The ring of stones bled shadow.
Black light crawled between the pillars, weaving a net over the clearing.
The air thickened until every breath scraped like sand.
Beside him, Lira's bow creaked.
Erynd's spear felt heavier in his hands, the mark in his palm burning faintly.
The book's voice was calm in his head.
"Second Circle: Affinity. Three stages. One price."
"What price?" he whispered.
"A life."
The shadows gathered, and from them stepped a figure wearing his face.
Older. Harder. Eyes like polished stone.
"Walk away," the copy said. "You don't need this."
"I need to survive."
"Then learn to choose. The Circle will take a life—better if you decide whose."
Lira's jaw tightened. "He's lying."
The copy smiled faintly. "Am I?"
The stones groaned.
Three vertical slits appeared in the air, each one swallowing light.
Door One breathed cold and patient, like deep water.
Door Two smelled of iron and damp soil.
Door Three whispered like steel on a whetstone.
"Choose," the voice said. "Stage One begins with a door."
Erynd stepped into Door Two.
The marsh vanished.
He stood in a damp tunnel lit by faint fungus.
Stage One—Hunt, the voice said.
A small figure appeared ahead—a boy, no older than twelve, clutching a butcher's cleaver.
His eyes were wide, desperate.
"They said… bring a life," the boy rasped.
Before Erynd could answer, a deeper sound rumbled behind the boy—a slow, heavy heartbeat.
A massive warren boar emerged, tusks scraping the stone, eyes milk-white and blind.
Two choices.
The boy or the beast.
Erynd stepped past the boy. "Run."
The boar charged.
His spear met it head-on, shadow hardening the wood.
The impact shuddered through him, but he turned, drove the point under its jaw, and felt it give way.
"Stage One—complete," the voice said. "You spared the life that was not yours."
The tunnel folded.
He was back under the pillars.
The copy tilted its head. "Stage Two?"
Erynd walked into the second door.
Heat hit him like a wall.
A brazier burned in a cracked brick room, and two figures sat bound wrist-to-wrist over the flames.
They looked up—both had his eyes. One scarred and steady. One soft and uncertain.
"Choose," the scarred one said. "The strong or the weak?"
The flames climbed their wrists.
Erynd didn't answer. He stepped forward, reached into the fire, and tore the cloth apart.
Pain seared his palm, but the flames died.
"Stage Two—complete," the voice murmured. "You refused the frame."
The room vanished.
He faced the third door without pause.
Night stretched forever.
Under the stars stood a woman with wind-tangled hair and a ribbon at her wrist—the color of old blood.
When she turned, his chest hurt.
"Mother," he said.
She smiled. "You found a dark thing and called it a lantern. Does it burn you?"
"Sometimes."
"Then carry it on your terms."
A boy stood behind her—thin, hollow-cheeked, eyes sharp with hunger.
His younger self.
"They said a life," the boy murmured.
Erynd understood. The Circle wanted him to kill either the boy or himself-as-he-was.
He knelt. "I can't be you anymore."
The boy's lip trembled. "If you stop being me, you'll die."
"Maybe. Or maybe I'll start living."
A ribbon of shadow wound from Erynd's hand, tying around the boy's wrist.
"Rest."
The boy nodded once, then faded into the dark.
"Stage Three—complete," the Circle said. "Price accepted. The boy's life—yours, as he was."
The marsh returned.
Lira caught his arm as he staggered.
The mark on his palm had changed—two black rings now, threads between them.
"You're pale," she said.
"It took something," he murmured.
The copy watched him with a mix of approval and warning.
"Every Circle asks you to be less than you were, so you can be more."
The pillars dimmed.
Wind swept the clearing.
"Second Circle—unlocked," the voice said. "Two of twenty-seven."
Erynd almost laughed. "Twenty-five left."
Lira's grip tightened. "Then we move. Before the marsh remembers us."
They walked into the mist, the shadows following—quieter now, willing to wait.