The bells had long since quieted. The castle slept in layers: servants in bunks that smelled of cabbage and soap, guards slumped in alcoves with hands still on spears, nobles behind oaken doors that muttered in their dreams.
Seren did not sleep.
He lay on his cot, Elara's hand resting on the latch, the wooden wedge pressed against the door like a silent sentinel. He breathed in four, held two, let eight go. The air in his narrow chest tasted faintly of dust and iron.
The note's words burned in his skull.
Between bell and bell. The south stair knows. Seven landings. Ash means death. Iron means life.
When the second bell gave its hollow note, Seren slid from the cot. He moved the way Elara had taught him—on the edges of his feet, shoulders lowered, body weight spread so the wood beneath him would not complain. He slipped the wedge aside and eased the door open just enough to pass.
The corridor beyond was a throat of stone. Torchlight had guttered out hours ago; only pale moon seeped through high slits, turning the air silver and sharp.
Seren counted each step. His mind, though housed in a body of a child, marched with the precision of a man who had once measured voltages, calibrated instruments, timed reactions to the second. He would not lose the count.
---
The south stair was older than the rest of the keep.
He found it behind a half-collapsed tapestry that smelled of mildew. The cloth depicted some forgotten triumph—dragons stitched in crimson thread circling a kneeling king—but rot had chewed holes through its glory. Behind it, a narrow arch opened onto steps that bent away into darkness.
The stones were uneven, worn not by years of servants but by centuries of secrecy. Moss clung to the mortar. His small hand on the wall came away damp.
Seren began to descend.
First landing. He breathed slow. The air here smelled stale, like a chest closed too long.
Second landing. A draft moved across his cheek. His hair stirred.
Third landing. He stopped. The air thickened, heavy with the tang of ash, the ghost of burned things. The note's warning pricked his spine. He turned his head, testing the current. He took one cautious step further. The taste of cinder spread across his tongue.
Ash.
He held his breath, turned, climbed back to the second landing. Waited. Breathed again. The ash receded. Iron crept into the air—a faint metallic tang, sharp and cold, like blood drawn on the tip of the tongue.
He descended once more.
Fourth landing. Iron lingered, steadier now.
Fifth landing. The walls sweated more heavily; droplets traced lines like old tears.
Sixth landing. His ears filled with pressure, as if he had gone beneath water. He forced himself to keep counting.
Seventh landing.
Here the stair ended against a blank wall of stone. To any other eye, it was nothing. But Seren saw the faint outline of a door long sealed, its cracks filled with dust.
He pressed his palm against it. The stone was cold. Colder than the stair. Colder than the air.
The note had said: Knock twice without sound.
He raised his hand and tapped the wall, feather-light, as if striking air. Two motions. Nothing more.
The wall shivered. Dust fell like old snow. A seam opened, groaning, until the stones gave way.
---
The chamber was no bigger than Elara's room, yet it breathed with age.
Shelves leaned drunkenly against the walls, half-collapsed beneath the weight of forgotten scrolls. A table scarred by blades and inkpots sagged in the center. In one corner, a chest lay split, its contents moldered into rot. But here and there, objects still resisted time: a dagger black with tarnish, a quill made from the feather of some vast bird, a length of chain that hummed faintly though no hand touched it.
Seren stepped inside.
The air smelled stronger here—iron, yes, but also something older, like rain trapped in stone. He ran a hand across the nearest shelf. His fingers came away black with dust, yet beneath it lay sigils carved into the wood itself, spirals and stars he did not know but that pulled at memory.
At the far wall hung a mirror.
It was cracked, its surface spiderwebbed, its silver backing peeling. But it held light where none should have been. Moonlight seemed to leak into it, drawn from nowhere.
Seren approached.
For the first time in his short life, he hesitated. He had been calm when the Patriarch sentenced him. Calm when the brothers sneered. Calm when Elara whispered warnings in the dark. But now, with his reflection rippling in broken glass, unease whispered up his bones.
He lifted his hand.
The mirror answered.
Words burned across the fractured surface, letters written in flame that did not warm.
Awakening begins with the willing.
Seren's throat tightened. He tried to breathe four in, two held, eight out—but his lungs faltered. The letters writhed, then bled away, leaving only the reflection.
Except the reflection was wrong.
The boy in the mirror looked back with Seren's dark eyes, Seren's thin frame, Seren's too-calm face. But his chest did not rise. His lips did not part. He was utterly still, a painting mistaken for flesh.
And behind that not-Seren, shadows moved.
Not torch-shadows. Not tricks of moonlight. They shifted with purpose, curling toward him like smoke learning to walk.
Seren staggered back. His shoulder hit the doorframe. The iron taste in the air sharpened, metallic and cruel.
The mirror whispered—no sound, yet his bones heard it.
Choose.
The shadows lunged.
The door behind him began to close.