The beginning of breaking the curse

Tears poured from Emilia's eyes as though a gateway to another world had been torn open a world where everything she knew had crumbled. She wasn't merely crying… she was collapsing. Her emerald green eyes trembled, and her cheeks were soaked with a silent wail she couldn't voice. Her breath came in shudders, and her heart beat like war drums in a lost battle.

Musa stood by her side, his eyes filled with worry and disbelief. He could no longer endure her silence or her collapse. He turned to Veytan, his voice hoarse and broken

"What... what did you do to her? What is she seeing?"

But Veytan said nothing. He simply stood there, like a statue carved from shadows, his gaze fixed on her unraveling with a silence that resembled vengeance.

Musa moved closer to Emilia, knelt beside her, placed a gentle hand on her shoulder, and whispered in a trembling voice:

"Emilia... I'm here. You're safe... I'm with you, just... breathe..."

But she didn't respond. She didn't see him. She didn't feel him. She was still trapped inside her vision… inside a memory that wasn't her own.

The scene inside her mind shifted from the battlefield to one of deeper silence… and deeper sorrow.

Noreen stood amidst the ruins, cradling Veytan's body in his arms. He wasn't smiling. He wasn't triumphant. His face was frozen drenched in sadness… or guilt. Veytan's body lay still, heavy as truth, droplets of blood falling upon shattered stones witnesses to an unforgivable betrayal.

Slowly, Noreen descended into the depths of the ancient mansion. His footsteps echoed through the forgotten, dark corridors. In a long-abandoned hall, he dug a grave with his bare hands into the blackened stone.

He lowered the body and stood above it, raising his right hand toward the sky. From it surged a dense, golden light. He traced intricate circles of sacred symbols, flowing with a power that stole the breath from the air.

Then he spoke his voice heavy, as though bearing the weight of a thousand betrayals:"Forgive me… brother..."

The light struck the earth, forming a massive seal at the heart of the chamber, pulsing with a force not of this world. An eternal prison unbreakable, impenetrable.

A seal to trap Veytan in the abyss should he awaken... And a seal to imprison all who step inside, should they try to leave.

Emilia gasped. A breath dragged from the depths of her soul, as though pulled from a grave within her. Her body jolted like she had returned from a brief death.

Without thinking, Musa pulled her into his arms and whispered with quiet strength,

"I'm here... I'm with you..."

But Veytan spoke then, his voice low sharp as a blade.

"Now... you know the truth."

Tears streamed down Emilia's face like a shattered waterfall, flowing beyond her will, as if her eyes no longer obeyed the emotion crashing through her. Her body trembled faintly, yet her face remained frozen in the grip of shock and disbelief. Beside her, Musa still stared at her with a mix of fear and a deep, protective instinct, bound by the reverence that filled the space.

He moved a little closer, his voice strained and trembling,

"Emilia... can you hear me? What did you see? What did he do to you?"

She didn't answer not out of refusal, but because her mind was still translating the flood of images pouring through it, trying to piece together the fragments of truth that had exploded within her.

Only Veytan remained silent, watching her with a gaze so dim it seemed to seep into her soul.

At last, Emilia lifted her eyes to him. Their glow had returned but it was a mournful, profound light, far too deep for a girl her age. She spoke softly, but with unwavering resolve.

"I've seen enough... I understand everything now."

She paused for a breath, then continued, her eyes fixed on Veytan.

"I'll help you break the curse. But before I commit to this path, there are questions that haunt me questions I won't walk past until I hear the answers."

Veytan nodded silently, as though he had expected this moment… perhaps even waited for it.

"The people who entered this castle over the years," she said, "those who vanished without a trace as if the earth swallowed them… even my younger brother among them… What happened to them?"

Veytan leaned his head back slightly, as though the question placed upon him the weight of centuries of regret. Then he spoke in a voice dark and low, echoing like death itself:

"I was not the one who doomed them. I did not choose their fate. This curse, daughter of Noreen, makes no distinction… and grants no mercy. Their entrance into this place made them part of it its fabric, its being… its body, if you will. They became lost spirits, nameless, memoryless wandering between the walls and shadows, seeking salvation that doesn't exist. I tried. I swear I tried… but I failed. It's too late for them."

Emilia's gaze faltered, and for a fleeting moment, she thought she saw her brother's ghost in the corner of the room only for it to vanish into the dark.

Veytan continued, his voice like a funeral for forgotten souls,

"All who were devoured by this mansion… are gone."

Then he looked at them both, his tone turning grim:

"But you… your gifts spared you from the same fate. You are not ordinary. The mansion sensed your power this is why it hasn't consumed you… yet."

Emilia asked, her voice laced with caution,

"And how do we break the curse? What is the cost? And what happens… when the bindings are broken?"

Veytan stepped toward her, his voice gaining that ancient, ritualistic tone, as if calling upon a magic buried deep in stone and memory.

"I'll draw a sigil using your blood. It must be placed over my grave where I was sealed in chains. Then I will recite a counterspell I've woven over centuries. At that moment… the curse will be broken. The castle will open. The chains that bound me here for a thousand years… will dissolve."

Emilia fell silent, her eyes glowing with wary intensity.

"And once you're free... what will you do?"

Veytan's reply came like a blade. Cold. Honest. Final.

"I will destroy the royal family… and reclaim the throne of Britain that was stolen from me with treachery and betrayal. I will take back my legacy with my own hands… and rip the traitors from their roots."

A heavy silence passed.

Emilia nodded, resolve shining from her gaze.

But Musa couldn't hold back anymore.

He exploded, his voice thunderous with anger at being constantly cast aside:

"This is the wisdom you pride yourself on?! Following a monster without mercy? What happened to your judgment? Has one vision changed you that much?!"

She looked at him her expression strangely calm, as if seeing a deeper truth than he could.

"I know it's hard. And I know you see him as a monster... but I'm not making this decision lightly. This is the only way out of here. I'll explain everything… once we're free."

Musa stared at her for a long time, then turned away from both of them silent, but not defeated. He simply… chose to wait.

As Emilia's final words faded into the silence, Veytan suddenly snapped his fingers.

The ground beneath them shifted. The darkness collapsed like a curtain being drawn, and they found themselves standing inside a deep stone crypt, dimly lit by still blue flames that did not flicker as if imprisoned themselves.

The walls oozed with ancient moisture, reeking of blood and stone. At the crypt's center stood a massive grave, covered in faint red sigils, carved as though burned into the rock.

Musa turned to Veytan, unable to hide his astonishment.

"How do you do that? How do you move us… and shape this place from nothing? What is this power?"

Emilia listened quietly she wanted to know too.

Veytan looked at him, his eyes glowing with a soft light, as though carrying the weight of galaxies behind them. He answered with the serenity of one who knows:

"A thousand years, Musa… A thousand years within these walls. Time has honed me but more than that, it granted me dominion. This mansion is no longer a place to me… it is an extension of myself. I move within it as the soul moves within the body. I open it, close it, reshape it… every corner now bends to my will."

He added, his tone deepening with mystery,

"But the curse… that is another matter. A blind energy planted by another. It binds me. It is not mine. I do not control it. It is my jailer and I, its prisoner, no matter how it may seem otherwise."

Musa stepped forward, a sudden memory returning to him.

"And the table? The wine? The light? Were those illusions?"

Veytan nodded slowly.

"Tangible illusions fleeting. Born of echoes from my mind. But they don't last… Nothing endures here except stone… and the curse." He allowed a faint smile.

"You're getting bolder in speaking with me."

A brief silence followed, broken only by Emilia's firm voice:

"How much blood do you need?"

He didn't answer with words.

He snapped his fingers again, and from the void appeared a slender, gleaming knife and a small stone basin that rose from the ground as if summoned. He stepped forward, voice steady:

"Fill it halfway. Your blood alone carries the signature needed to break the sigils being of the bloodline of the ancient Gift."

Without hesitation, Emilia stepped forward, rolled up her sleeve, and took the knife with steady hands. Mousa, unable to bear watching in silence, rushed to her side, gently grasping her shoulder.

"I'm with you... I won't let you face this alone."

She gave him a faint, weary smile then, with sudden bravery, she drove the blade into her wrist. The blood flowed quietly into the basin, drop by drop, as if bleeding out centuries of secrets.

Mousa held her hand, his other hand steadying her shoulder his gaze full of sorrow and care, but also belief in her.

When the basin was filled, the very air seemed to change.

Veytan stepped forward, raised the basin in his bare hands, and turned toward the grave. Then he began to chant words from a forgotten tongue, strange and ancient in tone… each one striking the air like the beat of a sacred drum.