Chapter 12: The Golden Anchor
Solas Thorne left Dorm 0 with her back straight and her face composed. No triumph stirred in her chest, no giddy pulse of victory. What she carried was sharper: certainty. The prey had been marked. The golden thread tied to that door was not ornament, not whimsy. It was an anchor, a beacon, a silent shout across the myth-layer: I see you. I will hunt you.
Her family's bloodline whispered through her veins, old and cruel. She was not brute, not soldier. She was predator. Every step away from the tower was part of the pursuit. Her golden eyes burned faintly in the night. She had already chosen the ending: she would find him, and she would kill him.
---
At dawn, the instructors discovered the thread.
It shimmered faintly on the doorknob, thin as hair but radiant as sunlit glass. Students gathered, whispering, though their whispers quickly became frantic. Unlike the black threads, the golden one carried a weight that denied rumor. This was no lie. This was truth.
The instructors touched it and flinched. Hidden in its weave was a signature, faint but undeniable — Thorne. One of the ancient families had left their mark on Academy soil. A storm of speculation ignited. Was the ghost truly a student? Or had the game been rigged from the start, an elder masquerading as prey?
The black threads had unsettled them. The golden thread terrified them.
---
From the cramped dark of a ventilation shaft in the main library, Kairo watched through his own threads. His pulse slowed, deliberate, as he studied the golden tether. A declaration of war. Not the clumsy ambition of frightened students, but the sharp, merciless move of a hunter.
He leaned his head back against the iron duct, feeling the hum of isolation around him. If Solas was bold enough to plant her family's crest openly, then the hunt had moved beyond rumor. The game was no longer about scaring shadows. It was about survival.
He pulled a scrap of paper from his pocket, the edges worn, already threaded with his focus. He wrote a single word. A word that lived in whispers, already half-believed. A myth to bait a hunter's pride. A rumor large enough to fracture her attention. He smiled faintly, the sadness in his eyes folding into calculation.
He was not afraid. He was intrigued. To escape a predator, he had to think like one.
---
In his dorm, Lian sat with his hands trembling on the edge of his desk. Loneliness pressed against him like fog. His mind was a wound he could not name. Something important had been cut out of him — he knew it, even if he couldn't describe what it was.
Compulsion drove him toward the library. Something had happened there, something that explained the strange ache in his chest. He was no hero. He was not brave. But he was a victim, and victims seek their wounds. The memory was gone, but the shadow of it remained, like a phantom limb.
He whispered to himself without realizing:
"I saw something… I think."
But he did not know what. He was a witness without a memory, a truth without a story.
---
Elsewhere, Selan Myris stood among the crowd that pressed toward the golden thread. Her breath came fast, her pulse hot. She knew the Thorne signature. She knew what it meant. This was not student play-acting — this was real. A rival. A master.
Adrenaline burned in her veins, but so did hunger. If she could challenge the Thorne, if she could match them, she could ascend. She could seize divinity with her own hands. She smiled, thin and sharp. This was her chance. She would prove herself. She would become a god.
---
Joric stood at the front of the throng, his eyes wide with awe. The golden thread shimmered before him, promise incarnate. He heard the whispers: Thorne, hunter, god. His chest swelled with borrowed courage.
This was his moment. To touch the thread was to prove himself. To seize the legend for his own. His hand lifted, trembling but determined. He imagined the glory, the recognition, the mantle of hero.
Fingers brushed gold.
Light erupted, violent and merciless. A scream tore from Joric's throat, high and raw. The brilliance swallowed him. When it faded, only silence remained.
Joric was no hero. He was a victim. A pawn. A fool.
The golden anchor pulsed faintly, as though amused. The hunt had claimed its first offering.