Chapter 7: The Grafted Page & A Forbidden Name
The journey back to the capital was a silent parade of pain. Garrison's stone-like arms were wrapped in bandages that slowly seeped red, his stoic expression a mask over the agony of wounds inflicted by magic that shouldn't have functioned so well in a Dead Zone. Riven's new scar, the silvery "Sundering Slash," pulsed with a dull, angry ache. Silas was pale, his mana reserves scraped hollow from the effort of casting in that mana-starved basin. And Kaelen… his head felt like a cracked bell, ringing with a phantom tinnitus that was the echo of his own desperate, world-defying lie.
But it was the small, grafted page found in the dust that occupied his mind. Inspector Vale had sealed it in a lead-lined folio, handling it with reverence and terror. The runes were not imperial script. They were angular, aggressive, like slashes of a knife. Vale had spent the carriage ride squinting at it, muttering about "clan glyphs" and "proscribed linguistic patterns."
He'd only translated one line before they reached the Obsidian Tower. A name, written not in ink, but in what looked like crystallized blood.
"Valerius."
The name meant nothing to Kaelen. But the way Vale's face had drained of all color, the way his hands had trembled as he closed the folio, spoke volumes. It was a name from a story no one was supposed to tell.
Back in the tower, the atmosphere had shifted again. The attack by the Sky-Cutter Clan wasn't just an ambush; it was a declaration. The hidden war Inspector Vale hinted at was no longer academic. It had claws, and it had tried to take Kaelen.
Justicar Ignatius's words hung over them all: "You may be one of them. Or you may be the only one who can fight them."
Training became survival. Vale, now with a frantic energy, pushed Kaelen harder. "The clan's techniques bypass standard mana channels! They use will and ritual, much like you do, but codified by generations. You must get faster. Stronger. You must understand the grammar of your power before they come with a whole dictionary."
The focus was on Dual-Path Evolution. Vale theorized that Kaelen's Unclassified grimoire, responding to his nature and the threats upon him, was approaching its first major branching point.
"Every grimoire hits crossroads," Vale explained, unrolling a complex diagram in the Penumbral Stack. "Based on the user's soul, their choices, their conflicts, the grimoire offers a fundamental choice in how its power will grow. Choose a path of Dominion—raw, overwhelming narrative imposition. Or a path of Finesse—precise, subtle edits with less backlash. You cannot have both. The path not taken is sealed forever."
Kaelen stared at the diagram. "How will I know?"
"The grimoire will present the choice. Usually during a moment of extreme conflict or self-revelation. It is a soul-deep decision. Many mages, when they feel the branch approaching, sequester themselves for months in meditation with their clans to prepare." Vale's expression was grim. "You do not have months. The next attack could come tomorrow. And you have no clan to guide you."
The pressure was a physical weight. Every exercise now carried the shadow of this impending choice. When he practiced defining a stone as "brittle," he wondered: was this Dominion, forcing a new truth? Or Finesse, gently suggesting a weakness that was always there?
His squad, meanwhile, dealt with their own scars. Garrison's wounds healed slowly, leaving thick, rope-like welts that no healing magic could fully erase—a permanent Grimoire Scar from a clan technique. He became even more taciturn, spending hours silently reinforcing the tower's walls, his movements stiff with pain.
Riven began experimenting with her scar. She found she could channel a tiny fraction of her blood magic through it, the silvery line glowing with a malevolent light. The resulting effect wasn't a clean cut, but a jagged, tearing wound that resisted healing. It was a stolen, broken power, and using it made the scar burn fiercely. "It's like using a sword with no hilt," she grunted one evening, flexing her aching arm. "You can hurt them, but you cut yourself every time."
Silas watched it all, his journal ever-present. He had begun cross-referencing Kaelen's experiences with the tattered records of the Blank Page Legion. One evening, he spoke without looking up from his notes.
"The Sky-Cutter Clan. Their records were purged eighty years ago. Officially, for 'treasonous modification of imperial grimoires.' Unofficially, they were among the clans who most vocally opposed the Silencing War. They believed the Blank Page Legion's techniques should be studied, not erased."
Kaelen looked up from his own grimoire, which lay closed and cold on the table. "They called me 'editor.' And 'void-walker.'"
"They see you as a relic of a forbidden school of magic," Silas said, his frosty eyes meeting Kaelen's. "A walking piece of the history they think was stolen. You are not a person to them. You are a principle. And principles are worth dying for, or killing for."
This was the new layer beneath the underdog story. He was a pawn in a forgotten ideological war.
A week after the Dead Zone attack, Inspector Vale arrived with an urgent summons. "We're needed at the Guild's main repository. A… situation has arisen that requires our unique perspective."
The "situation" was in a high-security vault deep beneath the Curator's Guild. The air was cold and smelled of ozone and anxiety. A senior curator, wringing his hands, stood before a sealed crystal case. Inside, floating in a field of neutral mana, was a grimoire.
It was beautiful and terrible. Its cover was platinum, inlaid with moonsilver filigree. But it was closed by chains of black iron, and the case was covered in warning sigils.
"This is the grimoire of Lady Caelia of the High Star Clan," the curator whispered. "Platinum-grade, Stellar Weave. One of the most potent astral magic grimoires in the empire. Or… it was."
"What happened?" Vale asked, his instruments already humming.
"It… it stopped," the curator said, his voice trembling. "Three days ago, mid-spell. She was weaving a constellation to predict a trade route. The grimoire simply… closed. It will not open for her. It rejects her touch. The clan is in an uproar. They've tried everything. It's as if the grimoire itself has judged her unworthy."
Kaelen felt a chill. Grimoires can betray their owners.
Vale's eyes were wide with a mixture of horror and fascination. "A spontaneous severance? In a Platinum? This is unprecedented outside of catastrophic moral failure or…"
"Or the grimoire's own purpose no longer aligns with the wielder's path," Silas finished, his voice soft as falling snow.
They were allowed to observe as the clan, in a state of barely-contained panic, made one last attempt. Lady Caelia, a woman of majestic bearing now etched with deep lines of fear, approached the case. She placed her hands on the crystal, pouring her immense mana into it, begging in a whispered, broken litany.
The platinum grimoire did not stir. Not a flicker. It was inert, a tomb for its own power.
Then, as she slumped in despair, something did happen. On the cover of the grimoire, in the moonsilver filigree, a single, thin line of the metal tarnished, turning a dull, dead black. It was a permanent mark. A scar of rejection.
"SEE," the voice in Kaelen's own grimoire whispered, a note of profound satisfaction in its dryness. "EVEN THE STARS CAN BE BLOTTED FROM THE SKY. NO CONTRACT IS ETERNAL. ONLY WILL ENDURES."
The High Star Clan left in disgrace, their political power crumbling in an afternoon. The vault was sealed again, the inert grimoire left as a monument to a terrifying truth: your power could abandon you.
On the walk back through the Guild's echoing halls, they passed a restricted wing marked "Orphanage." Kaelen, through an open door, caught a glimpse. It wasn't for children. It was a repository for grimoires. Dozens of them, of all grades, sat on plain stone plinths. They had no names on their covers. No souls were bound to them. They were just… there. Orphan Grimoires. Some looked ancient, their leather cracked like desert earth. One, a small Bronze book, seemed to be weeping a slow, viscous oil that pooled beneath its plinth.
"Don't stare," Vale said quietly, hurrying him along. "Those are the unclaimed. The ones that never chose, or whose owners died without heirs, and the grimoire… survived. Touching one is a good way to lose your mind or have your soul overwritten by a ghost of intent. They are history's leftover questions."
The pieces of the world's hidden machinery were falling into place for Kaelen, and the picture was horrifying. Grimoires were not just tools. They were partners with their own will, their own judgments. They could outlive you, abandon you, or drive you mad. And some had never been partners at all.
That night, in the root cellar, Kaelen confronted his own grimoire. He held the grafted Sky-Cutter page, still in its folio, in one hand, and placed his other on his own book's cover.
"Valerius," he said aloud.
The grimoire grew warm. The void on the first page swirled violently.
"A NAME FROM THE OLD TEXT. A WOULD-BE AUTHOR WHO FORGOT HE WAS ALSO A CHARACTER."
"Was he like me? A Blank Page?"
"HE WAS A FOOL WHO MISTOOK DOMINION FOR TRUTH. HE SOUGHT TO REWRITE THE WORLD IN HIS OWN IMAGE. THE WORLD PUSHED BACK. IT ALWAYS DOES."
"And the clans? The Sky-Cutters? They want his power back?"
"THEY WANT THE PEN. THEY DO NOT UNDERSTAND THE HAND THAT HOLDS IT, OR THE STORY THAT MUST BE TOLD. THEY SEE ONLY THE ABILITY TO CUT, NOT THE RESPONSIBILITY TO SHAPE."
The voice felt closer, more distinct than ever. Kaelen realized with a start that he was beginning to recognize its… texture. It wasn't evil. It was ancient, yes, and hungry for something—for meaning—but it was not cruel. It was a teacher, albeit one that taught with live blades.
"I feel the branch approaching," Kaelen confessed, the fear raw in his voice. "Dominion or Finesse. How do I choose?"
The grimoire fell silent for a long moment. The twin lights in the void seemed to consider him.
"YOU DO NOT CHOOSE THE PATH. YOU REVEAL IT. LOOK INTO THE MIRROR, KAELEN. AND DO NOT BLINK."
The first page, the mirror, shimmered. But instead of showing the cellar, it showed a split image.
On the left, Kaelen saw a version of himself standing atop a mountain of rubble that had once been the Astraean capital. His eyes blazed with cold light. He held his grimoire aloft, and reality itself frayed at the edges around him, obeying his every thought. He was power absolute. But he was alone. Utterly, terribly alone. The image whispered of Dominion.
On the right, he saw himself in the Obsidian Tower. Not as a king, but as the center of a web. He stood beside a reinforced Garrison, his scars glowing with stabilized power. He conferred with a focused Silas, frost and void magic weaving together in complex patterns. He fought back-to-back with Riven, her stolen scar-harmony blending with his precise edits. He was weaker, in raw terms. But he was not alone. The image hummed with the potential of Finesse.
The vision vanished, leaving him breathless.
It wasn't a choice of strength. It was a choice of self. Did he want to be a sovereign of a dead world, or a craftsman in a living one?
He didn't have an answer. But he knew the branch was coming. Soon.
As he left the cellar, he didn't see Silas in the shadows. But Silas saw him. And in his journal, the entry was stark:
'Subject is nearing first Conceptual Branch. The Grimoire is showing him potential paths. External pressure from Rogue Clans is accelerating his evolution. The incident with Lady Caelia's grimoire confirms the instability of the system. He is a focal point. Recommendation: We must prepare for the branch event. It will be a moment of extreme vulnerability. All factions will sense it.'
Silas closed the journal, his frost-kissed breath hanging in the dark air. He looked toward the tower's single, high window, as if expecting to see the Sky-Cutter Clan descending from the clouds.
He didn't see the other watcher.
Outside, perched on a gargoyle of a nearby building, a figure clad in faded, patchwork leather observed the Obsidian Tower. His own grimoire, a strangely muted Silver, was closed. He had no clan marks. He felt… empty, in a way that sucked in the sound around him. He was the one the Hollow Archive sought. The Unmarked.
He watched the light in Kaelen's cellar window go out.
"An editor in the making," he murmured, his voice devoid of tone. "And already the old pages are turning. The Archive wants him fixed. The clans want him claimed. The Empire wants him controlled." A faint, hollow smile touched his lips. "Let's see what the book itself wants."
He melted backwards into the darkness, leaving not a ripple of mana, but a slight, persistent deadness in the air behind him, as if a Dead Zone had taken a single, silent step.
High in the Council of Stabilization, Justicar Ignatius received two reports. The first: the High Star Clan's collapse was causing political tremors; fear of grimoire betrayal was spreading among the elites. The second: spectral scouts had detected unstable mana signatures converging on the capital's outskirts—signatures matching known Rogue Clan encampments. He looked at a third document, a personal missive from the Hollow Archive, asking about "anomalous void-signatures." He crumpled it in his fist.
"The canon is cracking," he said to the empty chamber. "And every fool with a pen thinks they can write the next page."