Chapter 64
Alora
When at last Alora returned to their chambers, Rune was not there.
She lay down, but rest would not come. Their bed felt too large and the room too cold without him.
Moonlight spilled through the translucent balcony curtains, painting the floor in pale silver.
The moon hung nearly full in the sky, swollen and watchful, and the sight made her skin prickle.
Then came the sound.
A sharp, slow split of glass.
Alora gasped and pushed herself upright.
The mirror on the vanity rippled.
Its surface cracked slowly, as though scored by an invisible claw. Fine fractures crept across the glass, twisting into jagged letters that burned faintly red.
LASHAR.
Her heart slammed against her ribs, but she hissed, “I am not your daughter.”
An eerie laugh seeped from the dark.
“Yet you understand a language you have never spoken…” His voice slid over her skin like a cold breath. “As you understand what is to come.”
The mirror darkened, its surface sinking inward like black water.
A vision swallowed glass.
Fire rolled through Argyle’s streets in choking waves, towers collapsing as though the earth itself had torn open. Banners burned midair, curling black. Her people ran screaming, stumbling over fallen knights, armor slick with blood.
Death came on horseback.
The Wild Hunt thundered through the breached gates, skeletal riders clad in tattered armor, hollow eyes burning with corpse-light.
Their mounts were wrong things, bone and shadow fused together, hooves never touching the ground.
Wherever they rode, her people were cut down by a tide that did not slow for mercy.
Souls were torn free in shrieking spirals of pale light, dragged howling into the Abyss behind them.
Rihan stood alone among the flames, crying and terrified.
Alora reached for her brother, but her hands passed through him like smoke.
The vision shifted.
The Midlands lay broken beneath a rain of fire. Briar walls split apart. Paladins fell, wings torn from their backs, silver blood soaking the roots of ancient trees as the forest itself cried out in agony.
Lady Zinnia lay lifeless in her armor, chest caved in. Her sightless eyes fixed on the bleeding red sky as thorns shriveled and blossoms withered beneath her.
The Harbingers stood their ground, shadows roaring as they met the Wild Hunt head-on. One by one, they were unmade, their forms unraveling into smoke and ash as the riders passed through them.
No battle cries. No glory.
Only obliteration.
Vorak’s voice sank into her bones as she helplessly watched. “All who stand against me will fall.”
And then she saw Rune.
He stood at the center of the carnage, beaten and bloodied, torn wings spread wide, shadows flaring like a dying star. He fought as only he could, tearing through the ranks of the dead, roaring defiance into the Heavens as the Wild Hunt closed in around him.
Behind it all loomed a vast storm.
Formless. Endless. Devouring everything it touched.
“The pretender has seen his future, Lashar,” Vorak said. “And yet, he still chooses to face it.”
“No…” Alora choked.
Rune turned, as if he could see her. As if he needed one final glimpse.
“You died for him once. Now it is his turn.”
Then he burned away and crumbled to ash.
She shook her head, tears spilling. “No!”
Red light swallowed the vision as the Blood Moon rose, filling the mirror. From its center opened a single eye, slitted and unblinking, fixed upon her with terrible patience.
“I am the sovereign of the dark,” Vorak said, his voice ancient beyond counting. “The storm without end. Join me… or be lost within it.”
The glass exploded outward in a shriek of splintering crystal, shards slicing into the air and tearing into her skin.
Alora jolted awake with a scream.
Sweat beaded on her skin, breath torn from her chest. For a moment she could not tell what was real. The echo of that distorted voice still clung to her mind like smoke.
The chamber was dark. Silent.
Her gaze dropped to her hands.
Thin lines of blood welled along her palms where the shards had cut her. She stared at it, numb, as the skin knit itself back together before her eyes. Nothing remained but a cold ache and the mirror was intact.
Vorak’s reach was growing. How long until her dreams became reality?
Alora drew her knees to her chest as she silently wept.
The bond stirred.
Songbird, Rune’s voice brushed her mind, taut with concern. Are you all right?
She wiped her eyes and forced steadiness into her reply. Yes… The lie slipped out easily, softened by a sigh. She leaned her head against her knees, eyes burning. Only a nightmare.
His comforting warmth passed through their connection. What was it about?
This wasn’t the way she wanted to tell him, but Alora was too tired to try to pretend anymore. Vorak… has been haunting my dreams.
Silence answered her.
Alora sought for him through the bond and sensed him deep within the mountain as it trembled. His emotions roiled but were quickly hidden behind a shield.
Her chest tightened.
Rune, she called gently. Are you coming to bed?
There was a pause. Long enough to hurt.
Soon, he said at last.
She closed her eyes, tears welling on her lashes.
There would be no more sleep for her tonight. She washed the sweat from her skin in the hot springs, trying not to think of the silent bond. He was pulling away again.
Well, soon was not enough.
She was done waiting.
Alora rose, wrapped herself in a robe, and followed the pull of him through the silent corridors until she reached the old throne room. The walls were washed in red, glowing faintly from the Netherworld Gate’s light streaming from the adjacent room.
She walked past the rubble of Vorak’s destroyed throne and found Rune near the back where it was darkest. The glow of the torch he held illuminated his still form, staring up at the wall.
He did not turn when she entered.
“Rune?” Her slippered feet moved softly over the floor.
Alora came to stand at his side, her gaze drawn upward to the terrible creatures engraved into the stone with such detail they looked ready to crawl free.
They were a host of monstrous forms frozen in stone.
Beasts with too many limbs. Wings fused to bone.
Mouths stretched wide in silent screams. Some were bound in chains.
Others were half-swallowed by stone, as if the mountain itself had tried and failed to erase them.
Their shapes blurred together, impossible to name, each more grotesque than the last.
“Are these demons?” she whispered.
He exhaled a low breath and his shadows stilled as though even they hesitated. “These are the true forms of the Primordials. When Elyōn cast them down, he damned them to appear as vile as their wickedness. They were the original Sovereigns of the Seven Hells.”
Goosebumps scattered down her spine. The mural was far more frightful and intricately wrought than the statues Sal’vathar had once presented to them.
Rune’s gaze was fixed on only one.
She knew who it was before he spoke.
“Vorak, Devourer of Worlds.”
Her father’s statue rose from the stone like a thing half-born of shadow.
Immense and towering over the others. The body appeared to be carved mid-motion, as though it were unraveling and reforming at once, limbs stretching into sweeping bands of stone that curled like smoke caught in a storm.
The surface bore deep, fluid grooves, chisel marks left intentionally rough, giving the illusion that the figure was forever shifting when viewed from different angles.
Where a face should have been, there was only a hollowed plane of stone, smooth and dark, broken by a single inset gem at its center. A red crystal eye, slitted through with a black vein, gleamed faintly even in low torchlight.
Alora’s skin prickled, a chill coiling in her chest. Who could have carved something so terrible with otherworldly detail?
“Vorak made each one of them kneel. He alone ruled the Netherworld, the others becoming his Dominions,” Rune continued. “When I fell, they had all been bound within the Abyss, sparing me a battle for Hell’s throne.”
It went unsaid, but she understood. This was the reason the court never truly accepted him as their king.
“And yet, he who destroys,” Rune murmured, his gaze falling on her with curiosity and wonder, “made you.”
Bitterness welled hot in Alora’s throat. “There is nothing magnificent in that. I still do not understand how a thing like him could have created me.”
Rune’s jaw flexed as he studied the wall.
His gaze lingered on a dragon carved in eternal defiance, wings spread wide.
“All gods have the power to create, Alora. What they shape bears no reflection on what kind of god they are.” His crimson eyes slid back to her, heavy and fierce all at once.
“Even the purest of them can create something as maleficent as I.”
Before Alora could reply, her gaze caught on another carving, veiled by a nest of dry roots that clung to the farthest corner of the chamber.
As if hidden. Forgotten.
With a flick of her hand, shadows severed the desiccated vines.
Her breath stilled.
This one was not as monstrous—it was worse.
A beautiful being falling through the clouds, mouth open in a soundless scream.
Two wings spread wide from his arched back, feathers fractured into jagged stone.
Four other torn wings fell with him, consumed with fire.
Fissures marked in his chest and face, like starlight trapped in a dying husk.
His expression was agony and pride both, carved so exquisitely he was almost alive.
“And him?” she whispered.
Rune didn’t look.
His jaw tightened, shadows rippling restlessly at his feet. When he spoke, his voice was low, dragged from some deep grave.
“Rumiel. The Fallen Star.”
There was something in his tone that made her heart stutter. She turned to him, seeing the shadow of indignity etched across his face.