The air tasted bitter, metallic, scraping her throat with every breath. She stumbled forward, boots basically gliding over ground that shifted beneath her, as if the land itself were alive and aware of her presence.
Then came the laughter. Low, mocking, curling through the air like smoke in a dead room. She spun, heart hammering, eyes straining into the dim haze - but there was nothing. Nothing but a horizon that wrinkled faintly, trembling as if reality itself were uncertain.
Her hands tightened into fists, nails biting into palms. "Who's there?" Her voice cracked, swallowed by the thick, uncanny quiet that followed.
And then the whispers began. Soft, seductive, threading through the stillness. Words she couldn't understand, memories that weren't hers, fragments of Rassafan clawing their way up from the dark corners of her mind. The city - its rot, its silence - was here, carried in these sounds, in this air.
No. She would not let it touch her. "I am not scared," she said.
She pressed forward, but the ground shifted beneath her steps, loose and uneven, as if it had never been meant for walking. She caught her balance, her breath sharp in her throat, and forced herself to move faster.
The laughter came again, closer this time, cutting through the silence like a blade. It had no face, no body - only a voice, harsh and tainted with smoke. She stumbled, then pushed on, refusing to let it root her in place.
The gate was gone behind her, swallowed in the haze. Every heartbeat thundered like a drum in her chest, but she didn't slow down. Whatever this place was, it wasn't safety. It wasn't an ending. It was waiting. And it had been waiting for her.
Her legs carried her forward, though every step felt like sinking into something unseen. The air grew heavier, thick with the scent of iron and dust, as though the ground had been bled dry long before her arrival. Each breath came harder, sharper, as if the world wanted her lungs to tear themselves apart just to draw it in.
She slowed, unwillingly, and the silence deepened. Not empty silence, not the void she had known in Rassafan - this was a silence that listened. It pressed at her skin, crowding her thoughts, waiting for the tremor of her voice or the falter of her stride.
Then it came - closer than before, close enough to rattle her bones. A man's voice, low and drawling, soaked in derision.
"You took your time."
Her breath caught. She whipped around, but the haze only thickened, shifting with every glance as though mocking her search.
"All that fire, all that hate… and yet you stumble here empty-handed, clutching nothing but more hate."
Her fists tightened until her nails carved into skin. "Show yourself," she spat.
The laughter came again - louder this time, barbed and deliberate. From the mist, a shape stirred, tall and crooked, its edges refusing to stay still. And at its center: a glint. An eye. Watching. Unblinking. Smiling in its own way.She stepped back, though every fiber of her body screamed not to yield.
"Do you feel lighter now?" the voice asked, mocking, almost sweet. "Or does Sezhar still choke you in the dark? Tell me, Rasna - did she wither before you, or did you turn your head so you wouldn't have to watch?"
The words struck sharper than any blade.
Her chest tightened, each breath dragging fire through her lungs. She wanted to answer, to tear the words out of the air and crush them, but her throat closed around the sound. His voice clung to her ribs like smoke, heavy, inescapable.
The eye gleamed brighter in the haze, catching some unseen light. For a heartbeat she thought it was the reflection of her own pain staring back at her - but no, this thing wasn't a reflection. It was a predator, savoring every crack it forced into her resolve.
"You left her in silence," the Mocking Eye purred. "Not a word. Not a glance. You were too afraid. Afraid to watch her fade. Afraid to see her last breath. And now? You dare to scream vengeance as if it means anything."
Her lips trembled, but her fists stayed closed, knuckles white as bone. She had promised herself - promised Sezhar - that she would never bow again. Yet here she stood, barely holding the ground beneath her feet while a voice from the mist picked her apart piece by piece.
"I did not turn away," she rasped. "I carried her with me."
The laughter cracked the air like thunder, sudden and cruel.
"Carried her? Oh, Rasna. You drag her like a corpse chained to your ankles. You've built a shrine out of guilt and called it love."
Her vision blurred, hot tears stinging the corners of her eyes, but she refused to let them fall. She would not give him that. Not him.
The haze shifted, thickening into tendrils that swayed and curled like fingers reaching for her. The ground pitched under her boots, uneven and soft, as though the soil itself wanted to swallow her whole. Still she planted her feet, her jaw set, her heart hammering like a drum of war.
"Step into the light," she demanded. "If you want to break me, don't hide behind smoke and whispers."
The voice chuckled, a deep roll of amusement that made the air vibrate in her chest.
"Light?" it said, almost gently, almost pitying. "There is no light here. Only eyes that watch. Only voices that mock. You crossed the gate into my world, little flower, and you will wither in it."
Something moved in the mist, closer now. Not just an eye, but the suggestion of a face - long, angular, with edges too sharp to be human. She glimpsed the faint curl of lips in a smile that did not belong to flesh.
Her pulse surged. She wanted to lunge at it, to tear the grin from that shape, but every muscle in her body held her still, trembling with restraint.
"I am not afraid of you," she forced out, though her voice cracked under the strain.
The eye narrowed. The smile widened.
"Then prove it."
The ground split at her feet with a sudden crack, a jagged line of darkness tearing through the soil. Heat surged from below, acrid and searing, carrying with it the smell of burnt stone and ash. She staggered back, catching herself only at the last moment.
The Mocking Eye leaned closer through the haze, its single gleam filling her vision.
"Step forward, Rasna. Step into the truth. Let's see if your hate burns brighter than the dark."
Her lungs burned, her skin moist with sweat despite the icy weight pressing down on her shoulders. Every part of her screamed to retreat, but retreat meant nothing. Behind her was only the gate, swallowed, gone.
Sezhar's name flickered in her mind, sharp and steady. Not weakness. Not guilt. A promise.
She straightened, her voice low and raw: "If you want me to burn, then you burn with me."
The silence that followed was heavy, charged, like the air before a storm. The eye did not blink. The haze did not shift. But the laughter, faint and cruel, began again.
And it did not stop.