The sunlight filtered gently through the silk curtains in Zena's home. The smell of roasted fruit filled the air as she took her first full meal in weeks. Her wounds, though still healing, no longer screamed with pain. For the first time since she and Afroda has been released, there was calm. Silence. Peace.
Zena sat cross-legged on her mat, sipping a bowl of tuzi, a Kerion fresh soup, a sharp knock echoed from the door.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
She stiffened.
Afroda was still out in the lower market, and no one else knew she was home. Her fingers hovered over the knife on the table before slowly rising to her feet. The knocks came again—soft, hesitant, but persistent.
She opened the door slowly… and there, standing under the warm light of mador, was a boy. Not older than fourteen. Dirt clung to his feet, his brown tunic was patched in several places, and his eyes—so hauntingly ancient for a child—locked onto hers with a strange familiarity.
"Who are you?" she asked, brows furrowed.
"My name is Kazov," the boy replied, his voice raspy yet oddly steady.
Zena blinked. "Kazov? What are you doing here? Where are your parents? It's dangerous for a child to wander alone in these times—"
"I had to come," he said quickly, voice almost pleading. "Please, I haven't eaten all day. May I come in? I have something urgent to tell you."
Still wary, Zena stepped aside and motioned him in. The boy limped in quietly and sank into the wooden chair near the table. She observed him as he devoured the food she placed before him—fresh fruit, tuzi, and a gourd of water. He was hungry. Not just physically, but spiritually—there was something hollow and desperate about him.
Once he finished eating, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and looked up at her.
"The seer sent me," he said.
Zena froze.
"The… what did you say?"
"The Seer," Kazov repeated. "He came to me. In a dream. But it felt real—like I was in another place. He told me to find you."
Zena's breath hitched. Her heart began to pound.
"The Seer has been dead for eleven years," she said slowly. "No one has heard from him since"
Kazov nodded. "I went to Micav. Not physically. I saw it in a vision. It's still there… in ruins, but alive. That's where I met him. He spoke to me. He showed me things. Powers I didn't understand. At first, I thought I was sick. That I was cursed. But I'm not. He said I am the bridge. The one who sees what others cannot."
Zena stared at him, mouth slightly open. Her mind reeled.
Micav is a place no one knew about, No one—no child—could know its name without having been told. And this boy… was describing things no one in Kerion knows.
"You… you spoke to him?" she asked shakily.
"I still can," Kazov replied. "Sometimes, when I sleep, I'm not sleeping. I travel. I see people. Places. I saw Sevira."
Zena jolted. "You saw Sevira?"
"She's in another world. She's doing okay."
Zena sat down slowly, legs trembling beneath her. The room felt colder now.
"Thanks Datu." She whispered. "What of your parents."
He looked down at his hands. "Gone. They were taken when I was six. Since then, I've wandered. Survived. I don't know why Datu chose me."
Tears welled in Zena's eyes—not just from the pain of his story, but from the truth she felt in her bones. He was different. She could feel it in the air around him—the way his presence bent it slightly, like heat dancing on stone.
"You're the new one," she whispered. "The next. A Seer reborn."
Kazov didn't smile, but there was peace in his eyes. He nodded once, stood, and picked up the small satchel by his side.
"I have to go," he said. "I sleep behind the spice merchant's quarters. There's a quiet place there. I'll come again sometime."
Zena couldn't move. Couldn't speak. She only watched him disappear into the street, dust rising with each of his steps.
⸻
Later that evening, Afroda returned and found Zena sitting silently by the window, lost in thought. When she told her everything—about Kazov, his powers, the Seer, and the mention of Sevira—Afroda's face lit up with wonder and cautious hope.
"Then the world isn't lost," Afroda whispered. "If the gift has passed on… if Sevira is still out there… then this prophecy is far from over."
Zena nodded slowly, still seeing the boy's grey eyes in her mind.
"A new Seer walks among us."
————
Far across the dark cliffs of Kerion, where mador rarely touched and the air smelled of burning herbs and rusted chains, Elektra paced slowly through the cold halls of her private wing. Her long net robe dragged behind her like a trail of blood, and her gold cuffs clinked with every measured step.
She has grown to be wicked like her father.
That morning, a trembling slave girl had been brought to her. A wide-eyed child of sixteen, barely more than skin and bone, her hands bruised from scrubbing stone floors. She had whispered something forbidden.
Silence followed the words. Elektra stood unmoving for a long moment.
Then she smiled.
The kind of smile that froze the heart of anyone who saw it.
"Do you believe in ghost stories?" she asked the girl gently.
The girl, confused, shook her head.
"Good," Elektra said. "Because soon… you'll be one."
She snapped her fingers.
Two guards stepped forward without a word. The girl screamed, begged—but Elektra didn't flinch. She turned her back as they dragged the girl away.
"Feed her to the birds," she said coldly. "Let the ravens remember the price of prophecy."
⸻
Later that evening, Elektra stood alone in her chamber, gazing into the dark mirror carved from obsidian. Her reflection seemed to ripple, shadows twisting behind her eyes. Something wasn't right. Since hearing the girl's words, her head had begun to ache. Her hands trembled slightly.
She heard whispers in her ears—soft and relentless.
"Our savior is coming."
"The child is coming."
"You will be destroyed."
She clutched her head, growling. "Silence!"
A sudden thud echoed behind her.
Zica had entered quietly, his massive frame darkening the doorway. His face, carved like stone, studied her.
"You're shaking," he said.
Elektra straightened. "It's nothing. I… I slipped."
Zica stepped closer, narrowing his eyes. He had known her long enough to sense when something was wrong. But Elektra had learned to lie with elegance.
"Another slave spoke out," she said. "About the prophecy. More poison. I've taken care of it."
Zica gave a grunt of approval but his eyes lingered on her a moment longer.
"You're becoming colder," he muttered, almost to himself.
Elektra turned sharply to face him. "We cannot be soft, father. Not now. There are whispers in the walls. Our enemies multiply like rats in the shadows. If we don't act, everything we've built—everything—will fall to a child who should have never been born."
Zica stared at her, saying nothing.
In that moment, something flickered behind Elektra's eyes—a dark heat, like smoke rising behind a beautiful mask. Power was changing her. Or perhaps, revealing what had always been hidden beneath her quiet smile.
She turned back to the mirror.
And this time, her reflection smiled at her first.