The ruin shook as if the earth itself remembered fear, dust choking the air in ragged clouds. I tightened my grip on Dahlia, her body still faintly glowing with the Crown's aftershock, her pulse a flicker against my chest.
Then the scar burned.
Not the usual gnawing fire, not the lash of moonfire clashing with shadow—but something deeper. Glyphs surfaced across my arm, hot brands crawling in sync with Dahlia's heartbeat. Each throb made the scar swell, as if veins beneath the skin had become conduits for something that was no longer mine.
The whispers I had endured since the oath reforging no longer lingered in the edges of thought. This was different. This was breath.
A presence moved beneath my flesh—crawling, coiling, waiting to break through. I staggered, half convinced my arm had become a living creature grafted to me. The ruin's survivors drew back, their eyes wide. They saw it too—the way the chain pulsed and writhed as if alive.
Then it spoke.
Not from without. From within.
"Shael vorenth, drael coroneth… Veyrathuun undral shaelth…"
The words were molten iron poured into my marrow.
(The chain breathes, the crown devours… the Devourer awakens.)
The sound rolled out through the ruin, not in my voice, not even in the wolf's—but in the scar itself. The very mark seared by gods, forged by blood and vow, now whispered in the ancient tongue like a mouth pressed against my soul.
Dahlia whimpered, her glow faltering, and I held her tighter though my own body betrayed me. The glyphs were no longer scars. They were runes. Living runes.
And in their rhythm I understood a single truth: this was no wound. No brand.
It was a tether.
A living leash that tied me not to gods or oaths, but to the Hunger itself.
The scar was alive, and it had chosen me.
---
Her body jerked against my arms, not the weak stir of fever-dreams but the sudden jolt of awakening. Dahlia's eyes snapped open—and for a heartbeat they weren't hers.
Black glass, polished to obsidian, stared up at me. Reflections swam across their surface: endless stars drowning in silence, constellations inverted into hollow voids. My chest seized, because the gaze looking through her wasn't hers at all.
Her lips parted, and the voice that slipped through was carved with the ancient tongue, fractured prophecy echoing like a thousand whispers bound into one.
"Ulthera shael, coroneth drael… Vorenth ultherra shaelth…"
(The vessel breathes, the crown devours… the wolf binds, the vessel breaks…)
Her hands trembled, twitching like puppets tugged by two masters. One seemed to push against me, desperate to pull away—but the other clutched me tighter, knuckles white, nails digging into my back.
I felt her heat, her fragility, the faint throb of her pulse—and I knew the war wasn't only mine.
Her eyes flickered then, shards of her true self forcing their way through the Crown's glass-dark veil. Her real voice, faint but sharp as glass, bled through the cracks.
"Don't let it chain me."
I swallowed fire. The scar seared my flesh, alive and writhing, its glyphs tightening as though trying to silence her humanity. She winced, lips twisting as if another whisper fought to replace her own words.
And then I saw it.
She wasn't just vessel. She wasn't just carrier. She was torn—split between resisting the Crown and becoming its mouthpiece.
And if she broke in half, the chain would choose for her.
The vesselhood wasn't passive. Dahlia's body was battlefield, and the Crown's whispers weren't simply invading—they were welcomed by the part of her already claimed.
---
The ground beneath us split, stone grinding like broken teeth. From the cracks seeped shadows thick as tar, rising in coils that twisted into bodies—not men, not beasts, but shapes carved from nightmare. Faces half-formed, arms too long, mouths whispering even before they opened.
Their voices came not singly, but as one. A chorus, ancient and terrible, vibrating through the ruin's marrow.
"Chain-bearer, blood-breaker… shaelth ultherra, coroneth drael. Feed us."
(Chain-bearer, breaker of blood… the vessel breathes, the crown devours. Feed us.)
The scar flared, branding fire into my veins, and I staggered, clutching Dahlia tighter as her trembling body pulsed with the same dark rhythm.
Inside me, my wolf tore at the chains, its snarl a blaze of half-moonfire, half-ash.
They are carrion voices, it growled, pacing the cage of my ribs. They feed because you bleed. Cut them off, or they'll hollow her from the inside.
But their chorus swelled, louder, pressing into me from every angle, until my own will began to splinter. Their hunger wasn't asking—it was taking. Each beat of my heart spilled more into their maw.
And then Dahlia screamed.
The sound wasn't hers alone. It came twisted, layered—her cry woven with the guttural tones of the Crown itself. It scraped across the ruin's walls, rattling the bones of the dead. The nightmare shapes bowed toward her as though she'd given them their first hymn.
My pulse hammered. If I didn't act, her scream would not be hers anymore. It would become the Hunger's first true cry in the world.
The next breath, the next word, could mark the birth of silence itself—through her. And through me.
---
Her scream clawed through the ruin, tearing at marrow and sky. The shadows bent, feeding, chanting in one endless chorus that beat against my skull.
I staggered, then bared my teeth and slammed my scarred arm into the broken earth. The chain writhed, searing, trying to drag me down into its rhythm—but I forced moonfire through it, burning it from the inside.
Light exploded outward—not pure, not clean. Half-moon, half-shadow, a hybrid blaze that scalded the chanting apparitions. They shrieked, folding back into smoke as the scar blazed like a brand of defiance.
And then words tore from my throat—not mine, not learned, but ancient, older than the oath itself.
"Ultherra shael drae'vorth! Veyrathuun shall not claim!"
(By wolf and vow! The Devourer shall not claim!)
The ruin convulsed. Stone split open, a jagged wound in the earth, dust and fire spiraling as a yawning chasm tore wider.
From the abyss below, chains clinked—a sound too vast to belong to men. Something colossal shifted, bound deep in the dark. Then a glow—an eye opening, faint, ancient, burning like a star drowned in shadow.
My wolf froze, hackles raised inside me. You fool, it whispered. It has a prison. And you just cracked the lock.
The Crown's Hunger wasn't just a whisper or a curse. It had a body, chained beneath the world—and I had just torn open the door.
---
The chasm breathed beneath me—smoke, dust, and a pull like the earth itself hungered. I dropped beside Dahlia as she collapsed, her chest heaving, voice torn between silence and prophecy.
"Ulthera shael… vorenth coroneth… Veyrathuun undral…"
(The vessel breathes… the crown ascends… the Devourer unbinds…)
I pressed my hand to her, but the scar burned hotter, dragging my vision downward into the abyss. My sight stretched, unwilling, and there it was.
A vast form, shackled in blackened chains thicker than towers, runes seared into its flesh that smoked and bled shadow. Its body shifted like a mountain trying to breathe, each movement shaking the ruin above.
And then its mouth—bound, but whispering. A sound not meant for mortal ears, pouring eternity into marrow.
"Coroneth shael… drael ultherra… come down, bearer."
(The crown breathes… the chain awaits… come down, bearer.)
The scar quivered, answering the summons. My knees nearly bent to it.
Inside me, the wolf lunged, snarling like thunder. Do not look longer. To see it is to feed it.
I tore my gaze back, choking on ash, clutching Dahlia tighter. But I couldn't unsee it. The Hunger wasn't just a voice. It was a bound god, waiting for me to unlock its chains.
Closing Hook: And with every beat of my scar, I realized—I was the final key.
---
The ruin shuddered as though the Hollowroot itself tried to breathe. Stones split, dust bled from the ceiling, and the abyss gaped wider beneath us—its maw open, hungering for her. For Dahlia.
I pulled her into my arms, her body trembling, shadows still smoking from her veins. My scar writhed, molten with fire and ash, glowing like a chain forged in hell.
The abyss whispered again, louder this time, the chained god stirring:
"Shael coroneth… drael ultherra…"
(The crown breathes… the chain awakens…)
The ruin buckled, pulling at her blood, her heartbeat, her vesselhood. I snarled against it, slamming my burning arm across my chest.
—"You will not take her. Not crown, not chain, not hunger. She is mine."
My voice rang raw in the chamber, the oath boiling with both wolf and man, moonfire ripping through the scar. For a heartbeat, the abyss recoiled. Silence pressed down, the ruin holding its breath.
And then came the laugh. Low, gurgling, infinite, echoing from the chained god below.
"Shael coroneth… drael ultherra… vorenth shaelth…"
(The crown breathes… the chain awakens… the feast has begun.)
The scar throbbed, and I felt it—I had stopped the Hunger for now. But its first feast was already claimed. The ruin itself. The land. The chain tethered through me had begun feeding it, and it would not stop.
The Hunger had begun its feast, and unless I broke it, it would swallow us both.
---