Prologue
Before the stars were named, there was only her. Vael’Ara. A presence born of silence. A voice before language, an exhale before the concept of lungs. She shaped the existence thread by aching thread. Oceans that pulsed like heartbeats and mountains that rose from the quiet between them. Veins became rivers, carrying memory through the body of the world. Wings unfurled as land, each a sleeping wyrm of fire, ice, or ash.
Magic bled into every line like pigment on canvas, a masterpiece woven from hush and longing. It was beautiful, yes. But it did not answer her.
So she summoned a companion from starlight and sea, and named him Esharion. A ripple of light behind the shadow. He poured motion into her stillness, made the wind hungry for direction, the waves curl toward shore.
However, he was not content with beauty. He pulled at the seams of everything she had spun. And finally, he whispered the world’s firstwhy.
Together, they gave the world its breath. And in that breath: people. They weren’t perfect. They were never meant to be. They dreamed too brightly, loved too recklessly. And for that, Vael’Ara loved them.
But even before any kingdom learned to cage wonder, the leash was spun. Balance, Vael’Ara learned, is a fiber. And it can fray.
And Esharion… oh, he wanted more.
He called it discovery. She called it unraveling.
Neither of them was wrong.
Recorded in the Archives of Solmara, Year 230 A.S.
By the hand of The First Archivist
Chapter 1
The Silverward on the left preferred sweet wine. The one on the right had a girl in Rhuhn’Fjel he was secretly writing poetry for. Dasmon hadn’t judged either, but they owed him, so he simply handed over the bottle.
“Five minutes,” he murmured.
They didn’t even blink as they pushed the heavy door open, their maroon armor clinking.
The corridor was silent. Only the hush of polished stone and frost-clad windows. The hallway to Evelyne’s chamber had been colder than the rest of the palace—facing north, built of thicker stone, left near-empty by design. But today, it felt wrong in a way he couldn’t name.
He adjusted the drape of his grey fur over his ceremonial white robe and slipped through her door without a sound.
The room reflected Calveran taste: austerity made beautiful. The walls were black marble, polished to a mirror sheen, veined faintly with silver so that candlelight glimmered like threads in the dark. A single crystal chandelier hung from the vaulted ceiling; its light fractured into cold shards across the fur-lined carpets. The furniture was spare but elegant—an ebony desk, a low couch draped in white wolf pelt, and a narrow bed framed in dark wood, its linens crisp and white beneath a folded fur throw.
On the broad windowsill, where the light fell in a pale band across the black stone, she sat—dressed in an ivory gown that caught the dim glow like snow beneath starlight, a thin silver veil cascading over her shoulders. He’d forgotten the faint circles beneath her eyes, candlelight only deepened them, softening her pale skin until she looked carved from frost. Her hair, light brown with a touch of ash, framed her face too neatly, the singlecurl at her shoulder the only thing out of place. It was her signature look; one she always wore.
Snow had gathered along on the other side, which was not surprising in the land of eternal nivalen.
“You’d think someone as precious as you might warrant more than two half-frozen guards and an empty hallway,” he observed.
She spun around.
Her veil caught the light, her spine ramrod-straight. Her eyes, always so quick to mask, flickered with surprise.
“You’re not supposed to be here,” she scolded him.
Dasmon entered the room, shutting the door with a muted click. His hair—white-blond and hopeless in winter—were melting slowly into soft curls.
He gave her the smallest of smiles. “The guards were easy to bribe.”
She folded her arms, one foot tapping with practiced patience.
“You’re going to ruin the ceremony. It brings bad luck.”
Of course she was worried about that. Evelyne Tresselyn would face a kingdom’s scrutiny with her chin held high but panic at a misstep in ritual.
