The fire had long since died, its embers flickering weakly in the cold, a faint glow in the darkness that still clung to the edges of the world. The camp was a ruin of tension, broken only by the soft crackle of a fire too weak to burn. Ziya's hands shook, her fingers still pressed to the amulet, feeling its pulse in time with her own erratic heartbeat. Khalid stood beside her, silent but watchful, his grip steady on his sword hilt, his gaze scanning the shadows that had receded but not disappeared.
The silence between them was heavy, thick with questions that neither of them dared voice. Ziya didn't know how long they stood there, the weight of the curse pressing on her, suffocating in its own right. Her mind was a battlefield, the words of the shadow echoing through her thoughts, gnawing at her, turning over in her chest like a twisted, gnawing thing.
Your blood calls to me.
The voice had filled her soul, and she knew it wasn't just a threat. It was a promise. A hunger that would never be sated, a shadow that had chosen her, and would never stop chasing. She could feel it now, that constant, insidious pull at the edges of her consciousness.
"I should've known," she whispered to the darkness, to the air, to herself. Her voice felt hollow, a mere echo of the words she longed to scream. "It's been there all along. The curse… I can't outrun it."
Khalid's voice was low, but there was a conviction in it that grounded her, even in the face of the impossible. "You don't have to outrun it," he said, each word deliberate, as though he was speaking to both of them. "You need to face it."
She turned to look at him, her eyes burning with the weight of her own disbelief. His face was a study in calm, his expression unreadable, but Ziya could see the underlying tension in his posture, the way his shoulders were squared, the way his gaze flickered to the shifting dark around them. He didn't know what it meant to face a thing like Nekhet. How could he? He didn't carry the mark.
He had no idea what it was like to be chosen by such an ancient, terrible thing.
But as she looked into his eyes, something in her shifted. Something warm, something fierce. Khalid wasn't afraid. Not for himself, not for her. And, for the first time, Ziya realized something: maybe she wasn't alone in this fight. Maybe, just maybe, there was still a way to survive it.
Her gaze dropped to the ground, her mind churning as she considered the woman—the shadow-wrapped figure—who had spoken of the curse. Nekhet. The balance keeper. The words swam in her mind. The curse wasn't just a beast to fight, it was a force. A necessity of destruction that had always existed, waiting for a soul marked by its darkness.
Ziya didn't know how to stop it. She didn't know how to end it.
But the more she thought, the more a single question burned through her: Why me?
Why was I chosen?
There was no answer, not in the wind, not in the shadows. The camp was as still as death itself.
"Ziya," Khalid's voice cut through her thoughts. "We'll find a way."
Her eyes snapped up to meet his, and for the briefest moment, she could have sworn she saw something flicker behind his usual guarded expression. Something fierce, something protective.
Ziya took a deep breath, nodding slowly. "We will," she said, though her voice was less certain than she wanted it to be.
She stood up straighter, brushing the dirt from her clothes. The pull of the curse was still there, tugging at the edges of her mind, but she couldn't afford to let it control her. Not yet. Not when she still had breath in her lungs and allies at her side.
The world felt off balance, unnatural. She could feel it in her bones, a dissonance in the air, as though the very earth itself had been altered by the shadow's presence. But as she steadied herself, she realized something else: the shadows were still there. They were watching. Waiting.
She could feel them now, whispering at the edges of her perception.
"We need to move," she said, her voice hardening with resolve. "The curse isn't done with us. Not by a long shot."
Khalid nodded without hesitation. "Where?"
"To the heart of it." Ziya's voice was quiet, but firm. "If Nekhet is a force, then it's tied to the land. To the balance. I need to understand it. I need to know what it wants—why it's coming for me."
Khalid's gaze softened, but he didn't argue. Instead, he said, "Then we'll face it together."
The certainty in his voice, in his unwavering stance, was like a lifeline thrown across a vast, dark chasm. For the first time in what felt like forever, Ziya felt a spark of hope. It wasn't much, but it was something. And in the face of such ancient, consuming darkness, something was all they had.
The journey toward the heart of the curse was not a simple one. The land had changed. The earth was no longer just earth. It was alive, alive with dark forces Ziya couldn't fully comprehend. The air was thick with an oppressive weight, the shadows darker, deeper, more malevolent than before. Each step they took felt like wading through some unseen, suffocating force.
Ziya couldn't help but feel the mark on her skin burn—an insistent, gnawing heat that spread through her body, as though her very blood had become part of the curse. Her hand instinctively clenched around the amulet at her chest, the ancient object warm against her skin. The amulet had been given to her by her mother, but she hadn't understood its true significance until now. It was more than just a trinket; it was a tether. A link to something older. Something that had been with her all along.
Khalid walked beside her, his presence a steadying force. "Do you feel it?" he asked quietly, his voice tight.
She nodded. "The land is changing. Whatever's coming… it's tied to this place."
The wind howled through the canyon they were crossing, sending a cascade of dust into the air. And then, suddenly, the shadows twisted unnaturally—writhing, moving like they had a life of their own. Ziya stopped in her tracks, her heart pounding in her chest.
"There," she whispered, pointing toward a distant ridge where the darkness gathered most thickly. The shadows seemed to pulse, like the land itself was breathing.
Khalid unsheathed his sword, his eyes narrowing. "What is it?"
"I don't know," she said, her voice heavy with dread. "But I think we've found the heart of it."
And, for the first time, the curse didn't feel like something that could be outrun. It felt like something that could be defeated.