The Silver Heir
Chapter Three: Whispers in the Dark
The village bells tolled at dawn.
Their hollow clangs rolled across the farmlands, deep and mournful, like the beating of a dying heart. Villagers whispered of livestock gone missing, of wells turned black with ash, of children screaming at night about eyes watching from their windows.
Pearl heard every word as she walked through the market with her mother. Eyes followed her, suspicion sharp in their gaze. The farmers who once greeted her father with nods and smiles now shrank back, muttering prayers.
"She carries the omen," an old woman hissed under her breath.
"She'll bring his wrath here," another spat.
Pearl kept her head low, fists clenched at her sides. Every whisper was a blade, but none cut deeper than the truth hidden in them: they weren't wrong. Kaelith's shadowspawn had begun to haunt the edges of the fields ever since her powers awakened. He wasn't just hunting her. He was punishing everyone around her for sheltering her.
"Don't listen," Liora murmured, though her own voice trembled.
Pearl bit down the rising words. If she spoke, the anger burning her tongue would spill out, and she feared what else might spill with it.
That night, she dreamed again.
But this time, it was not the faint, echoing laughter of Kaelith. It was a place.
She stood in a wasteland of shattered stone and broken towers. The sky above churned black, torn open by streaks of silver light like bleeding wounds. Chains stretched across the ruins, tethering countless figures. Men. Women. Children. Each one hollow-eyed, mouths open in endless screams that made no sound.
And at the center, Kaelith sat upon a throne of bone and obsidian, his cloak of shadows coiling like serpents. His golden eyes gleamed when they found her.
"You walk closer every night," he said, voice dripping with honeyed venom. "The moon draws you to me. Do you not feel it? Do you not ache for it?"
Pearl trembled, rage battling terror. "I'll never belong to you."
Kaelith laughed softly, leaning forward, his face half-hidden by the hood. "Oh, Pearl. You already do. The blood of Selunara carries my chains in its marrow. That power you cling to? It will be your undoing."
The chained figures turned their hollow faces toward her, mouths stretching wider. She clamped her hands over her ears, but the silence of their screams pressed into her skull until she woke—gasping, drenched in cold sweat.
The moonlight through her window painted her skin silver. And for the first time, she felt filthy beneath its glow.
Training grew harsher after that. Mareth pushed her until her hands blistered on the staff, until her arms trembled beneath the weight of stone. Liora taught her chants to steady her mind when the moonlight threatened to consume her.
But the more Pearl fought to master her gifts, the more violent they became.
One evening, while practicing alone, she tried to focus her power into a controlled beam of light. Instead, the blast tore through the barn wall, leaving it in splinters. Her father dragged her back into the dirt, fury and fear blazing in his eyes.
"Control!" he roared, shaking her by the shoulders. "If you can't control it, you're no better than him!"
Pearl stared at her trembling hands, silver still flickering across her skin. Her voice cracked. "I didn't mean to—"
"Meaning doesn't matter!" Mareth thundered. "If you lose yourself, you'll burn us all."
Liora pulled him away, her voice low but firm. "Enough. She knows."
But Pearl didn't know. Not truly. Not yet.
The third attack came when the moon was full.
Pearl had gone to fetch water from the well at the edge of the field. The night was silent, unnaturally so. No crickets, no wind. Only the distant creak of the rope as the bucket sank.
Then she felt it—the same suffocating weight in the air that had filled the barn the night Kaelith first appeared.
She froze.
A figure moved in the treeline. Not the twisted, formless shadowspawn this time. This was something worse.
It stepped into the moonlight, and her stomach turned. It wore armor—blackened and jagged, etched with runes that bled faint red light. Its face was hidden behind a helm of iron carved into a grin. But when it spoke, the voice was unmistakably human.
"Pearl of Selunara," it said, the words heavy with both reverence and malice. "I have been sent to fetch you."
Pearl's chest tightened. This was no beast. This was a man. A knight. Bound to Kaelith's will.
"I won't go with you," she forced out.
The knight tilted his head, the iron grin gleaming. "Then I will carry what remains of you."
He drew a blade the length of her body, its edge rippling like liquid shadow. The ground beneath it blackened as though scorched.
Pearl's pulse pounded. She raised her hands, light spilling between her fingers.
The knight charged.
The clash was blinding. Silver met shadow, the impact throwing her back across the soil. She gasped, pain flaring, but forced herself up as the knight advanced, each step sinking the ground beneath his weight.
Pearl hurled a blast of light. The knight's sword caught it, drinking the glow, twisting it into smoke. He laughed, the sound metallic and cruel.
"Your light cannot touch me," he mocked. "I was forged in Kaelith's flame."
Pearl staggered, fear clawing her throat. Her power fed him.
But then her training whispered in her mind—her father's voice, harsh and unyielding. Strength is not in your arms. It's in your will.
Pearl gritted her teeth, forcing the moonlight inward, not outward. Not a blast. A shield. Silver rippled around her body, fragile but pulsing.
The knight's sword struck, the force rattling her bones. The shield cracked, spiderwebbing with light. She screamed, pushing harder, until the moon itself seemed to answer.
The shield exploded outward, a wave of silver fire. The knight staggered, his armor sizzling, smoke rising from the cracks. He roared, more in rage than pain, before vanishing into the shadows like smoke in the wind.
Pearl collapsed to her knees, chest heaving, the taste of blood in her mouth. The well rope creaked behind her, swaying in the dead air.
Kaelith had sent more than shadows now. He had sent servants. Warriors. Men.
And he would not stop until she belonged to him.
When Mareth found her, she was still kneeling in the dirt, silver fading from her skin. He said nothing at first. Just looked at the burned ground, then at his daughter, and finally at the moon above.
His silence said more than words.
Pearl's voice cracked as she whispered, "I can't keep doing this. I'm losing control."
Mareth's gaze was grim, unrelenting. "Then you must learn faster. Because Kaelith will not slow for you."
Pearl lowered her head, tears stinging her eyes.
Above them, the moon glared down, silver and merciless.
And in the silence, she swore she heard Kaelith's laughter again—closer this time.