The light burned through the mist. For one frozen instant, the lake stopped breathing, every ripple crystallized in white fire. Jaka fell backward into the reeds, clutching his chest where the Hook had scorched through his shirt. The metal pulsed under his fingers, heat beating like a second heart.
Catalina was already beside him, one knee in the mud, eyes catching the reflected light like shards of mercury. "Let go of it," she hissed.
"I can't!" His voice cracked as the glow surged again, white flaring to silver.
Catalina extended a hand, and the shadows themselves shifted, crawling over the grass, wrapping around his arm. The Hook dimmed slightly under the cover of darkness, its glare stifled by the living shade that obeyed her will.
"Breathe," she said. "You're calling them."
"Them?"
Sera crouched nearby, wind-swept hair clinging to her face, watching the lake's horizon. Focused intently on the three points of light that hovered above the Solaryn Tree across the water, not stars, not reflections.
Catalina rose to her feet, silent, every muscle tensed. "The Watchers."
The name alone carried weight, the kind that silenced even the insects. They moved with intent, their forms twisting, stretching, glinting like glass caught in flame.
Jaka started to rise. "Oh Gods, they are real!?"
Kai had talked about them before, but he always shrugged them off. They were too far off into the distance to make any real shape, but right now, he could sense they were coming right at them.
They came slowly at first, drifting shapes that shimmered between forms, half-transparent, half-skeletal. Each had a long spine of mirrored plates that spun as they moved, catching moonlight and folding it inward. Their faces were blank masks of burning glass, and where eyes should have been, three concentric rings turned in unison, reflecting the world in impossible angles.
"They're... beautiful," Jaka said quietly. "Maybe I can talk to them…"
Catalina didn't let him finish. She slammed him back into the mud, her hand over his mouth. Her voice was a whisper of iron. "These are not Bloodborn, you idiot. There is no deal to make. The Watchers don't speak. They purge. They are executioners, not angels."
Sera's hand went to her blade. "How many?"
"Three... for now," Catalina answered. "too many to fight off"
The ground began to tremble as the lake rippled outward.
Jaka whispered, "If they're searching for the light, I can hide it."
"Hide it how?" Catalina snapped.
He looked at the Hook in his palm, its glow leaking through his fingers. "I'll think of something."
"Do whatever it takes," she said, her tone turning from command to desperation. "But hide that glow."
The nearest Watcher's body elongated, the lower half unraveling into ribbons of light. It began scanning the shoreline, its voice a hum that vibrated in bone rather than air.
Jaka clenched his fist, pressing the Hook into his palm. The metal's edge pierced skin. Blood welled up and ran down his wrist, glowing faintly where it mixed with the light, turning his veins into thin threads of silver.
"Damn it, that's worse," Catalina muttered. "You're bleeding resonance."
He scanned the treeline, mind racing. The trunks shimmered faintly, faint blue veins pulsing through the bark. He recognized it. "These trees… they're luminescent," he said quickly. "They carry light in their sap. We can blend in with it"
Sera frowned. "Blend in?"
Jaka grabbed his knife. "We carve the bark. Let the sap glow. They won't tell the difference between that and me."
Catalina hesitated, studying him. "Where did that idea come from?"
He didn't answer, too busy slashing shallow cuts along the nearest trunks, the milky light spilling like molten glass.
When he turned back, Catalina's eyes were fixed on him, not with suspicion, but awe.
Jaka led the way, boots sinking into damp moss, every step a whisper.
Behind him, Catalina and Sera came sharp and steady, blades sheathed but ready.
Above, the Watchers drifted closer to the tree line like spectral ghosts.
Each movement came with a low hum, an oscillating tone that rippled through the trunks, making the luminescent sap shiver inside its veins. The forest itself seemed to breathe with them.
Catalina slowed and motioned them down behind a cluster of root pillars. The glow from the sap was stronger here, pale blue veins threading the bark like arteries of light. Jaka's blood shimmered the same hue.
"Here," he whispered, driving his knife into another trunk. Thick drops of luminous sap spilled down the wood and pooled on the ground. He pressed his bleeding hand to it, smearing both lights together until it was impossible to tell where one began and the other ended.
The glow dulled, diffused, absorbed into the forest's pulse.
Catalina crouched beside him, eyes flicking between his hand and the tree.
They froze as a hum passed directly overhead. One of the Watchers descended through the canopy, its body rotating, plates of mirrored bone sliding over one another. Moonlight and shadow distorted around it, bending like water over glass.
It stopped ten feet above them. Its rings turned inward, scanning. For a moment, the forest's light dimmed — every glowing trunk flickering as though the thing were inhaling.
Jaka held his breath.
Sera's hand tightened on her dagger.
Catalina closed her eyes and whispered a word not meant for human tongues.
The shadows around them deepened. They didn't just darken, they inverted, swallowing the reflection of light itself. The air shimmered, the sound flattened, and the Watcher's hum became distant, confused, as if they had slipped behind a veil one heartbeat wide.
The creature drifted past.
When it was gone, the darkness thinned again.
Catalina exhaled slowly, eyes opening—her pupils still rimmed with silver.
"How did you know this would work?"
Jaka shrugged, voice low. "I didn't. It just came to me. Like instinct."
Her gaze lingered on him a moment longer than comfort allowed. "The Liar's Hook whispers," she murmured. "And you listened?" she asked questionably.
He met her stare. "It's better than dying."
"Not always," she said quietly.
Sera stared at her. "What was that?"
"Refraction," Catalina said, voice tired. "I'm able bend darkness, able to hide resonance light by making filling it with shadows."
"Doesn't that drain you?" Jaka asked.
She looked at him, lips twitching into something not quite a smile. "It costs darkness to keep us hidden, But darkness is what I have in abundance."
Her words hung heavy, almost a confession. The kind that carried centuries behind it.
Another hum rolled through the forest. The second Watcher cut across the treetops, dragging a veil of mist in its wake. The third followed, smaller, faster, sweeping in erratic arcs.
They continue to search for resonance traces, residual signatures of the flare.
Catalina whispered, "They're triangulating. The pulse from the Hook drew them straight here. They won't stop until they erase every echo of it."
Jaka stared at the faint light still leaking from his hand, panic creeping into his throat. "Then what do we do?"
She met his gaze. "We move deeper. The sap here masks you for now, but the farther from the lake we go, the thicker the cover. When they lose the trail, we'll circle back toward the Myralis Grove."
Sera hesitated, "Into the Veyloran Forest?"
Catalina stood, the air around her humming faintly with a darkness.
As they slipped deeper into the glowing forest, the Watchers fanned out above them, three perfect triangles of moving light against the black. Their bodies rotated in rhythm, their mirrored plates whispering faint mechanical prayers to a god that no longer answered.
And somewhere between those echoes, the Hook pulsed once more in Jaka's fist, faint, deliberate, almost alive.
Catalina's eyes flicked toward it, voice low enough for only him to hear.
"The Hook lied before," she said. "Don't let it lie to you."
No one moved. The forest had become a cathedral of glass and breath.
Catalina stole a glance at him, the Theryn heir, the impossible echo of all bloodlines made flesh. The moonlight cut along his features, too symmetrical to be purely human, too warm to be Bloodborn. Even now, power hummed under his skin in a way he clearly didn't understand. That ignorance almost charmed her.
Above them, the Watchers drifted between the canopy, their bodies unfolding and folding again like machinery. Each emitted a faint hum, a rhythm too exact to be natural, three notes repeating in perfect intervals. The sound wasn't loud; it vibrated in the ribs, a pulse that made the sap in the trees quiver in answer.
Catalina crouched low, her hand hovering just above the earth. "Don't breathe too deep," she whispered. "They listen more than they look."
He obeyed without hesitation, instinctive, almost primal. She recognized the discipline of Bloodborn command, the adaptability of Lunarborn senses, and the stubbornness of man, all coiled in one confused vessel. He didn't know what his blood could do. That made him dangerous.
The nearest Watcher descended. It was enormous, seven, maybe eight feet tall, its frame a cage of silver bones that moved like clockwork under water. Its head turned in slow degrees, rings within rings aligning. A cone of pale light swept the clearing, not a beam but a soft shimmer, like dust shifting in moonlight.
The cone passed over them once, but failed to pass through the shadows. Jaka felt the vibration crawl over his skin as if it were peeling layers of him away, measuring him.
Catalina didn't blink. Her pupils narrowed to slivers of silver.
She watched him listening, steady, unflinching even as the air vibrated around them. His calm was inspiring. Perhaps it was innocence, not knowing life could end in a moment. But yet, something in his gaze carried defiance, a flicker of individuality she hadn't expected. It irritated her that she admired it.
"Every living thing sings a pattern. The sap around us is screaming in harmony, if we stay still, they can't isolate ours."
Sera swallowed hard, eyes fixed upward. "And if we move?"
"They'll know which song doesn't belong."
The Watcher paused above one of the cut trees. It tilted its head, mechanical plates whispering. The sap's glow reflected along its mirrored ribs. Then it released a single tone.
Low, pure, absolute. The other two answered. The sound rippled outward, shaking dust from the branches, making the air itself shimmer.
Jaka flinched. Catalina's hand shot out, steadying his shoulder with deep pressure. "Still," she breathed. "The trees will cover us."
He only twitched once, then went still again, too still. Jaka felt the calm as Catalina pressed firm on his shoulder, but never would she have anticipated someone who could mute their own resonance by instinct. She felt it, his presence dimming, she could feel his heartrate dropping, syncing to the forest's rhythm. Even she couldn't do that, not without centuries more of practice.
The vibration passed. One by one, the Watchers drifted apart again, their lights dimming to faint pulses as they moved toward the lake. Their scanning rhythm changed, slower now, as though losing confidence in the trail.
Catalina finally allowed her shoulders to drop.
Time stood still until only when the last hum dissolved into the distance did she stand. Her movements were deliberate, graceful, every gesture conserving meaning.
Jaka rose shakily beside her. "You said they read resonance… What happens if they find it?"
Catalina looked out through the trees, where faint motes of dust still glowed from the Watchers' passage. Her voice came quiet, reverent, almost pitying.
"They unmake it. To them, resonance is infection. They return everything to silence."
Catalina studied him then, the glow under his skin had subsided, leaving faint veins of silver tracing his forearm. A Theryn who bled like a Bloodborn, healed like a Lunarborn, and carried human empathy in his eyes. Beautiful symmetry, she thought, the kind the gods always destroy first.
Jaka swallowed. "And you've seen that happen?"
Her gaze met his, unreadable. "I've survived it."
No one spoke after that. The forest resumed its breath, sap pulsing softly through wounded bark. The same light that had hidden them now cast faint halos across their faces.
She sat down against one of the trees, closing her eyes. The dim glow touched her skin, revealing faint cracks of silver under the surface, like light trapped in stone.
Jaka watched her a long time before speaking. "You said you weren't Bloodborn."
"I'm not," she murmured without opening her eyes. "They crave Echorim to fill the hollow. I crave the hollow itself."
The quiet that followed wasn't peace. It was waiting. The forest held its breath, as if listening to her confession. Then, beneath their feet, the stillness changed, a faint vibration, too deep, to steady. Not the steady rhythm of the Watchers' hum above, but something deeper, buried in the soil. The moss trembled. The luminescent sap in the roots flickered once, twice, then began to pulse in reverse, like light retreating underground.
Catalina's eyes snapped open. "They're not gone," she said.
Sera looked around, confused. "I don't see—"
"They're beneath us." Catalina's voice was barely a whisper.
The hum grew stronger, traveling up through the roots and into their bones. Jaka felt the vibration crawling up his legs like static. The soil itself seemed to shift, tiny pebbles dancing on the surface.
Catalina turned sharply, scanning the tree line. "Move. Now. Into the forest, quickly!"
There was no hesitation. Jaka bolted first, the other two close behind, branches snapping as they plunged deeper into the glowing trees. The light around them blurred into streaks, silver, blue, white the forest a tunnel of living veins. The hum followed, gaining rhythm, syncopated like a heartbeat just beneath the surface.
Sera's breath came hard. "How are they moving below ground?"
"Just like they do above," Catalina said between strides. "They're phasing. The Watchers can sift through the soil almost without disturbing it"
Roots shifted beneath their boots. A flare of light burst through the earth, a split-second glow like lightning under glass.
Jaka stumbled, caught himself against a tree, the Hook burning cold in his hand.
"Keep running!" Catalina shouted. "They're tracing the resonance trail, if we stop, we give them a fixed point!"
They ran until the hum softened, fading into the distance. When the glow beneath the ground finally dimmed to a faint pulse, Catalina slowed, raising her hand. "Here," she said.
They stopped among a circle of twisted trunks, each one darker than the rest, the sap here nearly black, the air heavy with damp stillness.
Jaka leaned against a tree, breathing hard. The Hook had cooled, but it pulsed with a faint, irregular heartbeat of light.
Catalina crouched, running her fingers through the soil. No tremor. No light. "They've lost the trail," she said softly. "For now."
For a long time, the only sound was the echo of their breathing. Sera moved ahead to keep watch, her silhouette melting into the dark, leaving Catalina and Jaka near the hollow roots.
Jaka turned the Hook over in his hand, the faint glow tracing his palm like veins of molten metal. "You called it the Liar's Hook," he said quietly. "Why?"
Catalina's gaze lifted, catching the shimmer of its light. "Because that's what it does."
He frowned. "It's just metal."
"It was struck from Echorim," she corrected, her tone patient but sharp. "Echo-bound metal blessed the night sky fractured. Each Echorim carries a trait, strength, foresight, endurance, reflection. The Hook amplifies deceit."
"Deceit?"
Catalina nodded. "Its first wielder used it to twist resonance, to lie to the world itself. He could make shadows speak, turn enemies into friends, reshape truth until even the Echoes believed him. He was powerful enough to bargain with the Bloodborn courts, outwit the Lunarborn councils, and break the Watchers' detection lines."
Jaka listened, uneasy. "So what happened to him?"
She looked at him, her expression unreadable. "He forgot how to stop lying. The Hook blurs the line between truth and desire. He began to speak things into existence that were never real, until his mind fractured under its own fabrications. In the end, he believed nothing. Not even his own reflection."
Jaka looked down at the Hook, its glow soft, inviting. "And you think that'll happen to me?"
"I think," Catalina said, "that it already speaks to you. I think you just haven't learned which voice is yours yet."
The wind shifted, rustling the canopy. Somewhere far off, a single hum rose and then faded, distant, but unmistakable.
Sera's voice came from the dark. "We need to keep moving."
Catalina stood, brushing soil from her hands. "They'll circle back. They always do."
Jaka slid the Hook into his belt, covering it with his hand one last time. "Then let them come," he said quietly.
Catalina's eyes lingered on him, searching for something she didn't find.
"Careful, Theryn," she said. "That's exactly what the last man said before the Hook taught him to lie to lake."
Jaka frowned. "Lie to the lake? You make it sound alive."
Catalina gave a low, humorless laugh. "Alive? Hardly. Only the lake remembers. The Hook lies about its resonance, that's why its been so elusive all these years. uth, but it's all imitation. It promises to draw what's lost, yet it only feeds what the lake already owns."
He turned the Hook in his hand, its light rippling faintly through his fingers. "Then why keep searching for it? If it's all lies, why chase it for centuries?"
"Because your kind can't help it," she said softly. "The Theryns have been bound to that sound since the first drowned man gasped his last breath beneath these waters. You call yourselves fishermen, but you were never after fish. You've been casting for the lie itself, trying to drag truth out of something that can't speak it anymore."
Jaka looked down at the Hook. "Maybe this time, it tells the truth."
"It never does," Catalina said, eyes narrowing. "It just learns your voice well enough to make you believe it."
The Hook pulsed once in his hand. A faint vibration crawled up his arm, a low rhythm pressing behind his eyes. Then, softly at first, a whisper came,
One sings in the dark now.
Jaka looked up. "What does that mean?"
Catalina's voice dropped. "It means The Echorim has awakened. When it sings, it draws everything with resonance toward it, Watchers, Bloodborn, even the dead. It's a warning, one Echorim has broken the silence."
Its pulse once hid beneath the water.
"The lake," Jaka murmured.
"Yes," Catalina said. "But it's changed… Its pulse hides beneath the water, the hook no longer resides beneath the water."
Do not let the others answer.
"Others?"
"Other Echorim," she said. "If more than one awakens, their songs converge. They build on each other until the world itself begins to vibrate apart. The last time they answered, the sky fractured and nearly ended life as we know it."
Silence is safety. Sound is surrender.
Catalina's tone softened. "That's not poetry, Jaka, it's survival."
The blood remembers what the mind doesn't know.
She looked at him then, really looked. "That one's meant for you," she said quietly. "It means your bloodline carries memory your mind has forgotten. The Theryns don't just guard the Echorim, they are part of them. They are calling you back to finish what was never done."
Jaka's jaw tightened. "And what if I don't want to answer?"
Catalina gave a small, knowing smile. "Then maybe you can join me in the dark."
The forest fell still again.
Beneath them, faint and relentless, the hum began to rise.