Chapter 41

The name echoed through the vault long after it was spoken.

**Sena.**

It clung to the air like dust in sunlight, curling into the corners of the ancient stone, brushing against every forgotten glyph as if reminding them that she had never truly disappeared.

Kye sat on the edge of the shattered pedestal, hands resting on his knees. His eyes stared blankly ahead—not dazed, not lost—just *processing*. Like a dam that had held for too long, now cracked, spilling fragments of a life too fragile to hold all at once.

Renna knelt beside him, one hand lightly resting on his shoulder.

"She was important."

Kye nodded slowly. "She was the one who reminded me why I hated the Council."

Veika leaned against one of the half-broken cylinders nearby, arms crossed. "What was she? A childhood friend? A sibling? A lover?"

Kye's fingers curled slightly.

"She was… the girl who remembered *me.* Before everything else."

He didn't elaborate.

He didn't need to.

The silence that followed wasn't heavy—it was sacred. Even Veika, queen of sarcasm, didn't break it.

The boy finally spoke, eyes still fixed on the mirror that had flickered and gone still.

"She was erased from all records. Not just forgotten—*unwritten.* That's why she didn't come back to you until now. You had to trade something of equal value."

Kye let out a slow breath.

"My mother's face…"

He didn't say it out loud again.

Because the truth was, the ache of that sacrifice had just begun.

But for some reason, it *felt right*.

Like he was finally fighting for something real, not just reacting to everything around him.

Renna stood up.

"So… what now?"

Kye rose too.

His face was calm.

His voice wasn't angry. It wasn't loud.

It was clear.

"We go to the Citadel."

Veika blinked. "The Council's old capital? It's still sealed off."

"Not to me," Kye said. "Not anymore."

The boy stepped forward, drawing a small map from his robes—drawn in ink that shimmered faintly under the dim light. He unrolled it on the floor between them.

"There's a hidden path through the northern ridgeline. An old smuggler's route. Abandoned when the Council started memory purges."

Kye studied the map.

"This'll take us past the perimeter patrols?"

"Yes," the boy said. "But there's a catch."

Renna snorted. "There's always a catch."

"It cuts through the Hollow Ward."

Veika groaned. "You've got to be kidding."

Renna glanced between them. "What's the Hollow Ward?"

Kye answered.

"It's where failed experiments were stored."

"Failed how?" Renna asked.

"Failed in remembering *too much.*"

---

They traveled light.

Eleska had left them rations, old relics that didn't need preserving. Food that tasted like moss and bitterness. Water that smelled faintly of herbs. Every bite reminded Kye how far removed from comfort they were.

The passage out of the Archive Below was long and winding. Occasionally, they'd hear distant echoes above—the Silence still patrolling, maybe searching for them, maybe waiting.

But they didn't descend.

As the boy had predicted, the agents feared what lay beneath.

By the third hour of climbing, the tunnel walls began to widen.

Veika held up a torch made from compressed emberroot, casting long shadows along the walls. The ground turned to uneven rock. Stalactites hung low, dripping with slow moisture. It smelled of age, mold, and iron.

Kye could feel the shift before they reached it.

The Hollow Ward.

He stopped without meaning to.

His heart beat differently here.

The air pressed in, like memory was *watching* them.

Renna moved close.

"You okay?"

"No," Kye said. "But I understand it now."

They stepped into a vast chamber.

It wasn't a dungeon.

It wasn't a vault.

It was a *cemetery.*

But instead of graves, there were *names.*

Thousands of them.

Written on the walls.

Carved by hand.

Some in blood. Some in stone. Some in languages no one had spoken in centuries.

Each name pulsed faintly when they passed. Like echoes of thought trying to surface.

Kye walked slowly, brushing his fingers along one.

The glyph flared softly.

And then—without warning—a voice entered his mind.

> "I was Fen. I remembered where the gods slept. They called me mad. Then they made me forget myself."

Kye stumbled back.

Renna caught him.

"Kye?!"

He steadied himself.

"They're still *here.*"

The boy nodded solemnly.

"They weren't killed. Just… *erased from everywhere else.* This is the only place they exist."

Veika's torch flickered.

Something moved in the shadows.

Renna drew her dagger.

Kye turned, his sword already in hand.

A figure stepped into view.

Tattered robes. Eyes glowing faintly blue, like moonlight reflected in a still pond. Hair like ash. Skin like faded ink.

It didn't speak.

It just stared.

Then another figure stepped into view.

And another.

All around them, the air shimmered with *presence*.

Renna whispered, "They're not alive."

"No," the boy said. "But they remember what it's like."

The first figure stepped forward.

Veika raised her pulse-stick.

"Back. Off."

But Kye stepped between her and the ghostly figure.

He didn't raise his weapon.

Instead, he asked, softly:

"What do you want?"

The figure opened its mouth.

But no sound came out.

Just a pulse of memory.

An image flashed into Kye's mind—fast, blurred, almost too much to process.

A tower.

A blade.

A burning sigil.

A promise.

The figure reached out—

And touched his chest.

Kye staggered back—

—eyes wide—

—and saw something new.

Not just a memory.

A *key.*

A location buried in the ruins ahead.

He gasped.

"I know where the entrance is."

Renna blinked. "To the Citadel?"

"No," Kye said, eyes burning. "To *what's beneath* it."

And then—

From deeper in the chamber—

A sound.

A single footstep.

Not from a ghost.

Not from the past.

A real step.

Boot on stone.

And a voice that sent a cold rush down Kye's spine.

"I was hoping you'd get this far."

Kaelion.

But it wasn't just him.

This time…

He wasn't alone.