The streets of Elarion never truly slept, but here—beneath the gaze of the Hollow Moon—there was only silence. A silence so thick it clung to Raine's skin, pressing into his bones like the weight of an unseen hand.
He didn't stop running.
The whispers still clawed at his mind, the last remnants of that woman's voice curling through his thoughts like smoke.
"You cannot run forever."
He gritted his teeth, forcing the words away.
The wound on his shoulder burned like a brand.
It had spread. He could feel it—an infection not of flesh, but of something deeper. Something worse. The darkness was moving beneath his skin, slithering through his veins like an invading force. He didn't dare look at it. Not now. Not when the city's eyes were on him.
The Forgotten Quarter was behind him now, swallowed by the night. The crumbling ruins of Elarion's past had given way to something colder—emptier.
Raine had lived in this city his entire life. He knew every shadowed alley, every hidden passage. He knew which doors to knock on for a safe bed and which streets to avoid if he wanted to see the morning.
Raine had lived in this city his entire life. He knew every shadowed alley, every hidden passage. He knew which doors to knock on for a safe bed and which streets to avoid if he wanted to see the morning.
And yet.
This place was unfamiliar.
The architecture here was different. Older. Buildings with curved eaves and stone facades loomed on either side of him, their surfaces carved with symbols he did not recognize. There were no lanterns here, no flickering torchlight. Only the pale, unnatural glow of the Hollow Moon, casting the world in shades of silver and shadow.
It was as if he had stepped into a place that had been forgotten by time itself.
He swallowed hard, slowing his pace.
There were no signs of life.
No stray cats darting between barrels. No distant murmurs of late-night dealings. No wind.
Just silence.
And the feeling that something was watching.
Raine exhaled sharply, gripping the dagger at his belt.
He didn't believe in curses.
Didn't believe in the old stories whispered around fire pits and tavern tables.
But the city had changed around him.
And that woman…
She had not been human.
His pulse pounded in his ears.
Slowly, he turned in a full circle, scanning the shadows. His instincts screamed at him to run, but—
A whisper.
Soft. Gentle. Almost kind.
"Shadowborn."
Raine spun, his blade flashing.
But there was no one there.
The street stretched empty before him, cobbled stones slick with moisture. The mist curled in slow tendrils, licking at his boots, swirling as if disturbed by invisible footsteps.
Then, ahead—
A door.
A door.
It was old, the wood warped with age, but unlike the others on this street, it was open.
A sliver of darkness beyond.
Waiting.
His fingers tightened around the hilt of his dagger.
Every part of him screamed no.
And yet—
The wound burned again.
A pulse.
A command.
Raine's breath shuddered as he took a step forward.
Then, another.
His heartbeat matched the rhythm of his footsteps, his vision narrowing to the void beyond that open door.
The masked man's voice fell flat. 'It will open with the next Hollow Moon—seven nights from now.'
He could leave. He could turn away, vanish into the night, find somewhere to hide until dawn.
But something was waiting inside.
Something that had been waiting for him.
He stepped across the threshold.
And the door slammed shut behind him.
The air inside was thick. Heavy. It clung to his skin, pressing against his lungs like a living thing.
No light.
No sound.
Only the steady, suffocating hum of something unseen.
Raine's fingers curled around the dagger at his waist, his knuckles white.
"Breathe."
His own voice in the silence. A reminder. A tether to reality.
He exhaled, steadying himself.
Then—
A flicker of movement.
A shape.
The darkness rippled, shifting wrongly, as though the space itself was alive. Then,
A figure emerged from the void.
It was tall. Wrapped in layers of deep, flowing fabric, its face obscured by the folds of a heavy hood.
A scent filled the air. A scent that did not belong in this world.
Blood and moonlight.
Raine clenched his jaw.
"Who are you?"
The figure did not answer.
But its presence filled the room.
A voice—not spoken, but felt—curled through his skull like cold fingers against flesh.
"You have come far, little shadow."
Raine stiffened.
That voice.
It was the same as hers.
The woman from the alley.
But the figure before him was not her.
The darkness around it pulsed, something shifting beneath its robes. Something alive.
He swallowed back the instinct to run.
"I didn't come here on purpose." His voice was steady, but his grip on the dagger was iron. "So if you've got something to say, say it."
The silence stretched.
Then,, slowly—
The hooded figure lifted a single, skeletal hand.
Not human.
Too long. Too thin. The fingers jointed in places they should not be, curling inward like the limbs of a dead spider.
Raine's breath caught in his throat.
The fingers unfurled.
And within the figure's palm—
A stone.
Black as the void.
Raine's wound throbbed.
The darkness beneath his skin writhed.
The stone called to him.
Then, the figure spoke.
"You have felt it. The hunger. The hollow."
The room tilted.
Raine stumbled, his vision swimming.
"The blood of the Eclipse is waking, Raine."
His name.
A weight heavier than the world settled upon him.
"You cannot run from what you are."
The stone pulsed.
The wound burned.
And in that moment, Raine knew—
He had never been running from the Sentinels.
He had been running from this.
From himself.