The Echo Within

The moon was waning, but Elara's glyph was burning brighter than ever.

She sat cross-legged in the ceremonial chamber beneath Vale Tower, her hands resting on her knees, eyes closed as magic pulsed beneath her skin. The more she tapped into the Moonmother's glyph, the more her body changed. Her heartbeat synced with lunar cycles. Her vision flickered with the memory of things she hadn't lived.

Visions came to her now unbidden—one after another.

A woman cloaked in starlight, standing over a dying world. Thirteen towers crumbling into dust. A blade of moonlight piercing a Herald's throat, followed by screams that shook the Veil.

And always, always… her own face staring back through time.

She opened her eyes to find Moriah kneeling beside her. "You left your body for nine minutes," she said. "You were between."

"I saw the Moonmother," Elara whispered. "Not in metaphor. In memory."

Moriah didn't blink. "Then you're almost ready."

"Ready for what?"

"The Veil's breaking point," the shadowguard said, rising. "You'll be called into the dreamspace of the Herald soon. If you don't go willingly… it'll drag you in by force."

Elara rose with her, spine straightening.

"Then I go before it calls."