens—a tapestry of silver pinpricks against an abyss of ink. Then, as the lenses adjusted, he saw it.

A star.

No—something else.

Unlike the others, this celestial body did not glow with the cool radiance of distant suns. It was dark, a violet void that devoured the light around it, pulsating with a slow, sickly rhythm. As Elian stared, the edges of his vision blurred. A faint ringing filled his ears, rising into a deafening crescendo.

And then the visions struck.

A city wreathed in black fire. Corpses writhing as if caught between life and death. A sky choked with twisting, serpentine shadows. A voice—a voice without sound, without mercy, whispering in a language his mind could not comprehend but his soul understood.

She is screaming.

Elian reeled back, gasping. His hands grasped at the marble railing, his breath ragged. He blinked rapidly, his vision returning to the present, but the images burned behind his eyes like aftershadows of a nightmare.

“Ah,” Tellus said softly, watching him. “You saw it, didn’t you?”

Elian turned to the astronomer, his pulse still hammering. “What in the gods’ name was that?”

Tellus didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he reached into his robes, withdrawing a folded parchment. He hesitated, then pressed it into Elian’s hands. “Take this. Read it. But do not—” his voice lowered to a whisper—“let the others see it.”

Elian frowned but tucked the parchment inside his coat.

The astronomer sighed, glancing toward the nobles below, still engaged in their meaningless posturing. His expression darkened. “They do not understand what is coming.”

Elian swallowed, his mouth dry. “And what is coming?”

Tellus met his gaze, his eyes hollow.

“Extinction.”

---

By morning, Master Tellus was dead.

His body was found locked within the observatory chamber, his fingernails caked with dried blood. The great telescope had been shattered, its lenses broken upon the marble floor. His eyes—once filled with the light of discovery—had been gouged from their sockets, his fingers curled as if clawing at something unseen.

The walls were scrawled with symbols written in his own blood, twisting patterns that seemed to shift when one stared too long.

And at the center of it all, a final note, scrawled in frantic, trembling script:

“It comes to consume us all.”

Chapter 1.5: Amber Ghosts

Aureum Pleasure District, The Gilded Veil

The air was thick with incense and sweat, heavy with the musk of perfume and desperation. The Gilded Veil, Aureum’s most infamous pleasure house, pulsed with music and whispered deals, its corridors awash in golden candlelight and the sighs of the city’s damned and privileged alike.

Elian Aurellis moved through the perfumed haze like a man wading through a dream. Or perhaps a nightmare.

The shard-dust burned in his veins, threading light behind his eyes, but it was fading too fast. He needed more. His coat, stitched with the finest Aureum silk, hung open over a loose tunic—his noble blood too obvious even in the dim lighting. The women knew him, the pleasure workers eyeing him with practiced detachment. The men he passed—mercenaries, merchants, minor lords—recognized him, though none dared to speak.

He was the heir to House Aurellis.

And he was a disgrace.

He slipped into a side room, ducking past a curtain of gilded beads, and found what he was looking for.

A man sat on a low couch, his teeth stained amber from years of shard-dust indulgence. His robes were simple but elegant, the kind of fashion that spoke of wealth hidden beneath a veneer of humility. House Draethis. A rival house. A dangerous man to be seen with.

But Elian was past caring.

“You look like a corpse,” the man said, setting aside a delicate glass pipe filled with golden dust.

Elian smirked, lowering himself onto the couch. “Then be a good merchant and sell me the only thing keeping me from the grave.”

The man laughed, a low, knowing sound. “And what will you pay, my lord? Your father’s coin? Or something more interesting?”

Elian exhaled through his nose, jaw tightening. He could end this conversation with a single word—his family’s name was enough to break most men. But that wasn’t how this world worked. Not in the Veil. Here, power came not from bloodlines but from secrets.

So he leaned forward. “You want a secret?” His voice was a whisper. “Fine. Master Tellus is dead.”

The merchant’s smirk faltered. “…Dead?”

“Found in his observatory this morning. Torn his own eyes out, apparently.”

The shard-dust dealer shifted, suddenly uncomfortable. Tellus had been a respected man. An untouchable.

Elian reached for the pipe, rolling it between his fingers. “Now, if you don’t want my coin, I can take my business elsewhere—”

The merchant’s hand shot out, snatching the pipe away. He nodded once to a shadowed alcove, where a woman in sheer, golden silks waited with a small lacquered box.

A fresh supply.

Elian let out a slow breath, his fingers itching.

The woman pressed the box into his hands, but as she did, she whispered something against his ear.

A single phrase.

"You are being watched."

Elian froze.

The haze of the pleasure house darkened around him. The candlelight wavered.

He turned his head just enough to catch the reflection of the room in the polished bronze mirror beside them.

A hooded figure sat in the corner. Still. Silent.

And though the figure's face was obscured, Elian felt it.

Felt them.

Watching.

---

The night air was cold against his fevered skin as Elian stumbled into the alley behind the pleasure house. The shard-dust was already working its way into his mind, numbing the edges, but not enough.

Not enough to silence the memories.

The first time.

The first time his magic had manifested. The first time he had killed.

It had been an accident. A noble’s son, drunk and taunting him, pressing too close, shoving him in a way that should have meant nothing. But then the heat had surged through his palms, light like molten gold searing his vision, and when it had cleared—

The boy had been nothing but charred bone and scorched velvet.

Elian clenched his jaw.

His hands were trembling again. The shard-dust wasn’t working fast enough.

A sound.

Soft. Almost imperceptible.

He turned—too late.

A shadow detached itself from the alley wall. A gloved hand closed over his mouth, dragging him backward, pinning him against cold stone.

A voice whispered against his ear, too smooth, too careful.

"Stop looking at the stars, Aurellis."

A sharp pain lanced through his shoulder.

Then darkness.

Chapter 1.7: The Shadow Broker

Aureum Kingdom | The Obsidian Quarter

Pain woke him first.

Elian Aurellis groaned as consciousness returned in painful waves, his skull throbbing as if someone had driven a spike through his temple. His mouth was dry as ash, the familiar ache of shard-dust withdrawal clawing at his nerves. He tried to move, only to find his wrists bound behind his back, the rope cutting into his skin.

The room smelled of sandalwood and old books. Not a dungeon. Not a cell.

Somewhere worse.

"Welcome back to the land of the living, Lord Aurellis."

The voice was smooth as aged brandy, the accent difficult to place—a calculated mix of Aureum refinement and Tidemarsh fluidity. Elian forced his eyes open, blinking against the golden lamplight that filled the chamber.

He knew where he was before he saw the man.

Thorne's study.

The room was a testament to quiet wealth—walls lined with leather-bound books, shelves displaying artifacts from all Five Realms, a broad desk of polished ebony strewn with maps and correspondence bearing the seals of noble houses. No ostentation, no gilded excess like the rest of Aureum.

Just power. Real power.

The man who called himself Thorne stood at the window, his back to Elian, hands clasped behind him. Tall, with shoulders too broad for his slender frame, clad not in Aureum silks but in a simple robe of midnight blue. His hair was iron-gray, cropped close to his scalp, his skin the weathered olive of someone who had seen too much sun in his youth.

When he turned, his eyes were the color of tarnished silver.

"You've been making quite a mess, haven't you?" Thorne's voice held no accusation, merely mild curiosity. "First the observatory, now the Gilded Veil."

Elian straightened in the chair, ignoring the pain that lanced through his ribs. "Your men didn't have to be so thorough."

A smile ghosted across Thorne's lips. "They aren't my men. But they owed me a favor." He crossed to a side table, where he poured amber liquid into two crystal glasses. "You should be grateful they brought you to me rather than leaving you in that alley."

"I'm overwhelmed with gratitude," Elian said dryly, watching as Thorne approached and set one glass on the small table beside him. "Though I'm finding it difficult to express while bound."

Thorne made a dismissive gesture. "A precaution. The withdrawal makes you... unpredictable."

"You mean my magic."

"I mean your temper." Thorne sighed and leaned against the desk, studying Elian with those unsettling silver eyes. "The shard-dust is killing you, you know. Slowly. Painfully. It's rather redundant, given that your own forbidden magic is already doing the same."

Elian said nothing. There was no point denying what Thorne already knew.

"You're burning out, Elian," Thorne continued, his tone softening to something almost like concern. "The amber shards weren't meant to be channeled through human flesh. Your ancestors knew that. That's why they locked the knowledge away."

"And yet, here we are." Elian's voice was flat. "What do you want, Thorne?"

The older man took a sip from his glass, considering his next words carefully.

"The dark star," he said finally. "You've seen it."

Elian's blood went cold.

"Master Tellus—"

"Is dead. Yes." Thorne set his glass down with deliberate care. "As are seventeen others across the Five Realms. All of them astronomers. All of them with their eyes removed. All of them leaving the same message."

Elian felt the room tilt. "How do you know that?"

Thorne's smile was thin. "I know everything that matters, Lord Aurellis. It's why kings and queens whisper in my ear while pretending I don't exist." He leaned forward slightly. "It's why your father employed me. It's why your sister still does."

"Leave Lyra out of this."

"I'm afraid that's impossible." Thorne moved to untie Elian's bonds, his fingers deft and quick. "Your sister is neck-deep in court politics, and the court is about to become a very dangerous place for those unprepared for what's coming."

Elian rubbed his wrists as the ropes fell away, eyeing the drink beside him but not touching it. "And what exactly is coming?"

"War," Thorne said simply. "But not the kind we've seen before. Not between kingdoms or houses." His expression darkened. "Something far worse."

Elian remembered the visions from the telescope. The shadows. The twisted corpses. The city burning.

"Why am I here, Thorne?"

Thorne reached into his robe and withdrew a sealed letter bearing the royal crest of Aureum. "There's been an incident at the border. A village called Red Hollow. Everyone dead. Strange circumstances."

"And this concerns me because...?"

"Because Commander Brightshield requested you specifically." Thorne's silver eyes glinted. "She believes there's something unusual about the deaths. Something possibly related to what happened at the observatory."

Elian's pulse quickened. "She knows about my... abilities?"

"Maela Brightshield knows many things she pretends not to." Thorne tossed the letter onto Elian's lap. "She's loyal to the crown, not to your family specifically. Remember that."

Elian stared at the letter, his mind racing. "And if I refuse?"

Thorne's laugh was soft, almost kind.

"You won't."

"Because of Lyra," Elian said flatly.

"Because of what you saw in that telescope," Thorne corrected. "Because whatever is coming, you're already part of it. The dark star saw you, Elian. Just as you saw it."

The room seemed to grow colder.

"How do you know that?" Elian whispered.

Thorne smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes.

"Because it saw me too." He turned away, moving back toward the window. "You leave for Red Hollow at dawn. Commander Brightshield will meet you at the East Gate with an escort."

Elian rose unsteadily to his feet, the letter clutched in his hand. "You haven't told me everything."

"No," Thorne agreed, his back to Elian once more. "I haven't. But unlike Master Tellus, I don't intend to gauge out my eyes when the knowledge becomes too much to bear."

He glanced over his shoulder, his silver eyes reflecting the lamplight like twin moons.

"One last thing, Lord Aurellis."

"What?"

"The next time you need shard-dust, come to me directly." Thorne's voice hardened. "The Gilded Veil is no longer safe for anyone. Especially you."

Elian hesitated at the door, questions burning on his tongue.

But Thorne had already dismissed him, turning his attention to the star charts spread across his desk.

Outside, the night air was cool against Elian's fevered skin. The withdrawal still clawed at him, but something else burned beneath it now.

Purpose.

And the nagging suspicion that Thorne knew far more about the dark star—and Elian's connection to it—than he was willing to share.

Far above, violet light pulsed in the night sky.

Watching.

Waiting.

Chapter 2: Tides of Portent

Tidemarsh Council Chambers, The Floating City of Serevas

The waters of the Tidemarsh churned with unease.

From her seat atop the pearl-inlaid dais of the Council Chambers, Nessa Tidecaller watched the restless waves beyond the great arching windows. The floating city of Serevas, a marvel of woven coral and shard-infused glass, swayed gently beneath her, but the sea was not calm tonight. The tide whispered of disruption, of imbalance. It had been speaking of shadows for weeks now, but tonight its voice was a scream.

She traced her fingers over the bowl of water before her—clear and untainted, yet strangely cold to the touch. The azure shard embedded in the basin’s rim pulsed softly, a heartbeat against her fingertips.

The water was waiting.

The council murmured around her, elders debating the reports from the outer villages. Strange disappearances. Unsettled dreams. The ocean spitting back its dead with salt-blackened flesh.

They had not yet turned to her. They would soon.

“Ambassador Tidecaller.”

Nessa inhaled, lifting her gaze as Elder Voska, the highest-ranking of the Tidal Council, leaned forward on his throne of sculpted driftwood. His robes shimmered with woven strands of kelp, his beard threaded with tiny, glowing barnacles that pulsed in time with his breathing. “You have performed the sacred rites. Have the tides spoken?”

Every eye in the chamber turned to her.

She forced herself to relax. A diplomat. A performer. A seller of futures. They must see what she wanted them to see.

“I have sought the waters in many places,” she began smoothly. “In the shallow wells of our people, in the deep currents beyond the reefs. And in every ripple, the message is the same.”

She dipped her fingers into the water, sending concentric waves lapping against the edges of the basin. The shard within it flared, brightening to an eerie sapphire glow.

“The tides speak of shadow.”

A ripple of discomfort spread through the council. Some shifted in their seats. Others merely folded their hands, wary, waiting.

Elder Voska’s expression remained unreadable. “Clarify.”

Nessa’s lips curled into the faintest smirk. He was frightened. Good.

“The dark star,” she said. “It is real. It is coming.”

A silence deeper than the abyss fell upon the chamber.

Even those who had scoffed at the astronomers’ warnings days before now hesitated. The Tidecallers held no armies, ruled no land, but their prophecies were never ignored. The sea did not lie.

Still, Elder Voska was careful. “And what price did the waters take from you for this knowledge?”

Nessa let her fingers drift over her forearm, where the edges of freshly carved symbols still stung beneath her silk sleeves. She would not speak of the memory fragments the sea had stolen, nor of the fleeting moments of blindness when she had seen nothing but that violet-black void consuming the stars.

Instead, she merely smiled. “A fair one.”

Voska studied her, but she had long perfected the art of giving nothing away.

Finally, the old man exhaled, his gills fluttering with the motion. “The Five Realms will meet in Aureum within the fortnight. You will go as our voice.”

There was no question in his tone.

Nessa inclined her head, already considering how many different versions of this prophecy she could sell before anyone realized they had bought the same fate.

But then the water in the basin darkened.

A flicker, almost imperceptible.

Nessa stilled, her blood turning to ice.

The chamber’s lights dimmed as the azure shard within the basin flickered erratically. The water’s surface rippled, not with the gentle pull of her magic, but with something else.

Something watching.

The murky reflection staring back at her was not her own.

The council’s murmurs faded. The entire room seemed to hold its breath.

The water churned, and a whisper—low, hungry—slithered through the chamber.

“We are already here.”

The basin shattered.

Nessa reeled back, gasping as shards of glowing azure scattered across the floor, water splashing over her robes. The sea outside roared in sudden upheaval, waves slamming against the pillars of the floating city.

Cries erupted from the council. Guards stepped forward, hands on the hilts of coral-forged blades.

But Nessa barely heard them.

She pressed a trembling hand against her temple, her vision swimming. Her forearms burned—new symbols had appeared, carved into her flesh without a blade.

And on the chamber floor, amid the shattered remains of the basin, water pooled into a single phrase.

“It comes to consume us all.”

Chapter 2.5: The Price of Visions

The Waters of Astramar

The waters had begun to whisper lies.

Nessa Tidecaller knelt at the edge of the obsidian pool, her breath shallow, the silvered moon casting fractured light over the ritual stones. The sacred basin, carved into the cliffside and filled with water drawn from the depths of the Black Trench, shimmered unnaturally.

She had performed this ritual a hundred times before.

But never like this.

She dipped her fingers into the water, feeling the pulse of the azure shard embedded in its rim—a heartbeat out of sync with her own. The cold bit into her skin, seeping past flesh, past bone, into something deeper.

“Show me,” she whispered.

The first price was always blood.

She pressed the edge of her ceremonial dagger to her palm, drawing a thin line of crimson that dripped into the water. The surface rippled, then stilled, and she exhaled slowly as the visions took her.

The River

The river’s prophecies were shallow things, easy trades—bits of the future exchanged for memory fragments that she would never miss. A name forgotten, the scent of childhood summers lost.

Tonight, the river was silent.

Its waters lapped against the stone, black and opaque. The vision it offered was empty, void.

Something had taken the river’s voice.

The Lake

Lakes held deeper truths. Their visions took more—memories worth bleeding for. She had once sacrificed an entire year of her past for a glimpse at a nobleman’s assassination.

She had never gotten those months back.

Now, the lake mirrored the sky, but the stars were wrong.

She saw herself, standing in a place she did not recognize, her hands bound in rusted chains. Figures loomed around her, their faces shifting, hollow. A voice—her voice—whispered words she did not understand, syllables foreign and sharp, spilling from her lips like an incantation.

Then came the knife.

It plunged into her chest, the pain sharp and real, and she gasped, the vision shattering.

When she looked down, the wound was not there.

But the pain remained.

The lake had taken something, though she did not yet know what.

The Sea

The sea was cruel. Its visions cost pieces of the body—numbness in fingers, dulled taste, blurred sight. She had given more to the sea than she had to any lover, and it had never once been kind.

She waded into the shallows, the cold biting at her skin. The waves licked at her calves, rising, dragging.

She let herself sink.

The water closed over her head, salt burning her lungs, the abyss swallowing her whole.

She did not resist.

And the sea showed her.

Darkness.

The black star loomed, pulsing like a living thing. The sky fractured, splitting open like torn flesh, and from the wound poured them. Shadows without form, hunger without end. They moved through cities like a plague, consuming, twisting.

She saw the floating city of Serevas swallowed by the tide, its towers sinking beneath the waves. She saw the forests of the Elvari burning with emerald fire, the screams of the blood-trees echoing in the void. She saw the high mountains of the Dominion cracking open, their forges dark, their steel turned brittle and useless.

And she saw her own death.

She was on her knees, her skin carved with shifting runes, her hands bound in chains made of something that pulsed with unnatural light. The figures surrounded her again, and this time, she saw their faces.

They were not strangers.

They were the kings and queens of Astramar.

Watching.

Waiting.

“The tides have chosen you.”

The knife came again.

It was her own hand that held it.

She screamed—

The Ritual Breaks

Nessa’s body lurched from the water, her lungs seizing as she gasped for air. She collapsed onto the stone, coughing violently, the taste of salt and blood thick in her mouth.

Pain burned across her arms. She looked down.

New symbols had been carved into her skin.

She did not remember making them.

The waters dripped from her fingers, pooling onto the stone. The patterns they formed were not random.

They were the same symbols that had been found on Master Tellus’s corpse.

Her pulse hammered.

The price of prophecy had never been this high before.

And the visions had never been this certain.

Something was coming.

And she would not survive it.

Chapter 2: The Golden Markets

Aureum Kingdom | The Merchant District

Morning light spilled like honey over Aureum's famed markets, warming the gold-flecked cobblestones and setting the merchant banners aflutter with jewel-toned ripples. The streets hummed with life—silk-draped nobles browsing delicacies beside laborers haggling over basic provisions, children weaving between stalls chasing paper birds enchanted with minor amber magic, merchants calling their wares in musical cadences that had been perfected over generations.

Elian Aurellis moved through this symphony of commerce with a practiced invisibility. His fine coat had been exchanged for something simpler—quality fabric but lacking the ostentatious embroidery that would mark him as House Aurellis. His hood remained low, concealing both his features and the shadows beneath his eyes. The withdrawal still gnawed at his nerves, but Thorne had provided enough shard-dust to take the edge off—just enough to function, not enough to dull his awareness.

The familiar weight of his dagger pressed against his ribs, and Thorne's letter hung heavy in his inner pocket.

Red Hollow. Border massacre. Dawn departure.

But first, supplies.

"You look terrible."

The voice cut through his thoughts like a blade. Elian tensed, then relaxed as recognition set in. He turned, allowing himself the smallest smile.

"And you're as tactful as ever, Lira."

Lira Kaven stood with her arms crossed, her lips quirked in a half-smile that never quite reached her shrewd amber eyes. She wore the practical attire of a merchant's daughter—sturdy boots, a divided skirt in muted green, and a leather vest adorned with dozens of tiny pockets over a cream blouse. Her dark hair was woven into an intricate braid coiled atop her head, held in place with brass pins shaped like songbirds.

"When you sneak through the markets looking like death itself, tact seems a waste of breath." She fell into step beside him, matching his pace effortlessly. "What brings the noble Lord Aurellis slumming with us common folk today? More herbs for your... headaches?"

The edge in her voice made it clear she knew exactly what kind of "headaches" had plagued him these past years.

"Equipment," he said simply. "I'm traveling to the borderlands."

That caught her attention. Lira's eyebrows rose. "The borderlands? Why would you—" She stopped herself, studying his face. "Royal business?"

"Something like that."

She nodded, asking no further questions. This was why he valued Lira—she understood boundaries, the currency of discretion.

"Well then," she said, her tone shifting to brisk efficiency, "you'll need proper gear, not the useless finery your usual outfitters would saddle you with." She gestured ahead. "Come on. I know exactly where to go."

---

The hidden markets of Aureum existed in plain sight, layered beneath the glittering surface that tourists and casual shoppers saw. Behind the satin-curtained stalls selling spiced wine and gilt trinkets were doors that led to merchants who catered to those with more practical needs.

Lira guided Elian through this labyrinth with the confidence of someone born to it. Her father, Davrin Kaven, had been a master merchant before illness confined him to their townhouse; now Lira managed their family business with a shrewdness that had doubled their profits. The Kavens weren't noble, but in Aureum, wealth spoke almost as loudly as bloodlines.

They ducked under a faded orange awning and into a dimly lit shop that smelled of leather and metal polish. Shelves lined the walls, packed with equipment that had clearly been crafted for use rather than appearance.

"Martis!" Lira called. "I've brought you a customer with actual coin to spend."

A grizzled man emerged from the back room, wiping his hands on a stained cloth. His left eye was milky white, and a scar ran from his temple to his jaw. He'd been a border guard once, Elian recalled, before taking shrapnel from an Ashland raid.

"Lord Aurellis." Martis gave a nod that contained exactly the minimum amount of deference required. "Unusual to see your kind in my shop."

"He needs borderland gear," Lira said before Elian could respond. "Quality work, nothing that shines or jingles or screams 'rob me' to every bandit between here and the Ashlands."

Martis's good eye narrowed as he assessed Elian. "Border duty, is it? Or something less official?"

"The less you know, the better for all of us," Elian replied.

The shop owner grunted in appreciation of this honesty. "Fair enough. Let's see what you need."

What followed was an education. Martis moved methodically around his shop, assembling a collection of equipment while offering terse explanations for each item. A bedroll treated with oils that repelled both water and certain crawling border parasites. A canteen with a filter system for purifying suspect water sources. Dried rations that wouldn't spoil in the border heat. Boots with hidden compartments in the heels. A compass that worked even in the strange magnetic fields near the Ashlands.

"And you'll want this." Martis placed a small clay pot on the counter. "Border balm. For the dust storms. Protects the eyes and lungs. The Ashborn make it from their native plants. Worth twice its weight in gold out there."

Elian raised an eyebrow. "You trade with the Ashborn?"

Martis's scar twitched as his lips quirked. "Let's say I know people who know people."

Throughout this process, Lira leaned against the counter, occasionally interjecting to haggle over a price or suggest an alternative. Her knowledge rivaled Martis's in some areas—evidence of her extensive trading connections.

"He's overcharging you on the water filters," she murmured at one point, loud enough for Martis to hear. "They're half that price from the Tidemarsh traders."

"Those filter marsh water, girl," Martis growled back. "Border water needs stronger medicine."

Lira rolled her eyes. "Fine. But throw in an extra firestarter, or we're taking our business to Valena's shop."

Martis muttered something unflattering but added the item to their growing pile.

Elian watched this exchange with quiet amusement, momentarily distracted from the gnawing anxiety about his mission. This was Lira in her element—sharp, confident, unintimidated by anyone regardless of status. She'd been this way since childhood, when they'd first met during one of his rare, supervised excursions outside the palace quarter.

He still remembered her as a girl of nine, hands on her hips, telling the son of House Aurellis that his father had overpaid for inferior silk and should fire his trade advisors. She'd been right, of course.

---

When they emerged from Martis's shop, Elian's new supplies packed efficiently into a weather-resistant backpack, the market had reached its midday peak. The scent of sizzling street foods filled the air—honeyed lamb skewers, spiced flatbreads, and the famous golden-apples dipped in caramel and amber dust (the legal, culinary variety).

Lira paused at a crossroads between market sections. "Hungry?"

His stomach answered before his mind could, growling audibly. How long had it been since he'd eaten properly? The days blurred together in a haze of shard-dust and royal obligations.

"I'll take that as a yes," Lira said, already cutting through the crowd toward a particular stall adorned with copper cookware.

The vendor, an elderly woman with intricate golden patterns tattooed on her hands—marks of a retired palace chef—brightened at the sight of Lira. "My favorite customer! And you've brought a friend!"

If she recognized Elian, she gave no sign.

"Two specials, Marna," Lira said, already placing coins on the counter.

"I can pay for my own meal," Elian protested.

Lira's expression was adamant. "Consider it payment for the entertainment. It's not every day I get to watch Martis squirm over his prices."

They found seats at a small table tucked between a fabric merchant and a jeweler's stall. The "special" turned out to be tender lamb and vegetables wrapped in paper-thin dough, seasoned with spices that tingled pleasantly on the tongue. Simple food, but better than anything served at the palace banquets Elian habitually avoided.

For a while, they ate in comfortable silence. The market flowed around them—a pocket of normality that felt increasingly precious.

"So," Lira finally said, wiping her fingers on a napkin. "Are you going to tell me what's really happening, or do I have to pretend I believe you're suddenly interested in border patrols?"

Elian hesitated. "It's complicated."

"It always is with you." She sighed, then leaned forward, her voice dropping. "There are rumors, Elian. Strange ones. Merchants returning from the borderlands speak of villages gone silent. Caravans disappearing. Shadows moving where they shouldn't."

A chill ran down his spine despite the warm day. "What else have you heard?"

Her eyes narrowed slightly at his reaction. "That's not denial. So it's true, then?"

"What else, Lira?"

She glanced around before answering. "The night market whispers about the stars. About one star in particular."

The violet star. Of course the rumors had spread. In Aureum, information was currency, and currency always flowed.

"Be careful what you repeat," he warned quietly.

"And you be careful out there." Her hand briefly covered his on the table, a gesture so unexpected he almost pulled away. "Whatever you're walking into... just come back from it, all right?"

The genuine concern in her voice made something twist painfully in his chest. It had been a long time since anyone had cared whether he returned from anywhere.

"I'll be back for the Festival of Lights," he said, surprising himself with the promise. "Save me some of those ridiculous sugar lanterns you love so much."

Her smile then—quick and bright and real—was like glimpsing something he'd forgotten existed.

"I'll hold you to that," she said. "The good baker's daughter has been asking about you, you know. Flora. The one with the laugh."

Elian groaned. "Are you still trying to play matchmaker? After all these years?"

"Someone has to care about your future, since you clearly don't." There was no judgment in her tone, just the comfortable frankness of old friendship.

For a moment, surrounded by the vibrant life of the market, with Lira's familiar presence across from him, Elian could almost imagine a different path. One where he wasn't cursed with forbidden magic. Where the dark star wasn't approaching. Where his greatest concern might be whether Flora the baker's daughter found him charming.

But then a shadow passed overhead—just a cloud crossing the sun—and reality reasserted itself with the weight of Thorne's letter against his chest.

"I should go," he said, rising from the table. "Dawn comes early."

Lira stood with him. "I'll walk you to the east gate. There's a shortcut through the silver quarter."

---

The walk through Aureum's merchant districts was like passing through layers of the city's social strata. From the glittering gold quarter where foreign dignitaries shopped, through the silver district of the aspiring wealthy, down to the bronze sector where practical goods changed hands, and finally to the iron quarter where common folk purchased life's necessities.

Elian watched the city transform around them. Here was Aureum beyond the palace walls—vibrant, complex, alive with commerce and ambition. Not just the corrupted nobles and their power games, but ordinary people building lives amid the grandeur and decay.

Lira kept up a running commentary, pointing out changes since his last visit—a new glassblower from the Tidemarsh setting up shop, a controversial statue commissioned by a minor noble, a teahouse rumored to be a front for information brokers (though none as well-connected as Thorne).

"You should get out more," she chided as they approached the east gate. "There's a whole city beyond your family's walls."

"As you frequently remind me," he replied.

The east gate loomed before them, its massive golden doors perpetually open during daylight hours, heavy with engravings depicting Aureum's mythic founding. Guards in burnished armor stood at attention, their eyes sweeping the crowds with practiced vigilance.

Beyond lay the road that would take him to Red Hollow. To whatever horror awaited there.

Lira stopped, squinting up at him in the late afternoon light. "You look better than when I found you," she decided. "Still terrible, but marginally improved."

Elian found himself smiling despite everything. "High praise indeed."

"Just be careful." Her tone turned serious. "Whatever's happening out there... the merchants who return aren't the same. There's a look in their eyes." She shivered slightly. "Just promise you'll watch yourself."

"I promise." The words felt inadequate against the weight of what he faced, but he meant them.

She studied him a moment longer, then nodded, apparently satisfied. "The Festival of Lights. Don't forget."

"I won't."

With a final smile, she turned and disappeared back into the market crowds, her braid catching the sunlight like a copper coin.

Elian adjusted his pack and faced the east gate. Whatever darkness waited beyond, he carried this small light with him—the memory of normal life, of markets and friendship and promises of sugar lanterns.

It would have to be enough.

As he passed through the golden arch, the guards straightened imperceptibly, recognizing him despite his plain clothes. One nodded toward a side courtyard where a small mounted company waited—Commander Brightshield's escort, right on time.

Tomorrow would bring blood and shadow.

But today, unexpectedly, had brought something like hope.

Chapter 3: Blood in the Borderlands

Aureum-Ashlands Border | The Village of Red Hollow

The stench of death settled into the soil like a sickness.

Elian Aurellis had smelled corpses before—duels gone too far, street killings in the outer districts, the slow rot of prisoners in the dungeons beneath the Aureum palace. But this was something else. Something wrong.

He stood at the edge of the village, his boots sinking into mud turned black with blood. The air was thick with the scent of iron and charred flesh, the weight of it pressing into his skin.

Red Hollow had been a quiet border town, caught between the golden opulence of Aureum and the ashen wastes of the south. Merchants passed through here, selling goods to those desperate enough to trade with the Ashborn nomads. Farmers worked the barren fields, their lives simple, forgettable.

Now, Red Hollow was silent.

The houses stood untouched, doors swinging open in the cold wind. No fires burned in the hearths. No dogs barked. No voices called for aid.

Only the bodies remained.

They had not simply been killed.

They had been arranged.

The villagers lay sprawled in patterns—spirals of severed limbs, circles of shattered skulls. Their fingers had been broken backward, forced into twisted symbols in the dirt. Their mouths gaped open in soundless agony, their eyes missing.

All of them.

Not a single body had eyes.

Elian swallowed hard, his fingers tightening around the hilt of his dagger.

"Gods," Maela Brightshield murmured beside him. The Royal Guard commander was as hardened as they came, but even she was pale, her blue cloak rippling in the wind. Her gloved hand hovered over the pommel of her sword, as if the steel alone could keep the horror at bay.

"This isn't a raid," she said. "This isn't war."

Elian forced his feet forward. His pulse hammered, his skin burning as the shardlight beneath his scars stirred.

He had seen something like this before.

Not with his own eyes.

But in the visions.

He stepped over a young woman's corpse—her ribs splayed open, her spine missing—and reached the center of the village.

The blood was thickest here.

A pool of dark crimson soaked the dirt, bodies piled high in grotesque formations. But it was what sat atop the carnage that made his breath catch.

A single survivor.

A man, slumped forward, covered in blood. His breathing was ragged, shallow. His fingers twitched against the gore-soaked ground, as if grasping at something unseen.

His eyes—he had eyes—snapped open.

Golden. Bright. Unnaturally so.

Alive.

Elian stared, recognition dawning. He had seen this man before—not in person, but in Thorne's study. A sketch, part of the intelligence report that came with his briefing. An Ashborn scout who had been tracking strange occurrences along the border.

"That's Cassius," Elian murmured, the name from the report coming to him. "Cassius Ashborn."

Maela looked sharply at him. "You know him?"

"One of Thorne's reports. He's an Ashborn scout who's been investigating disappearances in the region."

Elian moved forward, kneeling beside the man, gripping his shoulder.

"Cassius," he hissed. "What happened?"

The Ashborn's lips parted. Blood dribbled down his chin. His voice was hoarse, broken.

"I don't—" A ragged breath. "I don't remember."

Elian's stomach twisted.

Cassius was covered in their blood.

Not a drop of it was his own.

---

The Night Falls

They should have left.

Burned the village to the ground, salted the earth, erased it from history.

Instead, they stayed.

The dead needed to be buried, Maela had argued. They needed to understand what had happened here.

That had been hours ago.

Now, as the sun sank behind the hills, the corpses began to move.

Elian woke to the sound of wet, sucking noises.

He sat up sharply, heart hammering, hand flying to his dagger. The fire had burned low, casting weak light against the surrounding darkness.

And then he saw them.

The bodies had not risen.

They had shifted.

One of the corpses—a man, his chest caved in, his mouth frozen in a scream—was closer than before.

Another, a child, had turned its head.

Elian's breath came in short gasps.

No.

No, this wasn't possible.

His skin burned. The shardlight beneath his scars pulsed, warning him, screaming at him.

Something was still here.

A whisper.

Low. Crawling.

It slithered into his ears, a voice without form, without mercy.

"They are still watching."

A hand clamped onto his wrist.

Elian barely swallowed a scream as Cassius's fingers dug into his arm.

"They're wrong," Cassius whispered. His golden eyes were wide, wild. "They're not dead."

A sound.

A wet, meaty crack.

Elian turned.

One of the corpses was rising.

Not moving. Not twitching.

Rising.

Its broken limbs snapped back into place, bones shifting beneath torn flesh. Its head lolled to the side, too loose, the neck barely holding it together. Its lips curled, and though its throat was a torn mess, it spoke.

No.

Not spoke.

It laughed.

Elian scrambled back, his fingers flying to the blade at his hip. Maela was already on her feet, her sword drawn.

The corpse took a step. Another.

Then another figure stirred.

And another.

And another.

A chorus of brittle laughter filled the air as the dead turned to face them.

Their eyeless sockets watched.

And they began to run.

---

The Slaughter

Steel clashed against rotting flesh.

Elian slashed his dagger across a corpse's throat, but the thing didn't even slow. It grinned—grinned—as black sludge poured from the wound.

Maela fought like a demon, her blade a blur of silver as she carved through them. But for every one that fell, two more rose.

Cassius was on his knees, hands gripping his head, golden eyes wide with horror. "They're—inside. They're inside me—"

Elian grabbed him, yanking him to his feet. "Run."

The word barely left his lips before the ground trembled.

Something was coming.

Something worse.

The corpses stilled.

Then, as if sensing something greater, they turned—facing the village square.

The blood-soaked dirt began to shift.

The mass grave.

Elian's gut twisted as the bodies within the pit—dozens, hundreds—began to convulse. Their mouths opened, but no screams came.

They didn't need to.

The sound was inside his mind.

The thing that pulled itself from the pit was not human.

It wore their flesh.

A single body, made from many. Arms, legs, torsos twisted into a singular form, mouths screaming without sound. Its fingers—its fingers were still moving, still trying to crawl away.

It lifted its head.

Elian could not breathe.

No eyes. No features.

Just darkness.

And then it spoke.

"We see you."

The sound shattered the air, and the world broke.

Elian fell to his knees, his mind splintering beneath the weight of it. His scars burned, the shardlight screaming, pushing against his skin, trying to escape—

Then—

A flash.

A burning hand on his shoulder.

Cassius.

The light in his golden eyes was blinding, searing.

The creature hesitated.

And then—it fled.

The corpses collapsed, as if puppets with their strings cut. The air was suddenly empty.

But the damage was done.

Elian gasped, his fingers digging into the dirt. His body shook, his mind reeling.

Maela was on her feet, breathless, blade still slick with black ichor.

Cassius stood over him, his golden eyes flickering.

"…What are you?" Elian rasped.

Cassius's expression was unreadable. "I don't know."

But the bodies in the pit had known him.

And the way the darkness had fled from him meant someone—or something—knew him, too.

Far beyond the hills, the dark violet star pulsed.

Watching.

Waiting.

Chapter 3.5: The Hollow Remains

Aureum-Ashlands Border | Hidden Outpost

The fire wouldn't take the bodies.

Maela Brightshield stood at the edge of the pyre, her face shadowed by the flickering light. The flames licked hungrily at the heap of corpses, but they did not blacken. Did not burn. The scent of charred wood filled the air, but not of flesh. The dead of Red Hollow remained untouched.

Unclean.

She swallowed down a curse and stepped back, her hand instinctively seeking the hilt of her sword. Twenty years serving the Aureum crown had shown her horrors—border skirmishes where men were flayed alive, noble assassinations that left entire houses slaughtered, the ritual killings that sometimes plagued the outer districts. But this? This was something else entirely. Something that made her skin crawl with a primal fear she hadn't felt since childhood.

Something was watching. She could feel it, coiled in the darkness beyond the firelight, patient as a predator that knows its prey is cornered.

The wind shifted, carrying the sickly-sweet stench of the bodies. They shouldn't smell like that—not so fresh, not with wounds so grievous. Not with that strange, dark fluid seeping from their eye sockets, thicker than blood and glistening with an unnatural sheen. She'd ordered the pyre built downwind from their temporary shelter, but there was no escaping the reek of corruption that clung to everything in Red Hollow.

Elian Aurellis sat a few paces away, a flask of spiced brandy clutched between trembling fingers. His coat was filthy, streaked with ash and dried blood, but his face was worse—gaunt, haunted, golden eyes distant as if staring into something only he could see. The withdrawal was hitting him hard; she'd seen the signs before in shard-dust addicts when the palace guard raided the pleasure houses. But there was something else there too—a knowledge, a terrible understanding that seemed to age him beyond his years.

Cassius Ashborn was silent. He crouched beside the ruined well, washing the dried blood from his hands. But it wasn't just blood—his skin was slick with something thicker, darker. Something that did not belong to him. The water in his cupped hands turned black, yet still the stain remained. His shoulders tense with effort, he scrubbed until his golden skin grew raw, as if trying to remove more than just the physical evidence of what had happened.

No one spoke of what had happened in the village. Not yet.

Not while the air still hummed with a presence none of them could name but all could feel.

---

Nightfall in the Outpost

They had retreated to an abandoned waystation on the outskirts of Red Hollow—one of the many Aureum outposts meant to watch the borderlands. It had been empty when they arrived, no sign of soldiers, no tracks. Just dust gathering on abandoned provisions and weapons left behind as if their owners had simply walked away mid-task. The small wooden shelter offered little comfort, its walls too thin against the vastness of the night, its windows too dark like gaping mouths ready to swallow what little light they'd managed to create.

The fire in the hearth burned low, casting jagged shadows against the cracked stone walls. The small wooden table between them held nothing but untouched food and a map of the border, corners curling from the damp that seeped through the aging timber. The hard bread and dried meat they'd brought from Aureum looked foreign against the rough-hewn wood—too civilized, too normal for what they'd witnessed.

No one ate.

The silence had stretched between them for hours, broken only by the occasional shifting of wood in the fireplace or the distant howl of what might have been wind. Elian stared into the depths of his flask, watching the amber liquid swirl, his mind trapped between the horrors they'd seen and the creeping need for shard-dust that gnawed at his nerves. Each minute pulled his skin tighter, made the shadows in the corners seem deeper, the whispers at the edge of hearing more insistent.

Elian exhaled sharply and downed another swallow of brandy. The burn was immediate but hollow, nothing like the crystalline clarity of shard-dust, but it would have to do. "We need to talk."

Maela tore her gaze from the window, her fingers still wrapped around the hilt of her sword as they had been since they arrived. The dancing firelight caught the lines of tension around her eyes, the set of her jaw that had grown more rigid with each passing hour. "Talk about what, exactly?" Her voice was flat, weary. "How the corpses laughed? How they ran? How the thing in the pit—"

Cassius flinched.

Maela stopped.

The word hung unfinished between them, a door half-opened onto something none of them wanted to name. Cassius's hands curled into fists against the rough wooden planks of the table, his knuckles white with strain. The blood had been washed away, but a faint darkening remained beneath his nails, in the creases of his palms—shadow-stains that water alone couldn't remove.

For a moment, there was only the wind howling against the outpost walls, its voice rising and falling in patterns that sounded almost like words.

Elian leaned forward, his hands gripping the table's edge. His eyes fixed on Cassius with an intensity that made the air between them seem to warp. "Cassius." His voice was too even, too careful, a man speaking to a cornered animal. "You were the only one left standing in that village. You were covered in their blood."

The firelight played across Cassius's features, highlighting the sharp angles of his face, the hollow exhaustion in his eyes despite their unnatural golden glow. Those eyes hadn't dimmed since the encounter in the village square—still burning with that strange internal light that had somehow driven the darkness away.

"What happened?" Elian pressed, the words hanging in the stale air.

Cassius didn't look up. His gaze remained fixed on his hands, as if reading some terrible truth written in the lines of his palms. The silence stretched, broken only by the soft crackle of the dying fire and the distant keening of the wind.

"I don't know," he finally said, the words emerging like stones dragged from the bottom of a dry well.

"That's not good enough." Elian's voice hardened, the diplomat's son giving way to something sharper, more desperate. Shardlight pulsed beneath his skin, a network of golden veins briefly visible along his forearms before he pulled his sleeves down to cover them.

Cassius's hands clenched into fists. His breathing grew shallow, each exhale carrying the weight of something trapped too long inside. The muscles in his jaw worked as he stared down at his palms as if willing them to tell him something, anything that might make sense of the carnage they'd witnessed. When he finally spoke, his voice dropped to a whisper that barely carried across the table.

"I remember walking into Red Hollow last night. I remember talking to a merchant—something about supply routes through the Ashlands." His voice caught, a tremor running through it. "Then…nothing."

A ragged breath escaped him, his shoulders rising and falling with the effort of controlling something that threatened to break free. "Then I was on the ground. The blood was everywhere." He finally looked up, his golden eyes glowing faintly in the dim light. "And they were gone."

Maela crossed her arms, the leather of her armor creaking in the silence. Her expression remained carefully neutral, but her fingers tapped an anxious rhythm against her forearm. "Gone?"

"They weren't dead. Not at first." His jaw tensed, a muscle jumping beneath the skin. "I heard them."

The fire popped suddenly, sending sparks dancing up the chimney. All three of them flinched, eyes darting to the shadows beyond the firelight before returning to each other. The darkness outside pressed against the windows like something alive, breathing, waiting.

Elian's grip on the table tightened until his knuckles whitened. "What did you hear?"

Cassius hesitated, his eyes sliding toward the window before returning to meet Elian's gaze. Something passed between them—a shared understanding of boundaries being crossed, of truths better left unspoken. But it was too late for silence now.

Then, his voice—low, shaking with the effort of recalled horror.

"They were praying."

A silence fell over the room, heavy as a burial shroud. The fire guttered in a sudden draft, shadows leaping up the walls like grasping hands before settling once more into their quiet dance.

Maela felt her stomach twist, bile rising in her throat. She'd led men into battle, had seen magic tear bodies apart during the southern border conflicts, but something in Cassius's voice—the hollow certainty of it—chilled her more deeply than any battlefield horror. "Praying to what?"

The question hung between them, giving shape to the dread that had followed them from the village.

Cassius's gaze darkened, his golden eyes dimming slightly as he stared into the memory. "Something under the dirt. Something older." He ran a shaking hand through his hair, ash and dried blood flaking away from the strands. "I didn't see it. But I felt it. The whole village felt it."

The fire hissed and crackled, a log splitting open to reveal its glowing heart. The sound was too loud in the heavy silence that followed his words.

Elian's breathing was shallow, each inhale seeming to cost him. The amber light beneath his scars pulsed faster, visible even through his clothing. "And the thing in the pit?"

Cassius shut his eyes, his face contorting briefly as if in physical pain. When he opened them again, the golden glow had intensified, illuminating the hollows of his cheeks, the shadows beneath his eyes. "It knew me."

The fire crackled. No one moved.

Then—

A knock at the door.

---

The Not-Quite-Survivor

All three of them froze.

The knock came again—slow. Measured. Too deliberate to be a traveler, too confident to be a survivor seeking help.

Elian reached for his dagger, Maela's fingers brushed the hilt of her sword. Cassius was already on his feet, his breath uneven, his body coiled with a tension that seemed to make the air around him vibrate.

No one should have been here.

Not after what they saw.

Elian moved first. He pressed his back against the wall beside the door, motioning for Maela to do the same. The wood beneath his shoulder creaked, the ancient timbers protesting even his slight weight. Cassius positioned himself near the fireplace, hands flexing at his sides, ready.

Elian exchanged a silent glance with Maela, a wordless communication born of shared horror. Her jaw set, a small nod confirming she was ready. Then, in one swift motion, he unlatched the door and pulled it open—

Nothing.

The wind howled. The moon cast jagged silver light over the barren field beyond, illuminating the twisted remains of what had once been a fence, a garden, a place where people had lived ordinary lives.

But there was no one there.

Elian's pulse slammed against his ribs as he scanned the darkness, every sense heightened by dread and shard-dust withdrawal. The shadows seemed to shift and breathe beyond the thin circle of light spilling from the doorway.

He took a slow step forward—

A hand seized his wrist.

It was small. Cold. Wrong.

The fingers were too thin, the bones too close to the surface, the skin like parchment left too long in water. The grip was surprisingly strong, a desperate clutching that sent ice through Elian's veins.

Elian yanked back, stumbling, his heart hammering as if trying to break free of his chest.

Then he saw it.

A child.

A little girl stood just beyond the threshold, barefoot, her shift torn and soaked with dried blood. Her hair hung in matted clumps around a face too pale even in the silvery moonlight. Her eyes—her eyes were still there.

She should not have had eyes.

She should have been dead like all the others in Red Hollow.

"Please," she whispered. Her lips barely moved, as if the word were being formed not by muscle and breath but by something else pulling strings from within.

Elian took another step back, his dagger half-raised, useless against the horror of a child who should not be.

Maela stiffened, one hand on her sword, the other reaching for something at her belt—a charm, Elian realized, one of the protective amulets many career soldiers carried despite the crown's official disdain for folk magic.

Cassius didn't move. He watched the child with an intensity that seemed to fill the air with static, his golden eyes flaring brighter in the darkness.

"Who are you?" Elian's voice was tight, barely controlled, hand white-knuckled around his dagger's hilt.

The girl's eyes darted to him. Her pupils were too large, swallowing the color like black holes absorbing light. Too black, too empty, windows looking into nothing.

"My name is—" Her breath hitched. She blinked. Then again.

She was forgetting.

Something was slipping away from behind those too-dark eyes, draining like water through cupped fingers. Her mouth opened, but no sound came. Her face twisted, as if something was pulling at her from within, reshaping her features into a grotesque mask of childhood. Her small hands trembled, her lips forming a shape—

Not a word.

A symbol.

Elian recognized it with gut-wrenching clarity.

One of the marks carved into the bodies in Red Hollow. The same symbol he'd seen in Master Tellus's observatory, written in blood on the walls. The same pattern that had appeared in his vision when he looked through the telescope at the dark star.

His breath stopped.

Maela swore. "Shut the door."

Elian hesitated, some part of him still responding to the shape of a child, to the ancient instinct to protect the small and vulnerable—

The child screamed.

It wasn't a sound. It wasn't even a voice.

It was every voice at once.

The corpses in Red Hollow. The laughter. The thing in the pit.

The scream shattered the windows, rattled the walls, sent shardlight exploding beneath Elian's skin in jagged patterns that tore at his flesh from within. The air itself seemed to crack and split, reality bending around the impossible sound.

Cassius moved first. He lunged forward, slamming the door shut just as the child's fingers reached for the threshold—

The second it closed, the screaming stopped.

The silence was deafening.

The three of them stood there, breathless, shaking. Glass from the shattered windows littered the floor, glittering like fallen stars in the firelight. The walls seemed to vibrate still with the echo of that impossible cry.

Outside, the wind howled. The thing that had worn the child's skin was gone, leaving only the night and the distant presence that had followed them from Red Hollow.

Maela spoke first, voice hollow with the certainty of someone who has seen beyond the boundaries of what should be possible. "That wasn't a child."

Elian exhaled sharply, his pulse slowing from its frantic pace to something approaching normal. The shardlight beneath his skin receded, leaving behind a dull, throbbing ache. "No."

Blood dripped from his nose, spattering onto the rough wooden floor. He wiped it away with the back of his hand, leaving a crimson smear across his skin—another stain that wouldn't easily wash away.

Cassius's hands were still shaking. His golden eyes flickered in the dim light, the glow pulsing like a heartbeat. Sweat beaded on his forehead despite the chill air seeping through the broken windows. His voice, when he finally spoke, held a terrible certainty.

"She was here for me."

Elian didn't argue.

Maela's hand remained on her sword, her knuckles white around the hilt. Her shoulders were rigid, her breathing deliberately controlled. "How do you know?"

Cassius's expression was haunted, the golden light in his eyes casting strange shadows across his face. "Because I've seen her before. In the village. Before—" He stopped, unable to continue.

Because he knew, deep down, that Cassius was right.

And whatever had happened in Red Hollow—

It wasn't finished.

---

Final Image

Far beyond the ruined village, in the deep darkness of the pit, something shifted.

The corpses were still. The blood had dried.

But the symbols remained.

Unburned. Unfaded.

They pulsed in the black, humming with something alive. The darkness between them seemed to breathe, to expand and contract like lungs drawing their first taste of night air. The patterns connected, lines of power forming a lattice, a web, a doorway.

And somewhere in the abyss, far beyond the reach of the living—

Something opened its eyes.

Not eyes of flesh. Not eyes that could be gouged or blinded.

Eyes of ancient hunger, patient and vast.

The violet star pulsed overhead, its sickly light filtering down into the pit, feeding the symbols, strengthening the connection. The darkness stirred, reaching upward, tendrils of shadow stretching toward the sky in supplication or greeting.

In Red Hollow, in the abandoned homes and bloodstained streets, the air grew heavy. The dust settled into new patterns—spirals and whorls that mimicked the starry void above. A breath without lungs disturbed the silence.

And in the pit, something whispered a name.

Cassius.

Chapter 4: The Whispers in the Wood

Sylvan Reaches | The Eldertree Council

The forest was bleeding.

Sylvaria Nightwood knelt beneath the towering roots of the Eldertree, her fingers pressed against the damp earth. The soil was too dark, the scent too rich—not the fresh decay of fallen leaves, but something deeper, something wrong. She lifted her hand, her fingertips coated in black sap that glistened in the filtered moonlight. Not sap. Blood.

The ancient tree groaned overhead, its branches twisting against the windless night, whispering in a language only the Elvari could hear. For centuries, the Eldertrees had been the guardians of the Sylvan Reaches, their massive emerald shards embedded deep within their trunks. Their roots ran beneath the entire forest, pulsing with ancient wisdom, connecting all living things in a network of silent communication. But tonight, their voices were different. They spoke not of growth, not of balance, but of hunger—insatiable and vast.

Sylvaria wiped her fingers against her cloak and rose to her feet, her movements graceful despite the unease that tightened her chest. She had spent her life among these trees, sworn to protect them, to listen to their guidance, to channel their magic for the prosperity of the Elvari. But even she, Warden of the Western Grove, felt uneasy beneath their shifting boughs. The air itself seemed charged with something expectant, the usual chorus of night creatures silenced as if holding their breath.

She needed answers, and only the Eldertree Council would have them.

Or so she prayed.

---

The Council of Rot

The Eldertree Council gathered in the Hollow—a great cavernous chamber carved into the oldest tree in the Reaches. It had existed long before any Elvari could remember, its walls lined with glyphs that whispered to those who could still listen. The chamber was illuminated only by phosphorescent fungi that cast an eerie green glow across the faces of the assembled elders, making their already sharp features appear more severe, more alien.

At the center of the chamber sat the Eldertree itself, its roots coiled like veins across the floor, its bark cracked with age and power. It was alive, sentient, but no longer whole. Centuries of ritual had changed it, shaped it into something between plant and being. The emerald shard embedded in its center pulsed with a rhythm like a heartbeat, but slower, as if time moved differently within its crystalline structure.

High Warden Morvaine, oldest of the council, stood before it, his silvered hair adorned with the ceremonial crown of woven vines. His emerald eyes were dull, his expression vacant as though his mind were elsewhere. The other council members—seven Elvari elders whose lifespans had been unnaturally extended through communion with the Eldertrees—remained seated on carved wooden thrones, their faces impassive, their fingers idly tracing patterns in the air that left faint trails of green light.

Sylvaria approached the center of the chamber and bowed, pressing a fist to her heart in the traditional gesture of respect. "High Warden."

Morvaine did not acknowledge her immediately. His gaze remained fixed on some middle distance, seeing something beyond the physical world. When he finally spoke, his voice was distant, as if dragged from somewhere else, the words emerging with effort through lips that barely moved.

"You are troubled, Sylvaria."

She clenched her jaw, feeling the familiar frustration at his oblique manner. The Council had grown increasingly cryptic over the years, speaking in riddles and half-truths. Once, she had found it mystical; now, it seemed evasive. "The trees are bleeding," she said, direct and unadorned. No riddles of her own. Not tonight.

A ripple of unease passed through the gathered wardens. One elder shifted in her seat, bark-like skin creaking with the movement. Another's fingers stilled, the light they had been weaving extinguishing. But Morvaine did not flinch, did not show surprise or concern.

"The trees must bleed so that we do not," he said, his tone flat, rehearsed, as if reciting an ancient text. "You know this."

Sylvaria's throat tightened, her frustration giving way to a deeper dread. She knew the rituals, the sacrifices, the bargains made long ago. The histories taught that the Eldertrees sustained the Elvari through a sacred exchange—blood for wisdom, sacrifice for immortality. But this was different. Wrong. "Then tell me," she pressed, her voice low but firm, "what have we done?"

Morvaine exhaled slowly, the sound like wind through dry leaves. His gaze finally focused on her, truly seeing her for the first time since she entered. "We have done as we always have. We have fed the trees."

Sylvaria's stomach twisted at the implications. Blood sacrifice. The price of their immortality. The Eldertrees thrived on blood, on life itself. It had been this way for thousands of years. But something had changed. The sacrifices had always been chosen carefully, deliberately—a balance between giving and taking. Now, though? Now the trees were taking on their own, demanding more without the ritual constraints that had governed the exchange for millennia.

"You hear them, don't you?" Morvaine murmured, tilting his head, his expression unreadable in the green half-light. "The whispers. They have grown louder, haven't they?"

Sylvaria hesitated, too aware of the other council members watching her, their emerald eyes glinting with something between fear and anticipation. The truth was dangerous, but lies would serve no one now. "Yes," she admitted. The Eldertrees had always spoken to her, guiding her through dreams and visions, directing her in her duties as Warden. But their voices had changed—warped, twisted into something unfamiliar, discordant. "They do not speak of balance," she said carefully, measuring each word.

Morvaine studied her for a long moment, his ancient face revealing nothing. Then, slowly, he smiled. The expression did not reach his eyes, which remained cold, calculating. "They speak of awakening."

The chamber seemed to breathe in response, the very air growing thick with anticipation. The roots beneath Sylvaria's feet shifted almost imperceptibly, curling closer to where she stood. A sharp pain lanced through her temple, bright and sudden, and her vision blurred at the edges.

The vision took her before she could resist.

---

The Dream of Ash and Shadow

The forest burned.

The emerald glow of the starshards pulsed in agony as flames consumed the sacred groves. The Eldertrees screamed—not in words, but in death-rattles that shook the earth and split the sky, their roots twisting in torment, reaching upward like supplicants begging for salvation from a merciless god.

And beneath them—

Something was stirring.

A shadow moved beneath the soil, shifting, stretching, vast beyond comprehension. It had no form, no name, only hunger that radiated outward like ripples in a black pool. The ground pulsed with its movements, not with life, but with something ancient, something diseased.

The vision blurred, reality fracturing and reforming, and suddenly Sylvaria stood at the heart of the Reaches, in a clearing she knew well. But it was wrong. The trees that bordered it had changed, their bark blackened and twisted, their branches reaching downward rather than toward the sky. Their hollowed-out knots were filled with darkness deeper than night, and as she watched, eyes opened within that darkness—not eyes of flesh or anything living, but points of void that saw through her, into her.

A voice—low, crawling, inhuman—spoke from the darkness. It emanated not from any single point but from the air itself, from the soil, from within her own mind: "You were never the first."

The words carried knowledge with them, terrible and vast. Images flood her consciousness: the Elvari, not as the first beings to commune with the trees, but as latecomers, usurpers. The starshards, not as gifts from the heavens, but as prisons, containing something far older than the world itself. The sacrifices, not as payment for power, but as sustenance for captive gods whose patience had finally run thin.

Sylvaria gasped—

---

The Unraveling

She came back to herself on her knees, her hands gripping the roots beneath her. Her breath was ragged, her body shaking with the aftershocks of vision. Cold sweat beaded along her hairline, and the metallic taste of blood filled her mouth where she had bitten her tongue.

The whispers had followed her back, echoing in her mind, a cacophony of voices speaking in a language she almost understood. The knowledge they had forced upon her was already fading, slipping away like water through cupped hands, leaving behind only the certainty that everything she had believed was built upon lies.

Morvaine watched her, his emerald eyes dark with something she could not name—perhaps amusement, perhaps fear. "The Eldertrees remember," he said softly, his voice barely audible above the whispering that now seemed to emanate from the very walls of the chamber.

Sylvaria swallowed the bile rising in her throat, forcing herself to stand though her legs threatened to buckle. "Remember what?" Her voice sounded strange to her own ears, too thin, too fragile against the weight of what she had glimpsed.

Morvaine turned away from her, running his fingers along the bark of the Eldertree. The wood was warm beneath his touch, pulsing with a rhythm that matched the emerald shard at its heart. "The first fall," he said, his voice taking on a dreamy, distant quality. "The first Shardfall."

A cold knot formed in Sylvaria's stomach as pieces of ancient history rearranged themselves in her mind, forming a new and terrible pattern. "The histories say the starshards gave us life," she whispered, the words feeling like betrayal in her mouth.

Morvaine's lips curled into what might have been a smile on a face less ancient, less weathered by centuries of secrets. "The histories are lies."

The chamber darkened as he spoke, the phosphorescent fungi dimming as if in response to his words. The glyphs on the walls twisted, reshaping themselves into something else, something older. Not the elegant script of the Elvari, but jagged symbols that hurt the eye to follow, patterns that suggested geometries impossible in the physical world.

"The starshards were never gifts," Morvaine murmured, his gaze fixed on the writhing patterns. "They were prisons."

Sylvaria's breath hitched as fragments of her vision returned—the sense of something imprisoned, something ancient beyond reckoning, stirring after eons of captivity. The emerald shard within the Eldertree pulsed faster now, its light intensifying until it cast long, distorted shadows across the chamber.

"The Eldertrees remember," Morvaine continued, his voice taking on a rhythmic quality that matched the pulsing of the shard. "And now, so do you."

He turned back to her, stepping forward with a grace that belied his apparent age. His fingers brushed her cheek in a gesture that should have been comforting, paternal, but felt invasive, wrong. Too gentle, too intimate for the horror unfolding around them. "You should leave, Sylvaria," he said, his tone suddenly solicitous, concerned.

It was not a warning. It was a command. A dismissal. She was no longer welcome in this sacred space where truth and lies had become indistinguishable.

She swallowed hard against the fear rising in her throat. "You're afraid."

Morvaine smiled, and for the first time, she saw it—the black veins creeping up his neck from beneath his ceremonial robes, threading beneath his skin like the roots of some parasitic plant. They pulsed with the same rhythm as the shard, as if connected to it, as if something were flowing between them.

His emerald eyes had turned darker, the color leeching away to leave something else behind. Not green. Black. Depthless. Hungry.

"You should leave," he repeated, his voice layered now with something else, something that was not Morvaine at all. "Before the roots take you too."

---

The Escape

Sylvaria did not run.

She walked. Slowly. Carefully. With the measured pace of a Warden conducting a ritual inspection, though every instinct screamed at her to flee. To run. To put as much distance as possible between herself and what the Council Chamber had become.

Out of the Eldertree Chamber. Past the whispering roots that seemed to reach for her ankles as she passed. Through the sacred groves where the leaves had begun to wither and curl, turning black at the edges as if touched by invisible frost. The smell of rot hung in the air, sweet and cloying, a corruption spreading outward from the heart of the Reaches.

The forest was wrong.

It pulsed beneath her feet, alive in a way that it should not have been—not the steady, slow rhythms of natural growth, but something feverish, hungry. The emerald shards embedded in the trees she passed flickered erratically, as if something inside them was trying to get out, pounding against the crystalline walls of its prison.

She reached the edge of the grove, her breath shallow, her heartbeat too rapid. Her hands trembled, the aftershocks of the vision still burning through her mind like wildfire. The boundary between the sacred grove and the wider forest lay just ahead—once beyond it, she could reach her own dwelling, gather what she needed, and then... what? Where could she go? Who would believe her?

She had to go. Had to warn someone. Anyone. About what was awakening in the heart of the Sylvan Reaches.

Then—

A soft rustle. Not the wind—there was no wind tonight, the air too still, too heavy with anticipation.

She turned—

And froze.

A figure stood at the tree line, half-hidden in shadows deeper than the night around them.

Tall. Cloaked in robes that seemed to absorb the faint moonlight rather than reflect it. Watching her with eyes she could not see but could feel—a weight of attention that pressed against her skin like physical touch.

Not Morvaine. Not an Elvari. The proportions were wrong, the stance too still, too perfect in its immobility.

Something else. Something wrong.

Sylvaria's pulse pounded in her throat, her ears, her fingertips. Her hand moved to the dagger at her belt, though she knew instinctively it would be useless against whatever stood before her.

The figure tilted its head in a motion too fluid, too precise to be natural.

And then—

It spoke.

"The roots will take everything."

The voice was neither male nor female, neither young nor old. It resonated with harmonics that shouldn't exist in a living throat, that vibrated in her bones and teeth like the song of crystal struck by metal.

The shadows around the figure deepened, spreading outward like spilled ink, and then—

It was gone.

Swallowed whole by darkness that receded as quickly as it had appeared, leaving nothing but the ordinary night and the silent trees.

Sylvaria did not hesitate.

She turned—

And ran.

The forest blurred around her as she fled, branches reaching for her as if trying to snare her, roots rising from the earth to trip her. But she had been a Warden for decades, had known these paths since childhood. Her feet found safe passage even as the forest itself seemed to turn against her.

Behind her, in the sacred grove, in the Council Chamber, something ancient was awakening.

And the Eldertrees, prisons no longer, welcomed their captives home.

Chapter 5: Forge and Fury

Ironcliff Dominion | The Deep Forges

The mountain breathed fire.

Korvic Ironheart stood at the edge of the abyss, the heat from the molten river below scorching his skin even through layers of protective cloth. The cavern was massive, carved into the bones of the Ironcliff mountains by generations of dwarven smiths. The air shimmered with heat, thick with the scent of metal and stone, punctuated by the rhythmic clanging of hammers that echoed through the vast space like a heartbeat. Fire and darkness existed in perfect balance here, the dancing flames casting long shadows across walls embedded with silver starshards that glinted like watching eyes.

The Deep Forges had been burning for over a thousand years.

Today, they burned wrong.

Korvic squinted against the glow, watching as his newest batch of shardsteel cooled on the anvil before him. It should have gleamed silver, smooth and perfect. Instead, it pulsed with a rhythm that didn't belong to the metal but to something else, something alive. Dark veins threaded through the steel like capillaries beneath skin, shifting with each pulse as if something flowed through them. He'd been developing shardsteel for years—a revolutionary alloy that could channel starshard magic without the usual degradation. This batch had been intended for the Highland Thanes, a gift to cement the ever-fragile alliance between the dwarven Underkings and their human counterparts.

But something had corrupted it. The metal was tainted, the veins within it were threaded with something dark. Something alive.

His stomach twisted as he reached toward it, his calloused fingers hovering just above the surface. The heat wasn't right either—too cold at the edges, unnaturally hot at the core, defying the laws of metallurgy he'd mastered over his century-long career.

"Master Ironheart!"

A young apprentice skidded to a halt beside him, his face slick with sweat, beard singed from working too close to the forges. His eyes were wide with alarm, pupils constricted to pinpoints despite the relative darkness of the cavern. "Something's happened in the lower tunnels." His voice was thin, shaken. "You should come see."

Korvic exhaled through his nose and wiped the soot from his hands, smearing black across the intricate silver runes tattooed into his forearms—protection sigils that had been passed down through his family for generations. The prickling sensation beneath them told him something was very wrong. Magic flowed strangely today, currents disrupted by something he couldn't name but could feel in his bones.

"Show me."

---

The Breach

The lower tunnels were not supposed to exist.

They had been sealed for nearly four centuries, locked away after the last mining expedition had uncovered something unnatural. The records had been burned, the entrances collapsed, and the elders had sworn never to dig that deep again. Only fragments of the story remained, whispered between master craftsmen over strong spirits in the late hours—tales of darkness that moved with purpose, of miners who returned speaking in voices not their own, of starshards that seemed to feed on blood rather than reflect light.

But someone had broken through.

Korvic stepped through the jagged opening, his boots crunching over freshly broken rock. The tunnel beyond was black, slick with moisture, the air thick with the scent of rust and something older than iron. His lantern cast weak light that seemed reluctant to penetrate the darkness, revealing walls streaked with a substance that glistened like oil but moved like something sentient, pulling away from the light.

The other dwarves waited at the edge of the breach, their torches flickering weakly, their weapons drawn. Veteran miners and forge workers, hardy folk who had survived cave-ins and molten metal accidents—now they huddled together, faces pale beneath their soot-stained beards, eyes darting nervously toward the darkness.

Something had crawled out of the dark.

Korvic saw the first body before he saw the creature.

A miner, sprawled against the tunnel wall, armor cracked open like an eggshell, his ribs splintered outward as if something had forced its way through his chest from inside. His face was frozen in an expression beyond terror, jaw dislocated as if it had been stretched too wide, eyes replaced by dark, empty sockets that seemed deeper than they should be. Around him, the stone was carved with symbols that hurt to look at directly, patterns that suggested geometries impossible in the physical world.

The air was wrong. Too thick, too cold despite the proximity to the forges. It clung to Korvic's skin like something alive, probing, searching for a way in.

The walls hummed with a vibration he felt in his teeth more than heard—a sound just below the threshold of hearing that made his skull ache.

Then—

A skittering sound.

Low. Wet. The noise of something with too many limbs dragging itself across stone.

Korvic barely had time to shout before it lunged from the darkness.

---

The First Shadowborn

It had too many legs.

Too many arms.

A thing made of flesh and stone and something else entirely. It crawled on shattered limbs, its body twisted as if it had once been a dwarf but had forgotten how to be one. Joints bent in impossible directions, extra appendages sprouting from its torso like grotesque branches from a tree. Its skin was a patchwork of dwarf and stone, melded together as if the rock itself had grown into the flesh, or perhaps the flesh had taken on the properties of stone.

And its eyes—

Gods.

Its eyes were empty pits, but inside them, something moved. Not pupils, not flesh, but shadows that writhed and pulsed with a light that wasn't light at all, but the absence of it, darkness given form and purpose.

Korvic swung first.

His hammer crashed into its skull, shattering bone but not stopping it. The creature staggered, chunks of its head crumbling away like broken pottery, revealing not brain but a seething mass of black tendrils that twisted and reformed even as he watched. A sound emerged from it—not a scream, not a growl, but laughter. High and broken, the sound of something that had never known joy mimicking what it thought laughter should be.

It did not have a mouth.

But it laughed.

The torches flickered wildly as the other dwarves rushed forward, blades flashing in the uncertain light. They hacked at its limbs, but it did not bleed. Where their weapons struck, the flesh simply split open to reveal more of the black substance that seemed to animate it. The creature's movements were jerky yet purposeful, as if it were a puppet controlled by unseen strings, learning how its new body moved even as it fought.

Instead of blood—

The shadows beneath its skin writhed.

Korvic felt his pulse stutter as the creature turned toward him, focusing those empty eyes on his face with terrible recognition. Not by name. Not by sight. But by something deeper, as if it recognized something in his blood, in his very essence. It cocked its head at an angle that snapped vertebrae, studying him with something close to curiosity.

It lunged again—

Korvic grabbed a fallen torch and shoved the flame into its chest.

The creature screamed then—a sound no living throat should make, a discord of multiple voices layered atop each other, some so deep they rattled stones from the ceiling, others so high they made his ears bleed. The fire caught the black veins, and for a moment, Korvic saw it—saw what was inside.

Not flesh.

Not bone.

Something ancient.

Something waiting.

The black substance burned with a purple flame, shrinking away from the fire even as it tried to reform. The creature thrashed, its too-many limbs flailing against the stone walls, carving those same disturbing patterns with the force of its death throes. Then, with a final shriek that sent cracks racing through the solid stone floor, it collapsed into ash.

Gone.

Korvic's breath came ragged. His hammer trembled in his grip. Blood trickled from his ears, warm and thick, but he couldn't hear it falling. The screams had left him temporarily deaf, the world muffled as if he were underwater.

The other dwarves stood frozen, their weapons still raised, faces ashen with horror at what they'd witnessed. Some bore scratches from the creature's claws—scratches that were already darkening, black tendrils spreading beneath the skin around the wounds.

Then, finally—one of them spoke, his voice barely audible through Korvic's damaged hearing.

"…That wasn't one of ours."

No.

No, it wasn't.

And the worst part?

It hadn't come from outside.

It had crawled up from below.

---

The Warning

Korvic sat in his workshop, his hands blackened with soot, his mind still buzzing with what he had seen. The chamber was his sanctuary, a place where creativity and craft had always flourished. Now it felt tainted. The air was too still, the shadows in the corners too deep, as if they might at any moment coalesce into something with too many limbs.

On the table before him lay a shardsteel blade.

It was his finest work—or should have been. Days of careful forging, of precise shard-infusion, of delicate runic inscriptions meant to stabilize the metal's magical properties. The blade should have been his masterpiece, a weapon worthy of the Highland Thanes themselves.

And it was wrong.

The same black veins ran through the metal, shifting, pulsing like the thing in the tunnel. They hadn't been there when he'd started the forging—he would have noticed, would have discarded the metal immediately. No, they had appeared during the process, spreading through his creation like an infection. Even now, they moved beneath the surface, following the trail of his finger when he hovered it above the blade without touching.

Korvic exhaled sharply and grabbed the hammer from his belt. The weapon was heavy in his hand, comforting in its solidity, in the simple laws of physics it obeyed. Unlike the blade. Unlike the creature. He raised it, muscles tensing, determination hardening his features.

Then—

Without hesitation—

He brought it down on the blade.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

The metal did not break.

It screamed.

A sharp, high-pitched wail that rattled his teeth, that echoed in his bones. The sound wasn't physical—it bypassed his damaged ears entirely, speaking directly to something primal within him. The veins in the blade writhed more frantically now, bulging against the metal's surface as if trying to break free. Where the hammer struck, darkness spread outward like ripples in a pond, the corruption accelerating rather than being destroyed.

Korvic stumbled back.

His breath was ragged, heart pounding against his ribs. The hammer fell from nerveless fingers, clattering against the stone floor with a sound that seemed too normal, too mundane after what he'd witnessed.

For the first time in his life—

He was afraid of his own creation.

---

The Choice

By sunrise, the Deep Forges were sealed.

Korvic had ordered it himself, invoking ancient rights granted to the Master Artificer in times of grave danger. The great doors—twenty feet of solid iron inlaid with silver starshards—had ground closed on massive hinges, shutting away the corruption he'd discovered. The miners who'd been scratched by the creature were already showing signs of change—black veins spreading from their wounds, eyes growing dull and unfocused. They had been quarantined, their families told they'd been sent to outposts in the far reaches of the dominion.

A necessary lie.

None of the elders had argued. They had known.

They had always known.

The old records hadn't been completely destroyed. Some remained, locked away in the deepest vaults, accessible only to those with the highest authority. Korvic had spent the night reading them, the ancient parchment crumbling beneath his trembling fingers. The accounts matched what he'd seen—the corruption, the transformation, the shadows that moved with purpose. But they also spoke of something else, something worse. A darkness spreading across the realm, a violet star growing brighter in the night sky, connections between the starshards and something ancient that had been imprisoned within them.

But sealing the tunnels wasn't enough.

Because Korvic had seen the truth.

It was in the metal.

In the shards.

The starshards weren't just sources of power. They were alive in some fundamental way, connected to each other across vast distances. And now, after millennia of dormancy, they were waking up.

And something had been waiting for them to do so.

Korvic exhaled sharply and turned to his apprentice, a young dwarf who still believed the world made sense, that craft followed rules, that darkness stayed where it belonged.

"Prepare the caravan," he said, his voice rough from shouting orders through the long night. "Select only our most trusted. No more than twelve."

"Where are we going?" the boy asked, confusion written across his soot-stained face.

Korvic picked up the cursed blade, now wrapped in protective cloth inscribed with runes of containment. The corruption couldn't be destroyed, but perhaps, somewhere, someone would understand what it meant. The blade was evidence, proof of what was happening beneath the mountain.

"To Aureum."

If the realms didn't start talking soon—

There wouldn't be any realms left.