Chapter 9:Shadows Beneath Still Waters

The air beneath the Resonance Grove trembled, just slightly, as if holding its breath. Golden threads of sunlight bled through the canopy, catching on the subtle hum of Veil energy that pulsed between the roots and runes below. The old stones murmured beneath their feet, harmonizing with the breath of those who dared to touch the fabric of something older than thought.

Jamie exhaled too quickly. "Am I... doing it wrong?"

Kirin didn't look up from his seated posture. "You're doing it loudly."

Mira smirked, adjusting the angle of her wrist. The banded lines along her fingers shimmered as her qi cycled evenly, forming a crystalline loop that vibrated with gentle rhythm. Jamie was sweating.

"Try less," Elias said without thinking.

Jamie blinked. "Less what?"

"Just... less."

Kirin finally cracked an eye open. "A profound philosophy. Try breathing like your life isn't a performance."

That earned a laugh from Mira. Even Wren, seated cross-legged near the diagnostic array, let out a nose-breath of approval.

She hadn't been there when the lesson started. Or rather, she had, but no one had noticed. Her fingers were already flying over the pronged crystal interface beside her, flickering through screens of cascading data that the others couldn't read.

"Your field's distorted," Wren said, without looking up. "Elias."

He froze. "What?"

She turned the array toward Kirin. Graphs spiked, collapsed, and then surged again. "The Veil isn't syncing with his pulse rate. It's... lagging. Or maybe echoing."

Kirin rose to his feet, slowly. The ground didn't shake. But the silence suddenly felt heavier.

Mira watched Elias. Closely.

Elias, for his part, wasn't doing anything. Not consciously. His breathing was shallow, but steady. His eyes were open, half-focused on the pattern of wind moving through the leaves above.

He felt like he was falling inward.

"Hey," Jamie whispered. "You good?"

Elias blinked. Something flickered behind his eyes. Then it was gone.

Wren stood. That alone was unusual.

She approached, slowly, cautious not like someone afraid of danger but like someone preparing for miscalculation. Her boots barely disturbed the dirt as she walked a slow circle around Elias, the data pad in her hands throwing soft light across her pale expression.

"This signature... doesn't originate from Whispering Vein. Or Iron Pulse," she muttered.

Kirin frowned. "He's in Iron Pulse."

"He's somewhere," Wren said, sharply. "But the resonance loop is showing fragmentation. Whatever's answering him isn't from any known realm. It's not even local."

Mira's expression darkened. She stepped forward, placing a hand near Elias's shoulder but not touching him.

"This pattern," she whispered, "it feels like..."

She stopped herself. But her hand trembled.

Kirin saw it.

The Grove trembled again, just faintly. A ripple in the canopy light danced across their faces, bending the sunlight wrong. It passed, then returned, more forceful this time, like breath catching in a throat.

Jamie took a half-step back.

"What was that?"

Wren looked up. "That wasn't him. That came from outside."

Kirin was already moving.

He pressed his palm to the central glyph stone, and the Veil barrier's outer thread snapped into view—a transparent shimmer like heat against sky. Lines of script flickered through the air, distorted, imperfect.

"A resonance slip," he said.

"From what?" Mira asked, her voice sharp.

Wren answered, "Something's pressing on the boundary. Not breaching. Not yet. But it's testing the pattern."

Jamie looked to Elias, whose eyes were still wide, vacant and full of sky.

"He's not seeing what we see," Wren murmured. "He's somewhere else. Not asleep. Just... folded."

Mira closed her hand slowly. Her voice was quiet. "Like his grandfather used to do."

That silenced the Grove.

Elias stirred. His hand moved slightly, brushing the air like someone feeling in the dark. The moment shattered with a single word he didn't realize he said aloud:

"Threnody."

Kirin stiffened.

Wren stopped breathing.

Jamie frowned. "What's that? A girl? Sounds like a bard."

Mira didn't laugh. No one did.

Kirin turned away.

"Lesson's over."

"But—"

"Now."

The Grove emptied in silence, save for Wren, who lingered just long enough to look at the diagnostic data and whisper:

"You're not supposed to know that name."

Then she, too, was gone.

And Elias, still half-lost, looked at the sky through fractured light, wondering why the world felt like it was waiting for him to remember something he had never known.