The crack in the sky didn't close.
Not after the battle. Not with the rising sun. It hung there—a jagged tear in the heavens, as though the world itself had forgotten how to heal.
And it pulsed.
Once.
Twice.
Like a heartbeat.
"We're being watched," Eryan said, his voice low, his eyes on the sky as he stood beside Aurea atop the observatory. "But it's not a god, not a demon. It's… older."
"Older than gods?" she murmured.
Eryan didn't answer. He didn't need to. The silence between them did all the talking.
They'd stood there for nearly an hour since the last cultist's body hit the cobblestones below, both of them stained with ash and magic. The others were below—Kael tending to the wounded, Riven burning the dead.
But this moment was theirs.
"You weren't afraid," he said finally, glancing at her. "Last night. When they came for you."
"I was." She met his eyes. "But not of them."
"Of what, then?"
She hesitated. "Of being powerless."
Eryan's lips parted slightly, a flicker of something like understanding—or perhaps regret—passing over his face. "You're far from powerless, Aurea. You just don't know what you are yet."
"That's what scares me."
The wind picked up, tugging loose strands of her hair across her face. He reached out instinctively, brushing them back, fingertips grazing her cheek.
She didn't flinch.
"You look different in the sunlight," he said softly. "Less fury. More fire."
"And you," she murmured, "look less cold."
His mouth twitched in what might have been the ghost of a smile. "Then let's chase what burned the sky together."
Their descent from the observatory was interrupted by a sound too precise to be natural—three short, rhythmic knocks echoing from the Archive's lower gate.
Kael's voice barked out from the hall below. "Whoever you are, speak now or we open the door in pieces."
A voice answered, female, calm and commanding.
"My name is Serenya Vael. I'm not your enemy. And I think I can help you understand what that thing in the sky is."
The woman who stepped into the entry hall was unlike anyone Aurea had seen before.
She wore robes dyed in shifting opalescent hues, layered over armor etched with sigils that shimmered faintly. Her eyes were pure white—not blind, but glowing with a deep, celestial magic. A thin circlet of dark steel rested across her brow, the symbol at its center a spiral enclosed within a broken ring.
Eryan stiffened. Kael's hand moved subtly to his hilt. Even Riven, silent in the shadowed alcove, tilted his head with cautious interest.
"You're a Seer," Eryan said. "From the Skyfall Enclave."
Serenya inclined her head. "Excommunicated. Though the stars seem to think I'm still useful."
She turned her gaze—those strange, glowing eyes—on Aurea.
"You opened the Archive."
Aurea stepped forward. "And I didn't do it alone."
"No. But it responded to you. That matters." Serennya's voice carried the weight of someone used to being obeyed—but there was no condescension. Only gravity. "The fracture in the sky is not a portal. It's a wound."
"A wound to what?" Kael asked, frowning.
Serenya's eyes didn't leave Aurea.
"To the Loom of Fate itself."
They gathered around the central hall's map table, its surface strewn with flickering glyphs and partially burned scrolls. Serenya laid out a thin sheet of metal etched with diagrams—constellations, spiral paths, fragmented runes none of them could read.
"Long ago," she began, "there were no gods. Only the Weavers—the ones who stitched the pattern of reality. Time, magic, death, choice… all threads in the same design."
"The Loom," Aurea whispered.
Serenya nodded. "When mortals touched that loom—when they demanded freedom—something snapped. And now, it's unraveling."
She pointed to the tear in her diagram. "This fracture isn't just a symbol. It's the first sign that the pattern is tearing. If it breaks entirely... everything falls into chaos. No fate. No balance. No future."
Eryan leaned forward, brows furrowed.
"How do we stop it?"
Serenya's gaze lingered on him. "You don't. You slow it. Anchor the threads where they've come undone."
"And how many are there?"
"Seven."
The room fell into a hush.
"And let me guess," Riven murmured, "our girl's the only one who can do it."
Aurea didn't blink. "Why me?"
"Because you weren't woven into the Loom," Serenya said. "You were born outside of it."
Eryan turned sharply. "That's not possible. Everyone—"
"Not her."
The silence that followed wasn't shock. It was recognition.
Because somewhere deep inside, Aurea had always felt it. That she wasn't supposed to exist in the way others did. That her dreams weren't visions—they were memories of places that had never been.
"I'll do it," she said. "But not alone."
She turned to her companions. "You with me?"
Kael nodded without hesitation. Riven smirked. "Wouldn't be fun otherwise."
But it was Eryan she looked to last.
He didn't answer with words. Instead, he reached across the table, his hand curling gently around hers.
"We go together," he said.
That night, she found Eryan in the scriptorium, the candlelight casting gold over the sharp angles of his face. He didn't look up as she entered—he felt her.
"You knew something like this would come," she said softly.
"I knew something was broken. I just didn't know it would wear your face."
She crossed the room, stopping just short of him. "Do you think I'm a danger?"
He stood, slowly. "I think you're a beginning."
Their proximity shimmered with heat. Not the raw fire of battle, but something gentler. Deeper.
"Do you regret bringing me here?" she asked.
He raised a hand, cupping her cheek, thumb brushing just below her eye.
"I regret waiting so long to trust you."
And then he kissed her.
It wasn't rushed. It wasn't desperate.
It was a promise.
In the dark beyond the citadel, something moved.
Not the Cult. Not a Weaver.
But something awakened by the crack in the sky. Something with no name and too many mouths.
Its arrival was not heralded by flame or sound, but by the sudden stillness of every insect in the northern wood. The silence of earth holding its breath.
And its eyes—
They turned toward the Archive.
Toward Aurea.