Mingzhao ran a hand along the cracked ward-line on the floor. “The shard is what wounds the moonwell,” he said slowly. “But the shadow you saw is what wakes when the shard completely destroys the moonwell.”
Poppy’s breath froze. “Why?”
Mingjun answered quietly, “Because the shard is not the Devouring One.”
Mingxi finished the thought, soft and deadly, “It’s just the door. You cannot destroy the Devouring One.”
A hush fell like a veil. The foxfire lanterns dimmed to faint embers, and suddenly Poppy understood: The purification on the next full moon would just heal the moonwell.
Mingxi wrapped both arms around her. “We’ll face it,” he whispered into her hair. “Whatever waits inside the heart of the moonwell… we face it together.”
Beneath them, far below the valley’s trembling veins, the moonwell pulsed once more—soft, fading, pleading.
Hurry.
Chapter 102
The elders ushered everyone into the research hall—a long cedar chamber perfumed with ink, foxfire dust, and the faint hum of ancient seals. Scrolls and moon-ink diagrams lined the walls, many protected under shimmering glass charms.
Poppy had barely stepped inside when a sharp, briny wind burst down the corridor.
“Brace. She’s not slowing down—” Caelan called, the words torn away as a sharp, briny wind burst down the corridor.
Caelan and a woman stormed into the hall.
Caelan looked grim, seawater still drying in his hair. The woman looked ready to throttle the Devouring One herself.
Poppy blinked. “Caelan?”
Caelan didn’t waste a breath. “We felt it.”
Mingxi tensed. “Felt what?”
The woman slapped her palm onto a cedar table. A ring of blue-green water-qi rippled outward and then hissed and collapsed on itself like droplets on hot metal.
“Lirrane—” Caelan started but was interrupted.
“That,” Lirrane growled. “Corruption. In the currents. The tides are wrong.”
Caelan nodded tightly. “When the moonwell is poisoned, the entire water-leyline network warps. We sensed the shift from halfway across the realm.”
Lirrane scanned the room and smirked. “Oh, good, you’ve already pulled the archives. Saves me having to rip a cabinet off the wall.”
Caelan muttered, “She absolutely would’ve.”
Mingzhao placed several scrolls on the central table. “These are the moonwell records. Let us see what history left us.”
Caelan unrolled the first scroll carefully. The ink shimmered faintly—more magic than pigment.
“When a shadow-root lodges in the moonwell’s heart, the well cannot expel it. Only through ritual purification may the shard be drawn forth. The moonwell will not open its core again until the cycle completes,” he said, reading from the scrolls.
Poppy exhaled. “That’s exactly what the moonwell showed me.”
Caelan tapped the margin. “This matches the tide flow. The well sealed itself to survive.”
Lirrane nodded. “And if it sealed itself, nothing can be summoned out. We have to go to it. There’s no clean workaround.”
Mingxi’s grip tightened around Poppy’s hand.
