The bells tolled until the air cracked.
Each note echoed through Lockwood's hollow streets, turning to frost before it reached the next. The sound no longer belonged to bronze or men—it was the Veil breathing through the city's wounds.
Linda staggered beneath the noise. Her knees hit the frozen cobblestone, her breath fogging the ground in frantic bursts. The frost around her shimmered, stretching in rings that pulsed like veins under the skin of the world.
Then came the footsteps.
Not human—too measured, too light. They whispered instead of echoed.
From the mist between the buildings, figures emerged. At first, she thought them soldiers, but their armor was wrong: dull and half-transparent, as if carved from moonlight and memory. Where their eyes should've been, hollow light flickered blue.
The Silent Court's dead.
Linda froze. "No," she whispered. "You can't be—"
One stepped forward, its cracked mask still clinging to a ruined face. "You opened the path," it said, voice layered in a dozen tones. "Now we are what walks it."
"I didn't mean to open that door!"
Another shade tilted its head. "Intent is meaningless in the mouth of gods."
Her pulse thudded loud enough to drown the bells. "What do you want?"
The first spirit raised its skeletal hand. "To finish what you began. To crown what stirs."
Behind them, something vast moved through the fog—too tall, too fluid. The shape rippled, spreading a darkness that drank light.
"They remember me," the whisper inside her purred. "They always did. My choir."
"No." Linda clutched her head. "You're not real!"
The laugh that followed nearly broke her spine. "Then why do you tremble?"
The shadow advanced. Its face was all wrong—a mask without features, a hole where the world folded inward. It reached toward her, fingers dragging streams of frost through the air.
She screamed—and the frost screamed back.
The ground split. From the cracks burst light—white, searing, alive. The shades recoiled. The voice inside her hissed. "You dare call that light?"
It wasn't light. It was Philip's sigil, flaring through her blood.
For a heartbeat, his voice cut through the cold: "Linda—run!"
The frost shattered outward. She didn't think—she moved, sprinting through the alleys, breath sharp and painful. Behind her, the dead followed, their steps silent as snowfall.
⸻
The royal citadel loomed above Lockwood like a tomb for stars. The Ashguard's survivors—those who hadn't frozen in the bridge collapse—returned at dusk, pale and trembling.
They knelt before King Alaric, dropping fragments of shattered swords at his feet.
"She called the frost, Majesty," the captain rasped. "The air itself obeyed her."
Alaric's eyes hardened. "Then she carries the Veil's mark."
He turned to his spymaster, a tall woman cloaked in shadow. "Send word to the Raven Order. Tell them the witch is to be taken alive."
The spymaster's expression flickered. "Alive? That may be beyond any of us now."
"Alive," Alaric repeated, voice low and dangerous. "If she opened the gate, she can close it."
When she left, the King stood alone again.
The map of his kingdom now glowed faintly blue—rivers frozen on parchment, towns dimmed to cold light. Only one area pulsed red: the lower quarter, near the bridge.
He traced the spot with his finger. "Shawn," he murmured. "You'll give me my son back—or I'll bury the gods themselves to reach him."
Behind him, the hearth flared brighter—then flickered, blue for an instant.
⸻
Linda collapsed inside a ruined chapel at the edge of the canal. The stained glass had shattered long ago; moonlight poured through jagged holes like knives.
Her hands shook. The marks on her skin pulsed, red and black in alternating waves. Each beat brought whispers she couldn't silence.
"He's calling again," the voice crooned.
"But the way between you has teeth now."
"Why him?" she hissed. "Why me?"
"Because you were the only one desperate enough to bleed."
The altar behind her groaned. The carved angel above it—its wings eroded by centuries—shifted. Frost crept across its marble eyes.
Linda backed away slowly. "Stop it…"
The statue smiled. Not a crack. A deliberate curve.
"Little fire," the voice whispered through the stone. "You've woken the first gate. Do you know how many gates the world hides?"
"No."
"Seven." The smile widened. "You've one left before you burn through your body. Shall we see how far you last?"
Something inside her rebelled. Her fear burned itself to ash, leaving raw defiance. "You think you can hollow me out?"
The frost in the chapel darkened. "I don't think. I remember."
A scream of wind tore the roof open. The world outside churned with unnatural snow, falling upward instead of down. Through it, a black shape moved—massive, coiled, crowned in shards of ice.
Linda stumbled toward the shattered doorway. The creature's eyes ignited, twin comets against the storm. When it exhaled, frost turned to crystal spines across the ground.
It bowed its head.
"My herald," it rumbled in a voice older than the moon. "The Frosted Gate stands open. Come."
Her knees buckled. "I didn't summon you!"
The laugh shook the world. "No. But you sang the right name."
Behind her, the broken statue of the angel melted into shadow and rose to its feet.
"Go," said the whisper within her. "He waits."
Linda turned—and ran into the snow.
⸻
Meanwhile, in the mirrored world, Philip stood before the river of souls again. The water was glass; beneath it, faces drifted, sleeping, turning toward him.
He knelt beside the surface.
"Linda," he whispered. "Wherever you are, hold on."
The river answered with a whisper not hers: "She holds something else now."
Philip's reflection leaned closer to him—but it wasn't his reflection anymore. The eyes were black. The mouth smiled too wide.
He drew his sword, but it passed through air.
"Show yourself."
The reflection tilted its head. "I already did. You called it love. She called it salvation. I called it hunger."
Philip felt it then—the same cold that had devoured the undercity.
"What are you?"
"The echo of what your bloodline sealed away. The god beneath the crown."
The surface of the river cracked. From below, hands reached upward, grasping, pleading.
"Stop!" he shouted.
"She already began," the voice said. "And when she opens the second gate, your world will remember my name again."
The cracks spread until the mirror-world began to collapse inward.
⸻
Back in Lockwood, the snow burned blue.
Linda ran until her lungs tore, until the frost beneath her boots sang with every step. The city had turned to a labyrinth of frozen whispers. Every corner hid movement. Every window reflected her face—sometimes hers, sometimes something worse.
She turned a corner—and stopped.
A figure stood in the middle of the street, cloaked in black, hood down. Snow didn't touch them. Their shadow stretched far too long.
"Linda Shawn," the stranger said softly. The voice was male, human, but something about it pulled at the edges of her mind. "You opened the first gate. I felt it."
She stepped back, hand raised. "Who are you?"
The man smiled faintly. "Once, I was what guarded it. Now, I'm what hunts what came through."
He drew his hand from beneath the cloak. His palm glowed with runes—old, royal, forbidden. "Come with me before the frost finishes what it started."
Linda shook her head. "I can't trust anyone."
"Then trust the fact that I'm still breathing in this cold."
The voice inside her hissed. "He lies. He wears the King's mark. The blood of Astride burns bright in his veins."
Her eyes widened. "Philip's kin?"
The stranger's smile thinned. "Brother. Bastard, if you ask the crown. But right now, your friend's dying in a world you tore open."
Linda's pulse stuttered. "You've seen him?"
"Yes. And if you want him back—" He extended his hand. "—you'll help me close the Frosted Gate."
The whisper in her skull roared, furious. "If you touch him, I'll make you watch him burn."
Linda hesitated, torn between terror and desperate hope. The frost beneath her feet pulsed once, like a heartbeat.
She took his hand.
The frost exploded.