Chapter 19: The Sealed Wing
The 77th floor of Vantier Tower had been locked for over a decade.
No personnel accessed it.
No surveillance footage was stored.
No schematics listed it anymore.
To the world, it didn't exist.
But Aria remembered.
It was where her mother used to work.
"Security override confirmed," Kestrel said, stepping back from the biometric panel. "Door's yours."
Aria stared at the black double doors in front of her. They were marked with faint glyphs — old Faerondel sigils meant to repel scrying, memory, and time itself. Someone had gone to great lengths to make this floor vanish.
Damien rested a hand on her shoulder. "You don't have to go in alone."
She nodded, jaw tight. "But I will."
The doors hissed open.
Dust drifted out like smoke.
She stepped in.
Inside, the air was colder. Thicker.
Like something had been breathing in the dark all these years.
The corridor stretched long and curved — lined with old lab doors and observation rooms, each sealed tight. The lights flickered to life slowly as she walked, revealing faded Vantier emblems, cracked walls, and scorch marks. The echoes of a catastrophe.
She passed rooms filled with broken glass, shattered containment fields, melted equipment.
And then she reached the heart of it:
Research Lab Aetheris.
Her mother's sanctuary.
The door opened with a whisper.
Inside, the room was perfectly preserved — unlike the rest.
The walls were lined with shelves of runes, spellbooks, and data crystals. In the center, a small garden bloomed — glowing white flowers that never withered, pulsing with quiet magic.
Aria stepped in slowly, heart pounding.
On the desk sat an open notebook.
Her mother's handwriting.
Still fresh, as if written only days ago.
She read aloud:
"The Hollow seek to fracture the flame, but they cannot possess it without anchoring. The child was always the anchor."
Her hand trembled.
Another line:
"If I disappear, it will be because I chose to protect her. Not from death… but from truth."
Aria backed away.
Breathing hard.
A soft hum buzzed in the air.
Then—
A sound behind her.
She turned sharply, magic flaring in her fingertips.
Someone stood in the shadows at the back of the lab — cloaked, thin, head bowed.
Aria's voice cut the silence. "Who are you?"
The figure lifted their head.
And her blood ran cold.
It was a girl — maybe eighteen.
Eyes glowing faintly with golden light.
Hair tangled and wild.
Skin pale and marked with glowing lines of containment glyphs.
She looked like someone half-born of magic.
And half-shattered by it.
"I know you," Aria breathed.
The girl tilted her head.
Voice soft, trembling: "You're… the fire."
Aria took a cautious step forward. "What's your name?"
The girl blinked.
"I don't… I don't remember. They called me Echo."
The name hit Aria like a blade.
That was the codename her mother had used for a secret project — a failed vessel, a magical prototype meant to test the limits of flame transfer.
Everyone thought it had been shut down.
Buried.
But here Echo stood.
Alive.
Breathing.
Forgotten.
Aria stepped closer.
The girl flinched.
"I'm not here to hurt you," Aria whispered. "Did… did my mother leave you here?"
Echo looked down. "She protected me. From the others. From the ones who came after her."
Tears welled in Aria's eyes.
"She saved you. Even when she couldn't save herself."
Echo looked up again.
"There's fire inside you," she whispered. "It sings when you get angry."
Aria gave a faint smile. "Yeah. It's a little loud sometimes."
"I used to hear your voice… through the walls. When you cried. I cried too."
Aria's heart clenched.
This girl — this forgotten being — had been watching her. Listening. Hidden in the walls of the tower while she grew up in confusion and grief.
"How have you survived?"
"I don't eat," Echo said simply. "The magic feeds me. I dream when the tower sleeps."
Aria knelt slowly, leveling her gaze with hers.
"You're not a mistake," she said. "You're not an experiment. You're a person. And I'm going to get you out of here."
Echo's lip trembled.
"Will it hurt?"
"No," Aria whispered. "Not if I can help it."
She touched the containment runes on the girl's arms — each one etched with old Vantier security seals.
With a whispered counterspell, she broke the first one.
Echo gasped as the glyph vanished.
Light shimmered down her skin.
The air warmed.
Like a spell lifted from the floor itself.
Damien's voice came through her earpiece. "Aria. The building sensors just spiked. Magic just surged from the 77th floor. Are you okay?"
"I found something," she murmured. "No — someone. Get the med team and a full containment protocol ready. But tell them no weapons. She's not a threat."
Kestrel answered next. "Copy that. Medical is en route."
Aria helped Echo to her feet.
The girl wobbled, like someone waking from a dream.
"I don't want to go back to the dark," she whispered.
"You won't."
Aria's eyes glowed now too — fire behind storm.
"You're coming with me."
As they stepped out of the sealed lab, the lights down the corridor flared fully for the first time in years.
The dead wing stirred.
Not with ghosts.
But with the echo of something new.