The earth erupted in a geyser of writhing roots and blackened soil. Seraphina barely had time to raise the transformed dagger before the first tendril lashed toward her face. The blade moved with a will of its own, slicing through the corruption with a sound like tearing parchment. Where it cut, the roots withered, their ends curling like burned paper before dissolving into acrid smoke.
Lysandra wasn't so lucky.
A barbed root caught her across the ribs, sending her sprawling. Silver blood—too bright, too thick to be human—splattered the broken stones as she rolled to a stop. The branching scar on her chest pulsed erratically, its glow flickering between gold and silver as if fighting against itself.
Riven let out a roar that shook the air itself. The ground at his feet split open, healthy roots surging upward to intercept the next attack. But the corruption had learned. The blackened roots twisted midair, avoiding his defences entirely as they arrowed straight for his chest—
—only to be intercepted by a wall of silver flame.
Seraphina didn't remember raising her hand. Didn't remember calling the fire. But it answered all the same, pouring from the dagger's blade in a torrent that set the very air alight. The corrupted roots shrieked as they burned, their remains falling like black rain across the courtyard.
Her father—or the thing wearing his face—watched from the epicentre of the storm, his thorned fingers steepled in mock contemplation. "The bloodline remembers," he mused, his voice layered with whispers. "How... inconvenient."
The remaining courtiers moved as one, their bodies unravelling into nests of squirming tendrils. Lysandra pushed herself upright, her breath coming in wet, ragged gasps. "Sera—the dagger—"
Seraphina didn't need the warning. She could feel the weapon's awareness pressing against her mind, showing her the truth in fractured images:
The first king was kneeling before the great tree, drinking deeply from a cup fashioned from its roots.
The moment the corruption took hold, twisting his devotion into hunger.
The dagger, forged from the one root that refused to bend, waited centuries for royal blood to wake it fully.
The visions shattered as the first courtier reached her.
Seraphina moved without thought. The dagger's edge passed through the creature's midsection like mist, but where it cut, the corruption stuck, as if the blade had become lodestone to its darkness. The courtier screamed, its form collapsing inward as the dagger drank its essence.
Riven was at her side in an instant, his root-like hair forming a living shield around them. "It's too much," he gasped. "Even for you."
Lysandra limped forward, her silvered eyes blazing. "Then we share the burden."
She pressed her palm against the dagger's blade.
The world exploded into light.
The light burned.
Not with heat, but with a cold so intense it seared Seraphina's nerves like frostbite. Lysandra's hand fused to the dagger's blade, her silver blood running down the living metal in thin, glowing rivulets. The branching scar on her chest erupted with light, its patterns spreading across her collarbones and down her arms like cracks in shattered glass.
Riven staggered back, his golden eyes widening as the ground beneath them began to sing. The roots they'd fought so hard to purify now trembled in resonance, their surfaces humming with energy that made the air itself vibrate.
The corrupted courtiers hesitated—the first sign of uncertainty they'd shown.
Seraphina's father tilted his head, his blackened lips peeling back from thorn-like teeth. "Clever girls," he whispered. "But the crown remembers its bearers."
He raised his hands, and the ruins answered.
Stones levitated from the rubble, orbiting his elongated form like planets around a dying star. The roots that had resisted the corruption now thrashed in agony as dark veins pulsed through them once more. The sky above churned faster, the purple clouds coalescing into something almost solid—something watching.
The dagger's voice in Seraphina's mind was frantic now:
"Too soon. Too fast. The roots aren't ready—"
Lysandra screamed.
The sound was layered with a thousand whispers, none of them human. The silver light pouring from her scar had turned viscous, hardening across her skin like molten glass. Where it spread, her flesh became translucent, revealing the nightmare beneath—her bones were no longer bone, but root, her veins pulsing with liquid light.
Riven lunged for her, his hands outstretched. "Lys! Let go!"
But she couldn't.
The dagger had fused them—blade to hand, will to will. Seraphina felt Lysandra's consciousness brush against hers, not in words but in sensations:
The taste of damp soil.
The ache of centuries-old growth.
*The searing pain of being unmade.
The corrupted courtiers took advantage of their paralysis.
The first struck Riven from behind, its thorned fingers sinking deep into his back. He arched with a choked gasp, his golden eyes flaring bright as corruption spread through his root-like hair, turning the vibrant strands black.
Seraphina tried to move, to help, but the dagger held her fast—its hunger insatiable, its power still growing.
Her father laughed, the sound echoing through the ruins like shattering ice. "The cycle continues," he crooned. "Roots to crown. Crown to ruin. Ruin to hunger." He extended a hand toward Lysandra. "And hunger... to harvest."
The sky ripped.
A tendril of pure darkness descended, its surface studded with glistening, eye-like nodes that pulsed with malicious awareness. It moved toward Lysandra with terrifying deliberation, the air around it warping as though reality itself recoiled from its touch.
The dagger's voice in Seraphina's mind became a scream:
"NOW!"
With a strength she didn't possess, Seraphina twisted the blade—not to strike outward, but inward. The point pierced Lysandra's palm, her own hand still fused to the metal.
The explosion of light was blinding.
When vision returned, the world had changed.
The corrupted courtiers were gone—not dead, but unmade, their essence scattered like dandelion seeds on the wind. Riven knelt gasping, his wounds steaming as golden light fought the corruption spreading through him. The thing wearing her father's face clutched its head, its form flickering between man and monstrosity.
And Lysandra—
Lysandra shone.
Her body was no longer flesh, but living wood and liquid light, her form hovering inches above the ground. The dagger had become part of her, its blade extending from her forearm like a natural extension. When she spoke, her voice was the song of the roots given words:
"Enough."
The single word struck her father like a physical blow. He staggered back, his stolen face crumbling at the edges. "You can't—"
Lysandra raised her blade arm.
The sky screamed.