The chamber was still, heavy with the silence of centuries.

  Selene stood before the crystal statue, her golden eyes tracing every detail she already knew by heart.

  Her father, Iwein LeFaye, half-elven, his features fine and noble, forever locked in the moment of embrace. His arms encircled a woman whose beauty was both breathtaking and terrible: her mother. Her wings stretched like carved obsidian, bat-like and immense. Her fangs jutted from parted lips, and her long hair spilled like frozen midnight down her back. Her face was a storm of contradictions—rage, desperation, and a silent plea carved into crystal.

  Her father’s stance spoke of defiance even in stillness. One hand clenched as if to draw a blade that was no longer there, the other locked around his wife as though he could anchor her with sheer will. His eyes, caught forever in the crystal, burned with both grief and determination.

  Between them hovered the Dragon’s Heart. Its surface throbbed with crimson light, and as Selene drew closer, the pulse quickened. The glow licked across the statue, filling the cracks in her mother’s wings, glimmering against her father’s clenched jaw.

  Selene’s own pulse quickened in answer. Her lips parted in awe. It’s reacting.

  “Grandmother,” she whispered, then louder, unable to contain her delight. “Grandmother, do you see? That’s a good sign!”

  A firm hand settled on her shoulder. Morgan LeFaye stood behind her, robes trailing like midnight shadows, her silver hair unbound. Her presence filled the chamber without effort, the weight of a legend in every breath.

  “It is a sign,” Morgan said, her voice steady. “But only the first of many. Do not mistake a flicker for a flame.”

  Selene turned, excitement bubbling in her chest. “If this is only the beginning, then I’ll scour every tome, every ruin if I must. A few years of research—”

  “There will be no need.” Morgan’s tone was calm, almost casual. “The spell you seek is already known to me.”

  The joy in Selene’s chest curdled into anger. She stepped back, fists tightening, and the torches flickered as her power surged uncontrolled. Shadows twisted unnaturally, her golden eyes flaring with streaks of red. The faint tang of sulfur coiled in the air.

  “You knew?” she hissed. “All this time—you knew? And you said nothing?”

  Her aura rippled outward, edged with something darker than Vaylora, a whisper of demonic inheritance straining at its leash. The torches guttered out one by one, swallowed by her aura. The crystal beneath her feet warped, seams cracking as if her fury might split the tower apart. For a heartbeat, shadows writhed into the suggestion of horns curling behind her head.

  Then Morgan’s power struck like the ocean overturning a ship. Selene’s chest caved under pressure that was more than weight—it was like chains clamping down on every limb, dragging her toward the floor. Her ears rang, vision tunneling. Even her Gift, wild and furious, recoiled against the force that had commanded armies and ended empires.

  Morgan’s eyes narrowed. Her power unfurled with the inevitability of a tidal wave. Vaylora rolled off her in a crushing flood, a storm that made the tower groan.

  The city felt it.

  In the colosseum, an orc gladiator froze mid-swing, his axe halting an inch from his opponent’s skull. Neither moved, both staring wide-eyed as the sand rippled beneath their feet.

  On the outer wall, a werewolf hunter stopped mid-step, claws dug into the stone as his ears flattened against his skull. His keen nose filled with the reek of power, so sharp it drowned even the scent of the forest. He lowered his spear, tail rigid, a growl trapped in his throat, though he dared not let it out.

  Down at the harbor, the waters heaved as if pulled by a storm. Leviathans broke the surface, scales glistening in sunlight, their roars shaking the ships tethered at the docks. Sailors dropped to their knees, clutching rigging and prayer beads alike, while the sea itself seemed to bow.

  In the vampire quarter, a matron’s goblet cracked in her hand, blood running down her pale wrist as her eyes dilated in terror. She dropped to her knees before she even realized she had bowed.

  In the red-light district, illusions shattered like glass. Lantern-lit fa?ades of pleasure houses flickered, revealing bare stone and tattered cloth beneath the glamour. A nymph gasped as her skin dulled from radiant glow to mortal pale, while a fox-eared courtesan clutched her tails.

  Even in the demon quarter, where vice and violence thrived, silence fell. A horned pit-fighter, mid-swing with a jagged blade, found his arm locked in place as if the air itself had turned to iron. Around him, the gamblers and onlookers lowered their eyes, every infernal smirk wiped clean by the weight pressing down.

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  In the school halls, candles flared and books ripped free of their shelves, pages scattering like startled birds. Children shrieked as chalk scrawled frantic words across slates of its own accord. A teacher slammed her palms to the desk, forcing her Vaylora outward, but even she trembled as her knees bent unwillingly.

  In the ward of the Phoenix, a healer’s flame faltered just as he held it above a wounded soldier’s chest. The patient gasped, thinking his life was slipping away, until the flame steadied again, smaller, subdued.

  At the dwarven forges, molten metal cooled mid-pour. A master smith cursed as his hammer slipped, sparks guttering into darkness. Around him, apprentices dropped their tools, staring at their own hands as if suddenly made weak. The great bellows wheezed to a halt as if the forge itself dared not breathe.

  In the green heart of the forest district, the great trees groaned and bent toward the Clock Hand Tower. Elves fell silent in their rituals, their voices catching in their throats as leaves shivered and branches bowed. A priestess pressed her forehead to the bark, whispering prayers through clenched teeth.

  And even in the free zone, where no single race held sway, laughter died in the taverns and dice rolled to a stop mid-cast. Mercenaries exchanged uneasy glances, hands hovering near blades but never drawing. For one heartbeat, the air itself seemed to demand reverence, and none dared to disobey.

  At last, Morgan eased the storm, drawing the flood back into herself with the calm of a tide retreating.

  “Control yourself, child,” she said coldly. “Or I will control you.”

  Selene’s chest heaved, sweat dampening her brow, but she stood tall. “Why hide it from me?”

  Morgan’s face did not soften. “I did not hide it. There was no need. The spell exists, yes—but it is impossible to perform.”

  Selene’s nails dug into her palms. “Impossible?”

  Morgan lifted her hand, gesturing toward the crystal statue. “The spell requires seven. Seven Gifted of dragon’s blood, bound by something deeper than blood alone. Bound by covenant. Seven extraordinary souls, powerful enough to stand against the tide of madness. Only then can the spell undo what has been done.”

  Morgan’s voice lowered. “Those seven can only be drawn from the old bloodlines of the First Coven. Most are lost, scattered, diluted. Even if they were not, such a covenant is more likely to kill than bind.”

  Her gaze was final. “That is why I never told you. Because it was impossible.”

  Selene’s eyes widened, her heart stuttering. Seven.

  Not one or two to shoulder the burden, but seven — each harder to find than the last. She thought of the bloodlines she’d read about in hushed, forbidden texts: names etched in the margins of history, whispers of witches whose veins had not yet thinned. Were they truly all gone? Or were they hiding, buried in villages that no longer remembered their legacy?

  Selene clenched her jaw, thoughts racing. If they live, I’ll find them. If they sleep, I’ll wake them. And if they’re gone… then I’ll make new ones.

  Selene turned back to the crystal. Her father’s eyes, her mother’s plea, frozen forever in that tragic embrace. Her throat burned, but when she faced Morgan again, her voice was iron.

  “I am a LeFaye. Impossible is just a mild inconvenience.”

  The Dragon Heart pulsed in fierce agreement, crimson light staining her pale skin. Selene raised her chin, golden eyes blazing.

  Her gaze lingered on the statue—on her mother’s face, frozen in rage and grief, on her father’s arms locked in desperate embrace. She remembered being a child, pressing her small palm against the cold crystal, promising silently that she would not leave them there forever. That promise rang now like iron in her chest.

  “My path is clear. I will hunt the old bloodlines. I will find the sleeping veins and wake them, even if I must bleed the Dragon Heart itself to do it. If the spell demands seven, I will give it seven. If it demands a coven, I will make one to rival the First.”

  Her staff materialized in her hand, humming with power as though the city itself had heard her oath.

  Morgan said nothing. Her expression was unreadable, half-pride, half-warning.

  Selene’s words echoed against the stone: “I’ll bring them back.”

  Far beyond the sealed chamber, at the city’s colossal gates, a different figure approached.

  The stone doors loomed impossibly high, carved with every creature known and unknown, each detail alive in the torchlight. Two Titan Orcs flanked the gate, their weapons like trees. The line of petitioners stretched long, winding through the wild forest road that led here.

  A man with a broad smile and a plain, forgettable face walked past them, humming softly, two cloaked companions in tow. The knights at his side shifted uneasily, their hands never straying far from their blades.

  “Your Highness,” one whispered under his breath, “this is folly.”

  The second knight, older and broader, gave a sharp snort. “He won’t listen. He never does. Best pray Morgan herself doesn’t smell us before we’ve even crossed the gates.”

  The disguised Crown Prince only grinned wider, his plain face stretching into a boyish smile that didn’t match the steel in his eyes. “Alleve’s Hallow,” he said, voice light, almost giddy. “At last. Let’s see if the stories are true.”

  The younger knight swallowed. “Stories are stories, my lord. Best left untold.”

  The prince’s smile sharpened. “Stories only matter until someone writes a better one. Why shouldn’t it be me?”

  The gates loomed closer, carved beasts staring down with unblinking eyes. The Titan Orcs stepped aside, letting the strangers pass beneath the archway.

  For all the wards woven into the threshold—wards that stripped away glamours, illusions, and hidden weapons—his disguise did not falter. The plain face remained, the humble cloak unchanged.

  The werewolf at the booth watched them closely as they strode past. Visitors were nothing unusual—pilgrims, traders, mercenaries—all came seeking coin or sanctuary. But strangers who carried themselves with the ease of men who belonged? That was rare.

  He let them pass; after all, Alleve’s Hallow did not fear armies or kings. Only fools would test the walls while Morgan LeFaye still drew breath. Yet his senses prickled. He reached for the rune-carved slate at his side and scratched out a terse report. Odd newcomers. Three. One plain-faced man who smiled too easily.

  The message vanished in a flicker of blue light, carried to the watchers within Clock Hand Tower.