The chamber was too still.
Caelan stirred in his bed, eyes cracking open to violet firelight and silence thicker than sleep. The coals in the hearth whispered, casting faint shadows across the black-stone walls. But something was… different.
The pendant on his chest no longer merely warmed—it throbbed, faintly, like a second heartbeat just beneath his skin.
He sat up.
The quiet wasn't empty. It listened.
His breath misted faintly in the air.
Then came the knock.
One.
Pause.
Three.
He dressed quickly in the same dark garments from the day before, fastening the Ward-Sigil brooch to his cloak. As he opened the door, Seraphyne stood waiting. Her presence, as always, was cold and exact—but her eyes lingered on his longer than usual.
"You dreamt," she said.
It wasn't a question.
"I don't think I've stopped since I crossed the Veil," Caelan replied.
"Then it's time you saw someone."
---
They passed through halls untouched by the ceremonial grandeur of the upper palace. No banners. No guards. The walls were smooth and grey, carved from root-veined stone instead of black marble. Seraphyne walked in silence, her stride steady. She did not explain.
Only when they approached a stair of pale bonewood did she speak.
"She is called the Whisperbound," Seraphyne said. "You will speak with no one else in her presence. She will ask nothing, yet demand everything. Her vision is older than the Clans."
"And she answers to the King?"
"To no one," Seraphyne said. "But she listens when Kael calls. That is enough."
---
The stair curved downward into a tower without windows, where stone twisted like frozen roots and the air grew cooler with every step. A scent drifted on the air—something like myrrh and dusted rose, but deeper. Older.
At the bottom stood a door that pulsed faintly with silvery veins. It opened on its own.
"She will see you alone," Seraphyne said, not meeting his eyes. "Do not speak unless spoken to. Do not lie."
Caelan hesitated. "Will you be here when I come back?"
"If you return," she said, "I will be waiting."
Then the door closed behind him.
---
The chamber beyond was a dream made solid.
Walls of shadow-glass curved upward into a ceiling filled with suspended ink, like constellations frozen in motion. Candles burned with dark flames that gave off no heat. There were no furnishings—only a circular platform draped in thin veils of black and red.
And on it, she waited.
The Whisperbound.
Veiled from head to toe in layered silk, runes shimmered faintly across her exposed hands. A silver blindfold covered her eyes. She sat in silence, unmoving, yet Caelan felt her presence like a pressure behind his eyes.
Then—
"Duskwither."
The voice was not spoken. It bloomed inside his mind, clear and echoing. Not painful, but unnatural. Like hearing a memory you never made.
"You have stirred the marrow. The kingdom breathes again."
Caelan stepped forward. "Are you reading my mind?"
"I do not need to read what bleeds from you."
She gestured with one pale hand. A bowl rose from the floor—formed from bone and obsidian.
"Give me your truth," she said. "Let the shadows decide."
Caelan approached slowly. She handed him a pin—silver and thin.
He pierced his finger. Blood welled. One drop fell into the bowl.
Immediately, the black liquid inside writhed, reacting violently. The suspended ink in the ceiling began to stir. Shadows crept toward him from every edge of the room.
"Now," the Whisperbound murmured. "See."
---
The visions were sudden.
A throne of roots growing from broken stone. Blood dripped down its arms. No crown atop it—only thorns.
A woman in white armor, face half-burned, kneeling in ash. Her lips moved silently. Her eyes were Caelan's.
Wolves howling beneath twin moons, blood running in rivers between their paws.
A crown floating in dark water, cracked, reflecting both a bat and a wolf—and Caelan's face.
The pendant, glowing red. The Ward-Sigil, cracked in half.
And a single phrase, whispered through a thousand mouths—
> "The Crown does not wait. Choose, or be chosen."
---
He gasped, stumbling back. The shadows recoiled. The bowl fell still.
The Whisperbound did not move.
"You have stepped into a current that does not allow drifting," she said. "You are not prophecy's servant. You are its wound."
"What does that mean?"
"You are where it bleeds."
Her blindfolded face tilted. "There is more."
A final vision rose—not summoned by her, but by him.
He saw a river of black stars, infinite and silent. He was drowning in it.
And from the void, a pale hand reached down—her hand—the woman in white armor.
She pulled him upward. Not to air. But to light.
Then—darkness.
---
The vision vanished.
The Whisperbound exhaled slowly. "It is not often I see hope. Hope is cruel."
Caelan opened his mouth to speak, but she raised her hand.
"The more you speak, the more the vision fades. Leave now. You are not ready to ask."
"But you saw something. Tell me what she meant—"
"She meant run, boy."
The veils rustled.
"And pray you learn to stop looking back."
The door behind him opened without a sound.
He left.
---
Seraphyne stood exactly where he'd left her.
She did not ask what he saw.
"You were gone longer than most," she said as they began walking. "She does not usually allow time to stretch."
"It didn't feel like time. It felt like… drowning in something that knew my name."
"That is how she teaches."
They returned to the eastern residence in silence.
---
Back in his suite, the fire had not moved. The air was still cold.
Caelan leaned against the door and exhaled.
That's when he saw it.
A letter—slipped beneath the door.
No crest. No seal.
Only a spiral drawn in black ink.
His stomach tightened.
He opened it.
Inside, in flowing script that shimmered slightly at the edges:
> "Not all shadows serve the King.
Midnight watches you now."
— Unsigned
---
Caelan stared at the message. He looked to the pendant—its light steady now. Silent.
He stood slowly and crossed to the window.
The garden outside pulsed faintly with its strange, blooming red.
But this time, the flowers didn't stir.
They watched.
Just as something else now did.
And Caelan knew:
He was no longer just a guest.
He was a target.
Or a contender.