Ava
Morning came without color. The sea outside the window did not move, and the air was heavy with the echo of something that had not ended. The people of Havenscove walked the streets with quiet steps, avoiding my shop, whispering behind their hands. The light that had bled across the sky had frightened them, but not half as much as what they saw in me.
I tried to work. The herbs needed drying, the tinctures needed mixing, but every time I reached for a jar, the glass trembled. The Veil hummed faintly through the walls, alive and uneasy. I could feel it in my pulse, in the ache behind my ribs. The shop no longer felt like home. It felt like waiting.
Oliver sat by the window, his hands folded in his lap. He looked pale but calm. "Mama?"
"Yes, love?"
"He remembers you," he said softly.
My heart faltered. "Who does?"
"The man from the sea."
"Elijah?"
He nodded. "He said you are almost ready."
Before I could ask more, the world shifted.
It began as dizziness, a pulse of heat behind my eyes, then a rush of sound. The room dissolved. The air thickened, warm and damp, carrying the scent of rain and smoke. When I looked down, the wooden floor was gone. Stone stretched beneath me, slick and cracked. I stood in another time.
The ruins of Eldryn rose around me, towers broken, walls swallowed by vines. Rain fell from a bruised sky. And there, at the heart of it all, stood two figures.
A woman with silver eyes and dark hair, her hands streaked with blood. A man made of shadow and light, his eyes the color of molten gold. Alara Morgan and Elijah Varyn. The first bond.
They did not see me. I was only a witness, caught in the memory of the Veil itself.
"Stop this," she said, her voice raw. "You will tear the worlds apart."
Elijah smiled, and the rain hissed as it touched his skin. "They were never meant to be divided."
"You do not understand what you are doing."
"I understand enough," he said. "If we are divided, I am not whole."
Her hands trembled. "Then you were never meant to be."
For a moment, silence hung between them, heavy as the storm. Then he stepped forward, cupping her face in his hands. "You think I do not see what they see when they look at you? Light. Salvation. But I see the truth. You are the flame, Alara. And every flame needs something to burn."
Her eyes glistened. "Then let it be me."
He kissed her.
It was not gentle. It was the kiss of endings, the kind that seals a fate rather than changes it. The world around them began to tremble. Light burst from their joined hands, spreading like fire through the rain. The air tore open. I felt it, the pull between them, love and ruin in equal measure.
Alara's voice broke through the roar. "I am sorry."
Elijah's eyes widened as she pressed her hand against his chest. The mark on her skin blazed bright, and the light poured through him. The Veil formed from their blood, silver and black swirling together, sealing the sky with pain and mercy.
His last words were a whisper. "Do not let them forget."
Then everything went white.
---
I woke screaming. The scent of smoke and iron filled my lungs. Casimir was beside me, his arms around me, his heartbeat wild beneath my hand.
"Ava!" His voice was sharp with fear. "You were not breathing."
I clung to him, shaking. "I saw them."
He went still. "Who?"
"Alara and Elijah. The day the Veil was born." I pulled back enough to see his face. "They were us, Cas. It was our faces, our voices."
He looked stricken, his gaze distant. "I have seen it too."
My breath caught. "What?"
"In my dreams," he said quietly. "I stand in the rain. She presses her hand against my chest. I feel her heartbeat fade as the light takes her. I feel the Veil closing. And every time, I wake with her name on my lips."
"Alara."
He nodded. "And her face looks like yours."
The words hung between us, heavy and impossible. The air trembled softly, the bond between us pulsing like a wound reopening.
Before either of us could speak again, the door opened. Nicholas entered, carrying a bundle of old scrolls. His expression was grim.
"These were sealed in the royal archives," he said. "I broke the lock."
Casimir frowned. "What are they?"
"Records from before the first fracture. Drawings. Prophecies." Nicholas unrolled one across the counter. The parchment crackled softly. Two figures stood inked in fading lines, Alara and Elijah, the marks on their skin glowing in gold leaf that had not dulled with time. The resemblance was undeniable.
"They look like us," I whispered.
Nicholas nodded. "Because they are. Or rather, because you are their echo." He turned the page to reveal a single line written in ancient script. "The heart must break for the Veil to hold."
I stared at the words until they blurred. "What does that mean?"
Nicholas met my gaze. "It means the Veil was never built to last. It feeds on love, on sacrifice. Every generation, it chooses two souls to repeat the pattern. The light and the shadow. The heart and the heir."
Casimir's voice was quiet, steady. "And this time, it chose us."
Nicholas nodded once. "The world has no mercy for echoes."
Silence settled over the room. The only sound was the faint hum of the Veil outside, deep and distant, like the sea breathing through the cracks of the world.
I walked to the window, my hand pressed to the glass. The horizon still glowed faintly, the thin line of silver light where the Veil had torn. "If their love destroyed the world," I said softly, "what will ours do?"
Casimir came to stand beside me. His reflection met mine in the glass, shadow and light, side by side. "Maybe finish what they began."
I turned to him. "And if it kills us?"
He smiled faintly. "Then at least it will mean something."
I reached for his hand. Our fingers brushed but did not fully entwine. The marks on our skin shimmered faintly, answering each other's light.
"Then let it echo," he said. "Let it end with us."
Outside, the wind shifted. The sea moved again, slow and uncertain, as though remembering how to breathe.
---
Casimir
The storm had returned by nightfall. I stood on the cliffs, the rain cold against my skin. The Veil pulsed faintly across the horizon, a wound in the dark sky. The sound of the waves carried whispers that were not waves at all.
Elijah's voice drifted through the wind. "You cannot escape what was written."
I closed my eyes. "Then I will rewrite it."
He laughed softly, the sound like breaking glass. "You will try. They all did."
I opened my eyes to the sea. The reflection of the moon rippled over the water, fractured into a thousand pieces. I could see my face there, and behind it, his. For the first time, I realized they were almost identical.
"Tell me," I said quietly. "When your world ended, did you love her still?"
The wind whispered back. "I always did."
The reflection faded, leaving only my own shadow staring back. I turned toward the town. The lights of Havenscove flickered faintly in the distance. Somewhere beyond them, Ava slept, her heartbeat a steady rhythm against the storm.
The past had begun to speak through us, not as ghosts, but as memories desperate to be remembered.