Tri-Soul
Aks’Stof stands before me, a figure carved from twilight. He is impossibly tall—lean yet powerful—his midnight robes embroidered with silver filigree that shifts like living shadows. His skin is obsidian, polished smooth as river stones, his hair pale as bone, cascading past his shoulders in silken strands. And his eyes—luminous, slit-pupil, ancient—burn with the cold radiance of a dying star. He does not look at me as a stranger. Nor as a monster.
But as something worse.
Blood. My blood.
A breath shudders loose from my lips, too shallow, too fragile. The Abyss hums, low and ceaseless, its whispers threading through the air in a language older than time. The scent of damp stone lingers, but beneath it—something sharper, metallic, bitter. The ghost of a battlefield long since swallowed by the dark. My thoughts unravel at the edges, fraying, folding into the weight of the moment.
Then—
"Granddaughter."
The word scrapes against my senses. Cold. Absolute. It coils around my ribs, tightening, suffocating. My pulse stutters. Aks’Stof watches me, unreadable, his gaze laced with something distant—regret? Pity? Or worse… understanding.
My knees falter. The world tilts. Darkness rushes forward to claim me, but before I can fall, his arms catch me. Not harshly. Not forcefully. Just there—unyielding. Steady. His touch is warm, solid in a way that shatters me more than any nightmare ever could.
No. No, this isn’t real. It can’t be.
I push against him—weak, trembling. But his grasp does not waver. The weight of truth is heavier than chains, pressing into my chest, branding itself into my bones.
"You are not alone, Elara."
The words sink deep, threading through the fractures of my resolve. I want to scream. To tear myself from his grasp, to run until the Abyss swallows me whole. But I cannot.
Because a small, treacherous part of me already knows the truth.
I have always felt different. Always sensed something buried beneath my skin, coiled in the marrow of my soul.
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And now, I know why.
Aks’Stof’s fingers move through my hair, slow and deliberate, as if tracing the strands of fate itself. The motion soothes the tremor in my breath, though my body remains brittle—fragile in a way that one wrong word might shatter me all over again.
"You are a Tri-Soul user, Elara." His voice is quiet, edged with something close to reverence. "Do you understand what that means?"
I shake my head. He exhales, the sound softer than the hush of the Abyss around us. His fingers still for just a breath before continuing.
"Your Soul magic is why you hear the echoes. Why the veil between past, present, and future frays in your presence." His thumb grazes my temple, a featherlight touch that carries the weight of certainty. "Your Soul-Echo Catalyst grants you sight beyond time—a whisper of what was, what is, and what could have been."
A chill unfurls through me. I have always felt it—the glimpses, the shadows of futures that never fully formed. But this? This is something more. Something woven in blood, in inheritance, in a power I do not yet understand.
Aks’Stof’s voice is steady, inevitable, like the turning of celestial bodies.
"Merydeth inherited my Shadow Manipulation, just as you inherited her Elemental Affinity. And..."
His fingers still, resting lightly against my scalp. The pause stretches between us, heavy, waiting.
"...Now, you bear all three gifts. The Echo, the Elemental, and the Shadow. A balance few in history have ever held."
The air thickens, pressing against my skin, humming with something ancient. Power. Mine. But not mine alone.
"The Dragon-Heart ritual did more than bind you to Merydeth." Aks’Stof’s gaze darkens, something unreadable flickering in the depths of his eyes. "It tethered you to me as well. Blood. Soul. Fate."
A shiver runs through me. I do not yet know what it means. Not fully.
But I can feel it—a thread woven into something far greater than I ever imagined. A destiny I never chose, now pulling me forward.
The air is too thick, pressing against my chest like unseen hands, squeezing the breath from my lungs. Aks’Stof’s words coil around me, sinking deep, their weight pressing into the marrow of my being.
"...Now, you bear all three gifts."
Mother knew. She had to. Every lesson, every demand—was it ever truly about my potential? Or had I always been another piece in some grand design, a role chosen before I ever had the chance to refuse?
A bitter taste rises in my throat.
"Is this why they have been pushing me to be the next Merlin?" The thought lingers, sharp and poisonous, curling in the corners of my mind.
I press my fingers into my temples, as if I could knead the tension away, as if I could stop the unraveling thread of doubt before it pulls me apart.
Who am I, really? A prodigy? A tool? Or something else entirely?
My love for Merydeth wars with the sting of betrayal, the warmth of memory colliding with the cold edge of realization. A storm brews beneath my ribs, howling, relentless. I do not know how to quiet it.
I do not know if I want to.