Peace was never meant to last—not in the House of Light.
Since the council's unraveling, the air had turned heavy with suspicion. Two factions formed: those who distrusted Kael… and those who didn't know what to believe. Whispers slithered through hallways like smoke. Loyalties buckled in silence.
Tension reached its boiling point beneath the ancestral arch.
The Seventh Elder stood, draped in the silver-trimmed robes of tradition, voice rising above the unease.
"After the recent war," he began, "it is undeniable—our enemies have returned stronger. And we… are not what we once were."
Murmurs followed. Nods. Furtive glances.
"That is why," he continued, "I place a proposal before this house: a union to fortify our ranks. Blood that binds is blood that protects."
Someone asked cautiously, "And whose blood do you offer?"
The Seventh Elder smiled, thin and poised. "Lady Lyra."
A silence fell like snowfall—silent, cold, suffocating.
Auren rose from his seat slowly, his voice quiet and sharpened by steel. "What did you say?"
"She is of age. Of strength. Her marriage can forge an alliance with House Velnar. This house's survival depends on it."
"To survive," Auren echoed, "by trading my daughter?"
"She is not just your daughter," the elder replied coolly. "She is the key to this house's future. It is her duty to—"
"To be what?" Auren snapped, stepping forward. "A broodmare?"
"She would bear the heir of two great lines."
Auren turned to the room. "Is there anyone here," he asked, voice low and dangerous, "who agrees with this filth?"
Some elders twitched, half-rising… then sat again. Silence returned.
Then the great doors creaked open.
And something in the room recoiled.
The torches near the entrance dimmed, shadows lengthening as if the very stones rejected what stepped through.
It was the ex-elder of House Velnar—disgraced, banished, but grinning like a man who'd never lost. His gaze prowled across the council, daring them to object.
He belonged to the family Lyra was meant to marry into.
He didn't bow. He simply walked forward, like rot under silk.
Auren didn't blink. He only sat again, quiet and unreadable.
The Seventh Elder allowed himself the smallest, smug curl of a smile.
Then—another door opened.
An official entered, scroll in hand. Behind him strode Daran, his presence like the clang of iron against bone. He bowed with perfect form.
"Greetings, Head of the House."
Auren stood again and took the scroll. He handed it to Daran.
"Read it," he said. "And carry out the sentence."
Daran opened the scroll.
"The first name," he said calmly, "is Elder Varn of House Velnar."
The disgraced elder opened his mouth.
Daran's blade flashed.
And his head hit the floor before the scream could rise.
Blood pooled across the polished stone.
Gasps broke the silence.
"This," Auren said, voice cold as obsidian, "is the price of betrayal."
Another name. Another strike.
The executions were swift. Merciless. Necessary.
The Seventh Elder stood frozen, pale. Daran paused by him, blade still dripping.
But his name wasn't called.
Auren turned once more to the room. "You think to use my daughter as leverage? As property? She is not your key. She is the storm you will not contain."
Lyra stepped forward then. Quietly. Gracefully.
She stood beside her father, chin raised.
No words.
But her fists clenched beneath her sleeves, the heat of rage and fear burning behind her calm eyes. Every breath cost her restraint. She was trembling not with weakness—but with fury.
In the stunned stillness, an elder whispered, almost reverently:
"She's just like her mother…"
No one dared respond.
And beneath the council floor, carved into old stone between fresh bloodstains and lingering shadows, the spiral shone faintly once more.
And far below the blood-washed floor, the ancient spiral whispered once again.
One life for another. One turn closer to what must come.