The bells of Thalyssra had not rung in ten years.Now they tolled without hands to pull their ropes.
Their hollow clangs spilled through the morning fog, echoing across the cliffs and valleys. The air thickened with a copper tang, like the aftertaste of blood. Seliora woke first, the sound dragging her from a shallow sleep. She reached instinctively for the lantern beside her bed, fingers brushing the carved handle, but the flame inside sputtered as if suffocating.
She sat upright.
The bells tolled again.
The old abbey at the island's heart had been abandoned for generations, its stones sinking into ivy and moss. Yet now, as Seliora stepped outside, she could see its broken silhouette rising dark against the dawn, every shattered window blazing with pale light. Not firelight—something colder. Something hungrier.
Nysera was already outside. Shadows coiled around her like smoke, restless. Her silver hair whipped in the wind, eyes narrowed against the glow on the horizon.
"You feel it too?" Seliora whispered.
Nysera didn't answer. Her gaze was fixed on the air itself. Mist crawled along the ground, curling through grass and stone like skeletal fingers. Each breath tasted wrong—bitter, metallic, sharp.
Then, faintly, the whispers began.
Seliora pressed her hands to her ears, but it made no difference. The voices slithered inside her skull. One must fall. One must fall. One must—
"Enough!" Nysera's voice cut through, harsher than the sea wind. Her shadows snapped outward, shattering the chorus like glass. The whispers retreated, though not far.
Seliora lowered her hands slowly. "The curse has awakened."
"It's spreading," Nysera said. Her tone was flat, but Seliora could see the tension in her shoulders.
The bells tolled again, and with them came the sound of screams.
The sisters ran.
Down winding cliffs, across the jagged stones of the shoreline, up through the narrow paths where old trees leaned so close together their branches knitted overhead. The air grew heavier with every step, pressing against their lungs.
When they reached the village, the fog was everywhere.
It clung to houses, winding over doorframes, crawling through windows. People staggered in the streets, eyes glazed, mouths moving as if in prayer—or in horror. Seliora rushed forward as a child collapsed in the dirt. She dropped to her knees, pressing her glowing hands against his chest. Warmth surged through her, pouring into him, fighting the black veins crawling along his throat.
The boy gasped, coughing up shadow. Seliora exhaled shakily, sweat dampening her brow. "He'll live."
Nysera's gaze swept the streets. Her shadows stirred uneasily, tasting the curse. "For now."
A woman screamed from inside a nearby house. Nysera was already moving, kicking the door open. The smell hit them immediately—rot and smoke, but no fire. The woman crouched over her husband's body, clutching his hand as his skin withered before her eyes. His flesh shrank against bone, hair falling in clumps to the floor. His eyes rolled back, and with one last shudder, he lay still.
Seliora rushed forward, light flaring at her fingertips. "I can save him—"
Nysera's arm shot out, blocking her path. "You can't."
"Let me try—"
"Look at him."
Seliora did. The man's body was not only dead. It was hollow, as though something had been pulled out of him. The rot had gone too deep.
Her light dimmed. Tears burned at the corners of her eyes. "I could've—"
"No." Nysera's voice was iron. "Not this one."
The widow's sobs tore through the silence. Seliora touched her shoulder gently, but her healing glow could do nothing for grief.
Nysera turned away, her jaw set. She had seen this before, in fragments, in dreams clawing through her nights. But seeing it in daylight—smelling it, hearing it—left a chill that even her shadows couldn't swallow.
The curse was no longer whispering. It was devouring.
Outside, more screams rose.
The sisters moved through the village like torn halves of the same blade—Seliora kneeling at every fallen villager, pouring light into them until her body trembled, Nysera carving through the mist with shadows, striking at twisted shapes that rose from the fog like half-born wraiths. Each one she cut down shrieked with voices stolen from the villagers they had devoured.
Hours blurred together.
By the time the sun should have climbed high, the sky remained dim and veiled, as though the curse itself had draped its shroud across Thalyssra. Seliora collapsed against a wall, light flickering weakly around her fingertips. Her face was pale, lips cracked.
"You can't keep burning yourself like this," Nysera snapped.
"They'll die if I don't."
"They'll die anyway."
The words were cruel, but Nysera's eyes betrayed the fear behind them. Seliora met her gaze, stubborn and unyielding even through exhaustion.
"I won't stop," she whispered.
Nysera turned away sharply. The bells had fallen silent, but their echoes lingered.
And then—
"Orryn."
The name slipped from Seliora's lips before she realized it. She pushed herself upright, swaying. "Do you feel it?"
Nysera stilled.
Yes. She felt it. A presence in the fog, watching. Not in the village, but close. Too close. The shadows trembled, as if bowing to something greater.
The sisters followed the pull.
They left the village behind, climbing the narrow ridge that overlooked the sea. Mist pooled thick as blood at their feet. The cries of the villagers faded into silence. Only the crash of the waves remained.
And then she stepped from the fog.
Orryn.
Her hair hung in tangled strands, black at the roots but bleached bone-white at the ends, as if the curse itself had touched it. Her eyes—one their mother's warm brown, the other fractured glass reflecting endless shadows—fixed on her sisters.
She smiled. Not kind. Not cruel. Something in between, twisted.
"You heard the bells," she said softly. Her voice was the same as it had been when they were children, but beneath it ran a low echo, as though something else spoke with her. "The island is waking."
Seliora staggered forward. "Orryn, please—"
"Do not beg me," Orryn said, and her fractured eye flared. The mist behind her shuddered and formed into shapes—half-human, half-corpse, their faces stretched in silent screams.
Nysera's shadows rose instantly, hissing.
"Stop," Seliora begged, her voice breaking. "We can fight this together. You don't have to—"
Orryn tilted her head, studying them. For a heartbeat, her smile faltered. Something human flickered across her face.
Then it was gone.
"One must fall," she whispered.
The fog surged forward.