He died with his eyes open, watching white fire eat the sky.
Eliar Veyne, youngest of the Binding Bloodline, better known even among his own servants as the Hollow Son, didn't scream.
Screaming was for people who still thought their lives meant something.
Eliar hadn't mattered in years—not to his clan, not to the world, and definitely not to himself.
Only one thing had ever stayed with him.
A curse.
Burned into his spine the night he turned ten.
Words from his own mother:
"Do not rise."
Now, as the Veyne estate burned, devoured by flames that didn't care whether they touched books, relics, monsters, or fake gods—
Eliar lay perfectly still.
He hadn't killed anyone.
He didn't need to.
Someone else had come.
Someone wearing a mask of salt and ash, wielding a sword that dripped curses instead of blood.
That blade didn't spare Eliar either.
It found his chest like it had been waiting for him all along.
And yet—
The curse had said
"Do not rise."
But something inside him whispered back:
"Rise anyway."
The pain that followed wasn't like waking up.
It was like being rewound.
Bones pulled themselves together with the itch of regret.
Nerves reknit from threads spun out of old sins.
His heart didn't beat—it reshaped itself, like molten metal poured into a mold.
He opened his eyes.
No fire. No ash. Silk. A cradle.
The scent of dried herbs and candlewax hung in the air.
Somewhere nearby, a woman whispered gently,
"Shhh... breathe slowly, little one."
He tried. He couldn't. His lungs were too small. His body felt wrong—tiny, soft, unfamiliar.
Not again. Not like this.
He tried to move. Failed. A weak, high-pitched cry escaped his throat.
The woman gasped.
"Oh! He's awake again! Good boy, good boy."
Warm hands lifted him. He felt her heartbeat. Her smile. The safety in her arms.
No... this wasn't a dream. He'd been reborn.
Turning his head ever so slightly, he caught a glimpse of a black-stitched crest hanging above the crib.
The Sigil of Binding:
"That which bows, obeys. That which resists, breaks."
He knew that symbol.
It was his family's.
Eliar Veyne had returned.
And this time? He wouldn't bow. He wouldn't break. And he sure as hell wasn't going to obey.