He lingered a mont longer beneath the Rudy column. The etched na glowed faintly in the low light, the edge of the statue’s blade catching a final streak of sunlight as it disappeared behind the ridgeline. With it went the tension in Tarn’s shoulders. He let the silence settle.
Kenosha Shibuya would already be stirring for the Banquet of the Twin Moons. The festival ca once a year—when Kaelith and Voryn crossed paths in the sky above, silver and amber layered together in a way that washed the capital in strange, protective light. It was said the moons drove back things that had no nas. That no beast of the dark could stand in the radiance of the crossing.
Whether that was true, Tarn didn’t know.
But it made the people feel safer. That alone was worth sothing.
He stooped, slow and stiff, reaching for the scattered tools beside the base of the column. A cracked brush, a rusted shovel, a satchel whose seams had long since faded into the leather. They bore the marks of four decades of labor—stains from the clay-rich soil, dried blood from a ti he didn’t talk about, cuts from thorns no one else ever saw growing near the graves.
As he stood, a sharp pop traced the length of his spine.
The gem in his arm flared again, its warmth rippling through his shoulder, dampening the ache enough to draw a breath without wincing. He flexed his fingers once and turned toward the tree line. He had a long walk ahead.
Then the sky darkened.
Not gradually—but all at once.
The sunset vanished, swallowed behind a wave of indigo. The stars blinked on, hesitant at first... then steady. One by one, they lit the heavens, a scattered crown across the edge of the night.
Then—
A streak of blue light tore across the firmant.
It cut through the stars like a blade, glowing too bright, too fast to be anything natural. Tarn staggered a half-step, eyes lifted. The cot wasn’t white—it was layered, pulsing from blue to gold to violet, a spiraling trail behind it like the wake of sothing being pulled backward and forward all at once.
It wasn’t falling.
It was being sent.
The air humd—low, resonant, and old. Not sound. Not wind. Sothing deeper.
The gem in his arm responded instantly.
It flared hot against his skin, burning brighter than it had in years. Not since the Day of Ash. Not since—
He stared at it. The glow crawled up his veins, orange threads pushing toward his fingertips.
"...that’s not right."
He turned his gaze back skyward. The light vanished beyond the horizon, beyond the edge of Kenosha Shibuya, beyond the Hollow and everything he knew.
The hum lingered in the air long after the streak had gone.
Tarn clenched his jaw, the smile from earlier gone. He reached into his satchel, fingers brushing against a steel disc no longer connected to anything. His hand hovered there, motionless.
Then he withdrew it.
"...shit," he muttered."Wo-wiah... what in the gods of blue was that?!"
Tarn’s shout cracked the stillness like a pickaxe against stone. His shovel hit the dirt with a hollow clang, one hand flying up to shield his eyes from the trailing burn still etched in the sky. The cot—if it could be called that—was gone now, blinked out like it had never been there, but the flash left ghosts across his vision. He blinked hard, breathing through his teeth, waiting for the stars above to stop trembling.
The air had changed.
Not just the temperature, though the chill had crept in fast, curling under his collar and riding his spine like a parasite. No—this was sothing else. The Hollow had gone still. No wind, no creaking trees, no rustle of brush. Even the insects had gone quiet. The silence pressed in like a sealed chamber, thick and waiting.
The bonewood trees groaned behind him.
Their twisted branches swayed without breeze, scraping softly against one another like dry bones being sorted by unseen hands. The carvings along the Rudy column seed to stretch with the shadows, the engraved warriors flickering beneath the stars as if ready to move again. For a heartbeat, Tarn thought he heard sothing whisper from beneath the earth.
Then it passed.
The orange gem embedded in his forearm pulsed, once—twice—then settled into a low hum, its glow bright enough to outline the lines of his hand. Warmth spread up his veins, slow and deliberate, as though the gem were testing his pulse in return.
"That’s... new."
His voice ca out low. Not afraid. Just alert.
He stepped back once from the statue, boots grinding the edge of a grave marker worn smooth by wind and ti. The spot in the sky where the light had vanished still shimred faintly, like a hole in the dark that hadn’t quite healed.
Tarn stared at it.
Then, slowly, bent down and picked up his shovel.
"I don’t know what you were," he muttered, turning his eyes back to the column, "but don’t go ruining my ad tonight."
He slung the satchel over his shoulder and started back toward the path.
Far east—five miles, maybe more—the heart of Kenosha Shibuya pulsed with a different kind of life.
In the upper terrace of a curved stone manor, beneath vaulted beams of darkwood and a thousand flickering spirit lamps, a woman’s scream ripped the silence.
It echoed through corridors carved with scenes of starlit rivers and old kings long buried, cutting across the quiet chatter of servants like a blade. The air in the chamber was thick with heat, lavender, and the scent of birth—the sweat of it, the blood of it. A green glow filled the room, luminous and rhythmic, as if even the walls were holding their breath.
Kaelithar lay back on the birthing table, her hands white-knuckled against the arm of the girl beside her. Veins bulged against her wrists. Her face—noble, proud—had broken into a flushed mosaic of pain and exhaustion, her breath coming in sharp bursts, her eyes locked on the high rafters above. A scarf clung to her brow, soaked through, the edges trembling with every shudder that racked her fra.
Reviews
All reviews (0)