Rain fell — it was steady, inevitable shifting into the cracked between flagstones and weary turrets, as Aetherholt seemed once more to mourn the world. It was not a cleansing rain, nor a summer's reprieve; it carried the somber weight of old griefs, as though each drop recalled a host of sacrifices long sealed in stone and memory.
Inside the nursery, Kael remained still beside the eastern window. The fire had died long hours ago; embers lurked only in the blackened grate. Silence had gathered like dust along the walls, and behind him lay the silent sweep of tapestries, unmoved by any breeze. He had dragged his small wooden stool — it was once smooth, but now it's a scarred — across the floor. The sound had smothered itself, reluctant to disturb the hush.
He climbed and perched there, tiny fingers clutching the sill, pale as moonlight on snow. There was no moon tonight — only a spectral sliver suspended in the heavens. Not gentle or familiar, it was a shard of bone-white light, hovering in the void without pulse or welcome. Kael watched it without blinking, as though it might fade if eyesclosed. He often stared so: still, expectant, ancient.
When the first guard came to check before midnight shift change. He found Kael without movement, Kael remained unspoken. His breath fogged the glass in gentle clouds. When asked , in hushed voice, what he watched, he only said, "The light comes back." And that was all he would say.
Down below, Alaric laughed in the courtyard. Barefoot and defiant, he stomped through puddles bright with silver rain. His little wooden sword was at his side, held loosely, unused. He chased after a wooden ball shaped from barrels, his laughter ringing like rapture amid the stone.
Two knights armed folded stood under wet cloaks watched from a distance against the arches, and exchanged wary glances.
"He's fearless," one said softly.
Or just fearless enough to think he's not," replied the other. "But look — he splashes on purpose. Not afraid of the stain. "He holds promise."
Promise. The word drifted like a banner above Alaric, Golden-haired like sun and fearless, oblivious to the storm softening the world.
From the high window, Kael gaze was remained distant, thoughtful, wary. A candle on the sill, lit against the rain's gloom, guttered as if struggling to survive—just like whatever fought within him.
That afternoon, Seraphina retreated into the western solarium: glass panes arched overhead, ivy climbing the walls, sunshine once-smiling here, now distant. It felt too bright, too hopeful. She carried a cup of tea, untouched. And she held a half-read book, a book she had read dozen times but couldn't bare to finish the book. As her eyes barely registered the printed words. Instead, her fingers gripped the leather-bound journal in her lap and thought wandered back to Kael —endless questions, no answers.
She fingered the journal tucked in her lap —leather bound, corners frayed. Each entry had become confession:
Entry 12: His hands rest too still, cold as stone.
Entry 13: Eyes that watch, but do not see.
Entry 14: The dragon-seal on his skins flickers beneath the skin at night.
Her gaze slid to the page ahead. Blank. The words wouldn't come. She shook her head, trying to empty it. Her thoughts spun outward, pulling at her heart: He is my son —but something not my son is inside him now.
Later that evening, Aric returned from the border. His Armor stained with mud and blood, hair damp beneath the hood. He moved silently through the corridors. He was more like a ghost than king. Seraphina saw him only fleetingly averted in the gallery, his gaze hollow as he passed.
He said quietly, "They call again—for our blood." His voice was raw, stitched with exhaustion. "They call for the twins."
She pressed the journal into his hand, words blurred by tears. Shadows touched her eyes as she stared at him. "They are already calling."
He said nothing then. Only stared at the pattern of rain trailing down the glass.
In the nursery, she found Kael asleep in the cradle or so it seemed. One finger traced a rune of curved lines and tiny points along his wrist, vanished by morning. She touched his arm lightly, cold and impossibly still, and her heart pounded. She heard what his silence spoke: not peace, but presence of something deeper, older, and hungry.
That night, Aric stood on the battlements while rain poured like ancient lament. The castle below was a pattern of bright windows, the forest dark as spilled ink. He welcomed the cold. It tempered him. He needed to feel something real, raw. Inside, instead, there was emptiness.
He had seen the page Maeric brought a ledger of names stricken, ending suddenly in emptiness. The ink had flared at his blood-streaked fingers, but the page refused to burn. He had tossed it in the hearth. The page curled, blackened — but remained.
The last name had been erased by something deeper than man.
Meanwhile, beneath the castle, in vaulted crypts older than memory, a raven stirred near a brass-sealed tomb. Its feathers looked wet with midnight; its eyes held a distant glimmer. The ancient hinges creaked. The stone shifted. Something rose — silent, untouched by time's dust — and looked, too, toward the castle lights.
Back in the nursery, a whispered song drifted at midnight: Sanskrit syllables, lute-string soft and familiar — yet wrong. Seraphina paused at the door, heart in her throat. The candle flame in her hand trembled. But there was no one there, only Kael — eyes open in sleep, lips parted, breathing slow and even.
The words — Mara, Salach, Vor… echoed again, as if a voice just behind the wall.
Seraphina stepped in. The lullaby stopped.
She knelt beside him. He did not stir.
Beyond them, a single tear had formed in a drop of rain that snuck past the window frame.
Early next morning, they discovered the seal inside the chapel had shattered. An ancient mosaic of the First Flame — burned into the tile ages ago — lay in cracked, dusty shards. No wind had blown, no feet passed. Yet the design lay broken, patterns disturbed as though something had struck.
A lingering scent of ozone and burnt gold clung to the air.
A servant found Kael crouched at the chapel door: small, silent, still as night. His eyes studied him — unblinking. When asked what happened, Kael only whispered, "It opened." Then he stood, stepped into the rain, and vanished across the courtyard without a sound.
At supper, Alaric watched his father but seldom spoke. The young boy carved roasted meat and bread, his golden hair wet from rain. Aric's gaze lingered on Alaric's steady appetite, then flicked toward the nursery table. It was empty where Kael's seat should have been.
Seraphina caught his eye. He said nothing. She reached across the table, placing her hand atop his. His was warm. Hers was cold.
She didn't ask what he had seen on the battlements, what the ledger page meant, or what he thought of Kael's changing eyes.
After dinner, Seraphina slipped down the eastern wing. It was quiet except for torchlight's hush and occasional muffled drip of water. She paused at Kael's door. Nothing stirred. Yet she knew he lingered just beyond, somewhere deeper in silence.
She entered the old library — dust motes glimmered in the firelight. She ran her fingers along the spines of books on prophecy, Veil-born legends, eclipse-born twins. One tome in particular had been lost to time: the Prophet's Codex, with its script of silver leaf and blood-red tassel. She pulled it free.
She read:
"Twins of Blood and Shadow, born beneath the Veil, shall walk between flame and night. One holds the realm, the other breaks it. The first will be father's torment; the second mother's grief."
She closed the book. Her breath trembled. It named what she had only sensed.
She returned to the nursery before dawn, journal in hand. Kael sat by the window, the same stool in place. The pale bone-slit was gone; the sky was blank. He watched nothing now.
"Father can't fix me," he said, voice flat. "Mother can't either."
She swallowed. "I don't know how," she whispered back. "But I promise, i will try to."
He looked at her, eyes unblinking. A soft line at his lip: half a smile, half a warning.
In the courtyard, Alaric awoke early. He found the wooden sword in his crib, the cradle empty — and Kael's clothes folded on a stone bench. Without thinking, Alaric stepped across the threshold… and left footprints.
Morning guard found him at the gates, holding the wooden sword, staring east toward the forest. They carried him back silently. He wouldn't say a word about where Kael had gone.
That afternoon, deep in the crypt, stone shifted again. Runes glowed faintly: fire‑hungry, seed‑black. The air trembled. Footsteps echoed off walls, slow and measured. Something moved beyond the permanent seals — a thing that had listened while Kael spoke of "the light returning."
It responded.
Aetherholt remained clothed in rain and shadow. The twins' fates drifted apart still: Alaric, touched by sword and laughter; Kael, haunted by bone-light and silent song. The prophecy whispered in cracked tile and fire-lit script: two children, two destinies, one realm trembling in their wake.
Certain things had stirred.
And nothing would ever be the same.