Silence wrapped the dome like a second skin. Dust drifted lazily through the still air. Spandrex's body lay sprawled on the floor, limp and unmoving. His fingers, curled near the ancient tome, twitched once and then stilled. The stone beneath him was cracked in a spidering pattern from where he had collapsed, and soot smudged his cheeks.
The glyph on his wrist still pulsed faintly—Vehrash—fading in and out like a dying heartbeat.
All around him, objects lay tossed and broken. His desk was overturned, ink smeared across its shattered legs. Books lay scattered, some torn, others burnt at the edges. The candles lining the chamber had all snuffed out in unison, and the single window was so darkened it looked like night had buried itself into the glass.
Then—
A soft metallic creak.
The door. Someone outside.
It opened partway, and a pale shaft of lantern-light spilled across the ruined floor.
A familiar voice whispered, "I told you he was hiding something weird."
Jarn stepped inside, flanked by his usual shadows—Dren, tall and bony with a perpetual sneer, and Vashen, the nervous one with shaking hands.
"What the hell happened in here?" Dren murmured, kicking a blackened candle stub aside. "Feels… wrong."
Vashen's eyes didn't leave Spandrex's body. "He's not dead, is he?"
Jarn snorted. "If he is, serves him right. Always mumbling. Always lurking around the old halls like he's the next high-binder mage or something."
But his voice lacked confidence. The room was... colder than it should be. The air felt thick—like breathing water. And the scent—it wasn't smoke. It was older. Earthy. Like a grave dug open too soon.
Their eyes were drawn to the book, open and humming softly on the floor. The pages shimmered slightly, though no light touched them.
Dren stepped forward, despite Vashen's muttered protest. "This isn't Academy-issue. This wasn't in any registry." He crouched low, inspecting it. "What's it made of…?"
"It looks like skin," Vashen whispered, stepping back.
Too late.
Jarn, always the brash one, flipped a page.
Whispers.
They did not hear them so much as feel them—like vibrations on their teeth, pressure in their ears, chills racing their spines. The words slithered up their legs and into their skulls, a language older than memory.
The glyph on Spandrex's wrist ignited.
Vehrash.
The room moaned.
Candles re-lit themselves in unison, their flames violently upright. Shadows lengthened. Not in the way that light demands—but in the way nightmares do.
The book's pages began fluttering as if in a storm.
Then—A voice.
"You were not chosen."
It didn't echo. It resonated. From the floor. From the ceiling. From their bones.
The shadows moved.
At first, they slithered quietly—reaching from corners, stretching long fingers. Then, they sprang.
Dren had only enough time to turn before a black hand slammed across his chest and pulled. His skin greyed, his eyes hollowed, and his scream caught in his throat as his body crumbled like ash in wind—his shadow remaining, flickering like a flame caught in reverse.
"Dren!" Vashen yelled.
Jarn tried to run, but the shadows anticipated him. They crawled over the walls and ceiling like predators, descending as a single living mass. One latched onto his ankle. He kicked, sobbed, cursed—but it pulled, and as it dragged him backward, his body began to fade.
"No—no, don't—" he choked out.
His mouth opened wide in a final scream—
And nothing came out.
Just silence. A cold, final silence.
Vashen stood trembling. Too terrified to move.
Then the shadows turned toward him.
A beat of stillness.
Vashen ran.
He tore from the dome, not caring that his foot struck Spandrex's body on the way out. He ran as fast as his legs would carry him through the winding halls of the academy, past sleeping towers and cold statues and lanterns that flickered out in his wake.
Finally, breathless and half-sobbing, he reached the threshold of a large obsidian door.
He banged on it.
Once.
Twice.
It opened before the third knock.
Kael.
Her hair was unbraided, and she wore a thin black robe half-clasped at the collar. One look at Vashen and she stiffened.
"What happened?" she asked sharply.
"It's Spandrex—something's wrong. We went to check on him—I didn't mean to open anything—I didn't mean to—but shadows—" his voice cracked. "They took Jarn. And Dren. They're—gone."
Kael's face changed. Instantly. Her hand slid beneath her robe.
But Vashen froze. His eyes fixed on the corridor behind her.
Kael turned slowly.
Down the long hall, framed in moonlight, a figure stood.
Dren.
Or rather… something wearing his shape.
Its eyes were black pits. Its skin shimmered like oil. It smiled too wide. And when it stepped forward—
Its shadow moved first.