Warlock Ch 400. A Ghost
Damian walked through the quiet corridor, cloak clinging loosely to his shoulders, still half-damp where Victoria's bite had drawn blood earlier.
The old manor's walls humd softly with protective wards, and the scent of incense—probably Evelyn's doing—lingered in the air with a faint floral sharpness. He rubbed a thumb along the edge of his jaw, still sore from whatever spell she'd cast mid-climax. Hell of a way to start a morning.
By the ti he reached the living room, the air had already shifted.
He knew she was here before he saw her. The mana pressure alone gave her away—heavy, precise, calculated. Like a blade so sharp you'd only know you'd been cut once it was too late.
The dragon general stood by the window, arms crossed, her armor pristine as always, though her eyes—those piercing, molten gold eyes—were already sizing him up.
One of Damian's shadow servants stood nearby, waiting for a dismissal.
Lysandra turned when she saw him, her gaze pausing as it scanned him from head to toe. Her brow arched in the most unsubtle way imaginable.
Damian, still barefoot and shirtless with nothing but a cloak and pants thrown on in a rush, gave her the flattest look he could manage—the universal 'what now?' expression that conveyed how little patience he had left for the day.
"You surely have an interesting taste of fashion, Warlock," she said coolly.
Damian barked a dry laugh as he stepped down into the living room. "Thanks. I know you didn't co to comnt on that."
"No," she admitted, tone unreadable. "But you reek of sex."
He blinked. "Wow. Okay."
"I'm serious." She walked further into the room and let herself fall onto the couch with a grace that didn't match her steel-plated exterior. "Dragons have sensitive noses. That sll bothers ."
Damian exhaled sharply through his nose, shaking his head. "Yeah, well, sorry. I'm a normal guy with a normal sex appetite. I wasn't expecting guests this early."
She ignored that and motioned for the servant to leave. With a soft whisper of shadows, the figure disappeared, lting into the floor.
Damian walked to the opposite side of the room and dropped into the armchair, leaning forward with elbows on knees. "Alright. You're here. You're sitting. I'm shirtless. Let's just pretend none of that's weird and skip to why you're really here."
Lysandra's eyes narrowed slightly. "I want to speak to you, Kaelan."
Damian let out a long, frustrated groan, dragging his hand through his still-ssy hair. "Kaelan is dead," he muttered. "You want to talk to ghosts now, too?"
"You're Kaelan," she replied flatly, tone sharp like a blade being drawn, not accusatory—just sure.
He stiffened. "I'm Damian," he snapped, eyes narrowing. "Kaelan is my past. A na. A burned ID. A ghost, like I said."
"You can ignore it as much as you want," she said, her voice dropping to sothing calr but no less firm, "but I know what I saw. I've seen how you move. How you cast. The signature is the sa. The mana feels the sa. You can't fake what's in your blood."
He t her gaze with a tired, flat expression, like soone who'd heard this too many tis in too many ways. "Stop calling that."
"Fine. Whatever." Lysandra leaned back against the couch with a sigh, one leg crossed over the other, but her gaze didn't soften. "What matters is—you heard what I said yesterday, right?"
Damian nodded, rubbing at his temples. "Yeah. The part where I'm supposedly the only one who can stop whatever nightmare's crawling out of the void? About how I'm apparently the only one who can stop... whatever it is you were being vague about."
"I was being careful, not vague," she corrected. "There's a difference."
Damian arched a brow. "Not from my perspective."
She didn't rise to the bait. "The dragons have noticed sothing," she began, voice low now, serious. "Sothing big. Sothing unnatural. We're not the only ones—so of the elder courts have too. Mana's been shifting lately. Subtle things—leyline fluctuations, sealed vaults waking, ancient magic pulsing in places that haven't stirred in centuries."
Damian leaned back in his chair, eyes narrowing. "You're talking about convergence?"
"Yes," she said, face grim. "But not a natural one. Sothing is forcing it. Gathering different power sources—divine, demonic, fae, arcane. Human experintation included. And it's happening beneath the surface. Carefully. Deliberately."
"I've felt it too," Damian said, voice quiet. "The pressure. That strange hum in the system's mana stream. It's like... a storm that hasn't broken yet."
Lysandra nodded. "Exactly. And the dragons... we don't do paranoia. But this?" She t his eyes. "This has us scared."
Damian stayed silent for a mont, fingers tapping idly on the armrest.
"I'm assuming you think I'm sohow involved?"
"No," she said. "But I think you're connected to it."
"Why?" he asked flatly. "Because of what I used to be?"
"Because of who you still are, no matter what na you put on," she said, gaze sharp. "Kaelan—the real one—wasn't just a warlock. He was the first to hold dominion over multiple magical pacts across opposing systems. That shouldn't be possible. And yet, here you are. Still breathing. Still fighting. Still sohow balanced."
Damian exhaled. "You want to believe I'm so... catalyst?"
"I don't care what you believe," she said. "I'm telling you the threat is real. Sothing is building itself using remnants of old power. Shards of sealed magic, blood pacts, corrupted artifacts—all stitched together. And when it finishes? It won't care what side you're on."
Damian was quiet again, staring into the low-burning embers in the fireplace.
"I heard that," he murmured. "A fragnt, deep in the central vault. Sealed under layers of fae magic and blood-binding rituals."
Lysandra tilted her head. "Then you know what I'm saying isn't just fearmongering."
"Yeah," he muttered. "I know."
A long silence passed.
Then she asked, more softly, "So if you knew... Why did you run last night?"
Damian looked up.
His lips twitched, but there was no humor in it.
"…Because sotis," he said quietly, "it's easier to fight monsters than it is to face who you used to be."
And Lysandra, for once, had no coback.
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