Dawn broke in shades of violet and silver, casting the Hall of Threads in a delicate light that did nothing to ease the tension weighing on Elara's chest.
She stood at the highest balcony, the First Loom now sealed below, hidden again by layers of stone and protective wards. Her fingers rested on the cool marble, but her thoughts were far from still.
Elion's attack had changed everything.
Five gods remained unconvinced of their cause. One had just tried to kill her. And worse—he'd known about the First Loom. Which meant others might, too.
Caelum emerged behind her, silent as always, but she felt him before he spoke.
"You didn't sleep," he said.
"Neither did you."
He stepped beside her, his face touched by the morning glow. "I keep thinking about what Elion said. That he wanted to 'fix' the world. What if… he wasn't lying?"
Elara turned sharply. "You're defending him?"
"No," Caelum said calmly. "But I'm questioning everything. We all are. What if our idea of healing means breaking something that still matters?"
Her voice lowered. "We're not trying to break anything. We're trying to free it."
"Freedom has a cost."
She looked away. "Then I'll pay it."
—
Later that morning, a messenger arrived.
A golden feather, wrapped in air. It floated before them, glowing with divine energy.
Caelum reached for it first, frowning. "It's from Lysara."
Elara raised an eyebrow. "The goddess of fate?"
He nodded. "She's agreed to speak with you."
Idran stepped forward from the corridor shadows, where he'd been listening quietly. "That's a risk. Lysara doesn't offer audiences. She offers traps."
"She also sees more than any of the others," Elara countered. "If she's willing to talk, we can't ignore it."
Nessa looked worried. "She walks the threads like a spider, Elara. Even the gods fear what she knows."
"All the more reason to hear her out," Elara said.
—
The journey to Lysara's sanctum was not made by foot.
They traveled through a mirror woven of dream and time—stepping through the Hall's highest spire into a glimmering thread-path that shimmered between worlds. Elara, Caelum, Idran, and Terenna moved together, their bonds tightly held.
When they emerged, the world was silence.
Lysara's sanctum was a sphere of glass suspended in the stars. The sky beneath them rippled like silk. Time moved oddly—slower and faster in turns. Threads hung freely, swaying like vines in a breeze that didn't exist.
Lysara herself appeared from the air.
She was neither young nor old, her face shifting with every blink. Her voice was soft and terrifying.
"You've woven a storm," she said to Elara. "And the loom begins to fray."
Elara held her gaze. "I came for answers."
Lysara stepped closer, circling her like a hawk. "You seek to change the weave. But have you asked why it was woven this way?"
"Yes," Elara said. "And the answers are always the same. Fear. Control. Lies."
"And yet… you were born from it." Lysara stopped. "Do you know what that means?"
Elara didn't answer.
Lysara smiled faintly. "It means your thread is not a rebellion. It's a mutation. You are what the tapestry created when the gods failed to silence it."
Idran stepped forward, tense. "Are you saying she's a mistake?"
"No," Lysara said. "She's the cure."
Elara blinked. "The cure for what?"
Lysara looked into the weave, her eyes glowing. "For the gods themselves."
—
The words clung to Elara like thorns.
Back in the Hall, she sat alone in the silent gardens, staring at the fountain's rippling surface. A cure. For the gods.
Not a savior. Not a prophet.
A cure.
"Do you think she's right?" she asked quietly when Caelum joined her.
He didn't answer immediately. Then: "I think she sees what the rest of us don't."
"She called me a mutation."
"She also said you're what the tapestry created to heal itself."
Elara exhaled shakily. "Then why does it feel like I'm breaking everything I touch?"
Caelum took her hand. "Because the truth always breaks the lie before it builds the future."
Their moment was shattered by a shout.
Idran ran into the garden, eyes wild. "The warding stones are down. Someone breached the outer Hall."
Elara was on her feet in an instant. "Who?"
He shook his head. "We don't know. But one of the high chambers—Terenna's—was attacked."
Elara's blood ran cold.
—
They found Terenna bleeding on the floor, her blind eyes unfocused but furious.
"I tried to stop them," she whispered.
"Who?" Caelum asked urgently.
Terenna gripped Elara's wrist, her voice barely a breath. "It was him. Vireon."
Elara stared. "He's here?"
Terenna nodded. "He's not alone. Iros came with him. And someone else. A traitor."
The word echoed in Elara's mind.
Traitor.
The Hall quaked. Dust fell from the high arches. Elara turned to Caelum. "We have to protect the Looms."
But Idran didn't move.
Elara noticed the stiffness in his jaw. "Idran?"
He didn't meet her eyes.
Caelum stepped forward. "What did you do?"
Idran finally spoke. "I told them where the Loom was."
Silence fell like a thunderclap.
Elara stepped back, disbelieving. "You betrayed us?"
Idran's eyes burned. "I told them so they'd see. So they'd know it wasn't power we sought—but healing."
"And you thought they'd understand?" Caelum growled.
"I thought they'd hesitate," Idran said. "But I was wrong."
Elara's voice was ice. "You handed them the weapon they need to destroy everything."
"I trusted them to be better," Idran said.
Elara clenched her fists. "Then your trust may cost us the world."
—
The battle began before nightfall.
Iros and Vireon descended through the sky on wings of ash and lightning, the third figure behind them cloaked in golden fire.
The Hall's wards shuddered.
Aurelien rallied his flames. Nessa summoned the echoes of the dead. Terenna, wounded but unbroken, stood with her staff raised.
Elara walked to the center of the Hall, where the threads gathered, her mind a whirlwind. She had no time to grieve Idran's betrayal. No time to doubt.
She had to lead.
Caelum stood beside her. "They're here."
Elara met his gaze. "Then we show them what the future looks like."
The Hall doors burst open.
Iros strode forward, tall and wrathful, his armor cracking with stormlight. "You defied the weave."
"We became it," Elara answered.
Vireon raised his staff. "You will not unmake the gods."
"We're not unmaking you," Caelum said. "We're giving you a choice."
The third figure stepped into view.
And Elara's heart stopped.
It was Serai.
Her sister.
Alive.
Elara stumbled back, eyes wide. "No… That's not possible."
Serai smiled. "It never was. But here I am."
Caelum was stunned. "You… you're her sister?"
Elara barely heard him. "You were gone. They killed you."
"No," Serai said softly. "They remade me. I am part of the Loom now. I am its guardian."
Elara shook her head. "No… You were good. You were light. You—"
Serai's expression twisted with pain. "And you abandoned me. Left me to rot in the tapestry's shadows."
Elara stepped forward, trembling. "I didn't know. I never stopped looking."
Serai lifted her hand. Threads of fire coiled in her palm.
"Then fight me, Elara," she said. "And prove you deserve this world."
—
What followed was chaos.
Iros summoned storms that cracked the sky.
Vireon unleashed death with every word.
Serai weaved illusions so powerful the Hall bent beneath their weight.
Elara fought through it all.
Beside her, Caelum burned with light. Nessa called the ancestors. Aurelien's fire danced in harmony with Elara's power.
But it wasn't enough.
Vireon struck Terenna down with a bolt of unraveling. She fell in Elara's arms, smiling even as her thread faded.
"Finish the weave," she whispered. "Don't let them break it again."
Elara's fury ignited.
She rose, her body glowing with divine fire and mortal rage. Her thread blazed gold and crimson.
"Serai!" she cried. "Look at me!"
Her sister paused.
Elara stepped through the storm, deflecting Vireon's magic, pushing past Iros's gale. She reached Serai and took her hands.
"I didn't abandon you. I love you."
Serai's face cracked. "I don't remember what love feels like."
Elara pressed her forehead to hers. "Then let me show you."
She poured the thread between them—raw memory, childhood laughter, shared dreams, their mother's song.
Serai gasped, staggered.
Her fire dimmed.
And then she wept.
The sky stilled.
Iros faltered. Vireon lowered his staff.
And in that silence, Elara held her sister and whispered, "It's not too late."
—
The gods did not surrender that night.
But they retreated.
And when the sun rose, the Hall still stood.
Terenna's grave was the first thread Elara rewove—with sorrow and reverence.
Caelum stood beside her, wounded but alive.
Idran, shamed and silent, watched from afar.
Serai stood at the balcony, her hands clasped, her eyes distant.
"I don't know who I am anymore," she whispered.
Elara joined her. "Then let's find out. Together."
For the first time in days, the threads around Elara stopped trembling.
And for the first time, she truly believed:
They could win.
— End of Chapter 8