A few hours ago.
The gray fog pressed in from all sides, soundless and still. Vencian stood between fragments of shattered ground that hovered weightless in the void.
His head pulsed from the memory that refused to fade. The same whisper kept circling in his thoughts—the taste of genesis in your veins.
He turned when Quenya's voice cut through the haze.
"Take your hands off Lucian."
Her tone carried something sharp enough to split the air.
The figure holding him—skin etched with rust-red runes, hollow cavity where a heart should have been—staggered back. The light seeping from its cracks flared once before dimming. Dust spilled from its mouth as it spoke, voice grinding through its own decay.
The weight pressing on Vencian's chest lifted. He gasped, dragging air into his lungs like he had forgotten how to breathe.
A heat pulsed from the pact mark at his wrist. It crawled up his arm, burning through the haze of confusion that had been clogging his mind.
