In the drowned city of Veyrune, where the sea swallowed streets each winter and returned them each spring, there stood a tower no tide could touch. At its peak hung an ancient clock known as the Moon Dial. No one remembered who built it, only that it ticked without gears and chimed without sound.
On the night the moon turned red, seventeen-year-old Elric Vance saw the clock bleed.
Silver light spilled from its face like liquid mercury, dripping down the tower walls and pooling in the streets. Wherever the light touched, shadows peeled themselves off the ground and stood upright, thin and twitching.
Elric had always heard the stories—that the Dial did not measure time, but endings.
When the first shadow screamed, the city froze.
The sound wasn't loud, but it was sharp—like glass cracking inside the skull. People staggered. Windows shattered. And from the silver pools rose creatures shaped like men but hollow inside, their chests empty except for spinning fragments of starlight.
They turned their faceless heads toward Elric.
And began to run.