Aria awoke gasping, her back arched as if her body had been struck by lightning. Kael was kneeling beside her, shouting her name, his hands gripping her shoulders. But she couldn't hear him—not fully. The world around her buzzed, alive with energy she couldn't explain. Every surface seemed to shimmer, as if overlaid with a veil of stardust.
"I saw her," Aria whispered, her voice hoarse. "The Raven Queen… she spoke to me."
Kael's face was pale. "You were gone. You touched the crystal and collapsed. I thought—" He didn't finish the sentence.
Aria sat up slowly, her fingers tingling. "Something changed. Inside me."
She held out her hand, and as she focused, violet sparks danced along her palm, forming a brief, flickering sigil before vanishing. It left no burn, no scar—only a sense of power humming beneath her skin.
Kael stared. "That's impossible. Magic like that hasn't been seen in—"
"Centuries," Aria finished for him. "I know."
They both turned to look at the stone relief again. The crystal was gone—absorbed or transformed-but the image of the Raven Queen seemed sharper now, more defined. The feathers etched in the stone seemed to move ever so slightly in the flickering torchlight.
"We need answers," Kael said quietly. "And I know where to get them."
Aria followed him as they left the sanctum and retraced their steps back through the ruins. But something had changed—not just in her, but in the forest around them. The oppressive silence had lifted, replaced by an eerie harmony: the rustle of leaves, the hum of distant winds, the whisper of water in forgotten fountains.
When they reached the edge of the ruins, Kael turned to her. "There's someone I haven't told you about. A seer, older than anyone I know. She lives on the cliffs beyond the Valley of Sighs. If anyone can tell us what this means… It's her."
Aria nodded. "Then we go."
They rode out before dawn, their path illuminated by the faintest hint of starlight. As they traveled, Aria could feel the energy within her growing stronger, like a fire stoked by the rhythm of the earth itself.
That night, as they camped beneath the open sky, Aria dreamed again.
But this time, she wasn't alone.
She stood atop a mountain of bones, the stars bleeding red above her. A voice echoed in her mind—deep, ancient, filled with malice.
"She is awake. But so are we."
And from the shadows rose figures cloaked in darkness—eyes burning, hands outstretched.