The deeper Aria walked into the forest behind Kael, the more the world around her began to shift.
The trees grew taller, impossibly tall—soaring columns of bark and woven vines that seemed to stretch far beyond what gravity should allow. Pale-blue mushrooms glowed softly beneath their roots, casting rippling light across a winding path of stone and moss. Strange birds, with feathers like woven silk and eyes that blinked sideways, watched silently from the branches above.
Every breath Aria took felt heavier, not with suffocation, but with significance. It was as if the very air of this world carried memory.
Kael moved silently ahead of her, like a shadow trained by centuries of purpose. His cloak never caught on root or branch, and he didn't so much walk the forest as glide through it. Every few moments, he would glance over his shoulder, not impatiently, but as if he were measuring how much of the old world still clung to her steps.
"Does this path ever end?" Aria finally asked, her voice a little more breathless than she liked to admit.
Kael paused beside a natural arch formed by two trees grown into one another. "It ends when you stop seeing it."
She frowned. "What's that supposed to mean?"
He gestured toward the ground. "The path shifts based on your will. Doubt it, and you lose it. Trust it, and it will carry you where you need to be."
Aria folded her arms. "And if I trip on a rock and fall on my face? Was that also my will?"
A faint smile tugged at Kael's lips—just a flicker, gone almost before it appeared.
"There's a saying among the forest sentinels," he said. "The path may cut your feet, but only to make you notice where you're going."
She shook her head. "You all talk like poems."
"We talk like survivors."
They moved again, and the forest shifted with them. At times, it narrowed into tight passages with winding ivy and glowing insects like fireflies made of crystal. At others, it opened into wide clearings where ponds shimmered with mirrored skies that didn't match the one above.
Hours seemed to pass, though the light didn't change.
Then, at the edge of one clearing, Kael stopped.
"Stay behind me," he said, lowering his voice.
Aria barely had time to ask why before the air around them changed. It wasn't just colder—it felt... aware.
From the other side of the clearing, a figure emerged. At first, she thought it was human, wrapped in tattered white cloth and robes that dragged through the soil. But then it lifted its head, and she saw its face.
Or rather—she didn't.
It had no features. Just smooth porcelain skin stretched over an elongated head. Where eyes should've been, there were lines of ink, swirling in endless loops.
"Is that—?" Aria whispered.
"A Watcher," Kael said grimly. "It guards the Veil."
"The veil of what?"
"Between the waking world... and the silent one."
The Watcher raised an arm. A long, pale limb extended, with fingers like quills dipped in ink. It pointed directly at Aria.
"The girl bears the scent of crossing," the Watcher's voice echoed in their minds. "The gate has chosen. She walks with fractured threads."
Aria stepped closer to Kael, instinct pulling her back. "Is that bad?"
"That depends on what the threads decide to become," Kael said.
The Watcher tilted its head slowly, then spoke again. "Her fate is not hers alone. Others now stir. The Circle must know. The Balance bleeds."
Before she could ask what that meant, the Watcher's body twisted into smoke, then reformed as strands of ink curling into the shape of a doorway—an arch of light that shimmered with layered colors.
Kael stepped forward without hesitation. "Come. We don't have much time."
Aria hesitated. "What if I don't want to know my fate?"
He looked back, his expression unreadable. "Fate isn't something you get to want or not. You're already in it."
She swallowed hard, then stepped through the arch.
The world tilted sideways.
They emerged into a chamber that seemed carved not from stone, but from petrified memory. The walls were lined with floating glyphs, each pulsing gently as though breathing in their own time. Light came from no source Aria could see—just a gentle golden haze that illuminated everything but cast no shadows.
A circle of figures stood ahead. Six, robed in different shades: crimson, silver, obsidian, emerald, pale gold, and midnight blue. Their faces were obscured, but their presence pressed down on her like invisible tides.
Kael approached and bowed with a closed fist to his chest.
"Kael of the Eastern Reach," he said. "Guide of the Pathless. I bring a soul from the other realm. The Gate of Wyrmhold has opened."
A murmur passed through the circle.
One of them, the figure in silver, stepped forward. Their voice was neither male nor female—calm, clear, and filled with ancient weight.
"Step forward, child," they said.
Aria obeyed, her legs stiff, heart hammering.
The golden-robed figure raised one hand. "Name yourself."
"Aria Winters," she said, surprised her voice didn't crack.
They repeated the name like a ritual. "Aria Winters… Winters… from beyond the Thread."
Another stepped forward. "Place your hand here," they said, motioning to a platform that rose silently from the floor.
Aria placed her hand on it.
Nothing happened for a second.
Then—
Flashes.
A surge of color, light, and sound burst into her mind. She saw images—herself as a child, alone in her backyard. The stone gate, pulsing softly behind her shed. A strange voice whispering in her dreams for years—she had always thought it her imagination.
Then she saw something else.
A city.
Burning.
And her face in the sky.
The vision stopped. She collapsed to her knees, gasping.
The robed figures were silent.
Finally, the obsidian-robed figure spoke.
"She is not just called. She is bound."
A heavy silence fell.
"What does that mean?" Aria asked.
The figure in midnight blue stepped forward. "It means your presence here will either heal the fracture... or break it wide open."
Kael helped her to her feet. "Then we should start preparing."
"Preparing for what?" Aria whispered.
The golden figure answered.
"For war."