"Mama… is the Wall really made of blood?"
Gaius's voice came softly, barely audible beneath the shrieking wind that clawed at the shutters like a thousand broken fingers. His mother didn't speak right away.
Instead, she reached out, fingers stiff with cold, and pulled him tighter beneath their worn, patchwork blanket. Her movements were slow, deliberate—protective. Her other hand trembled slightly as she clutched his head to her chest, stroking his hair with the practiced rhythm of someone trying to keep herself calm more than the child.
Her eyes never left the hearth. The flames inside had burned low, casting long shadows that danced like ghosts across the cracked wooden floor.
Then the scream came.
Not human. Not animal. Something in between. Or something far, far older.
It scraped across the wind like metal over bone.
The boy jerked back in fear, arms wrapping around his mother's waist.
She didn't flinch. She simply exhaled—slow and controlled—her fingers still moving through his hair.
"Tell me the story," he whispered again, burying his face in her chest. "Tell me how the Wall was made."
She closed her eyes.
Her chest rose and fell in a single steady breath before she opened them again. Then, slowly, she lifted her chin. Turned her head toward the flames. Let their dying light paint the hollows of her cheeks gold.
She began to speak—not softly, but with the weight of memory.
---
"When the Devil and his angels fell..."
Her lips barely moved, but every word dropped like stones into silence. Her hand found the edge of the hearth, gripping it as if to steady herself.
"They didn't fall quietly. They burned."
She turned slightly, her fingers twitching as she reached toward the boy and tapped two of his trembling fingers.
"They tore the sky open, child. Heaven turned away. But Earth…" she looked out the window, eyes narrowing at the wind-blurred darkness.
"Earth welcomed them."
She shifted on the floor, pulling her legs beneath her, movements practiced but slow—one elbow bracing against the wall, the other still protectively around her son's shoulder.
"Stripped of wings, broken and burning, they crawled from the craters. Starving. Soulless. Searching for something they could never name."
She looked down at him now. Her fingers came to rest on his chin, tilting it upward.
"And then… they saw us. Women."
The boy blinked up at her, lips parted.
"Their love was not gentle. It was fire and teeth and domination. And from that… monsters were born."
Her voice dropped. She leaned forward, her hand gripping the boy's shoulder tightly now—not to soothe, but to steady herself.
"Not angels. Not demons. Something worse. Something that remembered both."
---
She shifted again—leaned her back against the wall, legs drawn up, boots scuffed and still caked in last week's frost.
"At first," she said, her voice turning harder, "they fought beside us. Their cursed sons. They killed the ones who sired them. Helped us burn back the night."
She spat on the floor.
"But poison always finds the heart again."
Her hand lifted, fingers flexing as if holding an invisible thread, and then closed into a fist.
"They wanted more. Our lands. Our skies. Our children."
---
Gaius whimpered.
He buried his face deeper into her side.
"And then?"
She was already standing.
She rose in one fluid, silent motion. No hesitation. No wasted movement. Her hand trailed along the stone mantle as she turned, one foot planting firmly in front of the other—weight shifted, eyes focused.
"Then we found her." Her hand opened at her side as if recalling a ghost from memory.
"The last witch."
She crossed the small room in three quiet strides, lifted a rusted lantern from its hook, and placed it gently on the floor beside the door. The metal clinked.
"Velmara. The Pale Flame. The Woman Who Walked in Ashes."
She crouched by the door now, hand resting against the cold wood.
"She didn't speak. She didn't beg. She opened her wrists."
She mimicked it now—slowly drawing an invisible blade across her arms.
"And from her blood... The Wall was born."
---
The boy was staring at her, eyes huge.
She turned—sharply. Knees pivoting. Hair falling across her cheek. She took two strides back toward him and crouched low again.
"It was not stone, child. It was alive."
Her hand extended—flat palm against the floorboards as if feeling a pulse in the ground.
"It screamed as it rose. Veins burning with the last light of the gods. A thousand miles of living, bleeding flesh."
She stood again.
One slow breath. Then another. Eyes narrowed. Head tilting.
She whispered:
"It split the world in two. Us on one side. Them on the other."
---
A shift in the wind.
Something clicked.
The mother stilled. Her eyes flicked to the window. Her hands curled slowly into fists.
The wind wasn't screaming now.
It was… singing.
A lullaby. Wet. Crooked. Close.
She moved.
Quickly this time. She reached for the door. Slammed the iron latch shut. Dragged the heavy oak table across the threshold with both hands, boots digging into the floor. Her breath came short, harsh. But she didn't stop.
"Mama?" The boy was on his feet now. "Is the Wall still holding?"
She turned. Slowly.
Her chest rose with a long, shuddering breath.
She smiled. Barely. Brokenly.
"Yes, my love,They say the Wall still holds… but I heard it groan last night. Like it was waking up."
---
BOOM.
The door exploded inward. Wood splinters flew like shrapnel.
The mother threw her arm out—shielding the boy. Her body twisted, dragging him behind her. She did not scream. She moved. Fast. Precise. Final.
A knife was already in her hand.
She stepped forward, feet apart, blade pointed at the thing in the doorway.
It wasn't human.
Tall. Ethereal. Limbs too long. Skin pale as frostbitten ash. Its head tilted. Eyes bottomless, rimmed with smoldering gold.
And it smiled.
Its teeth were wrong.
---
She lunged. Steel flashing in the firelight.
The creature moved first.
A blur. A soundless rush. Faster than thought.
One cut. Clean. Merciless.
She fell before her knees could even fold.
Her blood sprayed across the boy's face.
She hit the floor with a sound that would echo in his mind forever.
"Mama?" he croaked, voice shattered.
Gaius didn't scream. He just couldn't. The sound was trapped in his throat like a stone too heavy to lift. He stared at her hand—the one that had tucked him in, held him warm—now lying palm-up, fingers twitching in death.
---
The creature stepped forward. Each step deliberate. Slow. Like a god descending a broken throne.
It crouched before the boy. One hand reached out—long fingers curling toward his face.
Its breath stank of death and old, holy war.
Then it spoke.
"The wall is gone, little lamb."
Its jaw split wide. Too wide. A mouth that should not exist.
And it swallowed him whole.
---
By midnight, the cities burned.
Kings died whispering prayers that no one heard.
The gods watched.
And at last, the last of the pure-blooded understood—
No wall can hold back what was once your blood.
---
[End of Prologue]