🌕 Moonblood: The Curse of Arodan
**Chapter Twenty-Two: 22
The world did not end.
But it changed.
When Draven and Callen stepped through the Veil of Names, they did not fall.
They floated.
No gravity. No sound. No time.
Only light—silver and gold, swirling like rivers of breath through a vast, endless space. Their bodies drifted forward, their cloaks flaring behind them, their weapons dim shadows in a world built from memory.
Draven tried to speak. His voice vanished.
Callen reached out, and their fingers brushed—but even the touch felt unreal, like they were made of water.
Then the voices began.
Soft at first.
Like whispers behind silk curtains.
Then louder. Stronger.
Not angry. Not cruel. Just… endless.
"Arilyn…"
"Kaelen…"
"Syrien…"
"Moonblood…"
"Moonblood…"
"Moonblood…"
All around them, names drifted through the void.
Names of the fallen.
Names of the forgotten.
Draven spun slowly in place and saw a thousand figures flicker through the silver air—shadows of Moonblood who came before him.
Women in armor. Men with silver eyes. Children with flames in their hands. Some cried. Some screamed. Some stood with pride.
But none of them were alive.
Callen spoke. His voice echoed strangely.
"Are we dead?"
Draven shook his head. "No. This is something else. A… memory? A waiting place?"
The locket at Draven's neck pulsed hot. The blade on his back glowed faintly. Callen's crescent-mark shimmered, then dimmed again, as if uncertain.
Then the Veil shifted.
The soft glow turned red.
The air became heavier. Darker. Thicker.
And from the silver mist, a door appeared.
Tall. Cracked. Bound in runes.
On its surface were carved three moons: full, waning, and broken.
Callen stepped forward. "Do we open it?"
Draven hesitated. Then nodded.
They pressed their hands against the stone.
The door swung inward.
And the past came alive.
They stood in a throne room.
Not the Queen's. Not yet.
This one was older.
Its pillars were carved from moonstone, and a river of light flowed across the ceiling. On the throne sat a man with silver eyes and a crown of stars—Kaelen, the first Moonblood King.
Draven gasped.
He'd seen drawings.
But to see him move, breathe, live…
Kaelen stood.
He wasn't looking at them. He was looking at someone else—a young woman kneeling at the foot of the throne.
"Rise, Syrien," Kaelen said.
Her silver hair shimmered.
"You carry the final gift. You know what must be done."
"But if I do this," Syrien said, "I won't be myself anymore."
Kaelen walked down from the throne, placed a hand on her shoulder.
"You'll be more."
She looked up, tears in her eyes. "And if I forget who I am?"
"Then I will remember you."
The vision shattered like glass.
The two boys stood once more in the void, shaken.
"That was Syrien," Draven said, his heart thudding.
"And Kaelen," Callen whispered. "My… ancestor."
They were silent for a long time.
Then, the space before them rippled again.
A second door opened.
And behind it—
The Queen.
Not her true self.
A memory.
But she was younger, not yet crowned. She stood in the ruins of a battlefield, holding a sword made of shadow. Bodies lay around her. Her white gown was stained with red.
She looked up.
And for a moment—just a moment—she looked directly at them.
Even though she couldn't.
"I was never meant to rule," she said, her voice softer than they'd ever heard it.
"They made me Queen to keep the prophecy buried.
But I wanted to live forever. So I found the name that does not belong.
And I wore it like a mask."
Behind her, in the distance, a black shape stirred.
The Nameless Monster.
It hadn't followed them.
It had been here before them.
The memory dissolved.
The Veil trembled.
And the blade on Draven's back cracked with light.
He dropped to one knee, clutching his chest. The locket flared. The names inside it screamed.
Arilyn. Kaelen. Syrien.
Three voices. Three powers.
All fighting for space inside him.
Callen ran to his side, grabbing his arm.
"What's happening?"
"She's coming," Draven gasped. "The Queen… she's trying to break the Veil from the outside."
In the real world, Elira stood alone in the ruins of the vault.
Runes flared at her feet as the Queen's soldiers approached through the ashes.
And on a black altar in the Queen's tower, a prisoner was dragged forward.
A young girl.
One of the last of the Moonblood children.
"Blood must be spilled," the Queen said, "to shatter prophecy."
She raised her blade.
Elira screamed as the moon above split open.
Back inside the Veil, everything shattered.
Draven stood on a cliff of broken light. Callen beside him. The blade between them.
Above, the Veil cracked, and reality bled through.
"We have to get out," Callen said.
Draven nodded.
But neither of them knew where they'd land.