The moment Isla staggered back to the surface, silence wrapped around her like a second skin. Her boots sank into the soft mud, her breath ragged as if she'd run miles. Caius stood frozen, eyes wide with a thousand questions.
She said nothing.
Not yet.
Instead, Isla strode past him, her steps urgent and uneven. She dropped to her knees beside Finn's pack and pulled free the folded parchment he kept tucked inside. The map unfurled in her trembling hands, slick with moisture.
"Isla?" Finn asked warily.
She ignored him. Her eyes roamed the inked terrain like a fevered pilgrim searching for sacred ground.
"There," she murmured at last, pressing her fingertip to a jagged mark west of their current path—a deep, claw-like crevice between forgotten hills.
"What is that?" Caius crouched beside her.
"The Vale of Echoes," she whispered, voice thin and distant. "The Remnant showed me."
Lyra tilted her head, watching with narrowed
eyes. "Showed you what?"
"That we were heading into a trap," Isla replied, barely above a breath. "The Grotto… it's wrong. They're waiting there. The Circle."
Caius's brows drew low. "Who's 'they'?"
"Thorne Washburn was there," Isla continued, her words unraveling fast now, pulled by dread. "Not just now—before. Long before. This thing, this curse—it started with him. I saw the beginning… or part of it. The First Sin."
Finn flinched at the name. Lyra stepped back.
"And this Vale?" Caius asked.
"Something's hidden there," Isla said. "The Remnant didn't show it all. But it's not corrupted. Not yet. If we're going to find answers… if we're going to survive… we have to go there."
Finn looked down at the mark she had pressed. "There's no road."
"Then we carve one," Isla said, folding the map. Her eyes burned now—not with fear, but purpose. "We don't have time to lose."
Caius met her gaze, and for a moment, something passed between them: the shared weight of too much unknown. He gave a tight nod.
"Then let's move."
------
Beneath the foundations of an abandoned cathedral deep in the Bleeding Hills, where no birds sang and no fire warmed the stones, a great obsidian table rested in a subterranean chamber carved by old magic and older secrets.
Torchlight flickered along the walls, casting elongated shadows over the seven figures seated around the circular table. Their faces were partly obscured—some by hoods, some by masks, and one, by nothing but flame.
At the head sat Lord Thorne Washburn, his cloak black as coal and trimmed with silver thread, bearing the sigil of the First Sin over his chest. His face was pale, flawless, inhumanly still. He folded his fingers under his chin.
"We have a problem," Thorne said, his voice calm, deliberate, and cold as the grave.
Lady Veyra Mourn, seated to his left, gave a slow tilt of her head. Her mask resembled the skull of a stag, and dark feathers poured from her shoulders down her gown. "The Blackwood girl survived the consumption?"
"She did more than survive," answered Silas Gorr, a bald, hunched man with jagged red tattoos that ran from his neck to the base of his skull. His breath came in rasps, but his eyes glittered with malice. "She saw the Remnant."
A stir moved through the council.
"That should be impossible," murmured Ezren Hale, a tall, gaunt man in white robes dusted with ash. His eyes were milk-colored, blind but ever-watching. "The Remnants were bound to the Old Vow."
"And yet," Thorne said, "she made contact."
Mother Rilka, whose mouth was sewn shut with silver threads and whose fingers never ceased moving in silent incantation, tapped a series of symbols into the air. The runes hovered, glowed, then vanished. Veyra translated aloud.
"She asks if the Blackwood girl has awakened the bloodline."
"No," Thorne replied. "Not fully. But she is close. The sigil has not yet marked her. The Veil still clings to her spirit."
"She is untrained. Barely aware of the cost of her lineage," said Drayven Voss, a lithe, sharp-faced man dressed like a noble of old, with rings on every finger and a cruel smile on his lips. "Yet she managed to tap the deep current. Imagine what she could do with guidance... or pressure."
"Perhaps we should consider bringing her in," Ezren offered softly. "Not as a foe. As a weapon."
Silas chuckled. "She won't serve. Her mother refused us, remember? The girl burns with that same defiance. If anything, she is a threat."
Thorne stood slowly, letting silence hang heavy.
"She will not be captured," he said. "Not yet. Her journey must continue. The longer she walks this path, the more the world will fracture."
He turned toward the wall behind him—a mural carved into obsidian, showing seven shadowed figures looming over a burning tree. "Let her seek the Grotto. Let her think she is winning. Every answer she finds only leads her closer to us."
Veyra's tone was cautious. "And if she survives?"
"Then," Thorne whispered, "she will be worthy of the truth."
A moment passed before Ezren shifted again. "What of the others? The thief, the boy, and the Eliran witch?"
Thorne frowned. "The thief carries the cursed sigil. He is still useful. The boy is nothing. And Lyra…"
He looked to Rilka.
The old woman paused, then slowly nodded.
"She watches Isla too closely," Thorne murmured. "There's a reason she embedded herself with them. Keep an eye on her. If she steps out of line, we'll carve the truth from her bones."
Lady Veyra stood, feathers rustling. "And the Flame? They stir again in the east."
"We extinguished them once," Silas said with a snarl. "We'll do it again."
"No," Thorne said, raising a hand. "Let the Flame burn. Their light will only lead Isla closer to us. She must believe she is walking toward salvation."
Drayven leaned forward. "And when she reaches the end?"
Thorne smiled.
"We show her what salvation truly costs."
Behind him, the mural's tree began to glow with a faint, blood-red hue—its branches twisting unnaturally, its roots bleeding into a pit of shadows.
And one by one, the members of the Circle vanished into darkness.