The journey to Vael'Ruun took seven days.
Seven days through scorched earth and haunted silence.
Each step forward felt like a descent—not into a place, but into a truth Kael had spent his life running from.
On the eighth morning, they stood on the Edge of the Forgotten—a jagged cliff overlooking a chasm of blackened glass, where the ocean had once roared.
No maps marked it. No birds sang above it.
And yet, the air shimmered with presence.
Ezren whistled low. "Looks like the gods struck this place and missed."
Lilwen stared over the edge. "No… they didn't miss. They sealed it."
Below them, buried under layers of obsidian rock and broken time, the ruins of Vael'Ruun stirred.
And Kael felt something inside him wake up.
The path down wasn't natural.
The stone moved beneath their boots, reshaping into steps as if recognizing him.
Seraphine held his hand tightly. "You okay?"
"I'm not sure what I am right now."
When they reached the bottom, the wind stopped entirely.
The silence was thick, heavy—as if the city beneath still held its breath.
And then Kael touched the Veilfire crystal the Ember Witch had given him.
It pulsed.
He knelt and pressed it to the blackened earth.
And the world split open.
A roar of flame. Screams. Chanting.
Kael stood—not in ruins, but in a city alive.
Vael'Ruun, gleaming with spires of obsidian, hung in a perpetual twilight.
Demon banners snapped in the wind. Great halls shone with flame-colored sigils.
And in the center tower, Kael saw her.
A woman with hair like molten silver and eyes like his own.
She stood at an altar, holding a baby wrapped in dark velvet.
"He will be the last, and the first," she whispered. "Born of fire and shadow. My son. My Kael."
The image shifted—time bleeding forward.
The child grew, laughing, running down halls filled with light.
But then…
Darkness came.
Not war. Not fire.
Something else.
A rift tore through the skies over Vael'Ruun.
Unseen beings, made of nothing but hunger and silence, descended.
The demon lords—the true ones—fought. Kael's mother led them, wielding a blade made of starlight and sorrow.
The Hollowed Ones could not be killed, only sealed.
So they made a pact.
A Veil, bound in blood and flame.
Kael, still a child, was taken to the altar of Unmaking.
Not to die.
But to be marked.
His soul became part of the lock.
And his memories were erased.
"When the Hollowed Ones rise," a voice said, "he will return. He will remember. And he must choose—gate or guardian."
Kael gasped.
He fell back from the vision, trembling.
Seraphine caught him. "What did you see?"
He stared at his hands. "My mother… my real mother. She wasn't a werewolf. She was the high priestess of Vael'Ruun."
Ezren leaned forward. "You mean—your stepmother—?"
"She loved me. Raised me. But she's not the one who birthed me."
Lilwen's eyes were wide. "Then your bloodline…"
Kael nodded. "Is older than Velkaris. I'm not just heir to a throne. I'm heir to the flame that sealed the Hollowed Ones."
Veyra rubbed her arms. "But why erase your memory? Why hide you in a werewolf court?"
Kael's voice was hoarse.
"Because if the Hollowed Ones knew where I was… they would've come for me."
In the center of the ruins, they found the altar from the vision.
Cracked. Silent.
And embedded deep within it—
A blade.
Black metal veined with silver flame.
Runes in a forgotten tongue spiraled down its hilt.
Kael stepped toward it.
The moment his fingers brushed the grip, the runes
ignited.
And a voice filled the air:
"Welcome home, Kael of Vael'Ruun. You who were forged to seal the end."
Seraphine stared. "What is that blade?"
Kael drew it slowly. "It's called Varenth. The soul-bind. My birthright."
But as he held it, his chest ached.
Because now he understood:
This blade could seal the Hollowed Ones again.
Or it could tear the Veil completely.
And he was the only one who could choose.
That night, while the others slept in the hollowed halls of Vael'Ruun, Kael walked alone.
He stood beneath a shattered archway, blade in hand.
And he heard it again.
The voice from the mirror.
"You've found the blade. Good. Now open the gate."
Kael spun around.
A figure stood at the edge of the ruins—shrouded in a black cloak, their face obscured by a silver mask shaped like a screaming flame.
Kael lifted Varenth. "Who are you?"
The figure didn't move.
"I am the echo of what you were. The shadow of what you'll become."
A flash of pain pierced Kael's head. Visions. Flame. Screaming.
He stumbled.
The masked figure tilted its head. "You are not ready yet. But soon… you'll beg to open the gate."
Then it vanished—like mist.
Kael fell to his knees.
His thoughts spiraled—memories half-awake, truths half-formed.
He had been made a lock, a weapon, a key.
He was never meant to live freely. Only to seal or unmake.
But Seraphine's words echoed:
"You're more than your past. You're what you choose to be."
He gripped the blade.
And whispered to the dark:
"I will not be your puppet. I will choose."
And far away, deep in a place beyond the Veil, something stirred.
A mouth with no lips stretched wide.
A whisper of hunger bloomed like a wound.
"Let him choose. The gate will open either way."