Chapter 12: The Appraisal Begins

The scent of polished wood and aged parchment lingered in the air as the main hall's double doors opened with ceremonial weight. Sunlight streamed in through the high arched windows, illuminating the dust motes dancing in the silence.

The Duke of Azar stood tall beneath the high ceiling, flanked by servants in immaculate livery. His posture was regal, his hands clasped behind his back, but his expression was taut with veiled impatience. The only hint of his recent outburst was the slight tremor in his fingers—barely perceptible, but present.

A carriage had just arrived, drawn by a pair of midnight-black horses. The insignia on its side bore a radiant sun pierced by a scepter — the seal of the Imperial Arcanum Registry.

The door opened, and a man descended.

He was tall, gaunt, and dressed in deep blue robes, his form wrapped in subtle enchantments that shimmered faintly in the light. Thin gold embroidery traced the edges of his sleeves — delicate symbols of appraisal magic. His gaze was sharp, pale eyes almost colorless, like sun-faded parchment.

"Appraiser Claudius, Master of the Third Circle," the steward announced solemnly, bowing low.

The Duke stepped forward, his voice oily with performative courtesy. "Ah, Master Claudius. The Azar estate welcomes you."

Claudius gave a slight bow, his movements slow and precise. "Duke Azar. I come as summoned, with the sanctioned rites and seals of appraisal. You wish confirmation of divine aptitude?"

"Yes." The Duke's mouth curved faintly. "The last child of the house. A necessary formality."

Claudius nodded. "Show me to the subject."

"Of course," the Duke said, gesturing toward the corridor with a graceful sweep of his hand. "She is being prepared."

As they walked down the echoing corridor, Claudius's eyes flicked to the intricate carvings along the walls, the portraits of long-dead ancestors glaring down with hollow pride. "May I ask the age?"

"Ten. Barely," the Duke replied. "A late assessment, but the circumstances are… unique. She is not of my wife's bloodline."

Claudius gave no outward reaction. "I see."

They continued in silence, their steps soft against the carpeted halls. When they reached Lunaria's wing—the shadowed, tucked-away side of the mansion—the contrast was immediate. The air was colder here. Less maintained. Fewer windows. As though the house itself wanted to forget this part existed.

The Duke turned to the nearest maid. "Is she ready?"

The maid bowed hastily. "Y-yes, my Lord. She was instructed to sit quietly, as ordered."

"Good. Bring us in."

The door creaked open.

Lunaria sat by the window, small and still, her back barely straightened despite the bruises layered beneath her thin, clean blouse. The fabric clung to the half-healed welts that the Duchess had so recently torn open. Her silver eyes flicked upward as they entered—first to the Duke, then to the stranger in blue.

She felt the air shift again.

The presence of the man was different than anyone she'd met before—cold, clinical, but humming with latent power. She sensed it without understanding it.

Claudius's gaze fixed on her, assessing her already before a single word had been spoken.

"Sit straight," the Duke snapped softly. "You're about to be examined. Do not disgrace me further."

Lunaria shifted awkwardly, trying to obey despite the ache in her body. Every movement sent fresh stabs of pain rippling through her ribs and spine. Her fingers clenched in her lap to keep herself from flinching.

Claudius stepped forward, pulling a small silver box from beneath his robes. He opened it, revealing a thin wand of bone-ivory, etched with runes that pulsed gently with heatless light.

"Do you understand what is about to happen?" Claudius asked calmly, watching her.

Lunaria blinked. She shook her head once.

"It is a reading," he explained. "To determine whether the divine blood runs within you… or whether you are as mundane as the house fears."

She flinched at his bluntness. The Duke's mouth twitched in irritation but didn't object.

Claudius held the wand lightly in one hand. "I will pass this near your skin. Do not resist. Do not speak. Just sit and breathe."

Lunaria nodded silently.

"Relax," he said, though his tone lacked any warmth.

But how could she relax?

Her shoulders were tight, her wounds stung beneath the fabric, and her heartbeat thundered painfully in her ears. She could still feel the phantom touch of the iron rod, the Duchess's voice echoing in her skull.

She wasn't prepared. She didn't know what this was supposed to feel like.

But she sat there anyway, eyes unfocused, hands balled into fists in her lap.

The wand began to glow faintly in Claudius's hand.

The first pass neared her chest.

And Lunaria felt something shift deep inside her—like a door slightly ajar, like something ancient stirring beneath her ribs.

Something was watching.

Something waiting.

Claudius's ivory wand passed over Lunaria's chest, the delicate runes along its length humming with faint pulses of light.

At first, there was nothing unusual.

A soft resonance—low and dormant—responded to his probing. Subtle, quiet, almost hesitant. The kind of reaction typical in those with minor aptitude or the vague touch of divine blood.

Claudius continued, meticulous in his movements. His fingers turned the wand delicately, guiding the runes over her collarbone, her shoulders, then tracing gently down the air around her arms.

Lunaria sat stiffly, barely breathing.

Her muscles ached, her skin prickled. The strange sensation of the wand brushing her aura sent a crawling feeling along her spine, like something was stirring under her skin—not pain, not magic exactly, but something darker. Deeper. Ancient.

Claudius's brow knit slightly. The wand's light flickered—a dim pulse.

Then again.

A sharp vibration buzzed through his grip.

He narrowed his eyes and brought the wand closer to her abdomen. The moment it hovered there—a wisp of something cold slipped from beneath her skin like smoke.

It was faint. Fleeting. Barely more than a flicker, like a shadow writhing beneath water. But unmistakably real.

Claudius pulled the wand back slightly, frowning deeper.

Lunaria felt it too—the strange, chilling flutter in her chest, like something had stirred just beneath her ribs in response to the wand's proximity. The shadows in the corners of the room seemed just a bit darker now, as if watching.

A low pulse of dark energy throbbed beneath her skin before fading again into silence.

Claudius turned toward the Duke, face unreadable.

"…Something," he began, slowly, "has touched her."

The Duke's eyes narrowed. "Touched her? Elaborate."

Claudius lowered the wand entirely now, tucking it back into its case. "There is divine resonance—I cannot deny it. But it is… strange. It's not any deity registered in the Circle's known pantheon. No light signature, no elemental domain I can identify. But it isn't a false reading. She is… marked. Deeply."

The Duke's jaw tightened. "Then who? Which god has interfered?"

Claudius shook his head. "I do not know. There are no matching divine frequencies. It's not celestial, not infernal. The nature of it is obscure… twisted. Obscured by shadow. Whatever god or force has claimed her, it lies outside our current comprehension."

The silence that followed was heavy.

"She has a blessing, then?" the Duke asked slowly, voice low.

Claudius gave a tight nod. "Yes. Unquestionably."

"Then write it down. The House of Azar will not be shamed by weakness, no matter how cursed the form."

Claudius paused. "I will write my findings. But understand—this is not ordinary divine inheritance. It is other. Warped. Wild. A dormant potential perhaps… but one that may not bend to mortal order."

The Duke waved him off with a flick of his wrist. "As long as the damn record says 'Blessed,' then let the rest rot in ambiguity."

Claudius bowed stiffly and turned to leave.

Lunaria, still seated, stared blankly ahead.

Her heart beat slow and heavy in her chest. Not from fear—but from something darker. Something warmer. A thrumming echo beneath her ribs, as if something had stirred at the appraisal's touch and now refused to settle again.

She had felt it—something responding from within her. Not a spell. Not magic. Something colder. Hungrier. Watching.

Her fingertips trembled as she stood on shaky legs. No one spoke to her as she was dismissed, and the maid who escorted her avoided meeting her eyes entirely.

She followed the corridor back in silence, numb to the ache in her bruised limbs, her thoughts still tangled in the appraiser's words.

"Blessed… but twisted."

She was still trying to understand what it meant.

Was it a mockery? A curse in disguise? Or… something more?

The walk back to her wing of the house felt longer than usual. The light filtering through the windows had dulled, dimmed behind a slow-moving blanket of gray clouds. Shadows stretched farther across the floor now, pooling in the corners, reaching up the walls like ink spills.

Her bare feet moved across the stone floor softly. She had long since stopped trying to make noise. The silence clung to her like a second skin.

By the time she reached her room, the house was already beginning to settle into dusk.

She paused at her door.

The knob felt cold in her palm. Her silver eyes lingered on the wood grain for a moment longer than necessary, remembering how just days ago the Duchess had shattered the door open in a rage. The bruises still lingered beneath her shirt.

She entered.

The air inside her room was still, untouched. The faint scent of pressed parchment and blood still clung to her pillow where she'd lain for days. The tiny brooch Elowen had given her still sat on the windowsill—unpolished, but radiant.

Lunaria crossed the room slowly and collapsed onto the bed. Her legs folded beneath her, eyes blank as she stared up at the ceiling.

Twisted.

Blessed.

A god unknown.

Her fingers curled slowly around the brooch. Its thorned metal edges pressed softly into her skin, grounding her as her heart continued to beat to that low, haunting echo in her chest.

The shadows in her room seemed just a little more alive tonight.

And deep beneath her skin… something stirred again.

Lunaria's eyelids grew heavy as she lay curled in bed, the weight of the appraisal, the words "blessed but twisted", and the lingering pressure under her ribs lulling her into uneasy sleep.

The coldness came first.

Not the kind that clung to her skin, but a deeper cold—a hollow chill in her lungs, her bones, her soul. It swept through her like mist, muffling her senses until the weight of her body felt distant and unreal.

Then… everything went black.

Not the comforting darkness of sleep. This was deeper.

A void.

An all-consuming, bottomless black stretching endlessly in all directions. No floor, no ceiling, no sky. Just a dimension of infinite emptiness. But even in that emptiness, Lunaria felt watched—not by eyes, but by a thousand voiceless whispers brushing against her consciousness like fingers stroking glass.

Her bare feet floated just slightly above the ground—or where ground should have been. Every movement she made sent ripples of shadow pulsing beneath her, as if even the void itself responded to her presence.

The silence was maddening.

Thick. Dense. Alive.

Her breaths echoed in her ears unnaturally loud, each inhale swallowed into the void without sound.

Then—a whisper.

Soft.

Feminine.

Velvet-thick and serpentine.

"Lunaria…"

She froze. The whisper didn't come from behind or in front, but from everywhere at once—inside her head, beneath her skin, in the very air she breathed.

"Lunaria Azar…Daughter of Silence… Child of Shadows…"

Something began to move in the distance.

The void rippled, and in its center, shadows twisted and coiled upward, forming a mass of flowing ink-like tendrils that danced in slow motion. From their movement emerged symbols—strange runes, sharp and flowing, like ancient language etched in liquid onyx. They hovered in the air before her, burning with a cold, silver light.

Lunaria's silver eyes widened as she stepped closer—drawn by some invisible tether.

The moment she neared, the air thickened around her. The very shadows pulsed in response to her presence, curling protectively around her ankles and wrists, winding gently like a lover's embrace. Her heartbeat slowed. Her breath stilled.

It didn't feel threatening.

It felt… welcoming. Familiar.

The symbols flared once more, and a voice echoed louder now, more resolute and resonant—as if spoken by countless mouths layered over one another.

"Nyxara… Goddess of Shadows and Secrets."

The name etched itself into Lunaria's mind like a brand. It echoed through her bones, vibrating with a resonance that matched the strange pulse beneath her skin—the same thrum she had felt during the appraisal. Her knees weakened, and she dropped to them, staring upward as the mass of shadows twisted further, taking shape.

An ephemeral silhouette stood at the heart of the black vortex.

Not entirely humanoid—its form was flowing, ever-shifting, a figure cloaked in living darkness. Only the eyes stood out—two radiant silver flames, piercing through the void like moons in a starless sky.

The silhouette spoke.

"You are mine, little one…"

Lunaria trembled.

"Born from shadow, marked by silence… the world will not understand you. But I… do."

She couldn't speak. Couldn't breathe. The very gravity of this being pressed against her soul. She felt her essence peeled open, memories flashing behind her eyes—the abuse, the blood, the loneliness, the bitter ache that had rotted beneath her skin for so long.

"You were made in the dark… and it shall protect you."

At those words, the ground beneath her—if it could be called that—blossomed into a ring of thorned black roses, their petals made of shadows, their thorns sharp as obsidian.

One bloomed at her feet, pulsing like a heartbeat. Another wrapped around her ankle gently, curling up her leg like a ribbon. She felt no pain, only the promise of something older than time.

"You have suffered, Lunaria… But you are not broken. You are blooming."

The figure raised its hand—its fingers elongated and shimmering like liquid obsidian—and pointed to her chest. A pulse of black light surged outward from the center of Lunaria's sternum, a soft thrum of acknowledgment.

The shadows around her rose and swirled in slow, deliberate patterns. Whispered words—secrets not meant for mortal ears—slipped into her ears like silk:

"Secrets bind. Shadows shield. You belong to me now."

"You are my vessel… My child…"

"When the time comes… they will see what they tried to bury."

The shadows surged, encasing her in a cocoon of soft, cold smoke, cradling her gently like a womb of black silk.

"Remember my name… Nyxara."

The voice faded… but the name remained.

Burning.

Branded.

Etched in her soul.

And then—she woke up.

A sharp knock against her door startled her from sleep. Her eyes snapped open to the blinding light of day, her chest rising and falling with uneven breaths.

Sweat clung to her brow, her hair plastered to her forehead. Her bedsheets were twisted around her limbs like vines.

Another knock—harder this time.

She blinked slowly, disoriented. Her body still trembled slightly, her pulse thudding against her throat like the echo of that surreal voice.

"…Nyxara…" she whispered under her breath, almost afraid to say it aloud.

She sat up slowly, brushing a trembling hand across her chest.

She didn't know what that place was… but it wasn't just a dream.

And now, with a name—Nyxara—the puzzle began to take shape.

Her divine blessing… it had never been meant for the House of Azar.

It had belonged to something far older.

Something darker.

And it was watching.

Always watching.