Chapter 6

The seal hadn't left me.

Not truly.

Even after the duel, after the blood pact, after Cassian's broken pride, I could feel it—etched into the fabric of me. It didn't glow. It didn't burn. But it whispered. Quietly. Like memory.

Like something lost, trying to come back.

The note said: "The seal has chosen you again. The pit awaits."

I didn't know where the pit was. But Kadven is full of places that do not exist on any map. Forgotten stairwells. Locked doors. Halls that don't lead where they should.

The academy is alive, in a way stone shouldn't be.

That night, I followed the pull.

It led me below the training halls, beneath the eastern archive, down staircases that hadn't felt footsteps in years. Dust covered every step. The torches here didn't flicker—they were cold, dead stumps. I used a small light spell, weak and flickering. Just enough to see.

The deeper I went, the colder it became.

I reached a doorway made of iron. It hummed softly, not with magic, but memory. Old things had passed through here.

The door was ajar.

Not locked.

That was the first warning.

I stepped inside.

The pit was not a pit.

It was a cavern.

Wide. Silent. A wound carved deep beneath the academy. The stone was smooth, unnatural. Black veins ran through it like frozen lightning. In the center, a circular platform hovered above darkness.

Chains held it in place. Thick ones. Cracked with age, but still humming with forgotten power.

There were statues all around. Not human. Not beast. Things in between. Some crouched. Some stood tall. Their faces were twisted in agony. Or maybe worship.

I could not tell which.

I stepped onto the platform. It groaned beneath me.

Then it lowered.

The descent was long.

Long enough that I lost all sense of time.

No sound. No wind. Just the creak of ancient metal and my breath echoing in the dark.

When it stopped, I found myself in a smaller chamber. The walls were smooth. Perfect. Wrong.

And on the far side—a mirror.

Tall. Cracked. Framed in black bone.

It showed nothing.

Not even me.

A voice rose behind me.

"You came."

Not from a throat. From the stone. The walls. The air itself.

"You followed the seal. You let it mark you."

I turned slowly.

A figure stood beside the mirror. No light revealed it. No shadow touched it. Like it wasn't there at all.

"You're not real," I said.

"I am forgotten," it replied. "But not gone."

"What is this place?"

"A memory," it said. "Of what Kadven was. Before kings. Before magic wore collars."

I stepped closer to the mirror. It still showed nothing. Not even the room.

Just void.

"Why me?"

"Because you're a fracture," it said. "A crack in the surface. You don't fit the order. And cracks let things through."

My hands clenched.

"I didn't ask for any of this."

"No," the voice said. "But you survived it. And now you carry it."

The mirror began to change.

Not a reflection.

A vision.

I saw a city. Kadven, but older. Wilder. A spire where the academy now stood, taller than any mountain. Around it—shadows. Tall as giants. Crawling toward it.

I saw people bowing to something unseen, offering blood into silver bowls.

I saw fire falling from the sky. And then silence.

The image vanished.

"You saw the truth," it whispered. "Now carry it."

The figure raised a hand.

The mark on my chest pulsed. I dropped to one knee. Pain—not sharp, but endless—spread through my veins. Like frost and flame both fought for control.

Then it stopped.

I gasped, heart hammering.

"What did you do to me?"

"Awakened what's already inside," it said. "The seal was just the key. You are the gate."

"To what?"

It didn't answer.

Instead, it said one final thing: "Return to the surface. The veil has thinned. They will come for you now."

The platform rose again.

When I reached the surface, dawn had broken.

The sun over Kadven should have felt warm.

But I felt colder than I ever had before.

And far, far more dangerous.