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Chapter One hundred and eighty-five
The Vale of EchoesThe snow grew quieter the deeper they went.Not softer — quieter.It was as if the world itself held its breath, watching them pass. Each step Selene took left no sound, no trace, as though the earth refused to acknowledge their presence.Ahead, the mist thickened into walls of shifting silver. It wasn’t natural fog — it moved with purpose, folding and unfolding in patterns like thought, whispering in tongues too ancient to belong to the mortal world.Eryk stopped beside her. “We’re close,” he said quietly.Selene could feel it too. The air had changed; it was heavy, luminous, full of invisible currents tugging at her heart.“The Vale,” she murmured. “It’s… alive.”Eryk’s mouth tightened. “Alive isn’t the word I’d use.”The WhispersThey entered a single file. The mist swallowed them whole.Almost immediately, voices began to hum around them — thousands of them, soft and fractured, like fragments of wind through broken glass.At first, Selene thought they were ech
Chapter One hundred and eighty-four
The wind had teeth.Each breath Selene took burned like frost against her lungs. The northern road stretched endlessly ahead, a ribbon of stone swallowed by mist and snow. Behind her, Veyne’s distant towers had already vanished, consumed by the dark horizon.She walked alone, wrapped in a cloak that smelled faintly of rain and memory. Every step crunched through frost-bitten grass, and with each one, the faint glow from the crystal at her belt flickered like a dying heartbeat.The serpent’s voice came softly at first, like the memory of a dream.“You think distance can silence me?” it murmured. “Foolish child. I live in the marrow of your being.”Selene didn’t answer. She had learned that words gave it strength. But even in silence, she could feel it coiling within her — not wholly evil now, only… awake. A creature of old hunger, testing the limits of its cage.The stars above were dim, smothered by drifting clouds. Somewhere to the east, thunder muttered like a god’s forgotten bre
Chapter One hundred and eighty-three
By the second dawn, the council had turned from mourning to murmurs.The great hall of Veyne had been patched with black banners to hide the sky’s wounds, but nothing could hide the scent of division brewing beneath it. The air was thick with candle smoke and quiet accusations.Selene sat upon the broken throne — not out of pride, but because the lords insisted she must appear as queen. The weight of that word hung heavier than the crown. She could feel the serpent’s pulse beneath her skin, faint and slow, like a second heart. Every hour it slept, the scar burned a little colder.Adrian stood at her right, Kael at her left. Beyond them, voices rose and fell like surf against rock.“The realm is shattered!” cried Lord Renn. “Trade routes gone, temples burned. Without the Queen’s power, how do we rebuild?”“The same way we destroyed ourselves,” spat another lord. “By grasping at things we cannot hold?”The old mage, bent with age but eyes still bright, struck his staff upon the
Chapter One hundred and eighty-two
Morning crept in like a stranger unsure it was welcome.The clouds that had raged all night hung low and colorless, their bellies streaked with the faint rose of a sun that didn’t quite dare to rise.The battlefield lay quiet except for the caw of carrion birds and the soft hiss of rain dripping from shattered banners. The citadel of Veyne had survived — but only just. Its spires were cracked, its gates twisted, and the stones still smoked from where the serpent’s light had burned through reality.Kael moved among the fallen with the stiffness of a man walking through his own dream. Around him, soldiers who had once sworn to kill each other now worked side by side, dragging the wounded to makeshift shelters, whispering prayers to whatever gods still listened.He paused beside a dark smear in the mud and touched it — ash, warm to the skin. Not just fire’s leavings. Power’s.He glanced toward the center of the ruined square where two figures sat at the heart of silence.Selene and
Chapter One hundred and eighty-one
Inside the storm, Selene could no longer tell where her thoughts ended and the serpent’s began.It wasn’t a voice anymore — it was a thousand whispers, slithering through the corridors of her mind, speaking in the rhythm of her own heartbeat.Each pulse echoed with something ancient and cruel.We gave you power. You gave us pain.The words crawled through her like venom.Around her, the storm’s roar had dimmed to a muffled hum. The battlefield, the ruins, even Adrian’s voice — all of it had faded to shadow.Now she stood in a boundless space of obsidian light, weightless and alone — or rather, not alone.Before her coiled the serpent — vast, luminous, and terrifyingly beautiful.Its scales shimmered with galaxies. Its eyes were twin suns — and yet, when it spoke, the sound came from her own mouth.“You were never meant to be human,” it said, its tone tender, almost pitiful. “Do you remember what it was to be whole?”Selene’s fists clenched. “I remember the choice.”The serpent’s laugh
Chapter One hundred and eighty
Kael had seen war in all its cruelty.He had watched cities burn, heard the screams of men swallowed by magic they couldn’t understand, and buried comrades beneath soil that still trembled with old curses.But nothing — not even the bloodiest nights of the Crimson Siege — prepared him for this.The storm that loomed over the citadel wasn’t just weather.It was a living thing — pulsing, breathing, watching.Lightning arced across the heavens in unnatural patterns, forming symbols that glowed and vanished before his eyes.The rain had turned thick, black like ink, staining armor and skin. The air reeked of something ancient — copper and fire and decay all at once.And at the heart of it stood them.Adrian and Selene.Lovers. Warriors. Enemies.Now, something greater — something terrifying — was unraveling between them.The Moment of BecomingKael crouched behind the shattered archway, one hand gripping the hilt of his blade, though he knew it would be useless.Even from here, he could f
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