bChapter /bb158 /b

This is the start of book two.

Eight years after Gideon’s fall

Her name had not been spoken in centuries.

It wasn’t whispered in temples, or even in hidden circles of rites and passages. Not even among thest covens who still clung to the shreds of bwhat /bbthey /bused to be before the wars, the hysteria and the deaths.

The Hollowed Queen was a name buried so deep beneath ash, ruin and fear that even the oldest witches had forgotten whether she had ever truly walked among them. Many question if she was just the shape of grief and power that had taken like a curse when the world was young.

They hadn’t buried her with stone or sealed her with iron. They buried her with silence, the kind of silence that grows over generations, settling into bones, passed down in quiet nces and deliberate omissions until the memory is nothing more than a faint echo in our dreams.

At one point, Helena had believed that the silence was holy.

She had grown up revering the magic of the Veyrathi, and she had believed in their purpose, in the strength of the bloodlines that pulsed with inherited gifts. She was once trained under a woman who still remembered how the wind could be bent with a word. A trainer who could summon fire without needing to bleed for it. She had watched them pass into death, one by one, their power vanishing with them. The girls who followed were born empty- handed and wide–eyed, still hungry for magic that could no longer be answered.

Her belief was that once Gideon had fallen, the world would change, the magic would rebnce.

For a short time, it had. Forests had begun to regrow, rivers stopped carrying ash and blood, even the sky brightened a madman’s ritual.

→ thend, no longer bound to

Serafine’s magic had healed wounds that no one else could touch, and her bond with thend pulsed visibly in every field, every stream and every living thing that was thriving again.

Children of the wolves were born without screams in their throats, some even opened their eyes, already sensing the threads of life beneath them. The Veyrathi magic was back where it belonged, within the werewolves.

But not everything was reced, that wasn’t enough.

Helena had counted them, she had spent years now traveling and jebuilding the sisterhood, gathering the scattered bloodlines. She had asked Xander bto /btake in these girls needing sanctuary who had shown even the faintest sign of magic.

There had been so many, and yet, most had nothing. No spark, no pull, and no connection to the oldnguage of the earth.

None of them were capable of shaping air, they couldn’t feel water respond to them, and when they cried, the wind did not carry their grief.

Helena had watched the disappointment bloom behind their eyes, day after day. She’s lied to them kindly and told them it woulde in timeb, /bbthat /bbthe /bmagic was slow but patient.

She had told them that they would not be forgotten, that the witches would gain back btheir /bpowersb, /bbbut /bwith every passing bof /bbthe /bmoonb, /bbher /bbcertainty /bwithered ba /blittle more.

Tonight, she hade to bask /bthe one presence they were bnever /bmeant bto /bcallb. /bShe moved through the old witches‘ bchapel /bruins bwith /bbher /bbhead /bbowed and her hands wrapped in cloth to keep the cold from biting into her bones.

The chapel bhad /bbnot /bbeen used in decades, and bit /bstood bat /bthe northern edge of the Hollow’s reachb. /bThis ce bwas /bbhalf/bb–/bbburied /bbin /bbstone /bband /bbbrambles/b, and beven /bbthe /bbirds didn’t nest here. Something in the air kept them baway/bb, /bbas /bbif /bbthe /bnd remembered bwhat /bbhad /bonce bbeen /bbsealed /bbbeneath /bbit/bb. /b

Helena came bto /bbthe /bbbroken /bbaltar /band stopped in front of bit/b. It was now crumbling bwith /bbage /band blichen/b, bso /bbshe /bknelt bcarefully/b, bpushing /bbback /bbher /bcloak. Beneath the moss–covered bfoundation/b, her fingers bfound /bbthe /bfaintest bcarving /bbthat /bbwas /bbworn /bband /bnearly bsmooth /bby time. A sigil, ba /bbbroken /bexcle bwith /bba /bme in bthe /bcenter that was bturned /bupside down.

b1/3 /b

b87/bb%/b0

The mark of the Hollowed Queen.

She felt her heart begin to beat faster from sorrow. Slowly, she reached for the leather pouch at her hip and removed the small vial from within it. Inside a single drop of blood shimmered with silver threads.

She had hoped the magic of a Veyrathi would help. She ced the vial in the center of the sigil, and she watched it slowly.

I don’te to you for power,” she said softly. Her voice caught on the words. “I don’t want glory, and I don’t want control. What I want is to give them hope. I want the girls I train to feel what I once felt. I want them to know what it’s like ito /itouch the world and feel it answer to you.”

The wind stirred outside, but the chapel itself was different, the air in there remained still.

I know and understand that you were cast out,” she went on as her fingers trembled as she uncorked the vial. “I know the stories say you devoured magic, that you hoarded it, and that you took far more than you were ever given. The thing is, I don’t believe it, I think that they were afraid of you, as people were afraid of Serafine for being Veyrathi. I think they took your name because they couldn’t bear the power that you gave to others.”

The blood poured into the hollowed groove like water does into drynd that is thirsty. It disappeared quickly and was swallowed by stone that should have been too dry to drink. Helena’s breath stilled, and she closed her eyes.”

“I don’t ask for myself. I ask for them.”

The silence deepened, and she felt it press against her chest. It was soft but unrelenting, a presence that was old and watching. It wasn’t cruel or warm, but simply aware. It was the kind of awareness that didn’t belong in mortal ces, and when she opened her eyes, she saw the sigil pulse faintly beneath her hand. It pulsed once, then again and again.

The candle beside her flickered,d though there was no wind in there, and then she heard it.

It didn’te from the air, or even the earth, it came from within.

A voice that stitches through every memory of pain and longing she had carried in silence for too long.

“You remember me.”

Helena’s hands curled into fists, and her knees ached from the stone, but she didn’t rise.

“Yes,” she whispered. “I remember.”

The presence didn’t vanish, it lingered like a shadow that stretched thin across time. It wasn’t fully formed, and not entirely distant, but it had heard her,

and it had chosen to answer.

She lowered her head to the cold stone.

“Help us,” Helena said. “Please.”

No more words came after that, it wasn’t needed. The presence did not speak again either. Something inside of the sigil though pulsed bwith /bwarmth bthat /bhadn’te from the spell. A slow, deliberate heartbeat. It was as if something beneath the chapel had stirred, not to rise, but to listen.

Helena stayed kneeling until the candle burned itself out, and when she finally stood, her knees were stiff and her hands had turned cold. bShe /bbdidn’t /blook back at the sigil, she didn’t need to.

She had woken something, The Hollow Queen, thest witch to have true power. The one person who was bound in silence and forgotten, and bwhen /bbshe /bwasb, /bthe magic of the witches faded.

bNow /bshe’s back, and there’s no changing bit/b.