The fire had nearly gone out by the time Daelen returned. Its glow flickered weakly over the clearing, casting pale light across Sylen's sleeping form. She hadn't stirred. The wind had quieted. But inside him, a storm still raged.
He dropped to the ground slowly, fingers still wrapped tightly around the dagger. His grip hadn't loosened once since the voice spoke. Since the forest breathed its curse into his bones.
The cracks in fate will tear you apart.
His gaze lingered on Sylen. She looked peaceful in sleep, unburdened. Unaware. She wasn't meant to carry the weight of impossible truths. Daelen envied her simplicity. Her faith in what she could touch. Her belief in the world as it was.
But he knew better now.
He was a foreign piece in a machine already turning—too jagged to fit, too stubborn to fall away.
A flicker of movement caught his eye.
Across the clearing.
Daelen froze.
It wasn't Sylen.
It wasn't wind.
It was a figure.
Barely visible. More distortion than form.
He rose slowly, dagger in hand. His voice was quiet, but sharp. "Who's there?"
The figure stopped. The firelight bent oddly around it, like the world refused to let it exist properly.
Then it spoke.
> "It's time."
The voice wasn't human. Not fully. But it knew him. That was worse.
It stepped closer. Light shimmered off its body, ever-changing. A reflection of something that never stayed the same.
> "You've felt the cracks," it said. "You've seen what lies beneath the veil. But the Mirror is not done with you."
Daelen's pulse pounded in his ears.
> "You have been chosen to walk the path no one dares to tread."
His breath caught. "Chosen…? For what?"
The figure's face shifted—briefly human. Familiar. And then it wasn't.
> "To see what must not be seen. To walk between. To break the cycle."
A gust of wind roared suddenly. The fire spat sparks as the figure began to dissipate, its body unwinding like thread caught in a storm.
> "When the world cracks, so too will you."
Then silence.
Daelen was alone again.
The dagger trembled in his grip.
Chosen to break the cycle?
Chosen to walk between worlds?
He didn't know what it meant.
But he felt it.
The world had noticed him.
And it didn't like what it saw.
Sylen stirred beside the fire, blinking sleep from her eyes. "Daelen…?" she mumbled, voice heavy with confusion. "I thought I heard…"
He didn't answer right away.
His gaze was fixed on the trees. On the dark.
On the truth.
When he finally spoke, his voice was a whisper.
"Just a bad dream."
But he knew better.
And soon, so would everyone else.
---
Author's Note:
This chapter was meant to feel like standing at the edge of a cliff—where things can either collapse or take flight. Daelen has officially been "noticed." The world is no longer passive. The figure at the edge of the clearing? You'll see more of them. Not everything watching Daelen has a face—and not everything is part of the Mirror.
We're just getting started.