Mira woke to shouting.
Not the close, familiar sounds of the mountain halls—the measured steps, the echo of stone—but raw human noise. Panic. Anger. Pain that didn't know how to be quiet.
She tried to sit up and failed.
Her body felt wrong again. Heavy, but not weak. Like something inside her was pressing outward and had nowhere to go.
"Easy," Selina said immediately, close enough that Mira felt her before she heard her. "Do not force yourself upright. The air outside the mountain is unstable. Your body is reacting."
Mira swallowed. Her throat burned. "Where are we?"
"Halfway down the eastern descent," Kael answered from the other side. His voice was steady, but alert. "The inner roads collapsed overnight. We're taking the surface route."
Surface.
That word sent a ripple through her chest.
She remembered the council's decision. She remembered agreeing. She remembered saying she was ready.
She hadn't expected this.
The transport slowed, then stopped completely. Outside, the shouting grew louder.
Selina's hand rested flat over Mira's sternum, grounding but firm. "Listen to me. Do not draw on the flame unless I tell you to. The mana density outside fluctuates in waves. If you react instinctively, you could hurt people."
"I can feel them," Mira said hoarsely. "All of them."
Kael glanced back. "How far?"
"Too close," Mira answered. "And farther than they should be."
That got his full attention.
He opened the door.
Heat slammed in immediately. Not warmth—heat layered with smoke, rot, and something sharp that burned the back of Mira's nose.
The road ahead was no longer a road.
It was ash.
Cars sat abandoned at odd angles, some melted into the ground like wax left too close to flame. Buildings leaned or had simply collapsed inward, their contents spilling out into the street. People moved between them in ragged clusters—some crying, some shouting, some too numb to do either.
A body lay face-down near a crushed storefront.
Mira's breath hitched.
Kael closed the door halfway. "Do not look too long."
"I have to," she said.
Selina did not argue. She adjusted Mira's cloak instead, fastening it tighter at the throat. "Then we move carefully."
Outside, a man was screaming at a woman clutching a child. "You said it was safe! You said the lights meant help was coming!"
"I didn't know," the woman sobbed. "I swear I didn't know!"
A boom echoed in the distance. Not thunder. Something heavier.
Mira's pulse spiked.
The ground beneath the transport vibrated faintly, and the wards etched into the undercarriage flared white for half a second.
Kael cursed under his breath. "That wasn't artillery."
"No," Selina said. "That was something coming through."
Mira's fingers curled against the blanket. "We can't just drive past them."
Kael met her eyes in the rearview mirror. "We cannot stop here."
"People are dying," she said.
"And if you lose control, more will," Selina replied, firm but not cold. "You are not ready to act in open space yet."
Mira looked back out the window.
A teenage boy staggered into the road, blood running down his arm. He stared straight at the transport—and then froze.
His eyes widened.
Mira felt it.
A sharp, instinctive pull. Like something in him had reached toward her without knowing why.
Her vision went white at the edges.
"Kael," Selina snapped. "Now."
Kael slammed the accelerator.
The transport lurched forward, swerving around debris. The boy fell back, disappearing from view.
Mira gasped and folded inward, clutching her chest.
"I didn't do anything," she whispered.
"I know," Selina said immediately. "But they can feel you."
That was new.
Mira lifted her head slowly. "What do you mean they can feel me?"
Kael's jaw tightened. "Anyone with even a fragment of spiritual sensitivity can feel you now. You are not hidden outside the mountain."
Selina added, "And some of them will try to follow that feeling."
As if summoned by her words, something shrieked in the distance.
Not human.
The sound scraped along Mira's spine, triggering a sharp flare of heat behind her eyes.
A shape vaulted across the ruins two blocks ahead—too fast, too large, moving on limbs that bent the wrong way.
The people scattered.
Screams erupted.
Kael braked hard.
The creature landed in the road.
It was once a dog.
Now it stood nearly as tall as the transport, ribs exposed under stretched skin, eyes glowing a dull green. Its jaw split wider than it should have been, teeth uneven and too many.
It snarled.
Mira's breath came fast. "Kael—"
"I see it," he said.
The beast lunged.
The wards flared again as it struck the front of the vehicle. Metal groaned.
Selina did not shout. "Mira. Listen carefully. Do not burn it. Do not heal it. Push it away. Only that."
"I don't know how," Mira said, panic threading her voice.
"Yes, you do," Selina replied sharply. "You stopped the belt. You stopped Kael's bleeding. This is smaller."
The creature reared back, preparing to strike again.
Mira raised her hand instinctively—and stopped herself halfway.
She breathed.
Slow. Controlled.
She didn't reach for flame.
She reached for pressure.
The air between her palm and the creature compressed violently.
The beast yelped as if struck by an invisible wall and was hurled sideways, smashing through a ruined storefront.
Silence followed.
Mira's arm shook as she lowered it.
"That's enough," Selina said. "Do not follow it."
Kael didn't wait. He drove.
They didn't stop again until the road narrowed into a ravine where the ash thinned and the air cooled.
Only then did Selina let herself sit back.
Mira stared at her own hand. "I didn't mean to do that."
"You did exactly what you were told," Selina said. "That matters."
Mira looked up. "That thing—it was alive."
"Yes," Selina replied. "And it was already gone."
Kael glanced back. "This is why we couldn't stop."
Mira nodded slowly.
She understood.
Three hours later, Nora crouched behind the wreckage of a collapsed checkpoint and pressed her fingers into the dirt to steady herself.
The Red Veil had moved faster than expected.
Too fast.
Their banners hung from streetlights. Their patrols moved in clean lines, weapons gleaming with runic marks she recognized too well.
They weren't hiding anymore.
They were consolidating.
She lifted the burner phone and hesitated.
If she sent the message now, they would know.
If she waited, Kael and Selina would already be gone.
She thought of Mira's face on the mountain. Pale. Glowing. Terrified and determined.
Nora swallowed hard and dialed.
The line connected immediately.
"Yes," a voice said. Calm. Male. Dangerous.
"They're moving east," Nora said. "Surface route. She's awake. Fully."
Silence stretched for two seconds.
Then: "Are you certain?"
"I felt it," Nora said. "There's no mistaking it."
"Good," the voice replied. "You have done well."
"I haven't told them everything," Nora said quickly. "I slowed them. I lied about the route."
Another pause.
"That will not save you," the voice said mildly. "But it may earn you mercy."
The call ended.
Nora closed her eyes.
"I'm sorry," she whispered. She didn't know to whom.
Far from the ash road, Arthur Halden stood in a reinforced observation deck overlooking a fractured city.
The sky above it glowed wrong—veined with light that pulsed like a heartbeat.
His wife stood beside him, immaculate despite the chaos below. Elara Halden's expression was sharp, calculating.
"This world is becoming unrecognizable," she said. "Your failure with the girl accelerated it."
Arthur did not answer.
Below them, his daughters watched the streets.
Lyra's fingers trembled as she stared at the glowing horizon. "Mother… I can feel something. Like it's pulling at me."
Elara turned sharply. "What do you mean?"
Lyra swallowed. "It's warm. And cold. And it's calling."
Arthur's blood ran cold.
His wife smiled slowly.
"Well," Elara said. "That changes things."
Back on the road, Mira leaned her head against the window as dusk settled.
Every mile away from the mountain felt heavier.
"Kael," she said quietly.
"Yes."
"If the world keeps breaking like this… what happens to people like me?"
Kael didn't answer immediately.
Selina did.
"You become a line," she said. "Between what survives and what doesn't."
Mira closed her eyes.
The ash road stretched on ahead of them, glowing faintly under the wrong sky.
And somewhere behind them, the Red Veil began to move.