The keep was silent again, but the silence no longer felt empty.
It was a silence that listened.
Seraphine pressed a trembling hand against her forehead, her breathing still uneven. The visions, the presence of Vael'thiran—it had changed something inside her. She could feel it, like a thread of darkness stitched into her bones.
Caius exhaled beside her, his expression unreadable. "So, just to recap—this Seal doesn't just hold the Harbinger. It holds something… else."
Seraphine nodded, gripping her mother's journal. "Something forgotten."
Caius ran a hand through his hair, muttering a curse. "You're really not making me feel better about any of this."
Neither of them spoke for a moment. The flames in the torches flickered erratically, as if disturbed by an unseen breath.
Then, a sound broke the stillness.
A soft, wet drip.
Seraphine turned sharply.
At the edge of the chamber, near the crumbling stone archway—
A dark stain was spreading across the floor.
Blood.
Caius noticed it too. His sword was in his hand within seconds. "That wasn't there before."
The air thickened, charged with something wrong.
Seraphine's pulse hammered as she followed the slow, pulsing trail of blood toward the far wall. It led up to a shattered column, where something shifted in the shadows.
Something alive.
She barely had time to react before a body slumped forward.
Seraphine inhaled sharply. The figure was a man, his robes tattered, his chest torn open by deep, jagged wounds.
But it wasn't the sight of the wounds that froze her blood.
It was his eyes.
They were still open.
And they were watching her.
His lips moved, barely a whisper.
"… too late…"
Seraphine's breath hitched. "What?"
The man's body convulsed. His blood—dark, almost black—began to seep upward, moving against gravity.
And then, with a sickening snap, his head twisted toward her, his voice sharpening into a rasping command:
"RUN."
---
The Screaming Walls
The torches exploded.
A howling wind tore through the chamber, and the walls themselves screamed.
Caius grabbed Seraphine's wrist and pulled her back just as the corpse lurched upright.
Its mouth stretched too wide, its limbs jerking unnaturally, as if something inside was trying to escape.
Then—it moved.
Fast. Too fast.
Caius barely got his sword up before the thing lashed out. Steel met rotting bone, and the impact sent a sharp tremor through the air.
Seraphine didn't hesitate. She dove forward, her dagger flashing. The moment the blade touched the creature's flesh, a pulse of energy shot through her arm—
And suddenly—
She wasn't in the chamber anymore.
---
The Memory That Was Not Hers
Darkness.
And then—
A city in flames.
Seraphine stood at the edge of a vast, crumbling kingdom. Towers split in half. Streets littered with the dead.
And at the center—
A massive tear in reality itself.
A rift.
She knew, without question, that this was Oraveth.
Not as it was now.
But as it had fallen.
She tried to move, but the air was thick with whispers.
Then, a voice cut through them all.
A woman's voice.
Familiar.
"… You must not let them open it."
Seraphine turned sharply—
And saw her mother.
Standing at the edge of the rift, her robes torn, her hands slick with blood.
And behind her—
A figure stood cloaked in shadows.
Not the Harbinger.
Not Vael'thiran.
Something else.
Something without a face.
The whispers surged, rising into a deafening roar—
And Seraphine was ripped back into the present.
---
The Warning Left in Blood
She gasped, stumbling backward. The corpse was gone.
Only the blood remained, smeared across the floor in the shape of a symbol.
A rune.
One she recognized from her mother's journal.
Caius's voice was tight. "What just happened?"
Seraphine swallowed hard. "A memory."
She pressed a hand to her chest, her heart racing. "Not mine. My mother's."
She looked down at the blood-drawn rune.
It wasn't just any symbol.
It was a warning.
Caius studied it, his expression darkening. "That's… a sealing mark."
Seraphine nodded. "It means something was bound here. And now—"
She didn't need to finish.
They both knew.
It wasn't bound anymore.
A deep, distant tremor rattled through the stones beneath their feet.
Seraphine clenched her fists.
Whatever had been buried here—forgotten, sealed away—
Was waking up.
And they had just unlocked the door.