The contours of his face take shape, carved by the years of famine.I trace the shaggy waves of his hair and the thin, pale lips that once curled with a mischief the plague couldn’t kill.
My hand stills, the coal hovering as I reach his eyes—not the ones frozen in fear by the terror of his end, but the ones that once sparked alongside his grin.
The trance snaps, leaving me staring at the page.A perfect crescent sits within his eye, a mark I have no memory of making.Confusion stings, demanding an answer the room refuses to give, while the air turns heavy and clotted with a familiar, cold presence.
“Why him?”The whisper is a ragged thing, nearly choked by a grief I can no longer cage.In the corner, the shadows writhe and knot, coiling like a reprimanded child retreating into the dark.
Nothing answers.Instead, they move closer—black tendrils sliding over my knees, offering a silent, cold apology.The cool touch against my skin ignites an unwelcome memory, a sharp image from a time when the world was still whole.
“Da?”My five-year old voice is a tiny, fragile sound.I’m sitting on his lap, tucked against the warmth of his chest, hidden from the cold bite of the Hollow outside.He’s reciting one of his old stories, but his gaze is drifting, lost in another time or place.
“Da?”I ask again, my little hand tugging at the collar of his grey shirt.His eyes focus, his pupils anchoring on my face.The twinkle returns—a distant star in a cloudy night sky.Then, his mouth turns downward as he finishes the end.“The old gods don’t give, my sweet,” he says, tucking a loose strand of hair behind my ear.“They only take.You musn’t give them what they want.”
The memory dissipates like smoke from a pyre.
The pyres.Sylas.
The thought jolts me upright.I have to go—I have to see him before the fire claims him for good.Before it’s too late.
I shove my sketchbook into the satchel with reckless force, the pages buckling under my haste.My knees skid over the wood as I crawl toward the loose floorboard.The plank protests with a sharp creak before I heave it aside.I grab the coins, the weathered sketch of Da, the onyx ring, and the wedding band—the only tangible ghosts I have left.
A low, predatory growl echoes in my stomach as my body finally demands its due.When did I last eat?The memory stabs at me; the scrap of beetcake shared with Sylas.My throat tightens—the taste of it now a bitter reminder.
I jam a fist into my stomach, as if the pressure alone could strangle my appetite.It only makes the hunger bellow.I pillage the cupboards, stuffing the scant remains—a hardy carrot and a tin of beans—into my satchel.It isn’t enough, but there is no more time.
Slinging the bag over my shoulder, I catch Yara’s on my way out.My palm anchors to the door frame, the woody fibres biting into my skin as I force myself to look back one last time.
Sylas’ bed is a hollow of grey sheets, still rumpled from where the Scav’s heaved him away.Next to it, the beetcake remains untouched, a tiny monument to a future that died an hour ago.
I failed him.I failed Da.The thought settles over me like ash.
A single tear stings my cheek as I turn, stepping through the door and into the dark.
8
SEREN
The straps of the bags dig into my shoulder the higher I climb.Roots and gravel crunch underfoot, and the occasional stray pebble skitters into my boot.
The roar of the Hollow fades with every step, smothered by the clammy earth and the thick, spongy bloom of fungal growth.Without a sky to signal the end of day, the dark only bleeds deeper into every crevice, coaxing the shadows to stretch and coil—a perfect shroud to vanish into.
Below, lights flicker to life, an endless, fractured sea of stars glowing within a hollow imitation of a night sky.A sky I have yet to meet.
The cliff path winds its way toward the only great hill anchored in this chasm we call home.Pantheon’s Peak—a name carried through the ages, its history warped by every generation that whispers it.
Some believe it was the cradle of the Veiled One; others say it once housed the three goddesses purged in the Cleansing.Its true purpose is a void, but we cling to the frayed threads of these fables as if they could save us.
I never believed any of it.Not until now.
The sparse scrub gives way to corpse-candle trees, their gnarled trunks blackened like ancient charcoal.They grow in mournful circles, taunting us with the effervescent glow of the Death Apples.One bite of that fruit ignites a rot in your marrow, a searing heat that turns your blood to liquid fire until it weeps from every orifice.
A shiver claws down my spine as I pick my way through the fruit littering the path.This place holds its memories like a scar that refuses to fade.
Images of Sylas darting through the trees, a stolen piece of fruit in hand, flicker in my mind.For a heartbeat, my lip quirks—until the pit in my chest yawns open, turning his laughter into a hollow, haunting echo.
I sink to my knees, buckling under the gravity of his absence.The damp earth clings to my skin, and the shadows uncoil, wrapping around my shoulders like a living shroud.They are the architects of this ruin.I should claw them off—but I don’t.I surrender to the dark, letting it hold the pieces of me together.
The world narrows down to this single, jagged point in time.I knew the moment I left the house that my goodbye would be here, in the shadow of Pantheon’s Peak, where our happiness once felt as solid as the stone around us.
