CHAPTER 238: HOLLOWED ONE

Zane slammed the door shut and twisted the lock. His chest burned, his ears rang, but all he could hear was the laughter and whispers echoing in his head.

He pressed his back against the wood, sliding down until he sat on the floor. His hands shook. "Why me... why always me..." he muttered. His reflection in the crystal still haunted him—blank, empty, like he wasn’t even there.

Knocks came. First soft, then firm. His cousins. His mother’s voice. Even his father once.

"Zane," Selena called, her tone sharp but trembling beneath.

He said nothing. Not a word.

He refused them all.

The curtains stayed shut. He didn’t want to see daylight, didn’t want the warmth of the sun. He felt like he didn’t deserve it. Meals were left at his door, but most went cold. The smell would eventually drift into the hallway until a servant carried them away.

Time blurred. Days into weeks.

Sometimes he would wake to his own voice whispering in the dark: "Maybe they were right." Sometimes he’d laugh bitterly at his own shadow, stretching long across the wall, the only thing that never left him.

And outside his locked room, the world was louder than ever.

"Did you hear? The Caelum boy... nothing came out when he touched the crystal."

"A Hollow... in the bloodline of stars?"

"Even the slums are laughing. They say House Caelum raised a ghost."

The rumors crawled through markets, taverns, noble banquets. Some whispered with pity, most with scorn. Zane’s name was spoken not with awe, but like a curse.

And within his darkened room, he curled tighter into himself. The world was moving on, but he couldn’t.

He wouldn’t.