Chapter 12: Ghosts of Solstice
The hidden chamber beneath the library smelled of wet stone and old magic. Evan's breath came in ragged gasps, each exhale making the dagger's glow pulse brighter through his veins. The silver cage in his chest thrummed like a second heartbeat, its light casting their faces in ghostly relief.
Selene pressed her palm against the far wall, murmuring words that made the stone ripple like water. A passage revealed itself—narrow, sloping downward into absolute darkness.
"Where does it lead?" Isolde asked, her cracked glasses reflecting the eerie light.
"To the first binding," Selene said. Her voice had taken on a hollow quality, as if speaking from far away. "Where my ancestors made their pact."
Aria snorted, adjusting the strap of her stolen alchemy satchel. "Great. More spooky family secrets."
Rowan placed a steadying hand on Evan's shoulder. "Can you walk?"
Evan nodded, though every movement sent jagged bolts of pain through his sternum. The dagger wasn't just part of him now—it was rewriting him. He could feel it in the way his magic coiled differently, in the way his pupils stayed blown wide to accommodate the stormlight.
They descended.
Seven pillars stood in a circle, each carved with different arcane symbols—but where the ones in Caine's ritual space had been pristine, these were ruined. Cracked from top to bottom, oozing a thick black substance that smelled of rotting parchment.
Between them lay the source of the humming Evan had felt since arrival—a massive, pulsing wound in reality itself. A rift.
And from its edges dangled threads of silver light, frayed and snapping one by one.
Selene approached the rift with the reverence of a mourner at a graveside. "This is where it began," she whispered. "Where the first Arkwright bound the first Crowhurst."
Evan's dagger flared in response, its light lancing toward the rift. The black ooze on the pillars began to boil.
Rowan stepped back. "That's not just magic. That's—"
"Blood," Isolde finished, her voice thin. "Old blood."
A shape moved in the rift.
Translucent figures materialized between the pillars—students in outdated uniforms, their faces frozen in various states of terror. Some clutched at gaping wounds. Others screamed soundlessly. One, a girl with familiar copper curls, reached toward Aria with desperate fingers.
Aria recoiled. "That's—that's me."
"Echoes," Selene said. "Past offerings. Their magic sustains the binding, their memories fuel it." She turned to Evan. "And now it's your turn."
The implication hit like a physical blow. Evan would become one of these hollow things—his magic drained, his consciousness trapped forever in this wretched place.
The dagger's glow intensified, its light spearing toward the rift. The ghosts wailed as one.
Then—
A new voice cut through the cacophony:
"Actually, I have a better idea."
Vera Lune stepped from the shadows, her floral skirts pristine, her hands cradling a blooming nightshade.
Only it wasn't Vera.
Not anymore.
Her eyes were all wrong—pupils blown so wide they consumed the iris, black veins creeping down her neck. When she smiled, her teeth gleamed sharp as thorns.
"You," Selene breathed. "You're the reason Lucian woke early."
Vera laughed, the sound like rustling leaves. "Guilty." She stroked the nightshade's petals. "Fifty years is such a long time to wait for freedom."
Evan's blood ran cold. "You're working with Lucian."
"Working for," Vera corrected. She tilted her head, studying the rift. "He promised me things, you see. Power. Knowledge. The true name of the thing that grows beneath this academy."
Rowan raised his rusted crossbow. "What thing?"
The ground trembled in answer.