The blood-mark burned faintly beneath Veylen's collar as he and Zhada emerged from the portal. They landed just outside the perimeter of the outpost's wards—quiet farmland on one side, rocky fields on the other. The wards shimmered faintly in the air like a mirage of heat.
Zhada dusted off her hands, flexing her fingers. "So—stealthy approach or crash the party?"
"Stealth," Veylen replied, gaze locked ahead. "If Thae's still undercover, we don't want to give her away."
Zhada rolled her eyes but nodded. "Right, right. No flashy entrances. I'll keep my lightning to myself." She smirked. "For now."
They moved fast, cloaked in shadow. Veylen's enchantments concealed their presence from the outer guards. As they passed the threshold, he reached into his sleeve and activated the sigil hidden beneath the leather. A pulse—faint, searching. No response.
His jaw tightened.
"Still blocked?" Zhada murmured, close behind.
"Yes. Something's jamming her transpondence. Could be magic, could be tech. Or worse—intentional interference."
Zhada whistled low. "They're getting bold."
They slipped into the edge of the compound, sticking to the blind spots between posted patrols. From here, Veylen could see the facility's main building and surrounding structures. Nothing looked obviously off—but his instincts buzzed like hornets.
Then he heard it.
A tremor in the air. Not sound—resonance. Faint, like a hum beneath the skin. The same frequency he'd felt on the Choir woman. It was here.
He exchanged a look with Zhada.
"Let's find her," he said.
Meanwhile, deep in the administrative wing…
Thae sat at a data terminal, expression calm, fingers moving as if performing routine diagnostics. A technician beside her muttered something about recent shipment discrepancies, but she only half-listened.
Because she felt it too.
The sigil ward around the outpost had just fluctuated.
Someone had entered. Someone familiar.
She stilled.
Her message to Veylen hadn't gone through last night. The transpondence had failed—not jammed, but swallowed. As if something had eaten the transmission mid-flight.
Now, there was movement behind the walls. Shifts in energy. Foreign presences just outside the sealed corridors.
She straightened, voice even. "Can you bring up the logs on last night's gate usage?"
The tech nodded, oblivious. "Sure. Give me a sec."
As he tapped, Thae subtly ran her fingers over the charm stitched inside her cuff. Her own sigil shimmered. Faint. But active.
She was not alone anymore.
And yet, as her senses sharpened… she could feel it again.
That same low hum. The echo of Choir magic. Far too close. Somewhere in this compound, something was watching.
Thae stood alone in the outpost's secondary records chamber, fingers tracing the corner of a shelf while her mind tried, once more, to reach him.
Transpondence: Initiate.
She whispered the phrase inwardly, focusing her intent through the blood-etched sigil at her wrist. The tether flared—briefly—then dimmed. Again.
Static.
A hollow void answered her, like her voice was being pulled into thick mud. Not jammed. Not bounced.
Swallowed.
She released a breath through her nose and closed her eyes. This was the fifth attempt in as many days. Each more faint than the last. Something in this place was devouring her signal before it could reach Veylen.
Thae straightened her posture, brushing dust from her shoulder. No panic. Only patterns.
She left the chamber and stepped into the corridor, a slow, observant walk. Footsteps echoed lightly off polished floors—too clean, too quiet. The hum of the outpost's mana-core thrummed gently beneath her boots, just like always.
And yet.
Something had shifted.
The energy in the air prickled across her skin, like walking through spider thread. She could feel it coiling—delicate, but deliberate. Watching.
She rounded a corner and spotted two employees ahead, whispering near a wall panel. The taller one—a narrow-eyed woman named Jalen—went stiff when she noticed Thae, and the shorter one glanced sideways before hurrying off.
"Trouble with the systems?" Thae asked lightly, maintaining her professional tone.
Jalen blinked. "Oh. No—routine calibrations. We had a surge in the lower archives earlier."
"Ah. Strange. Nothing showed on my end." She offered a smile that didn't quite touch her eyes. "I'll flag it for diagnostics."
Jalen nodded and left, too quickly.
Thae watched her go.
Then—
A chill.
It slithered up her spine, and her instincts sharpened. She turned.
The corridor was empty.
But that presence—cold, curious, heavy like a dream pressing down—remained.
Anya.
She knew the feeling by now. That eerie tension in the air, the way shadows leaned too far forward, like they were listening.
But this time… it wasn't just Anya.
Someone else was here. A second thread in the web.
She moved faster now, back to the administrative wing, past the glass-lit halls where blood samples were catalogued and shipments tallied. She paused as she passed a security junction and spotted a new face—a woman she hadn't seen before.
Pale. Poised. Filing reports like she'd always been there.
Thae tilted her head. "You're new."
The woman looked up with a too-wide smile. "Just transferred from the Larthan facility. Varek approved it."
"Mm." Thae kept her smile controlled. "Hope you're settling in."
"Oh, I am," the woman said softly, almost… sung.
There it was. Just a flicker. Barely audible. But her tone—her cadence—slid like silk over bone. Too smooth. Too tuned.
Choir.
Thae's skin tightened.
She nodded politely and continued walking. But her breath was measured now. Her mind a storm.
They've placed one of their own inside.
And if they were inside… they already knew she was too.
"The scent of power is never silent."
Veylen moved like a whisper through the night, his cloak trailing behind him as he and Zhada raced across the darkened landscape toward the outpost. Trees blurred. Stones cracked beneath their boots.
The air shimmered faintly around them.
"Hold still," he murmured, reaching over without looking. His fingers traced three symbols onto Zhada's shoulder—one with speed, one with silence, one with smoke. Her form dimmed, her aura tucked inward like a blade sheathed.
Zhada grinned. "Was starting to feel too seen anyway."
Veylen etched the same trio across his own chest, finishing with a press of blood to his tongue and a whisper: "Cloak the light. Cloak the name."
They vanished to the naked eye.
But they were not invisible to all things.
In a tree far off to the northeast, two shadows perched among twisted branches. One had wings, faintly golden, folded tightly to his back. The other wore a crown of black vine and bark that pulsed gently with enchantment.
Nephilim and Fae.
The Nephilim's eyes narrowed. "Something's moving. Southward. Fast."
The Fae woman raised a slender hand, runes curling around her forearm like vines in bloom. She inhaled sharply.
"Blood magic," she whispered. "Powerful. Hidden. But not gone."
Without hesitation, she drew a slender silver arrow from her hip, already inscribed with glyphs of unraveling.
She nocked it, aimed—not at a target she could see, but one she felt.
TWANG—
The arrow ripped through the sky, silent and perfect.
Mid-stride, Veylen's eyes widened. He turned his head just in time to feel the rupture.
CRACK—
The arrow struck the space just in front of them and burst in a burst of violet fire, unraveling the concealment sigils like paper in rain. Their glamours shattered, and the world saw them again.
Zhada skidded to a halt, hair flaring like a wild halo, eyes glowing faintly orange. "What in the—"
Veylen stepped forward, already raising one hand in warning, the other tightening a glyph behind his back.
From the trees above, the two watchers leapt down, landing in a crouch twenty paces ahead.
Neither drew a weapon. But neither bowed.
"You're far from your warded halls, Graveblood," the Nephilim said, his voice smooth as tempered steel.
The Fae tilted her head, more curious than confrontational. "We felt something dark blooming in the soil. Your name was among the roots."
Zhada stepped to Veylen's side, sparks curling at her fingertips. "They always this poetic?"
Veylen didn't look away. "Depends which kind. These two are watchers, not killers. But that arrow says they're not fond of us, either."
The Fae's eyes narrowed. "Your scent is tangled. The Choir stirs. Lilin stirs. We ask only once—what are you dragging behind you?"
The Nephilim's wings flicked open, subtle but commanding.
Veylen's reply was quiet.
"War."