She walked south for thirteen days.
The fen gave way to forest.
The forest to scorched earth.
Then, on the fourteenth morning, she saw it —
not rising from the ground,
but clinging to it.
A ruin.
Not of stone.
Not of war.
But of fire and silence.
Tall, broken arches.
A bell tower split down the middle, like a ribcage pried open.
Vines thick as arms coiled through the nave, pulling the walls inward.
And at the center —
a well, its mouth covered with a slab of blackened wood.
No birds sang.
No wind moved.
Even the insects avoided it.
But Yrsa felt it —
not in her ears,
but in her blood.
A pulse.
Faint.
Irregular.
Like a heart wrapped in ash.
She stepped through the broken gate.
The moment her foot crossed the threshold, the air changed.
Not colder.
Not darker.
But denser — as if the silence had weight.
And then —
a sound.
Not from the ruin.
Not from the trees.
But from beneath her feet.
A hum.
Low.
Steady.
Like a woman singing through stone.
She knelt.
Pressed her palm — the one marked with the silver vine — to the cracked flagstone.
And the earth answered.
Not with vision.
With memory.
She saw:
Snow falling on a stone abbey, nestled in a valley no map remembers.
Not monks — but nuns.
Hooded. Silent. Faces pale, hands scarred with frostbite.
They do not pray to Christ.
They sing to the cold.
In a language with no name.
And when they sing, the frost on the windows moves.
One among them — Sister Lia — younger, her hair not shaved, but braided with wolf-fur.
She does not wear the habit.
She wears a tunic of white hide.
The others call her the Rememberer.
They fear her.
They follow her.
She walks the halls at night, pressing her ear to the walls.
"It's still here," she whispers.
"The Wolf.
Not in the north.
In the blood."
She finds a book — not scripture, but a ledger of skin.
Names carved into birch bark, wrapped in sinew.
Twelve names.
Twelve marks.
One is hers.
One is missing.
She begins to teach the others the Oath — not as prayer, but as binding.
"The Beta does not kneel," she says.
"She holds the line."
Then — riders.
Black cloaks.
Iron masks.
They do not speak.
They burn the gate.
The nuns do not run.
They gather in the nave.
They link hands.
They begin to sing.
Not in Latin.
Not in prayer.
In the old tongue.
The fire comes.
It does not stop at the walls.
It climbs the vines, the beams, the robes.
But the song does not stop.
Even as skin blackens.
Even as breath turns to ash.
They sing — until the last voice fades.
And the fire — instead of spreading — collapses inward, like a dying star.
And in the silence after —
from the well —
a single note rises.
Pure.
Unbroken.
And the earth trembles.
The memory ended.
Yrsa gasped — not from horror, but from the taste in her mouth:
Charred wood.
Singed hair.
And beneath it —
honey.
Like frost-melt on stone.
She looked down.
The flagstone beneath her palm was no longer cracked.
It was smooth — as if newly laid.
And etched into it:
A single rune.
Not from the Oath.
Not from the temple.
But from the nuns' ledger.
A circle.
A line.
A drop.
The mark of the Second Bloodline.
And on her forearm — where the silver vine had pulsed —
a second mark bloomed:
faint, red, like a scar just healing.
She touched it.
It was warm.
And from the well —
the hum returned.
Louder now.
Clearer.
Not a song.
A name.
"Lia."
She did not hesitate.
She went to the well.
Pried the blackened slab aside.
The shaft was deep.
No rope.
No bucket.
Only darkness.
She tied her knife to her belt.
Wrapped her cloak tight.
And climbed in.
The air grew colder the deeper she went.
Not with frost —
with memory.
At the bottom, her feet touched water — not still, but moving, like a slow pulse.
She stepped forward.
The chamber opened — not natural, but carved.
Walls lined with niches.
Each holding a skull.
Not arranged in prayer.
In a ring.
And at the center —
a stone bench.
On it:
A bundle wrapped in charred cloth.
Bound with sinew.
Sealed with wax the color of dried blood.
She approached.
Knelt.
Broke the seal.
Inside:
A book.
Not paper.
Birch bark, stitched with tendon.
Covered in runes — not carved, but written in blood.
She opened it.
The first page:
Twelve names.
Twelve marks.
Eleven crossed out — not in ink, but with a single stroke of ash.
The twelfth:
Yrsa Vaela
— already written.
Already waiting.
Her breath caught.
Then —
a whisper from the skulls:
"You are late."
She turned.
One skull — not in the ring, but half-buried in silt — moved.
Not fallen.
Not shifting.
Watching.
And from its hollow mouth —
the hum returned.
But now, she understood.
It was not a song.
It was a voice.
"We did not die," it said.
"We slept."
"The Church called us heretics.
Burned our tongues.
But we sang through the fire.
And the Blood remembered."
"We are the Second Line.
The Silent Choir.
The ones who held the Oath when no one else would."
"And you — marked one —
you are not the first to come.
You are the first to listen."
Yrsa knelt before it.
"Why me?"
"Because you carry the song of the first Beta.
Because you touched the temple.
Because you are not afraid of the dark."
"Now take the book.
Carry the names.
Wake the others."
"And when the Hollow Fang rises —
you will not face it alone."
She reached out.
Took the bark-book.
Held it to her chest.
And the skulls —
every one —
closed their eyeless sockets.
The hum faded.
The water stilled.
The mark on her arm glowed —
not silver.
Not red.
But gold.
She did not return the way she came.
She climbed out of the well.
Walked through the ruin.
And at the gate, she turned.
The vines were moving.
Not in wind.
In rhythm.
Like something breathing.
She raised the book.
Spoke one word — not in her voice, but in Lia's, from the memory:
"Vaela."
And the ruin answered.
The bell in the broken tower — rusted, split —
rang once.
A single, pure note.
That carried for miles.
Then silence.
She turned.
Walked south.
Toward the next place.
The next Bloodline.
The next name.
And behind her —
the vines bloomed with white flowers.
For the first time in three hundred winters.