Sarynne did not awaken easily. For hours, she remained unconscious on the improvised bed Caelan had set up in the underground chapel. Her breathing was shallow, and a thin layer of frost had formed on her eyelashes and hair, even though the room itself was not particularly cold.
Caelan sat beside her, rubbing his hands together to warm them. "This isn't normal. Not even for ancient magic."
Rhaevan watched from the doorway, his arms crossed. "She mentioned a cost of vital energy. Maybe it took more than she could give."
Lysarion examined the symbols on the walls, which now looked faded, as if the paint had aged decades in minutes. "The ritual worked. We managed to speak with Elyria. But for how long will Sarynne pay for that conversation?"
That was when Sarynne stirred, a low groan escaping her lips. Her eyes opened, but they were strangely dull, as if they were seeing something beyond the room.
"It's all dark," she whispered. "And cold. She's so alone there…"
Caelan took her hand. "Sarynne, you're here with us. In the chapel."
She blinked several times, and slowly her eyes focused. "Caelan? What… how long?"
"Just a few hours," he replied. "How do you feel?"
Sarynne tried to sit up, but her body did not fully obey. "Like I've been running for days without stopping. And there's… a pain here." She touched the center of her chest. "As if something were missing."
Rhaevan stepped closer. "Do you remember what happened? What Elyria said?"
"I do." Sarynne closed her eyes, as if reviewing painful memories. "She's afraid. Not just of the isolation or the responsibility. She sees something… something coming from the other side. Something our ritual made stronger."
Lysarion stopped examining the walls. "What do you mean?"
"Every time we open a connection with Elyria, we weaken the Veil at that location," Sarynne explained, her voice growing steadier as she spoke. "It's like making a hole in a dam. Even after the hole is closed, the spot remains weak. And the thing on the other side… it feels those weak points."
Caelan looked at the others. "So every time we talk to Elyria, we draw that thing closer?"
"It seems so," Sarynne confirmed. "Elyria tried to warn us. She said the price to bring her back would be too high. Now I understand what she meant."
Rhaevan began pacing back and forth in the small room. "Then we have an impossible choice. Either we cut off communication with Elyria completely to protect the world. Or we keep risking everything to keep her in our lives."
"It's not that simple," Sarynne said. "Elyria isn't just our friend or beloved. She is the Heart of Nyxara now. She sustains the balance. If we cut off communication completely, how will we know if she needs help? If the balance is being maintained?"
Lysarion sat down on a nearby chair, his expression grim. "We need a one-way communication system. Something that allows us to hear her without opening a full connection."
"There are listening runes," Caelan suggested. "The Order used them to monitor distant locations. They don't open a connection, they just… capture sounds and images."
Sarynne nodded with difficulty. "We can try. But it will be limited. And still risky."
As they discussed it, something changed in the air of the chapel. The candles, which had been burning with steady flames, began to flicker. The shadow in the corner of the room deepened, becoming a patch of absolute darkness.
"She's trying to speak again," Sarynne whispered, sitting up on the bed with effort. "But this time… it's different. More urgent."
From the darkness, an image began to form. It was not Elyria this time, but something that made them all recoil. It was a landscape of impossible ruins—structures that defied geometry, angles that should not exist, colors that hurt the eyes.
"It's not safe," Elyria's voice echoed, but it sounded distant, muffled. "He woke up. He felt our conversation."
The image in the shadows shifted, showing something moving among the impossible ruins. It was a shape that constantly changed, never settling into a single appearance. Sometimes it looked like a swarm of insects, sometimes a mass of tentacles, sometimes a distorted human figure.
"The Hungry One," Elyria named the thing. "He was trapped on the other side when the first Veil was woven. Now he wants to get out. And every time we speak, we give him a map of the weak points."
Rhaevan stepped toward the image. "How do we stop him?"
"You can't," the answer came, heavy with despair. "Only I can. But for that, I need… I need more power than I have now."
The image vanished abruptly, and the darkness in the corner of the room retreated to normal proportions. Sarynne fell back onto the bed, gasping for breath.
"She cut the connection," Caelan observed. "By her own will this time."
Lysarion looked at the others. "Then our problem is clear. There is an entity that wants to destroy our reality. Elyria is the only one who can stop it. But she needs more power. And every time we try to help her, we make it easier for the entity to reach us."
Rhaevan closed his eyes for a moment, processing. "We need information. We need to know more about this 'Hungry One.' And about how Elyria can gain the power she needs."
Sarynne, still lying down, pointed to the wall where the ritual symbols were still visible. "The ancient texts. The secret archives Idril mentioned. If there are answers, they'll be there."
"The problem," Caelan reminded them, "is that most of the palace collapsed. The archives may be destroyed or buried."
"Then we dig them out," Rhaevan decided. "Lysarion, you and Caelan organize a team to begin the excavation. Focus on the areas where the archives were. Sarynne, you rest and recover. We'll need you in shape when we find something."
Lysarion looked as though he were about to protest, but then nodded. "All right. But we must be discreet. If the nobles discover we're digging for forbidden knowledge…"
"…they'll think we're becoming like Valthor," Rhaevan finished. "I know. That's why secrecy is crucial."
In the days that followed, the palace became a place of restrained activity. While public reconstruction took place in the main areas—with Rhaevan and Lysarion alternating public appearances to calm the people and the nobles—a secret operation was underway in the ruins.
Caelan led a small team of workers who had been personally loyal to Theron, his grandfather. They began removing debris from the area where the Forgotten Archives had once been. Progress was slow and dangerous, with the constant risk of further collapses.
Meanwhile, Sarynne gradually regained her strength. But something had changed in her. She now sometimes stared into nothingness, as if seeing things the others could not. And in certain light, her eyes seemed to hold a faint silvery gleam, like the reflection of distant stars.
"On the fourth day, she spoke in her sleep," Caelan told Rhaevan privately. "She said, 'The chain is growing thin. She can't hold him alone much longer.'"
Rhaevan didn't need to ask who "she" was. "Elyria is fighting that thing alone. And she's losing."
On the fifth day, the excavation team made a discovery. Beneath a pile of broken beams and stone, they found a metal door that had withstood the collapse. It was locked with a complex mechanism, but Lysarion, using skills he did not reveal the origin of, managed to open it.
Inside, the Forgotten Archives had survived almost intact. Shelves of books and scrolls stretched across the room, covered in a thin layer of dust but without significant damage.
It was Sarynne, still weak but determined, who found the first relevant text. It was a diary written by one of the first priestesses of Nyxara, centuries before the Veil was woven.
"Listen to this," she said, reading to the others by the faint light of their lanterns. "'Today Nyxara confessed her fear. She senses something growing at the edges of creation. Feeding on the darkness between the stars. She calls it The One Who Waits at the Edges. She says that if it ever finds its way into our world, everything will be consumed.'"
Caelan leafed through another text. "Here there's a description of the first weaver of the Veil. It says he used three threads: one from Nyxara's shadow, one from the light of the primordial stars, and one from the very fabric of reality itself."
Lysarion took the text from Caelan's hands, his eyes scanning the pages quickly. "And here… it speaks of the price. To weave the Veil, the first weaver had to sacrifice his own connection to reality. He became part of the Veil, forever separated from the world he protected."
Everyone looked at Lysarion, remembering what he had revealed about his own lineage.
"My ancestor," Lysarion confirmed, his voice heavy with restrained emotion. "He sacrificed himself to protect us. And now… now the Veil is weakening again."
Sarynne picked up another page of the diary. "And here is the answer. The only way to strengthen the Veil permanently… is to repeat the original sacrifice. Someone must become part of the Veil. Someone who carries the three threads within themselves."
Rhaevan understood first. "Elyria already has two. She is Nyxara's heir—the shadow. And she merged with the Heart—the light of the stars. But the third thread…"
"…is the weaver," Lysarion finished, his face pale. "She needs a weaver to complete the process."
The room fell silent as the implication sank in. Elyria needed Lysarion. Or someone of his lineage. Someone willing to sacrifice themselves to become part of the Veil with her.
And looking at the determined expression on Lysarion's face, they all knew he had already made his decision.
To be continued…