Location: Moonstone Vaults – Restricted SectionTime: Just after midnight
The hourglass had long bled out its final grains, yet the shadows beneath the Moonstone Vaults only grew darker. The sealed corridor leading to the Founders' Seals groaned faintly, responding to the presence of those who did not belong — or perhaps, those it had waited for.
Rael stood before the triple-locked gate. His fingertips grazed the obsidian metal etched with runes from before the Concord of Nine Kingdoms. With every breath, the sigils pulsed softly beneath his touch, recognizing not his name — but the echo that clung to his soul.
> "It shouldn't open," whispered Alric Vyrmor behind him. "Even the Headmaster doesn't have access without a Conclave vote."
> "It's not opening for me," Rael replied. "It's opening for who I used to be."
The final lock clicked open with a shiver of frost and silence.
They stepped through.
Aelira Caerthyn and Evelyne Thornehart followed in silent formation, their footsteps muffled by the thick carpet of stardust that blanketed the inner vault floors — not real dust, but magical particulate suspended in a static haze. A forgotten enchantment, meant to disorient memory and perception.
> "Hold onto a truth," Rael warned, his voice low. "Anything. Or you'll start forgetting why you came."
Ilyara clutched a locket of barkwood to her chest. A token from her childhood in the Fae Glades — long before betrayal had marked her.
Cassian murmured, "I'm holding onto the fact that I hate libraries."
> "That's not a truth," Aelira deadpanned. "That's a personality flaw."
The corridor opened into a dome-shaped chamber with no ceiling. Above them stretched a sky of void and constellations — not painted, but real, scryed from the threads of the Wyrd. Floating in the center of the chamber, suspended by invisible forces, were six tomes bound in elemental chains — each bearing a different seal.
Rael walked to the one bound in shadowvine and moon-iron. The chain throbbed as he approached.
> "This one holds the legacy of the fae pacts," he said. "The old law — before the courts splintered. If there's a way to untangle Ilyara's curse, it starts here."
Evelyne's brow furrowed. "You're sure it's not a trap?"
> "Everything here is a trap," Alric muttered. "The question is… who it's meant for."
Rael laid his palm over the seal — and the tome shuddered.
The moment his skin touched the glyph, visions surged across the dome. Ghosts of memory spun into being: elven nobles garbed in woven starlight, their mouths sewn shut with gold thread. A thorned crown passed hand to hand until it finally settled on a shadowed figure with antlers wreathed in frostfire.
> "The King of the Weeping Thorns," Ilyara whispered, recoiling. "That's him. That's what they planted in me."
The figure's mouth opened — and screamed.
A pulse of magic exploded outward.
The group staggered. Rael held the book fast as the dome's illusions scattered and the sky darkened. From the book, a voice rose — not spoken aloud, but inside each of their minds.
> "She was not meant to flee. She was to bear the bloom. The seed remembers."
Rael's jaw clenched. He stared into the vision, unflinching.
> "Then forget what you were promised. She is no longer yours."
The seal cracked — just enough to open the first page.
And the true knowledge began.
---
Later that night – Upper Archives Alcove
They spread out what they had copied. Rael had taken only one page from the cursed tome — any more and the wards would've closed forever.
The page showed the Sigil of Withering Rebirth — a ritual that reversed soulbound contracts by substituting a living core for the original anchor.
> "It's a sacrificial rite," Alric observed grimly. "You'd have to offer a piece of your soul in exchange for hers."
> "Not hers," Rael said softly. "The seed's."
Evelyne narrowed her eyes. "You're proposing we burn the fae king's presence out of her… using your own soul as a vessel?"
Rael nodded once.
Ilyara's eyes widened, her voice cracking. "You can't. If you carry that burden, it will try to take you instead."
> "I've carried worse," Rael replied. "And I don't intend to let it grow."
Aelira tapped the diagram. "But the ritual needs a convergence. A place where soul, magic, and memory intersect. Those are rare."
> "I know one," Ilyara said slowly. "But it's... broken. Forbidden. Even among the fae."
Cassian leaned forward. "Where?"
> "The Hollow of Echoes. Beneath the Dead Grove, east of the academy walls. The last place the Weeping Thorns tried to birth a new court… before they were buried."
The name sent a chill through the room.
Rael's hand tightened into a fist.
> "Then that's where we go."
---
Somewhere far away…
A twisted forest shuddered in unnatural wind. Beneath a mound of roots and ancient soil, a pulse echoed like a second heartbeat.
Eyes opened in the dark.
A voice rasped across the dying moss.
> "The seed has awakened."
> "The chainbreaker walks again."
And in the darkness, something began to rise.