The Shadow Court pulsed with ancient, breathing magic.
Elira felt it the moment she crossed the obsidian threshold. The air thickened—darker, richer—like ink suspended in water.
The walls trembled faintly with a pulse not unlike a heartbeat, and the floor beneath her slippered feet hummed with life. This place was alive, watching, and she didn't know whether it wanted to welcome her… or consume her.
Kaelen led her through winding halls of black stone and glass, thorn-covered archways bending like twisted ribs overhead. Their path was lit by hanging orbs of witchlight that flickered with colors Elira had no names for—violet, silver-blue, crimson threaded with shadow.
"I thought the Shadow Court was a ruin," she said, her voice low.
"It is," Kaelen replied without glancing back. "A glorious, dying thing."
They stopped at a set of towering doors carved with crescent moons and blooming thorns. With a flick of his hand, the doors creaked open. Beyond them was a private suite unlike anything she'd imagined.
It was beautiful. Dark, yes—but not cold.
The room was draped in velvet and silk, walls painted in deep blues and grays like storm-washed skies. A hearth crackled with blackwood fire, casting flickering shadows over a grand four-poster bed. Moonstone chandeliers hung above like constellations caught mid-fall.
"This will be your space," Kaelen said. "You'll find our court doesn't believe in chains. But don't mistake comfort for safety."
"How thoughtful," Elira murmured, stepping inside. "A gilded cage still cages."
He didn't rise to the bait. Instead, Kaelen moved to the hearth, leaned a hand against the mantle, and turned his head slightly toward her.
"You feel it, don't you?" he said. "The pull. This place knows you."
Elira said nothing. She did feel it—that strange stirring in her bones, the sense of being drawn downward, deeper, like the Court itself was sinking into her soul.
"I've never belonged anywhere," she said finally. "Not in Lysaria. Not in the temples. Not even in my father's eyes."
Kaelen turned then, and there was something raw in his gaze, just for a breath—a flicker of understanding. Of familiarity.
"I was born in blood and shadow," he said quietly. "Trained to be a blade for a kingdom that never wanted me. You think you're the only one the moon turned her face from?"
"Then why this alliance?" she asked. "Why take me?"
Kaelen's lips curved—not into a smile, but something darker.
"Because the moon doesn't choose our fate anymore. We do."
And before she could ask what that meant, he vanished—his shadow melting into the wall, leaving the room colder in his absence.
Elira dreamed of thorns that night.
They wrapped around her arms, her throat, blooming black roses against her skin. The moon hung blood-red in the sky, whispering in a language that tasted like salt and smoke.
You were never unmarked, it said.
She woke in a tangle of sweat-soaked sheets, her pulse thundering.
And on the inside of her wrist, where nothing had ever been, a faint shimmer danced—a ghost of silver light.
Gone in a blink.
By morning, servants arrived—silent, sharp-eyed creatures with shadow-drenched skin and long, curling horns. They brought her gowns spun from midnight silk, oils that smelled of obsidian and flame, and a breakfast she didn't dare touch.
One of them, a woman with braided silver hair and eyes like quartz, finally spoke.
"His Highness requests your presence in the war room."
Elira raised a brow. "Is that what he's calling our next argument?"
The woman didn't smile.
"He doesn't request twice."
The war room was shaped like a crescent moon, with an obsidian table in its center and floating maps suspended in the air. Creatures—ministers, warriors, beings Elira didn't recognize—stood around Kaelen as he pointed to glowing marks.
When she entered, the shadows stirred. All heads turned.
She didn't flinch.
Kaelen looked up, and for a moment his expression gave nothing away. Then his gaze dropped—to her hands, her throat, as if searching for something.
"Nice of you to join us," he said. "We're discussing how not to die."
"I always try to keep my mornings light," Elira said dryly. "So, who's killing us today?"
A man with scaled skin and crimson eyes chuckled. "The Hollow King. Dead god, mostly. But rising."
Elira stepped closer, eyeing the floating map.
"The Hollow King was a myth."
"So were we," Kaelen said, fingers tapping the map. "But he's stirring in the Northlands—where the Veil is thinnest. Lands once buried in ice are thawing. Creatures long thought extinct are crawling through. And every shadow whispers the same name."
He looked at her.
"Yours."
Elira froze. "What?"
"Your arrival awoke something," Kaelen said. "Something ancient. Something older than the moon."
The ministers whispered among themselves, words like gatekeeper and vessel tossed like curses.
"I don't know what you think I am," she said, voice low. "But I didn't cause this."
"No," Kaelen said. "But you may be the only one who can end it."
That night, she wandered the halls.
Sleep wouldn't come, and the Court called to her—its heart beating in time with her own. The corridors changed when she wasn't looking, guiding her deeper into the castle.
Eventually, she reached a locked door, bound in silver chains.
Her hand moved before her mind did, brushing the wood.
It opened.
And inside, a room filled with moonlight. Real moonlight. It spilled through a high glass ceiling onto a pool of still water surrounded by statues—each one carved in her likeness. Her face. Her hands. Her eyes.
Some older. Some… burned.
Elira stumbled back.
"Do you understand now?" Kaelen's voice echoed behind her.
She turned, her breath sharp. "What is this?"
"Fate's tomb," he said, stepping into the light. "You weren't the first they offered. But you may be the last."
She stared at the statues. So many versions of her. Some twisted in pain. Some peaceful in death.
"They were all me?"
"No," he said. "They were almost you."
Her voice was barely a whisper. "Then what am I?"
Kaelen stepped closer, and his hand hovered near hers, not quite touching.
"Something the gods tried to erase," he said. "And something I intend to wake."
And as his fingers brushed hers, that shimmer sparked again on her wrist—silver and blazing.
This time, it didn't fade.