My journey home felt longer than usual. I'd gotten so used to running around rooftops and using my Grapple Cord that walking on the pavement made me feel like a snail. Fortunately, the estate was actually safer than it usually was. All the thugs have been driven back into their holes by the increased police presence, which meant that it was safe to walk around and not feel the need to constantly look over your shoulder or be ready to run at the sound or sight of trouble. I had to keep reminding myself that I was just plain old Alex, that I couldn't face off with any goons, and that I might be tough at night with all my gear, but in the daylight, I was still just a scrawny teenager with a bullet hole in his shoulder.

  Despite the lack of criminal presence, I still felt a certain level of paranoia, like I was being watched. I think the constant pain from my shoulder was making my anxiety even worse. I was sweating from the light walk home and I’d been unconsciously clenching my teeth so hard that my jaw ached. The pain was constant and every step seemed to jar my shoulder and make it worse. By the time I was close to home, the whole limb felt like it was going numb.

  As I got to my street, I looked over my shoulder and saw the pigeons. I'd noticed them as I was walking, but now I was definitely sure they were following me. I imagined they were probably the Pigeon King's feathered followers, here to keep tabs on me maybe, or did they have something more sinister in mind? I wasn't sure, but I made a mental note to keep my Wrist Rocket and a few Bang Rocks with me from now on, and I'd give these pigeons a nasty shock if they tried anything.

  I walked into my flat, double-locked the door behind me, grabbed a glass of water, and went straight to the medicine cabinet. I popped a handful of pills and washed them down with cold water. I sighed and closed my eyes, willing the pills to take effect. I limped to my bedroom and locked my bedroom door behind me, drew the curtains tight, and then fished around for the Codex under my bed. I pulled the book and the blood red candle out. As I drew the book out I felt the unnerving sense that it had been waiting for me.

  I dusted it off, took it back to my desk, and then set it down. I hesitated. My hands began to shake. I looked at the candle, my nostrils flaring and my pulse raced. I sat the candle on my desk, paused, and then lit it. It sparked to life immediately, the flame devouring the wick hungrily, and the bright orange flame danced and flickered. I don't know why, but the candle made me feel more reassured and more settled. I swallowed, took another deep breath, and looked at the Codex again. I could almost feel the glee radiating from the book. No, that was stupid. Books couldn’t be gleeful. I’d studied this damn thing for two years but now… the book felt like it had a presence, like I'd awoken something in it. But this was my only source of power. I had no real power of my own; I was nobody, really. It was the book that had given me the ability to do all that I had done so far, and I'd need the book if I wanted to push further. If I really wanted to take the fight to the Syndicate, I needed to unlock its secrets.

  I flicked a single bead of sweat from my brow, closed my eyes for a second, and listened. The room was silent. Those haunting whispers had been constantly at the edge of my consciousness, even in the daytime. Sometimes, especially when I was outside and there were a lot of other noises, I was able to block it out and ignore them, pretending they weren't there. However, when I was alone, it only took me a second to find them again. But there was nothing. I didn't know if that was a good thing or not. I stretched my neck, took a sip of water, reached out, and flipped the book open. The first page was different again; this time it was a journal entry: number 13. I wasn't sure where the other 12 entries were since this was the first page in the book, but it was in English, and I could understand it, so I slowly set about reading, diving into the mystery of the Codex.

  Entry XIII – The Hollow

  I write this now, not for the faint-hearted or the curious, but for those who would brave the Void and let it speak through their veins. This book, this collection of thoughts, bindings, and truths, is a doorway. No, it is the lock. And you, my unfortunate inheritor, are the key.

  The Hollow was no man, nor woman, nor even a soul bound by the rules of flesh. They were a conduit, a whisper carved into the frost of the world’s first breath. When the stars were young and the oceans still a dream, they walked. Alone, always alone, for what kin could they have among mortals? Their tongue carried words older than stone, yet their heart carried the curse of understanding too much and too deeply.

  I found the legend in the North, in the howling winds of a forgotten fjord where the land itself seemed to bleed memories. There, among ruins older than the mountains, I saw their mark: a spiral etched into stone, infinite in its precision, as though it had been carved by hands that did not shake with time or death. And I touched it. Fool that I was, I touched it.

  The first gift was silence, but it was not mercy. It was the silence that fills a tomb, heavy with waiting. My tongue burned, and the scream that rose from my throat was no longer my own. They spoke through me. It spoke, and I knew then that my name, my thoughts, and my path were no longer my own.

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  This book? It is not mine. It is theirs. It came to me as it comes to you now, a stranger in its own skin, a living thing of ink and vellum. I did not write it so much as it carved itself into my mind and poured through my hands. Each page is a fragment of what the Hollow left behind, yet it is not complete. It can never be.

  I blinked and rubbed my heavy eyes. What did that mean? I'd never been a good reader in school. I always found words to be slippery with too many meanings attached to them. I've never really read anything above kids' books and textbooks. It took all of my concentration just to read that short passage and even then I was sure I hadn’t read it correctly. What was the Hollow? From looking at the book last time, I thought the Hollow was the person who wrote it, whose book this was. But the way the writer was speaking about it, it seemed as if the Hollow was an entirely different entity. Whatever that mystery was, I definitely knew that I wasn't smart enough to figure it out or to even really follow what the writer was trying to say, and I didn't particularly care either. The mysteries of the universe weren't my concern; the villains of the Mulberry Estate were. I persevered and kept reading.

  I was not a mage when I began. I was a scholar, a seeker of riddles in ancient places. The world was simpler then, or so I thought, and I believed knowledge was merely the unravelling of mysteries. How na?ve.

  The Hollow was the first and greatest riddle. Their name was not spoken, for it could not be, but their essence lingered in forgotten hymns and cursed places. I sought them out, thinking myself clever. I found their trail, but it was no map, it was a spiral leading ever inward, deeper into darkness.

  When I reached the fjord, I thought myself victorious. How foolish I was.

  Magic, if it can be called such, is not light nor fire nor song as poets might tell you. It is hunger, a void that pulls the fabric of existence apart. To wield it is to let yourself be undone, to make room for the Hollow’s whisper within you. You do not command it; you merely direct it, as a river bends around the rocks of its bed.

  You will bleed. You will break. Your body will rebel against it, for it is not meant for such things. But if you survive, if you let the void remake you, you will touch power that no mortal can fathom.

  This book does not serve you. It binds you. Do not think to master it, you must surrender to it. The language within is not one you will read, it is one you will become. The first step is blood. The book must taste you, know you, before it will reveal its secrets. Let it. But never read this book without the candle. The candle keeps the shadows at bay.

  Never turn around in the darkness.

  The pages will shift. The ink will move. It will speak to you, but do not listen lightly. Each word is a shard of the Hollow’s will, a fragment of their endless hunger. To write upon these pages is to make a bargain. To read them is to become the bargain.

  Your first lesson is this: power is not given freely. Everything has its cost, and the Hollow is no different. What will it take from you? That depends on what you are willing to give and what you seek.

  But know this: the more you take, the less you remain. Once you have been seen you can never be unseen.

  Signed,

  The Hollow Tongue

  Once a scholar, now a shadow

  I felt the thrill of fear roll up my spine, making the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. My ears pricked up, listening for unknown dangers. Was that what those whispers were, the whispers of the Hollow? And what does it mean, "never turn around in the darkness"? I looked at the candle, saw it flickering, and some utterly mad temptation took hold of me to snuff it out to see what would happen. I even felt my fingers twitch towards it, but fear kept me frozen. It was similar to what my nightmare had said to me and what the Pigeon King had said about magic; it was all about trade, all about giving something to receive something. While I didn't understand much of the ramblings on the page, one thing did stick out to me: "to write upon these pages is to make a bargain.”

  Could I write on the Codex? Would it respond? I chewed on my lip and slowly reached for a pen. I pulled off the cap with my teeth and then whimpered as pain shot through my shoulder. I spat the cap out, and then gently laid my elbow on the desk, trying to not lean my weight on it. I hovered above the page, pen poised. What did I want to know? What did I want to ask the thing? And if everything was a trade, what would it want in return? What was worth knowing if I had to give something else up? Perhaps the bigger the request, the bigger the trade. That made sense to me, at least. I licked my lips and then wrote:

  "How do i lurn about more Runes?”

  I sat back, waited with bated breath for the book to do something magical, but nothing changed.

  "That was anticlimactic," I said, my voice sounding odd in the silence.

  I flipped through the pages and suddenly saw a page I'd never seen before. The page was titled "Runecraft," and underneath I saw Runes that I recognized. Even better, the entire thing was in English! I felt my pulse quicken and a smile came across my face.

  Had the book answered me?

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