---
The first dream came before dawn.
It began as a whisper — a voice behind my thoughts, speaking words that were not mine.
Then the light came.
I was standing in a marble hall, endless and white, but the air shimmered like liquid gold.
Chains of light hung from the ceiling, binding shadows that moved as though alive.
And at the center — a figure knelt, his head bowed, wings of molten flame spread behind him like broken suns.
Lucien.
He looked younger here — or perhaps older, unburdened yet crowned by sorrow.
The chains around his wrists pulsed with symbols that hurt to look at.
A sigil — the same one carved on my collarbone — glowed faintly at his throat.
I reached for him.
But before my fingers could touch, the hall rippled and shattered.
---
I woke with a gasp. My heart thundered in my chest.
The candle beside my bed had gone out, though I hadn't blown it. The room felt colder, too still.
Across the room, Rowen stirred on his cot. "Another nightmare?"
"Not… exactly."
I rubbed the mark on my collarbone. It still glowed faintly, soft as dying embers.
Rowen sat up, his hair messy, eyes sharp with worry. "Elaris, this is the third time this week. You said the dreams stopped after we left the ruins."
"I lied."
He sighed. "Of course you did."
I looked away. "It wasn't a dream, Rowen. It felt like I was there. Like I stepped into one of his memories."
He frowned. "You're saying the tether allows shared consciousness?"
"I don't know what to call it. But I can feel him when I'm awake. His anger, his confusion… his loneliness."
Rowen muttered, "That's comforting."
Before I could respond, the candles relit themselves — one by one — though neither of us moved.
A scent filled the room, like smoke and iron.
Then a voice — soft, layered, echoing — whispered from nowhere and everywhere.
> "The veil thins. The vow remembers."
Rowen froze. "Elaris… tell me that was you."
"It wasn't."
The temperature dropped sharply. The mirror across the room fogged, words forming across its surface as if written by unseen hands.
> Find him before the veil does.
And beneath that, another sigil — one I didn't recognize — began to form.
Rowen lunged forward, tracing it with chalk. "That's not human magic."
"I know."
"Whose is it, then?"
The mark pulsed once, and I whispered before I realized what I was saying:
> "The Veiled One."
---
That night, I didn't sleep again.
When dawn came, I stood by the balcony, watching the light creep across the towers of Aethryn. The air shimmered faintly — like the city itself was waking from a long dream.
Every sound, every whisper of wind felt heavier now. Like eyes watched from behind the veil.
Lucien's presence stirred faintly in my mind.
Not words — more like emotion. Regret. Anger. Longing.
I whispered to the air, "What are you trying to show me?"
And the world changed again.
---
[Vision Sequence — Lucien's Memory]
The scent of rain.
A battlefield of ash and wings.
Lucien stood among the fallen, his blade black with blood and starlight.
All around him, the angels burned — not by mortal fire, but divine.
> "The covenant is broken," a voice thundered from above.
Lucien looked up, his expression defiant. "It was never sacred."
The light struck him like judgment. His wings — half light, half darkness — tore apart midair.
And from the clouds, a being cloaked in gold descended — faceless, radiant, merciless.
> "You were born of both — but you will serve neither."
The chains appeared around his wrists — light forged from sin and grace intertwined.
Lucien's voice broke with fury. "You cannot cage what you made impure."
The golden being raised its hand — and a seal burned into his chest, a brand that looked painfully familiar.
The same as mine.
---
I gasped and stumbled backward, collapsing against the wall of my chamber.
The vision shattered, leaving behind only silence and the faint ringing of celestial bells.
Rowen rushed in, startled. "Elaris, what happened?"
"I saw it," I whispered, still shaking. "His fall. The curse. The moment they bound him."
Rowen's eyes widened. "And the Veiled One?"
I hesitated. "I think it was there too — not as one of them, but watching. Waiting."
He frowned. "For what?"
"For me."
---
Later that night
Lady Thalindra Veyra appeared unannounced, her silver staff tapping softly against the floor. The white witch moved like mist — calm, cold, timeless.
"You've opened the tether too far, child," she said.
I looked up. "You knew this would happen."
"I warned you that binding blood and soul to a celestial-demon hybrid would wake the oldest gods."
"The Veiled One?"
Thalindra's gaze darkened. "It speaks through cracks in the world. The more you dream, the more it sees. And now…" She trailed off, staring at my mark. "It already has your scent."
Rowen frowned. "How do we stop it?"
"You can't. You can only delay it."
"By doing what?" I asked.
"By finding Lucien before the Veiled One does."
Thalindra drew a glowing circle in the air — a map made of starlight and sigils. It revealed a broken coast, scattered islands shrouded in mist.
"The Blood Compass will awaken again soon. When it points east, follow it. That is where the veil first tore — where the old vow was written."
"And if we don't?"
The witch's pale eyes flickered with sorrow. "Then both realms — mortal and divine — will drown in their own reflection."
---
That night, as the witch vanished into mist, I stood again at the window.
The city below gleamed faintly, as if veiled in dreamlight.
Lucien's voice came again — faint, weary, distant.
> "Elaris…"
I froze. "Lucien?"
> "They're coming for me. For us. Don't let the veil remember too soon."
"Where are you?"
Silence. Then — faintly, through the bond — a heartbeat.
Not mine.
And when I looked down at my hands, the sigil had changed.
Now, beneath the symbol of light and flame, a new mark pulsed faintly —
the mark of the Veiled One.