Chapter 11 – Hollowlight Vale
Aurther woke to quiet.
No wind. No birdsong. No rustle of leaves. Only the gentle sizzle of dying fire and the smooth, even breathing of Lysaria sleeping beside him.
He rose slowly, working the kink from his muscles. Over them, the canopy thinned to a light-skied horizon, early morning sun illuminating long, glassy shadows through the trees. Everywhere around them, the air was… waiting.
Lysaria turned over.
"Morning," she said quietly, already putting on her boots.
"We going soon?"
She nodded, rubbing her temples. "The air's wrong here. I don't plan on sticking around."
They traveled quickly. Within minutes, the fire was extinguished, and they were moving again—on a twisting trail hacked through stone cliffs and earth-rooted land to roots. Aether shone faintly in the wind, and the more they traveled, the more the forest changed.
The trees lost their bark.
Their trunks went pale—bone-colored. The leaves above thinned to silver threads that rustled hardly at all even in the wind. And the moss under your feet crunched with every step, not soft, but as dry as ash.
"What is this place?" Aurther breathed.
Lysaria did not answer immediately. Her eyes swept the trail before her, fast and wary.
Then she said, "This is Hollowlight Vale."
He arched an eyebrow. "That name doesn't exactly shout warm and fuzzy."
"Because it isn't. This place is cursed. It was a garden—a grove of trees cared for by soul-menders in the time of the Blood War. Something then happened. It… flipped. The trees started bleeding. The light started warping. They say this is where the first Bloodborn showed up."
Aurther looked around.
The air was too clean.
Too still.
"I don't like this."
"Good," she said. "You shouldn't."
They pressed deeper into the vale, further in its hollow beauty. Odd shapes emerged from the ground—stone totems, statues with blank faces, and skeletons of bones bound to tree roots. At frequent intervals, Aurther could have sworn he caught a breathing just at the furthest edge of the mist.
They walked quietly until Lysaria stopped with her hand up.
"Wait."
He stood still. "What is it—"
Then he heard it.
A low wet hiss—like flesh being dragged across stone.
Then the sound of a voice, wheezing unseen.
"You bleed… so warm…"
The mist rolled back.
And from between two shattered statues, a Bloodborn stepped out.
This one was different.
Its form was lean and greased, patchwork-sealed of a half dozen bodies—elven ears, human limbs, splintered armor plates pounded into its flesh like bones stuffed into ill-formed spaces. Its lips split horizontally down the center of its face, exposing teeth not adapted to meat.
Lysaria swore under her breath. "God dam it."
The creature lunged at her.
Lysaria was a blur—her swords out, sigils blazing down her arms. She was fast, pushing the creature back with precision and fire. But this Bloodborn was faster than the previous one. It shuddered off the blasts, shrieking, limbs regenerating before her strikes could land.
Aurther stumbled backwards,eyes wide.
"I can't just stand here," he growled. "I have to help."
His hands trembled.
He grasped the power.
Nothing.
Fear clouded his mind.
The shard at his chest pulsed—twitchy, cold.
The Bloodborn turned on him.
And charged.
Lysaria screamed, but she was too far away.
Aurther coiled to impact.
But something cracked inside of him.
Not pain. Not fear.
Focus.
He could see the creature's motion—its trajectory, its weight, the shape of its hatred.
And he reached.
Not with hands.
But with will.
The ground beneath the Bloodborn rent—and a shadow shot up like a spear. Black tentacles wrapped its legs mid-lunge, halting it in midair, pinning it like a fly in amber.
It screamed.
Lysaria charged in with a war cry and stabbed its chest with her sword.
The Bloodborn struggled once—twice—and froze.
Its form dissolved into ash.
Aurther dropped to his knees, gasping. His hands burned. Not with flame—but with void.
He could feel the darkness flowing through him—not feral, but bound. Flickering.
Trained.
Barely.
Lysaria rushed to him. "Aurther! Are you all right?"
He nodded slowly, scrubbing at a patch of blood on his nose.
"I—I did something. I stopped it."
She looked down where the creature had been pinned.
A perfect, round burn had been seared into the earth—spiral lines with a broken edge.
"Your magic responded," she whispered, hardly above breath. "You controlled it."
"Not really," he gasped. "It just… listened. For a moment."
"That's a start."
They sat in the shade of a twisted tree afterwards, gasping.
Lysaria offered him water, and he gulped it thirstily.
"Do you think it's getting stronger?" he asked.
"No," she said.
He looked up.
"I think you are," she said.
The vale behind them was still once more.
But neither of them glanced back.
Ahead, the path narrowed—and in the distance, they saw it.
A sliver of white wood standing like a fang from the earth.
Mossglass.
Even distant.
But no longer rumor.
[End of Chapter 11]