Through steel and flame…
Then—Vale’s face, pale and drawn, eyes reflecting the blaze.
I reach for him, but the world cracks open between us.
I gasp awake, drenched in sweat, my pulse thundering like hooves on stone. The fire in the hearth has reignited—or perhaps I only dream it so.
“Easy,” comes his voice, low and steady.
Vale sits beside me, half in shadow, concern softening the hard lines of his face. His hand brushes damp hair from my forehead.
“You’re safe,” he murmurs. “It was only a dream.”
But I’m not certain of that. The air still shimmers faintly, the scent of ash lingering like memory.
I turn toward him, breath shuddering. “It didn’t feel like one.”
His thumb traces my temple, the same gesture that steadied me once before. “Then whatever it is,” he says quietly, “it will not reach you here.”
I want to believe him. But as I sink back into his arms, the words of the ballad still echo—soft, insistent, eternal.
His heart shall find its equal too.
And for the first time, I wonder if prophecy has already begun to keep its promise.
By the time I join Ace in the library, the nightmare has retreated—but not far. It hovers at the edge of thought, like smoke that refuses to clear, as if the dream itself waits for me to name it.
“That song—where does it come from?” My elbows rest on the table, a book open before me. The words blur on the page, haunted by the melody that refuses to leave me.
“Oh, so you like it?” His grin breaks wide, pure mischief and pride. “It’s one of my own.”
“It captures your history in a haunting way,” I say, keeping my tone steady. “But the ending…”
“Well, that comes straight from the pages of prophecy, my dear. Here—come with me.”
He hops from his perch and beckons for me to follow. His footsteps echo softly through the corridor, drawing me toward a place I somehow already know.
“The Sanctum,” he says grandly, “where all of Caerhollan’s greatest secrets lie.”
We stop before the barred gate at the stair’s end. Iron and chain, lock and spell, seal the way. My chest tightens. Despite the warmth that defies reason, an unsettling chill courses through my veins. The air feels older—like breath drawn from stone.
“What exactly is down there?” I ask, though part of me already fears the answer.
“Mostly dust and parchment,” he says lightly. “Though one book down there claims to hold every word ever written about the royal line. Vale and I used to sneak down as boys. We thought if we read the prophecies first, we might outwit fate itself.”
“Did you?”
“Not once.” His grin falters into something gentler. “Some lines are clear—revealed when a birth or death demands it. Others are as tangled as mountain mist. Even translated a dozen times, they read like riddles whispered by ghosts.”
He rubs the back of his neck, brow furrowed. “If it speaks of the crown, it’s in there somewhere. But only the gods—or the brave—would try to read it.”
I stare into the dark below, the air humming faintly with unseen power. Something ancient calls from beneath the stone. I feel it in my bones—the ache of it, the pull.
Ace claps his hands together, shaking off the quiet. “Let’s not dwell, Mira. Come back to brighter things—like how much you adore my music.”
He steers me back toward the library. I let him fill the air with stories, laughter, and mischief. But even as I smile, I can’t shake thevoice from the dark, the one that seems to whisper my name between heartbeats, as if waiting for me to stop pretending I haven’t heard it.
The days fall into rhythm. Mornings spent among the shelves with Ace—his chatter a kind of lifeline, his laughter keeping the shadows at bay. Afternoons bring quiet hours in Vale’s company, our talks turning softer, our silences more certain. Soria’s presence weaves through it all, steady and grounding, her quiet grace shaping each day into something almost ordinary.
