Chapter 1: The Forest Opens Its Mouth

The forest didn't welcome me.

It swallowed me.

Every step into Virelyn felt like walking deeper into something's throat.

The trees arched above like black ribs. The air was too damp. The soil too soft—like it remembered bleeding.

Overhead, the moon loomed Loud and low, like a head hung from broken neck muscles, gurgling laughter only I could hear.

I didn't know what I hated more: the sound—or the fact that I wasn't sure it was laughter.

> "Smell that?"

A voice behind me, cheerful and cracked. "That's the aroma of destiny. Or possibly a rotting squirrel. I mix those two up a lot."

I didn't turn. I just sighed and adjusted the strap biting into my collarbone.

Grimpel.

A half-shattered skull floating , just floating. He bobbed along behind me like a sarcastic torch, swinging gently with every step I took.

> "If I flip you upside down," I muttered, "would your jokes come out less stupid?"

> "Unlikely," he replied, faux offended. "But at least then I could finally see the world from your miserable point of view."

I didn't laugh.

I hadn't laughed in years.

The deeper we walked, the more the forest changed.

Twisted. Sick. Still.

Trees lined the path like prisoners locked in place, their branches bent upward into shapes too close to pleading hands. Moss grew where bark should have been. Every now and then, I'd pass a trunk carved with names I didn't recognize—but something deep inside me did.

And the moon watched.

It didn't glow. It gloated.

A thick emotion seeped from the sky. Not noise—worse.

Expectation. Hunger. Amusement.

The kind of emotion you feel from a crowd before an execution.

The Wyrmstone around my neck pulsed.

Not warm. Not cold. Just... known.

The only thing that hadn't betrayed me. Not yet.

I clutched it like it could anchor me in this place.

It didn't. But I held on anyway.

> "You sure about this?" Grimpel asked suddenly.

"There's still time to walk away. Not a lot of time, obviously. You've already pissed off the forest. And the moon. And me, for that matter."

I didn't answer at first.

We crossed beneath a hanging tree, its roots curling downward like fingers grasping for air. A cluster of beetles hissed as we passed.

> "No," I said at last. "I'm not sure."

> "Ah," he replied. "Good. Would've been worried if you were."

But I was sure of one thing.

I hadn't come to Virelyn just to reclaim the fragments of my soul.

No. That was only part of it.

The real reason was simpler. Uglier.

Maedra.

Witch. Prophet. Goddess. Curse.

I didn't know which title fit her best.

Maybe all of them.

She shattered me.

Not just in body. Not just in soul.

She broke the parts of me I thought were unbreakable—and made sure I lived long enough to remember what I'd lost.

I came here to find her.

To end her.

Even if it killed me.

Especially if it killed me.

There used to be more of me.

I don't mean that metaphorically.

There used to be seven pieces.

Fragments of who I was—who I could've been—scattered across the cursed bones of this land like offerings left for a dead god.

I've retrieved two.

And with each, a piece of myself returned. But not cleanly. Not gently.

The first one made me relive the night I walked away from the burning orphanage.

The second brought back the screams of the boy I didn't save in the drowned city.

When I reached into those shards, they didn't just show me memories.

They rewrote me.

Tore open the wounds I'd sutured with time and silence.

> "You're breathing hard," Grimpel said.

"That's usually a sign of anxiety. Or guilt. Or perhaps a fungal lung infection. Either way, makes for good drama."

I didn't respond.

He was always like this before a shard.

Joking too much. Voice lighter than usual. Like something was crawling under his bones—if he still had any.

That silence that followed his jokes was always the real warning.

Eventually, the path opened into a clearing.

Black grass swayed gently, as if underwater.

The air thinned. The moon dipped even lower, dragging its weight across the sky like a tumor.

I stopped walking.

> "Smells like old blood," Grimpel whispered, suddenly less amused.

"Delicious."

In the center of the field stood a jagged stone formation.

No statues. No monsters.

Just a circle of jagged stones—and in its center: a shimmer of light, barely visible.

Another fragment. Waiting.

I didn't move toward it.

Not yet.

Something about this one felt…

Personal.

Familiar in a way that made my spine itch.

> "You know what this one is, don't you?" Grimpel said, quieter than before.

> "Maybe," I replied. "I think it's mine."

> "They're all yours," he reminded me. "But this one… this one's the one that remembers you back."

I closed my eyes.

Bread.

For a moment, the scent of warm flour hit me.

Not smoke. Not rot. Just… bread. Real, human bread.

My father's hands guiding mine. Sticky fingers. The soft sound of my mother humming in another room.

A fragment of peace. A memory too sharp to be innocent.

> "This is where it starts to hurt, Clive," Grimpel said.

"This is the one you'll choke on."

The moon above made a sound again.

Not laughter.

This time it sounded more like a chant.

Low. Wet. Hungry.

I stared at the glowing fragment.

And stepped forward.