CHAPTER 81: THE DEEP CALL

The light faded, but the silence did not.

Elena stumbled to her knees, one palm pressed hard against the ground as she gasped for breath. The chamber had returned—or some echo of it—but the stone felt wrong beneath her hand. Warmer. Smoother. Like bone rather than rock. The symbols had dimmed, but they hadn’t vanished. They pulsed faintly in the corners of her vision, no longer demanding attention, just... waiting.

Leon stood at the basin’s edge. The girl was gone. Or changed. It was hard to say. In her place, a shimmer hovered, the shape of a child in outline only—light folding inwards, as if reality itself had thinned there.

He didn’t move. Not yet. He looked older. Not in face, not in form. But in weight.

Elena rose. "Leon."

His head turned slightly, but his eyes never left the shimmer. "I remember."

"What did you see?"

He answered, slow. "Not what. Who."

The shimmer pulsed at that.

Leon stepped back, the contact broken. The shape flickered and then burst—no light, no sound, just absence. As if it had never been. But something remained in the air.

A pull.

He turned to Elena. "The monastery wasn’t built to guard something. It was built to contain. And the ones who built it? They failed."

She shook her head. "Then what was the child?"

He looked down at his palm. There was a mark there now. A ring of thorn—closed. "A key. Or a promise. Maybe both."

A tremor ran through the stone beneath them. Subtle. Rhythmic. Not of collapse. Of awakening.

From the far wall, a door cracked open—a narrow split of black between ancient stone. No hinges. No handle. Just invitation.

Leon started toward it.

Elena grabbed his arm. "You’re not going alone."

He didn’t argue.

Together, they stepped through.

—

The passage beyond was nothing like the ruins above.

The air was colder, but cleaner. The walls shimmered faintly—not with light, but with memory. Shapes and figures danced along the edges, like shadows cast from another time.

Voices whispered. Some cried. Some prayed. Some screamed.

Leon didn’t flinch.

He kept walking.

Because at the end of this path, the Eye was waiting.

And it was time to ask what it wanted.

—

The corridor narrowed until they had to walk single file. The stone was darker now, almost blue, and laced with veins of something crystalline that pulsed faintly with each step. Elena kept one hand on her sword hilt, the other tracing the wall beside her. The whispers were louder here—recognisable, almost.

Names.

Old names.

"Do you hear them too?" she asked.

Leon nodded. "They remember us. Even if we don’t remember them."

A turn in the path revealed a larger chamber—circular, ringed with statues. But none were intact. Every face had been chiseled out, defaced beyond recognition. The centre of the room held a dais. Upon it, a mirror—tall, wide, black as void.

No frame. No reflection.

Leon approached. The air around the mirror buzzed like a struck bell. Elena stayed back, jaw tense.

"This is it?"

"This is where it speaks."

The Eye wasn’t behind the glass. It was the glass.

Leon placed his marked palm against it.

The mirror rippled. Not outward. Inward.

A voice came. Not a sound. A presence. Felt first in the chest, then behind the eyes.

Ashblade.

The name pressed through him, heavy and warm.

He didn’t respond.

The voice continued. You carry the thorn. You remember the gate. But do you carry choice?

Leon’s throat was dry. "Choice died with the monastery."

No. The mirror pulsed. It sleeps.

A figure formed within the glass. His own shape—but older, cloaked in cinders and ash, with eyes that glowed white like twin suns.

Elena stepped forward. "That’s not you."

"No," Leon said softly. "That’s what I become. If I choose wrong."

You must choose, the Eye said.

Leon lowered his hand. "Not yet. Not without knowing what it means."

The Eye fell silent.

Then a single tear of light rolled down the mirror’s surface.

It struck the ground.

And from it, a seed grew.

Not a tree. Not a plant. A blade.

Black steel. Red hilt. Wrapped in binding runes.

Leon stared.

Elena touched his arm. "What is that?"

Leon didn’t answer.

Because the blade knew his name.

And it whispered it back, over and over.

Witness. Witness. Witness.

He reached toward it slowly, his fingers brushing the hilt. It felt warm—not heated, but alive. With memory. With choice. The runes flickered as his hand closed around it.

And the mirror shattered.

Not into shards. Not into dust.

It collapsed inward, spiralling into itself like a star devoured. The chamber shook. The statues groaned. Elena drew her blade.

"Leon—"

He didn’t move. His eyes stayed locked on the sword in his hand. It pulsed with each breath he took, as if syncing with him.

From the ruins of the mirror, something stepped out.

A figure. Not shadow. Not flesh. Smoke held in form. Horns curled backward from a narrow skull. No mouth. No eyes. Just a single, flickering ember in its centre.

It looked at Leon.

Then bowed.

Elena raised her weapon, confused. "What the hell is that?"

Leon’s voice was calm. "A sentinel."

The figure turned toward her.

Leon raised his hand, and it stopped.

"It won’t harm us. Not unless we break the oath."

Elena blinked. "What oath?"

Leon turned to her. The runes along his new blade flared bright.

"The one I just accepted."

The sentinel stepped aside, revealing another doorway—this one of fire and glass, suspended in nothing.

The path forward was no longer stone.

It was choice.

Leon looked back one last time.

Then stepped through.

And the sentinel followed.

—

The fire did not burn.

It parted around Leon’s frame like steam through cold breath, brushing his armour without heat or pain. Beyond it lay a skyless expanse, endless and suspended, as if the world itself had been turned inside out.

The floor was not floor. It was memory given shape. Endless waves of frozen moments, glimmering faintly like starlight trapped in glass.

Elena emerged behind him, breath shallow. "Where are we now?"

Leon scanned the nothingness. "The Eye’s mind. Or its prison."

Far off, at the edge of vision, pillars floated. Not standing—drifting upright, swaying like kelp in deep water. Each bore a symbol. Not just arcane. Personal. He saw one etched with his father’s crest. Another bore Elena’s house seal. A third... was blank.

The sword in his hand pulsed.

Then, from the air itself, a voice.

There is no choice without weight.

A pulse shook the ground.

And from the blank pillar, something began to form.

A new crest. Not royal. Not noble.

Just a single black thorn.

Leon stepped forward, eyes narrowing. "That’s mine."

The runes on his blade flared white.

And the pillar cracked open.