The spiral screamed as it broke.
Stone split, skulls tumbled, fire and shadow poured from the walls. Chains lashed the cavern like whips, snapping stalagmites in half. The air itself turned to knives.
Tomas staggered to his feet, blood soaking his torn shirt. His sword was little more than jagged metal, but he raised it anyway, teeth bared. Shadows lunged, and he met them with a roar that shook his ruined lungs.
"Elara!"
She stood at the pit's edge, the key blazing in her hand, her body split by the spiral's curse. Half of her face was bone, one eye a white sun, the other still hers. Her skin bled light, veins glowing like molten rivers.
She did not answer.
Her gaze was locked on the spiral as it widened into a mouth, endless and screaming. Beyond it, stars twisted into impossible shapes, chains tearing free of their moorings, and something vast stirred.
The Silent Hour was opening.
Aldric fell to his knees, chains spilling from his ribs, his arms outstretched in ecstasy. His voice was no longer his own but a choir of silence and thunder.
"Yes! Yes! At last, the chain is broken!"
His eyes burned with fanatic joy as he turned to Elara. "Do you feel it? Do you see what you are? This is your birthright, girl! You are the gate! You are the Hour!"
Tomas spat blood into the dust, raising his broken blade. "She's Elara."
He charged.
Chains lashed toward him, mouths snapping, shadows swarming like locusts. Tomas ducked low, his blade catching one in the throat, tearing black ichor across the stone. He ripped a chain from the air with his bare hands, skin splitting, blood running, and he used it like a whip, dragging Aldric to the ground.
But Aldric only laughed, chains writhing back into his flesh. "You cannot kill me! The Hour is within me!"
"Then I'll tear it out!" Tomas snarled.
Elara staggered forward, the cavern warping around her.
She saw two worlds at once: the stone cavern with Tomas fighting, and the endless void of the Silent Hour. Chains drifted through both, overlapping, binding. Every scream in the cavern echoed in the silence beyond.
And the Hour spoke.
You are ours. You are not girl. You are not Elara. You are chain. You are silence given shape.
Visions tore through her:
Villages crumbling to dust, their bells tolling empty.
Generations of keepers drowning in rivers of bone.
Tomas, broken, lying in chains, his eyes dim.
Herself—older, younger, infinite—each raising the key, each drowning.
Her knees hit the stone. Blood poured from her nose, her skin cracking with light.
"No," she whispered, though her voice was barely her own. "I'm not yours."
The suns blinked overhead.
Then prove it. Break him. Break the boy. Keep the silence.
"Elara!"
Tomas's voice ripped through her visions.
She looked up, and through the blur she saw him—battered, bloodied, yet standing, his blade buried in Aldric's side. Shadows screamed around him, chains whipped his flesh, but his eyes burned only for her.
"Don't let go!" he roared. "You hear me? Don't you dare let go!"
Her heart convulsed.
The Hour thundered inside her skull: Anchor. Keeper. Anchor.
Aldric screamed, his body twisting, chains exploding outward as he wrenched Tomas away. His laughter filled the cavern. "She cannot save you, boy! She was never yours—she was always ours!"
He flung Tomas into the pit.
"No!" Elara's scream split the world.
She dove.
The spiral swallowed her, silence crashing like a tide. For a heartbeat she was nothing, weightless, unbound. Then her hand found his.
Tomas's fingers were slick with blood, his eyes wild as he dangled above the abyss.
"Elara," he whispered, his voice raw and breaking. "Don't… don't leave me."
Her grip tightened until her bones cracked. Tears streaked her burning face.
"I won't."
The key seared between them, binding flesh to flesh, light to blood. The Hour shrieked, chains snapping, suns flaring.
Aldric howled in rage. "No! She is ours!"
Elara's eyes—one human, one sun—lifted to him.
"Not anymore."
She pulled Tomas up.
The cavern exploded.
The cavern was no longer stone.
The spiral's light turned the walls to fire, the ceiling to smoke, the floor to teeth. Every skull screamed as one, their cries like bells tolling the end of the world.
Tomas fought within it like a shadow himself, his broken sword hacking, blood streaking his arms. Each step was agony, but he forced himself forward, forcing himself to remain between Elara and the storm. His breath rattled. His heart hammered.
He was almost gone.
And yet he roared her name with every strike.
"Elara!"
She could barely hear him. The Hour thundered too loud inside her head, drowning him out. Visions swarmed her eyes—villages burning, seas swallowing towns, generations of keepers crushed under chains. All of them were her.
All of them raised the key.
All of them drowned.
Her reflection knelt beside her in the silence, smiling with teeth too sharp. "You know what must happen. Keep the silence. Break him before the Hour breaks you."
Her gaze fell to Tomas. Bleeding, staggering, still standing. His eyes—always his eyes—locked on hers.
"No," she whispered. "I can't."
"You can," the reflection hissed. "You must."
Chains wrapped her arms, dragging her to her knees. The key burned so hot it branded her flesh, and her scream was swallowed by silence.
Aldric's laughter split the cavern.
He rose from the shadows, his chest gaping wide, chains writhing like serpents. His body was more Hour than man now, a conduit for its will.
"You see?" he thundered, his voice many voices. "She kneels already! She belongs to the spiral!"
He lashed a chain into Tomas's chest, sending him sprawling across the stone. Blood splattered the spiral's edge.
"Elara!" Tomas choked, trying to rise, his arms trembling.
The Hour pressed harder.
Anchor. Keeper. Silence.
Her reflection leaned close, whispering. "One cut. One chain. End him, and you will never be alone again."
Elara raised the key.
Her hand shook so hard she nearly dropped it. The light flared, brighter than fire, brighter than suns. The cavern shivered, shadows wailing in anticipation.
Tomas's voice, hoarse and raw, cut through the silence.
"Don't let it take you. You hear me?"
His chest heaved, blood dripping from his lips. His eyes locked to hers. His eyes never wavered.
"You're still Elara," he said, barely breath. "Not chain. Not Hour. You. Don't forget."
Her tears blurred everything.
For a heartbeat, she almost let go. Almost gave him to the silence.
But then—her grip shifted. The key turned.
Toward the spiral.
The world split open.
The spiral's mouth tore wider, chains snapping like thunder. The skulls shattered, black fire raining down. Shadows screamed as their forms unraveled.
Aldric shrieked, his body splitting apart, chains whipping wildly as the Hour consumed him. He stretched his arms wide, laughter turning to a scream. "Yes! Yes, open it! Show me—show me the Hour's true face!"
The cavern collapsed around him.
Tomas crawled toward Elara, dragging himself through blood and fire. "Elara!"
She was no longer fully there. Her body burned with light, half-shadow, half-sun. The Hour roared inside her veins, ripping her open from the inside. She was Elara and not-Elara, girl and Hour, keeper and silence.
She turned to Tomas, her human eye swimming with tears. "I don't know if I can stop it."
He seized her hand, his grip iron despite his broken body. "Then I'll stop it with you."
The key blazed between them, their blood mingling on its edge. The spiral howled, the Hour leaning closer.
And everything—stone, fire, shadow, blood—collapsed into silence.