Light swallowed everything.
Not warm light.Not gentle.
A wildfire of silver tore through Aera's veins as if her own blood had been waiting centuries for this exact moment.
Her body lifted from the platform — not floating, but suspended by the force funneling through her. Threads of radiance streamed from the Sleepwalkers into her skin, weaving themselves into the very architecture of her pulse.
"Aera!" the stranger shouted, stepping forward despite the crushing pressure.
She couldn't answer.
Her throat wasn't hers.
Her heartbeat wasn't hers.
The ruins were breathing through her.
The city seemed to recognize her like an heir returning home.
Her eyes rolled upward as visions slammed into her — not memories, but inheritances.
A woman carved of starlight, running her fingers through a newborn's hair.A council of luminous beings bowing before a sealed cradle.A pulse of power being locked away beneath ribs too small to understand it.
A child.A prophecy.A betrayal drowned in snow.
The visions vanished.
Aera collapsed to her knees, gasping as the last of the light bled off her skin in shimmering currents.
The stranger caught her before she hit the stone.
"Aera. Look at me."
Her lashes fluttered. For a moment her gaze was distant, unanchored.
Then she blinked back into herself.
"I saw…" She shook her head, breath trembling. "I don't know what I saw. My mother—she—"She pressed a hand to her chest. "Something's awake."
"I know," he murmured. "I can feel it."
He wasn't looking at her eyes this time.He was looking at the faint silver lines now glowing beneath her skin, tracing up her throat like constellations.
Aera shivered.
The Sleepwalkers stood in a ring around the platform, their luminescent bodies stabilizing, no longer glitching. They weren't bowing this time.
They were guarding her.
"What am I?" Aera whispered.
The stranger opened his mouth—but the ruins answered first.
A low vibration rippled through the towers, followed by a crack of shifting stone. The frostwardens beyond the courtyard recoiled, snarling, suddenly hesitant to attack.
Aera frowned."Why did they stop?"
"They sense what you're becoming," he said. "And they fear it."
Aera's stomach tightened.
Before she could speak, the Sleepwalker nearest her hummed — a soundless vibration that rang inside her bones. Its mask-like face tilted, then turned toward the ruins' eastern gate.
The mist thickened.
A shadow moved through it.Then another.Then several more.
The stranger's posture sharpened instantly.
"Not frostwardens," he muttered. "These are trained."
Aera stood, still unsteady."Trained what?"
"Hunters."
Figures emerged from the fog, cloaked in obsidian armor laced with shimmering seals. Their masks were angular, emotionless, reflecting the ruins like broken mirrors.
The leader stepped forward.
When he removed his mask, Aera's breath caught.
His eyes were silver — the same shade now glowing beneath her skin.
He bowed.
Not to the stranger.
To her.
"Aera Khyrelis," he said, voice smooth as cut glass. "At last, the lost daughter of the Lethyr line returns."
Her heart thundered."I—I never told you my name."
"You didn't need to."A faint, unnerving smile."Your blood carries the signature of the ancient houses. We've been searching for you since the day you vanished from this world."
Aera stumbled back."Vanished? I was raised in the Coastal Divide—my parents—my life—"
"Fabrications," he said gently. "To hide you."
A chill crawled across her spine.
The stranger stepped instinctively between her and the newcomer, jaw tight.
"State your purpose."
The hunter's gaze flicked to him."You guard her well. But this is no longer your duty."
Aera's pulse spiked."What does that mean?"
"It means," the hunter said, extending a gloved hand toward her, "it is time for you to return to your dynasty… before the world tears itself apart searching for you."
The Sleepwalkers shifted, their glow sharpening with warning.
The stranger reached for Aera's arm without looking away from the hunter.
"Aera," he murmured, "don't move."
She inhaled shakily.
"Why?" she whispered.
His voice was low, taut, threaded with something primal.
"Because that man isn't here to protect you."
Aera's voice cracked."Then why is he bowing?"
"Because," the stranger said, eyes burning, "he thinks he owns you."
The air snapped with tension.
The Sleepwalkers lit up.
The hunters tensed.
And Aera—
Aera felt the new power in her blood coil like a sleeping star ready to flare.
This wasn't a reunion.
It was a claim.
And she had never allowed anyone to claim her.
Not in her old world.
Not in this one.