The soft rustle of leaves stirred in the high canopies of the Isle of Selene, the easternmost of the Floating Isles and one of the oldest. Here, the light was filtered through mist and moonshine, casting silver shadows across the ground. It was morning, though you'd never guess it from the sky above—thick clouds rolled across the upper horizon like heavy breath, diffusing sunlight into a perpetual twilight.
Aiden stood on the balcony of the Eryndor estate, a crescent-shaped stone manor that clung to the cliffs like a half-formed thought. Silver ivy curled around the balcony columns, and glass orbs hovered quietly in the air, glowing with the house's ancestral magic.
Beyond the edge of the stone railing, the Floating Isles spread out like jewels on a velvet cloth—suspended above the clouds by the ancient will of the Loom.
But something was wrong.
He could feel it.
The threads that held the Isles aloft pulsed unevenly now, as though confused. Off balance. Stretched.
He leaned against the rail and closed his eyes, trying to remember a time when this place felt whole.
He couldn't.
Behind him, footsteps echoed lightly on polished stone.
"You always come here when you're troubled."
Aiden turned. Clea Eryndor, his aunt and former mentor, approached him with her usual quiet grace. Her robes were deep indigo, streaked with star-thread. She carried a walking stick more for ceremony than support. Her eyes—mirrors of his own—were sharp, unwavering.
"I thought you were still at the Observatory," Aiden said.
"I was," she replied. "Until the Loom began humming like a fraying harp string."
She stopped beside him, staring out over the cliffs. "You feel it too?"
He nodded. "It's worse than we thought. Kael is pushing deeper. The echoes of his magic are beginning to reach Selene."
"And Lena?" Clea asked. "Is she ready?"
Aiden hesitated. "She's more ready than I ever was."
That gave Clea pause. "You don't give yourself enough credit."
"I give myself exactly what I've earned."
Clea watched him for a moment. "You still carry it, don't you? The guilt."
He didn't answer.
Aiden had grown up within the oldest lineage of Weavers—House Eryndor, guardians of balance, defenders of the Loom since the first breath of magic.
His childhood had not been unkind, but it had been rigid. Duty before desire. Precision before wonder. He was praised when he succeeded, corrected swiftly when he strayed. Emotions, his father once told him, were tools—not truths.
That philosophy hardened Aiden into a quiet, watchful boy. He spoke less than most children, read more. He learned quickly, mastered the basics of thread-weaving before his tenth year, and was formally recognized by the Council as an Apprentice of Selene at twelve.
But it wasn't until tragedy struck that his magic truly changed.
He remembered it with painful clarity: a rift surge—violent and sudden—tearing across the outer edge of Selene's protective field. There had been no warning, only a sharp cry of distortion in the Loom's core, and then chaos.
Aiden had been in the garden with his younger sister, Elara, when the surge hit.
She was only eight. Laughing as she chased a sky-glow moth between the Echo Trees. Then, in an instant, the ground split, the sky shivered, and magic spun violently out of control.
He had tried to protect her.
Tried to weave a shield.
Tried to be enough.
But the surge was too strong. The magic buckled. And Elara—his sweet, brilliant sister—was gone.
The Loom had reclaimed her. Or the rift had devoured her. No one could say for certain. There was no body. Only silence.
After that, the Eryndor house grew quieter still.
His father became colder. His mother, once gentle and affectionate, grew distant, lost in rituals of mourning. And Aiden—
He turned inward.
He vowed never to lose anyone again.
And he would never, ever be too slow again.
"I know what you're thinking," Clea said now, her voice low. "But what happened to Elara wasn't your fault."
"I didn't stop it."
"You were a child."
"I was a Weaver."
Clea touched his shoulder. "And you still are. But you're also more than that now."
Aiden turned to look at her. "How can you still believe in all this? When the Loom is unraveling, when Kael's shadow is reaching even here?"
"Because I believe in those who still choose to weave, even when it hurts."
He didn't speak again. Instead, he gazed down at the Cloudroot trees swaying in the wind below the cliffs.
Their silver leaves whispered to each other, their roots curled into invisible threads.
His thoughts drifted, as they often did now, to Lena.
Her laughter in the Loom chamber.
Her stubborn resolve in the face of shadow.
The way she balanced curiosity with compassion.
She wasn't just strong—she was present. Where Aiden had spent years running from his grief, Lena had looked hers in the eye and asked it to speak.
She was changing things.
Changing him.
Later that afternoon, Aiden returned to the central dome of the Selene Library, its great ceiling shaped like a spinning helix of crystal and memory-thread. He wandered the lower halls until he reached a private chamber—one no longer in use by the Council, but long reserved for the Head of House Eryndor.
He placed his palm on the crystal door, whispering the name of the Loom's first song.
It opened.
Inside, the room was quiet. Dim. The only light came from a hovering orb at the center of the ceiling. Tapestries hung from the walls, each bearing a record of the Eryndor lineage.
In the farthest corner was Elara's.
Aiden stepped toward it.
The tapestry was unfinished.
Just a single silver thread curled near the top, forming the faint suggestion of a flower—one she had loved as a child. Skyblossoms. It shimmered faintly with her magical imprint.
Aiden reached out and touched the edge.
"I'm still trying," he said quietly. "I haven't forgotten."
The Loom pulsed in the distance. He could feel it. The weight of destiny pulling tight again.
But this time, he didn't feel alone in it.
He turned from the tapestry and exited the chamber.
That evening, Lena arrived at the edge of Selene by skyship.
She stepped off the vessel, wind tugging at her braid, eyes bright with anticipation. Aiden was there waiting.
"Beautiful place," she said, glancing around.
He nodded. "It has its ghosts."
"Most beautiful places do."
They walked together through the Cloudroot path, silence comfortable between them. At a small glade lit by floating lantern-moths, they sat by a stream that trickled with threads of magic, weaving itself over stones with quiet grace.
"I've been thinking about Kael," Lena said. "About what he used to be."
Aiden's jaw tensed. "You saw the echoes?"
She nodded. "He wasn't always a monster. He wanted to heal the Loom. He just… got lost trying to force it."
Aiden looked down at his hands. "We all carry that risk. The line between fixing something and breaking it worse."
She reached over and gently took his hand. "That's why we do it together."
He looked at her.
Really looked.
And for the first time in years, he allowed himself to believe it might be true.
That maybe he didn't have to carry all the weight alone.
That maybe love wasn't another form of vulnerability—but strength.
"I want to show you something," he said, standing.
He led her back to the tapestry hall.
To Elara's corner.
To the unfinished thread.
"This was hers," he said. "My sister."
Lena stepped closer, eyes softening.
"She died during a rift surge," he explained. "I wasn't strong enough to protect her."
Lena shook her head. "You were just a boy."
"I was a brother."
She turned to him. "She would be proud of the man you've become. I think… you're exactly who the Loom needs."
He didn't answer.
But his hand didn't leave hers.
And as the moon rose over Selene, casting its light across the Isles, Aiden Eryndor stood no longer as just a guardian of legacy—
But as a man choosing his future.
With Lena beside him.