The night after the Path Between Doors closed, the Loomspire held its breath.
No wind moved through its halls. No torch dared flicker. The world itself seemed to wait for something—an echo that hadn't yet arrived.
Mary sat alone in the observatory, the faint glow of the mark on her chest casting a dim light across the floor. The sigil burned softly, its lines shifting like veins of living silver. Each pulse sent a ripple through her body, and with every heartbeat, she could feel the Codex below respond.
It wasn't just alive anymore. It was listening.
Lucien had sealed the chamber beneath the Loomspire as best he could, using old wards and older names, but both of them knew the truth. The Queen wasn't gone. She was gathering herself, fragment by fragment, through the dreamscape of anyone foolish enough to still sleep.
And across the scattered remnants of the old world, her whispers had begun.
Far away, in the broken city of Hallow's Edge, Lela awoke screaming.
She sat upright on the cold stone floor of what had once been the Cathedral of Dawn, her breath misting in the chill air. Around her, the surviving monks stirred—those who hadn't fled, those who still believed in light despite everything.
But the light no longer answered them.
Lela pressed a shaking hand to her temple. Her dreams were bleeding through into waking reality again—vivid, fevered visions of black rivers and red suns, and of a woman's voice humming lullabies in reverse.
That voice knew her name.
"Mary," it had whispered in her sleep. "Your sister cannot hold me."
Lela staggered to her feet. Her reflection in a broken mirror nearby showed eyes threaded with crimson veins, faint and glowing.
She knew, then, that the Queen's shadow had found her too.
Back in the Loomspire, Lucien poured over old maps of the interwoven realms, his expression grim.
"They're fracturing," he said, tracing his finger along the parchment. "Every dream connected to the Codex is unraveling. It's like… she's redrawing reality from the inside."
Mary didn't answer. She was staring at her reflection in a shard of obsidian glass, testing the way her mark glowed when she spoke certain words aloud.
"Lucien," she said softly, "she's using the dream-thread."
He looked up sharply. "That's impossible. The thread burned out centuries ago."
Mary shook her head. "Not entirely. It's woven into every sleeping mind that ever touched the Codex. The Queen's using it as her anchor."
Lucien cursed under his breath. "So, she's building an army in the one place we can't reach."
Mary's eyes lifted, calm but haunted. "Not if we go there."
Lucien blinked. "You mean into the dream-thread? Mary, that's suicide."
"Maybe," she said. "But if she's already in everyone's dreams, then that's where we have to fight her. She's remaking the Codex through the collective unconscious of every connected soul. If we can find her within that space, maybe the Friend's word can rewrite her essence before she manifests again."
Lucien stared at her for a long time. "You'd be fighting her on her own ground."
Mary gave a thin smile. "Then it's about time I stopped playing defense."
By the second hour before dawn, they'd prepared the circle.
Lucien stood by the outer ring, holding the stabilizing wards. Mary knelt at the center, the mark on her chest already bleeding light through her skin. Around them, the air began to thicken—reality stretching thin like molten glass.
"Once you cross into the dream-thread," Lucien warned, "I won't be able to follow you. You'll be alone in her realm."
Mary nodded. "I was born from it once. Maybe that's what gives me an edge."
He met her gaze, his eyes dark and uncertain. "And if you don't come back?"
She gave him a faint, tired smile. "Then make sure no one ever opens that door again."
With that, she drew a breath and placed her palm flat against the stone. The sigil flared to life—brighter, louder, filling the chamber with a hum that wasn't sound so much as a vibration in the soul.
And then the world fell away.
She opened her eyes to a sky made of shattered mirrors.
The dream-thread stretched beneath her like a river of glass, reflecting a thousand broken realities—each one a memory, a life, a fragment of the Codex's long history. Words drifted through the air like snowflakes: names, sentences, half-formed thoughts.
It was beautiful and terrible all at once.
"Mary…"
The voice came from behind her.
When she turned, she saw a child standing there—pale, thin, her eyes as black as ink. The girl's hair fell in long, tangled strands that shimmered faintly as if woven from text.
Mary's breath caught. "Who are you?"
The child smiled. "Don't you recognize me? I'm your first draft."
Before Mary could respond, the world rippled. The child's body blurred, her form stretching and darkening until she stood tall and regal, her eyes gleaming with cruel light.
The Queen.
Even here, she was radiant—a living contradiction of beauty and malice. Her gown was woven from the pages of the Codex itself, words bleeding across her body in constant motion.
"Did you think you could unwrite me?" the Queen asked softly. "You were made in my image, Mary. Every beat of your heart still carries my rhythm."
Mary forced herself to stand tall. "Maybe once. But I've learned how to change the song."
The Queen tilted her head. "You carry his word," she said, her tone darkening. "The Friend's gift. It burns in you like a second sun. But even suns die."
Mary reached into her chest and drew upon the mark. Light flared, white and sharp, and for a moment, the dream-thread trembled.
The Queen's eyes narrowed. "Ah. So that's what he gave you. A word without author. Dangerous thing, that. Even I couldn't write one."
"That's why it's mine," Mary said. "Not yours."
The Queen's laugh was like glass breaking underwater. "You misunderstand. You were never meant to be free. You were my final stanza—the living continuation of my will."
Mary stepped forward, light gathering in her hands. "Then I'll rewrite your ending."
The Queen's expression shifted from amusement to something colder. Her form began to dissolve into shadow, spreading like ink across the mirrored river. "Try, then. But remember—every dreamer who sleeps is mine. And I will wake through them."
The shadows surged.
Mary was thrown back, crashing into the mirrored ground. The reflections beneath her cracked, revealing glimpses of other worlds—Lela clutching her head in agony, Loosie kneeling in a blood-soaked chapel, Lucien shouting her name through the veil.
The Queen's shadow rose above her, towering, endless. "You can't fight what you are," she hissed. "You are a vessel. I am the content."
Mary gritted her teeth, forcing herself to her knees. "Maybe. But even a vessel can choose what it holds."
She pressed her hands together and whispered the word the Friend had given her.
It wasn't a word in any language. It was a feeling—the essence of rebellion, of authorship, of choice.
The dream-thread convulsed. The mirrored world shattered completely, exploding into shards of light. The Queen screamed—not in pain, but in fury.
"You dare write without me!"
Mary's voice rang through the chaos. "I already have."
Light engulfed everything.
When she opened her eyes again, she was lying on the floor of the Loomspire. Lucien was kneeling beside her, his hands pressed against her shoulders, his face pale.
"Mary! You stopped breathing—"
She sat up sharply, gasping. The mark on her chest had dimmed, its light now a faint ember.
"What happened?" Lucien demanded. "Did you reach her?"
Mary nodded slowly. "She's inside the dream-thread still. But I hurt her. I made her bleed language."
Lucien frowned. "That's… good?"
Mary met his gaze, her eyes distant. "Maybe. But she's adapting. Every wound I gave her, she turned into a new verse."
Lucien stood, pacing. "Then the Friend's word wasn't enough."
Mary shook her head. "It wasn't meant to end her. It was meant to wake me."
Lucien stopped, watching her carefully. "Mary, what do you mean?"
She rose to her feet, the faint silver glow returning to her veins. "If the Queen is the story… then maybe I was never supposed to fight her."
"Then what?"
Mary looked toward the horizon, where the dawn broke in shades of blood and fire.
"Maybe," she whispered, "I'm supposed to finish writing her."