Chapter 82 – The Cloaked Witch
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The moon hung low and swollen over the Rune Coven that night, its pale light spilling like milk across the snow-laden grounds. Midnight. The hour where truth and lies walked hand in hand.
The wind moved restlessly through the courtyard, threading through cracked stone and half-broken wards that glimmered faintly along the edges of the Coven's ancient walls. A faint scent of sage and smoke lingered in the air — a sign that protective spells were still active, though faint, flickering. Somewhere deep within, the witches of the Coven slumbered, their energy drained by days of healing the wounded and reinforcing failing barriers.
And through the silence, a shadow moved.
A hooded figure slipped past the boundary stones, her movements soundless as a whisper. Beneath her black cloak, the faint gleam of runes pulsed across her hands, glowing and dying in rhythm with her heartbeat.
Selene.
Her eyes were like violet grass beneath her hood, sharp and emotionless. Each step she took was careful, deliberate — not a footstep misplaced. The guards that once patrolled these parts were gone now, killed with nothing but a single suffocation spell from her. It was almost too easy.
As she passed the garden of now withered moonflowers, her lips twitched. "Still beautiful, even in death," she murmured to herself. Her voice was soft, melodic, a deadly lullaby.
The air shifted. She could feel her target nearby — faint traces of energy, warm and ancient, prickling against her senses. The Queen was close.
Inside one of the guest chambers, Hazel stood before the tall window, her silver hair cascading freely down her back. She wore a soft nightgown — pale, delicate, unarmored — yet her eyes carried that quiet vigilance she had begun to wear since coming here. Something about the night felt wrong. The wind was too cold. The shadows too still.
Her reflection in the window flickered — for a brief heartbeat, she saw herself not as she was, but with fire burning behind her eyes, wings of light stretching out from her back. She blinked, and it was gone.
"...I'm imagining things," she whispered, though her heart told her otherwise.
The faintest knock came at her door. Three soft taps.
Her hand tensed immediately.
"Who is it?" she called.
"It's... someone who comes seeking forgiveness."
The voice was gentle, almost fragile — feminine, low, trembling slightly. Hazel's brows furrowed. Something about the tone was strangely familiar, though she couldn't place it. She approached the door cautiously, opening it just a crack.
The figure beyond the door stood cloaked in black, head bowed. "My name is Selene," she said softly. "I mean no harm."
Hazel's heart gave a strange twist at the name. Alyssa had mentioned her once — the witch who betrayed the Coven. The one who had helped Velia.
"You shouldn't be here," Hazel said carefully, her voice steady but cautious.
"I know," Selene interrupted gently. "But first, I wanted to ask... for forgiveness."
Hazel blinked, caught off guard. The woman's tone was sincere, her posture submissive. There was no malice in her face — at least not that Hazel could sense. Still, her instincts warned her to stay on guard.
"Forgiveness?" Hazel echoed.
"Yes." Selene stepped closer, lowering her hood slowly. Her face was striking — ethereal, almost otherworldly, with soft features and pale lips that barely moved when she spoke. "I have done terrible things. But I did not know the full extent of Velia's plan until it was too late. I came here tonight because I wish to make it right."
Hazel hesitated. The woman's words carried weight — too calculated to be a lie, too emotional to be rehearsed. Still…
"If you truly want forgiveness," Hazel said slowly, "then Alyssa is the one you should speak to."
Selene's smile faltered, pain flickering across her expression. "I cannot face her yet," she whispered. "Not until I've proven myself. Please, Your Majesty, I only ask for a moment of your time."
Hazel exhaled, torn between caution and compassion. "What could you possibly say that would prove anything?"
Selene's gaze lifted — cold and luminous, her eyes reflecting the moonlight like mirrors. "I know the source of the storm," she said quietly. "And what was being summoned."
Hazel froze. Her pulse quickened, fingers curling around the edge of her sleeve. "You... you know?"
Selene nodded. "It was Velia's doing. She's been preparing this for months — gathering souls, binding them to a ritual that should never have existed. The storm of the dead was the first ripple of what's to come. And the creature she's summoning—"
She paused, glancing around as if afraid of being overheard. "It is something neither angel nor demon can control. The Eclipsed One — a being that consumes all."
Hazel's mind whirled. The same name she had heard whispered days ago in Alyssa's research. She stepped forward before she realized she was moving. "You're certain of this?"
"I've seen it," Selene said. "Velia intends to use it to destroy the balance between the realms. She'll unleash it, and it will go first for the phoenix — for you."
"For me — the pheonix?" Hazel swallowed hard. Hazel was the pheonix? She had felt Hazel was different but she was the prophesied phoenix?!!
She didn't want to trust her — something about Selene's calmness unsettled her — yet this information was too crucial. Hades needed to know. Ares, too.
"Then show me," Hazel said, her voice firm. "If you know where this is happening, take me there."
Selene's lips curved slightly. "Follow me," she said, turning toward the hallway.
Hazel hesitated at the threshold, one foot forward, her instincts screaming no. Something was wrong. Selene's shadow stretched unnaturally long against the wall, bending in directions it shouldn't.
Her heart pounded. Don't move.
Just as Hazel stepped back, a sharp voice rang through the corridor.
"YOU."
The air vibrated with power.
Alyssa stood at the far end of the hall, her hair glowing faintly, eyes turned a pure, blinding white. The runes on her wrists shimmered like molten silver as she raised her stele. "Get behind me, Hazel."
Hazel immediately obeyed, retreating as Alyssa strode forward. The warmth of her magic filled the hall, pushing back the cold that Selene carried.
Selene sighed, her expression shifting from pity to venom. "You should have followed me when I asked nicely, Queen."
The facade melted away. Her aura exploded outward — dark energy rippling through the corridor, extinguishing nearby candles. The air turned heavy with the scent of ozone and decay.
"So this is how it's going to be," Alyssa muttered. "I was hoping you'd learned something from your betrayal."
"Oh, I've learned plenty," Selene said sweetly, lifting her hands. "I've learned power answers to no one."
And then the world erupted.
Alyssa moved first — her stele slashing through the air as she spoke ancient words in a tongue older than the realms themselves. "Sator Amun Revalen!" The runes around her blazed to life, forming a shield that shimmered with blinding blue light.
Selene countered instantly, flicking her wrist. "Tenebris Caelum!"
The shield shattered like glass as darkness flooded the hallway, swallowing the moonlight. Bolts of black energy streaked through the air, colliding with Alyssa's defenses.
Hazel stumbled back, shielding her face from the force. Sparks rained around her like fireflies.
Alyssa retaliated, slamming her stele into the ground. The runes lit up beneath her feet — glowing circles expanding outward in concentric patterns. "Feros Lumen!" she shouted, and beams of pure light burst from the floor, slicing through the shadows.
Selene hissed, her body twisting unnaturally as she evaded them. Her laughter echoed. "You always were predictable, Alyssa."
"And you always underestimated me." Alyssa's eyes gleamed, her hands weaving faster now, symbols carving themselves in the air. Every rune she drew left trails of blue and white, forming sigils that floated around her like stars.
Selene mirrored her movements, runes of violet rising to meet Alyssa's. The air trembled, the clash of their magic sending waves of heat and frost colliding.
Hazel could barely keep up — each spell felt like a storm unleashed. One moment the hall was flooded with blinding light, the next drowned in suffocating shadow.
Selene's voice rose above the chaos, chanting in an ancient tongue. "Mortem Venire!"
A swarm of wraiths erupted from the floor, screeching as they dove toward Alyssa and Hazel.
Alyssa raised her palm. "Divum Purgo!"
A blinding pulse erupted, vaporizing the wraiths mid-flight. The sound was deafening, the energy scorching the air. Hazel's ears rang as she fell back, gasping.
"You just won't die, will you?" Selene spat, fury twisting her face. She extended both arms, dark energy swirling around her. "Then burn with your Queen!" The cloaked rogues appeared out of nowhere, snarling.
She thrust her hands forward — a beam of violet flame streaked toward them.
Alyssa spun, grabbing Hazel and casting a shield just in time. The impact threw them both backward, slamming Alyssa against the wall. Her stele clattered to the ground.
"Alyssa!" Hazel cried.
"I'm fine!" Alyssa snarled, summoning her weapon back with a flick of her wrist. Her arm bled from the impact, but her eyes burned with defiance.
"We just want the Queen, give her to us and we'll let you live." One of them snarled.
She turned back toward Selene. "You want her?" Her voice dropped into something dangerously calm. "Over my dead body."
Then she drew a new rune in the air — sharp, jagged, ancient. "Mira Fogarum!"
The floor trembled. A thick fog rose from beneath the stones, curling and twisting until it solidified into spears of ice. Alyssa thrust her hands forward, sending the spearcicles flying.
They pierced through the attacking rogues that emerged from the shadows, impaling them mid-leap. Blood splattered across the marble, the scent iron-heavy and sharp. The remaining rogues howled, only for Alyssa to summon another wave of fog.
Selene tried to counter, chanting furiously, but one of the icy spears struck her shield, the force sending her flying backward. She crashed into a stone boulder, her head snapping against it. The world went dark around her as she slumped, unconscious.
The sudden silence was deafening.
Hazel's chest heaved. The barrier around the room shimmered faintly — and then cracked. The sound returned, the faint echo of alarms from the outer coven.
"The sound barrier's down," Alyssa said hoarsely. "Go. Find Hades. I'll hold them off."
"But—" Hazel began.
"Go!" Alyssa shouted, slamming her stele into the ground, summoning another fog wave.
Hazel didn't hesitate anymore. She turned and ran.
The night blurred around her — snow and trees and broken wards flashing by as she sprinted through the coven's outer fields. Her heart pounded in her chest. Behind her, she could hear howls — inhuman and hungry.
The rogues had recovered.
She stumbled, gasping, her lungs burning. A shadow leapt over her — a wolf, massive and snarling, its eyes glowing yellow. She barely dodged its claws, rolling across the ground. The snow beneath her was stained with blood from fallen witches.
Another wolf lunged. Hazel grabbed a sword from a dead rogue, slashing upward. The blade connected, slicing its side. The creature yelped but didn't fall.
"Come on," Hazel whispered to herself, steadying her stance. "Come on!"
The wolf charged again. She sidestepped, slamming the hilt of her sword into its jaw. But as she turned to run, another wolf tackled her from the side, its teeth sinking into her leg.
She screamed — pain exploding through her as blood poured freely. Hazel swung her blade wildly, slicing through the wolf's neck. It fell, twitching.
Panting, trembling, she forced herself up. Her leg burned, every step agony, but she kept moving.
"Almost there," she gasped, spotting the faint glow of torches in the distance — where Hades and the others were stationed. She tried to run faster, but the world was spinning, her vision blurring.
Then a silhouette appeared ahead — tall, broad-shouldered.
Gavriel.
His smile was slow, mocking, his eyes glowing faintly in the dark.
"No…" Hazel whispered, stumbling back.
He vanished.
And then pain.
A blur of movement — faster than her eyes could follow — and his fist connected with her jaw. The impact sent her crashing to the ground, snow exploding around her.
Her sword slipped from her hand.
The last thing she saw was Gavriel standing over her, his expression unreadable, almost pitying.
"Sleep, Queen," he murmured. "You've run enough."
"H—Hades."
Darkness swallowed her whole.