Smoke clung to the edges of Hollowmere like a stain that wouldn't wash out.
The market was a graveyard of ash. Water pooled in the cracks between the cobblestones. And beneath the stillness, the air thrummed with quiet fear—the kind that lingers long after the blood has been cleaned up.
Sael moved like a ghost through it all, silent and deliberate, his cloak barely stirring in the breeze.
The villagers said the witch girl had done it.
They said she had summoned the river.
But Sael had seen that kind of power before.
And it didn't come from spells or chants.
It came from blood.
"She's gone?" he asked the merchant, who was hastily repacking what little was left of his wares.
The man nodded, face pale. "Ran off with the cloaked stranger—the quiet one. I knew he was cursed. Came here smelling like cold earth."
Sael's jaw tightened.
Xerces.
That was the name.
The one who moved like a man but didn't blink like one. Who spoke with too much weight behind too few words.
Sael crouched beside the shattered well. The stone had cracked clean down one side. Inside, the water still churned unnaturally, though the storm had passed.
He reached out.
Dipped two fingers in.
Then closed his eyes.
The sensation that greeted him wasn't water.
It was memory.
—
She'd stood here.
And screamed.
Not in fear—but in pain. In protection. In desperation. The water had listened. Had obeyed.
A weaver, he thought. No… something older than that.
The term drifted up from deep inside his mind, one he hadn't spoken in years.
"A Tidebound."
One in a generation.
And always, always hunted.
He stood slowly, wiping his fingers on a cloth. His breath steamed in the morning air as the chill deepened.
"Did you know her?" a voice asked.
Sael didn't turn around.
"Only just met her," he said. "But I know what she is now."
The village headman stepped closer, wringing his cap nervously.
"If you find her… you'll kill her, won't you?"
Sael tilted his head slightly.
A pause.
"No," he said flatly. "I'll protect her."
The man looked stunned.
"Why?"
"Because you people would burn down a river if it scared you enough."
He started walking again.
As he passed the edge of the market, Sael noticed something in the mud—a small imprint, nearly washed away.
Not a bootprint.
A bare foot.
Mira's.
But beside it, overlapping slightly, was a deeper print.
Wider. Heavier. No toes.
Not human.
He crouched, eyes narrowing.
Something else had been here.
Watching them both.
The wind shifted.
And with it, a whisper—not spoken aloud, but felt.
Find the girl. Find the key.
The Lich walks blind.
But the river knows.
Sael straightened, jaw set.
The game had changed.
And he wasn't hunting monsters anymore.
He was hunting fate