The leyline pulsed again. Once. Twice. Exactly like the lanterns had. A cold shiver skittered up Poppy’s spine, and Mingxi’s ears flattened.
“It’s the same rhythm,” he said.
The foxfire orbs flickered. Mingxi wrapped an arm around her waist.
“If anything moves, I pull you out.”
The leyline shimmered—and something rose. A tendril of silver light unfurled upward, swirling lazily like smoke caught in slow motion. Not threatening. Not reaching aggressively. Just… reaching.
Poppy whispered, “It’s aware.”
The tendril twisted, curling toward her—not touching, only hovering.
Mingxi’s tails bristled like blades. “Don’t let it near your skin.”
“It’s… curious,” she said softly.
“Curious things kill,” he muttered.
The tendril flickered sharply, like a candle flame guttering in the wind, and then steadied. Something darker moved beneath the surface.
Poppy leaned forward involuntarily. “What is that?”
The leyline surface warped. Liquid light pulled apart, and a shape rose through the shimmering glow. Thin. Black. Jagged at the edges like a broken obsidian fang. A piece of night condensed into form.
Mingxi’s voice was a shocked whisper. “A fragment.”
The temperature dropped several degrees. Foxfire dimmed. The fragment drifted slowly within the leyline, turning like a creature sensing its surroundings, and then it twitched.
Mingxi’s entire body snapped taut. “Fragments do not move. Ever. They are inert until given power.”
This one moved again. A flex. A curl. A slow, deliberate tilt… facing Poppy.
Her breath froze in her throat. “Mingxi,” she whispered, “it’s looking at me.”
“Stay back!” Mingxi said as he shoved her behind him, foxfire crackling to life in his palms.
His voice was steady but threaded with fear she had never heard from him.
“It’s not looking at you,” he said. “It’s looking at what touched the moonwell.”
Poppy’s hand flew to her chest. “The moonwell residue…”
“It recognizes your qi signature,” Mingxi said. “And it wants it.”
The fragment pulsed, the leyline answering like a struck chord. Poppy gasped as a cold jolt shot through her core. Not pain. Connection. A thread pulling taut between her ribs and the shifting darkness. She stumbled.
Mingxi caught her instantly. “Where does it hurt?” he demanded.
“It doesn’t… it just…” She gripped his sleeve. “It pulled again.”
His grip on her tightened with a protective desperation. “It’s calling to you.”
The foxfire orbs guttered and then blinked out all at once. The chamber plunged into darkness.
Mingxi flared his seven tails instantly, flooding the space with silver illumination. The fragment recoiled from the light—but did not vanish.
Poppy trembled. “It’s not dead.”
