Chapter 17: The Serpent’s Bargain

POV: Priam Lockhart

The void was not emptiness. It was a living thing—a labyrinth of whispers, memories, and hungers older than Erathia itself. Priam stood before the Abyssal Sovereign's true form, its serpentine body coiled around a dying star, each scale a window into a collapsing world. Liana floated beside it, her body translucent, the shard in her chest flickering like a trapped firefly.

"Choose," the Sovereign hissed, its voice a chorus of dead kings and forgotten gods. "Her soul for your service. Or watch her fade into my embrace."

Priam's hand hovered over the fang offered to him—a jagged shard of obsidian thrumming with primordial power. "What kind of service?"

"The kind that reshapes worlds." The serpent's maw split into a grin, revealing galaxies within. "Erathia is a speck. I hunger for more. You will be my herald… or her executioner."

Liana strained against invisible bonds, her starlit eyes desperate. "Don't! It's lying—!"

The Sovereign's tail flicked, silencing her.

Priam clenched the fang. Cold fire seared his veins, and visions erupted: cities crumbling, stars snuffed out, Seraphine's laughter drowned by screams. But beneath the horror, he glimpsed a thread—a flaw in the Sovereign's cosmic tapestry.

The shard. It's a tether, not just to Liana… but to the Hartwells' ancient pact.

He met the Sovereign's gaze. "I'll be your herald. But I want her free. No strings."

The serpent's laughter shook the void. "Mortals and their conditions. Very well. But remember: all bonds have teeth."

The fang dissolved, its power surging into Priam. His vision blurred—

The Academy's Crucible

—and he awoke in the courtyard, the Sovereign's avatar looming above. Liana lay beside him, gasping, her veins still shadowed but alive.

"What did you do?" Seraphine demanded, her dark magic barely holding back the rebel onslaught.

"Saved your damn kingdom," Priam rasped, rising. His hands glowed with alien runes—the Sovereign's mark.

Lord Garrick's rebels faltered as the Voidspawn horde recoiled, hissing at Priam.

"Kill the void-witch!" Garrick shouted, nocking another arrow.

Liana raised a trembling hand. The shard flared, and a beam of fractured light vaporized the arrow midair. "I'm not your enemy," she said, her voice echoing with dual tones—hers and something older.

Garrick spat. "You brought this upon us!"

"Enough!" Seraphine's voice cracked like a whip. "Garrick, your rebels are outmatched. Stand down, or I'll let the Sovereign finish you."

The lord's face twisted, but he lowered his bow. "Temporary truce. But when this is over, Valois—"

"You'll still be a footnote," Seraphine finished. "Lockhart. Report."

Priam flexed his marked hand, Voidspawn skittering from his shadow. "The Sovereign's bound to me. For now. But it wants more than Erathia—it feeds on realms. Liana's the key to sealing it, but…"

"But?" Roland pressed.

"It's not alone," Liana whispered. "There's something worse coming. The Sovereign called it… the Devourer of Chains."

Lucien limped forward, his shoulder still bleeding from Garrick's arrow. "Ah, so you've met its big sister. Charming family."

Lucien's Endgame

In the war room, now shared with wary rebels, Lucien unfurled a map scarred with void-runes. "The Sovereign's a pup compared to the Devourer. It's why I've been thinning Erathia's herd—strengthening the Sovereign to fight its sibling."

Garrick slammed a fist on the table. "You let cities burn as a test?"

"As a vaccine," Lucien corrected. "Better a controlled plague than annihilation."

Seraphine's nails dug into the wood. "You don't get to decide Erathia's fate."

"Neither do you," he shot back. "But here we are."

Priam studied the map. The runes aligned with Hartwell ruins—places where Liana's bloodline had sealed rifts. "The Sovereign wants me to reopen the gates. Let it devour the Devourer."

"And then it turns on us," Roland said grimly.

"Unless we trap both in the void," Liana said. Her shard pulsed, casting light on a faded ritual circle. "The Hartwells' last sacrifice."

Seraphine's eyes narrowed. "Sacrifice?"

Liana touched the shard. "Me."

"No," Priam and Seraphine said in unison.

The Calm Before

At dawn, Priam found Liana on the academy's broken ramparts, her gaze on the horizon. The rebel and Valois camps buzzed below, an uneasy hive.

"You're planning to die," he said.

She smiled faintly. "I'm planning to save you. The Sovereign's mark is killing you, isn't it?"

His runes pulsed, veins blackening. "I've had worse."

"Liar." She leaned into him, her warmth a fleeting comfort. "When I first met you, I thought you were just another noble's puppet. But you're different. You see the cracks in the world… and try to fill them."

He scoffed. "I see the cracks and fall through them."

A shadow fell over them—Lucien, his smirk tempered by pain. "Touching. But we have work to do."

He tossed Priam a voidsteel vial. "Sovereign's essence. Drink it, and you'll have enough power to manipulate the ritual. Maybe even survive."

"And if I don't?"

Lucien's gaze flicked to Liana. "Then Erathia becomes a tomb. Your choice, herald."

The Ritual of Chains

They gathered at the largest Hartwell ruin—a crumbling cathedral swallowed by vines. Liana stood at the altar, the shard's glow piercing the twilight. Seraphine and Garrick's forces formed a perimeter, blades and magic at the ready.

"Ready?" Priam asked, the vial bitter on his tongue.

Liana nodded. "Stay alive."

He drank. Agony and ecstasy tore through him, the Sovereign's power merging with his mimicry magic. The sky split, two colossal entities emerging—the Sovereign and a shapeless horror with chains of stardust.

The Devourer of Chains:

Status: ???

"Now!" Seraphine roared.

Liana's resonance erupted, the shard binding both entities. Priam channeled the Sovereign's power, weaving a prison of void and light. The Devourer shrieked, chains snapping—

And Lucien plunged a dagger into the ritual circle.

"Sorry, darling," he whispered. "But every story needs a villain."

The ground collapsed, swallowing Liana and the entities into the void.

SCENE BREAK: The Fall

Priam lunged, grabbing Liana's hand as the abyss yawned. Above, Lucien smiled.

"Till next time, herald."

They fell.