Liora collapsed to her knees in the smoking crater where the Heart had once stood.Every breath she dragged into her lungs tasted of ash and iron.Her arms hung useless at her sides, blood dripping steadily from the gashes on her skin — each wound a reminder of what she had defied, and what it had cost.
The garden was no more.Only twisted remnants remained: shattered bone, shriveled vines, the stink of burning magic.
She should have felt victorious.Instead, she felt hollow.
The Codex at her hip was silent now — drained, as if it too had needed everything she could give.And somewhere deeper, under the noise and blood and rage, her soul trembled.
Something was wrong.
The ground shuddered beneath her palms.
Not an earthquake.Not magic.
Footsteps.
She forced her head up, blinking through the haze.
Figures emerged from the smoke — warriors clad in white-lacquered armor, their faces hidden behind smooth, featureless masks. Each carried a weapon etched with symbols older than the Circle itself.
The White Circle had sent its Purifiers.
Liora tried to rise, but her legs refused to obey. Her muscles screamed, her vision swam.
"Target confirmed," one of them said, voice hollow through the mask.
They moved in perfect silence after that, fanning out, forming a cage around her.
No spells left. No strength to fight.
Panic clawed at the edges of her mind.For the first time in a long time, Liora felt real fear — not for herself, but for what would happen if they took her. If they twisted her into a weapon. If all she had fought for was undone.
One of the Purifiers raised a long, slender blade — not to kill.
To bind.
The first restraint lashed out, a whip of pure light aiming for her throat.
But it never reached her.
A blur of shadow crashed into the Purifiers with the force of a hurricane, sending bodies flying.
"Touch her and die," growled a voice she hadn't heard in months — rough, familiar, and filled with rage.
Daren.
Her brother.
He moved through the Purifiers like a storm given flesh, blade flashing, spells crackling from his fingertips.Every blow was lethal. Every step he took was one closer to her.
"You idiot," he snarled as he knelt beside her, grabbing her wrist and pressing something cold into her palm. "I told you not to come alone."
Liora stared at him, wide-eyed.
He was different.
Older, harder.His armor was pieced together from scavenged scraps, his sword worn and chipped — but his eyes were the same. Sharp. Burning.
Family.
The word caught in her throat, too big to say.
Instead, she closed her fingers around the thing he had given her — a shard of obsidian etched with blood.
It pulsed weakly in her grasp, stabilizing the fraying threads of her soul just enough for her to breathe again.
"Move," Daren barked, hauling her to her feet.
She stumbled, but he caught her.
The surviving Purifiers regrouped, forming another line, weapons at the ready.
Daren spat blood onto the ground.
"Fine. You want a war?" he growled. "You'll get one."
He slammed the obsidian shard into the earth.
The ground ruptured, cracks spiderwebbing outward, vomiting black mist. From that mist rose figures — skeletal warriors bound in chains of smoke, their empty eye sockets glowing with faint blue light.
Necromancy.
Old magic.
Blood magic.
The kind they both carried in their bones, whether they wanted it or not.
"Run when you can," Daren hissed in her ear. "I'll hold them."
Liora tried to argue — tried to tell him she could fight — but he was already moving, charging into the fray with a scream that split the air.
Liora staggered into the ruins of the Heart's garden, using the broken trees for cover.
Behind her, battle raged.
Flashes of light.The crack of steel against steel.The wet thud of bodies falling.
Her mind reeled.
Why was Daren here?
How had he survived?
The last she had heard, he was dead — executed by the Circle for rebellion. She had mourned him, buried the memory deep, forced herself to move forward.
Yet here he was.
Alive.
Stronger.
And hiding something behind those burning eyes.
She reached the edge of the ruins just as the first wave of nausea hit her.
The shard had bought her time, but not much.
Her soul was still bleeding out, her body still dying by inches.
Ahead, a narrow canyon cut into the land — a gash in the earth leading somewhere darker, somewhere hidden.
Instinct pulled her toward it.
She had no choice.
Whatever waited in that canyon would either save her... or finish what the Heart had started.
Either way, she couldn't turn back.
With the last of her strength, she stumbled into the shadows.
Behind her, unseen, Mavrek watched.
He had arrived moments after the Purifiers.
Had watched the girl defy death again and again.
Had watched her brother throw himself into the fire for her.
It was... fascinating.
Beautiful, even.
But predictable.
"Family always weakens them," he murmured to himself.
His eyes gleamed with cold satisfaction.
The seeds were growing.
Soon, the girl would be his — broken, reshaped, reborn in a crucible of pain and betrayal.
And when she was ready...
When the Circle finally fell...
He would stand atop its ashes.
And she would kneel beside him.