Chapter 12 — The Bone Prophet's Omen
The air inside the hollowed mountain temple was thick with incense and blood.
Drennir knelt before the Altar of Skulls, his head bowed low as the chanting grew louder behind him. The scent of burning marrow filled the cave as a ring of cloaked figures—Blood Hound seers—drew ancient symbols in ash and bone across the floor.
On the altar, an ossified corpse stirred.
The Bone Prophet.
The creature was not alive, nor truly dead. Its ribs shifted with breath it did not possess, and its jaw hung open in a silent scream. Eyes made of gemstone flared red as the ritual reached its peak.
Drennir lifted his gaze, unafraid. "Speak."
The Prophet's voice was like stone grinding over metal. "You have found the girl."
"Yes."
"You have tested her power."
"She survived," Drennir said, voice unreadable.
The Prophet tilted its head. "Then she is the one. The Harbinger."
Drennir stood slowly. "She bears the Vaeroth sigil. But something else moves in her. A second voice… older. Feral."
"The Weeping Flame," the Prophet rasped. "It sleeps within her bones. And when it wakes, kingdoms will die."
One of the seers recoiled, but Drennir remained still. "Then we must break her before it does."
The Prophet's eyes dimmed, and it whispered, "Or bind her... if you dare."
---
Elsewhere — Halbrecht Keep
Seris sat alone in the training yard, her hands shaking. The revenants had died, but their faces lingered in her mind.
"I felt something," she told Kael when he joined her. "Like something inside me woke up during the fight. But it wasn't mine."
Kael glanced at the mark on her palm. "You think the sigil is talking to you?"
"No," Seris whispered. "I think it's remembering… something ancient."
Before Kael could answer, a blast of light split the sky above the keep—a comet, trailing violet flame.
They stared up, hearts pounding.
From the far north, the seers of the Blood Hounds began their chant again. And beneath the hollowed mountain, the Bone Prophet grinned as its last words echoed through the stone:
> "She will burn the crown... or wear it in ash."