The new throne room in Veilhold had been remade twice over in six months.
Gone were the obsidian pillars etched with conquests and the crimson banners that once choked the light. Now sunlight poured through high arched windows framed in living vines grown by young Wardens practicing earth echoes. The great throne itself remained cracked but mended: golden veins sealed the fractures, and two seats had been carved side by side at its base simple, unadorned, equal. No one sat on the old imperial seat anymore. It stood empty, a reminder.
Elara Voss Anchor, Guardian, no longer just a historian from another world sat cross-legged on the cool stone floor in front of it, sleeves rolled, a small obsidian tablet in her lap. She traced runes with a fingertip, testing a new weave meant to detect distant echo disturbances. Thorne lounged against a pillar nearby, arms crossed, wings relaxed for once. He watched her with the quiet amusement that had become his default expression when she was deep in research.
"You're going to burn a hole through that tablet," he said.
"Better than burning through the realm." She didn't look up. "The resonance has been… humming. Not loud. Just persistent. Like a string plucked once and left vibrating."
Thorne pushed off the pillar and crouched beside her. His hand settled on her shoulder warm, steady. Through their eternal link she felt the faint echo of his own awareness: the same low vibration, like distant thunder that hadn't yet broken.
"North," he said quietly. "Beyond the Frostveil Range. I felt it strongest last night."
Elara set the tablet aside. "Then it's not just imagination."
She stood. He rose with her close enough their arms brushed.
"Fragment awakening?" she asked.
"Or growing bold enough to call." His amber eyes darkened. "It's not the mindless hunger we fought before. This one feels… deliberate."
A soft knock at the side door. Lira entered hair still cropped short, silver-threaded cloak draped over practical leathers. She carried a sealed scroll, wax stamped with the new guardian sigil: intertwined gold flame and black scale.
"Scout report from the northern border," she said without preamble. "Three villages gone silent in the last fortnight. No bodies. No battle signs. Just… empty. And the livestock untouched."
Thorne's wings shifted a subtle flare of tension.
"Echo drain," Elara said. "Clean. Precise. Like the Devourer learned manners."
Lira handed her the scroll. "The last message from the final village before it went dark: 'Shadows sing. They know our names.'"
Silence fell, heavy and familiar.
Elara unrolled the parchment. At the bottom, in shaky hand: a single sketched symbol—a broken crown encircled by jagged teeth.
She looked up at Thorne.
"Pack light," she said. "We leave at first light."
He nodded once no argument, no hesitation.
Lira's gaze flicked between them. "You're not taking an army?"
"Not yet." Elara rolled the scroll closed. "If this fragment is calling us specifically, it wants us to come. An army would only feed it faster."
Thorne's hand found hers fingers lacing tight. "Besides," he added with a faint, dangerous smile, "we've always been better as a pair."
Lira exhaled. "Then may the old queens watch over you both. I'll hold Veilhold. And if you don't return in three weeks"
"We will," Elara said firmly. "We always do."
As Lira left to prepare supplies and brief the council, Thorne turned Elara toward him fully.
"Ready to hunt again?" he asked, voice low.
She met his gaze steady, unafraid.
"Ready to end it," she answered.
He leaned down, kissed her brief but fierce, tasting of smoke and promise.
"Then let's go remind the Devourer why it should have stayed asleep."
Outside, the first stars pricked the twilight sky.
Somewhere far north, in frozen valleys no map still named, a shadow stirred smiling with too many teeth.
The whisper grew louder.
And two guardians answered.
[End of Chapter 1 – Volume 2]