The town of Gravenmoor was the sort of place where silence felt alive. Streets of cracked cobblestone twisted between buildings that leaned too close together, as though whispering secrets into one another's shutters. At night, fog curled low over the ground, muffling footsteps, carrying only the faint toll of the distant bell tower.
Sixteen-year-old Custiel Morvain had grown used to silence. He carried it like a second skin—an isolation no one could pierce. His classmates called him strange, cursed, even touched by the dead. They weren't entirely wrong. On his right forearm burned a birthmark that wasn't quite a mark. It shifted sometimes—faint, threadlike runes that glowed under moonlight before fading back into pale scar-tissue.
Tonight, that mark pulled him toward the oldest part of town. Toward the library.
The Morvain Library of Antiquities had stood for centuries, built by Custiel's great ancestor, a man who was said to have collected every book that no one else dared to keep. Superstition claimed the library grew on its own, swallowing forbidden texts in the night, binding their words in walls of dust. Most of its wings were still in use, a haven for scholars and record keepers. But one wing had been sealed off for nearly fifty years: the Ashen Wing.
People whispered of curses, of strange voices, of books that bled ink like wounds. Children dared each other to knock on its chained doors and run. Custiel had never dared. Until now.
The sigil on his arm was burning.
He stood before the heavy oak door that separated the Ashen Wing from the rest of the library. His silver-gray eyes flicked over the iron chains that wrapped it shut, dull with rust but humming with something more than age. No lantern light touched this part of the hall; the air was stale, thick with dust and forgotten breath.
"Why here?" he muttered under his breath, clutching his arm. The mark pulsed hot, almost feverish, as though dragging him forward.
Something whispered back.
Not a word. Not even a sound he could name. Just the echo of a voice that wasn't his.
The chain rattled.
Custiel froze, heart lurching. Then, with a sound like stone grinding, the chain loosened on its own, slithering to the floor in a coil of rust. The door groaned, opening a crack. Cold air rushed through the gap, brushing his skin like skeletal fingers.
He should have run.
But silence had defined his life, and now silence was breaking. He had to know why.
With trembling hands, Custiel pushed the door open and stepped inside.
The Ashen Wing was no ordinary hall of books.
Shelves stretched into impossible heights, ladders rising to nowhere. Dust hung in the air like drifting ash, and the smell of old paper was sharp, almost metallic. At first glance, it looked like any neglected archive—but then Custiel heard it.
Whispers.
Soft at first, like wind brushing through reeds. Then clearer, voices layering over one another until they pressed against his skull: pleading, praying, laughing, screaming. He clapped a hand over his ears, but it didn't matter. The voices weren't entering through sound. They were inside.
Custiel stumbled forward, his eyes darting to the shelves. Each book… was breathing. Their spines swelled faintly as though lungs hid beneath their covers. When he brushed one with his fingers, it shivered.
A book tumbled from the shelf, landing at his feet with a hollow thud. Its cover was black, its title etched in letters that crawled like insects: "Wish of the Forgotten."
His mark blazed like fire.
"Don't," Custiel whispered to himself. "Don't open it."
The book opened on its own.
Inside, words wrote themselves in glowing ink:
I wish… I could see her one last time.I wish my mother knew I never meant to leave.
The handwriting was shaky, childish. Tears stained the page, appearing fresh though the paper was centuries old. Custiel's throat tightened. He could almost see the boy behind the words, hear his desperate plea.
The air rippled. A faint silhouette rose from the page: the ghostly outline of a child, pale and flickering like a candle flame. Its empty eyes fixed on him.
"Please," the voice said—not with sound, but with the echo of need that pierced his skull. "Please… grant it."
Custiel staggered back, heart hammering. "I—I can't—"
The whispers swelled. A thousand overlapping tones, pressing against him, urging, tempting.
Every wish must be kept. Every keeper must choose.
The child's shape reached for him, hands trembling, eyes wide with hollow yearning. Custiel felt his fingers twitch, reaching despite himself. His mark burned hotter, glowing now like molten iron.
Then, from the shadows, another presence stirred.
The air thickened, the whispers fell silent, and a single deeper voice resonated through the Archive.
One wish. One price.
Custiel spun, eyes straining. At the far end of the endless hall, where the shelves vanished into dark, a figure stood. Horned, tall, wrapped in shadows that writhed like smoke. Its face was hidden, shrouded in black flame, but its gaze—though unseen—seared into him.
The child's ghost clung closer. The voices rose again.
"Who are you?" Custiel demanded, though his voice was thin against the crushing silence.
The figure tilted its head, horns catching faint glimmers of crimson light. It spoke again, but its lips never moved:
Grant it. Become mine.
The ground trembled. More books shook loose, slamming to the floor, their pages flying open. Whispers poured out, filling the Archive until Custiel thought his skull would split. Every voice begged, screamed, laughed, prayed at once.
He stumbled backward, clutching his burning arm. The child's ghost was dissolving into smoke, its plea echoing still. The horned figure did not move, but the weight of its will pressed down like a storm.
Every keeper begins with one.
"No!" Custiel gasped, forcing his eyes shut. "Not me!"
He slammed the book shut.
The whispers cut off. The ghost dissolved. The library plunged into silence so heavy it rang in his ears.
His breath tore ragged from his chest. Sweat ran cold down his back. The book at his feet pulsed faintly before turning to ash, scattering across the floor.
On his arm, the sigil no longer looked like a mark. It was glowing—lines of red, curling into runes he had never seen, alive and burning.
Custiel staggered out of the hall, slamming the door behind him. The chains re-coiled across the wood, snapping tight like a snake biting shut.
He leaned against the wall, gasping for air. His arm still burned, whispers still crawled at the edge of his hearing. He knew, with a clarity that cut deeper than fear:
The Archive had chosen him.
And silence would never belong to him again.