The air above the dais begins to distort, the fabric of the world thinning beneath her control as she reaches for the echo-plane. It responds as it always does—distant, vast, waiting just beyond the veil.
The opening forms gradually, a controlled tear that widens under her direction. Cold seeps through first. Then space. Endless and empty, ready to receive whatever she chooses to send into it.
Lara holds it there, her power steady as the pull of the echo-plane brushes against the Memory Orbs, tugging at them, urging them toward the threshold.
All she has to do is release them.
Finish what she was assigned to do.
Claim what she was promised.
Seren’s voice surfaces, uninvited and unrelenting.
I give you the opportunity to be the kind of mother I wish I had.
Lara’s focus tightens, narrows.
The opening flickers, then steadies again as she adjusts her grip on it.
Her gaze remains fixed on the Orbs.
You told me it was men who forgot our power…
The words settle more deeply this time.
… but I think it is you who has forgotten.
Lara exhales slowly.
Stupid child.No one questions her like this. No one gets under her skin and into her marrow the way Seren has. Seren does not allow Lara the comfort of self-deception.
The echo-plane remains open before her, waiting.
So does the future she has been offered.
Land in Nymeris.
Authority.
A place that belongs to her.
A place where the witches can preside without threat.
Perhaps even raise their witchlings.
Her mother’s choice rises in her mind, unwanted but clear—a life given up so that Lara might have one at all. A chance to exist beyond survival. To build something of her own.
This is what she made of it.
She stands in a vault built on stolen memory, holding open a path that will ensure it remains that way.
Her hand lowers slightly. Not enough to close the opening. Just enough to weaken its pull.
You told me to belong to myself. And you? It looks like you belong to the highest bidder.
Lara growls under her breath.
Her magic shifts. It reorients. Not toward the tear in the world—but toward the Orbs themselves.
