They stood before the sealed door, iron rings crusted with blood, runes carved into bone.
"Valdrik is behind this?" Alera whispered.
Kael nodded. "He's alive. In a way."
Kieran scowled. "This feels like a trap."
Cayle chuckled darkly. "Everything feels like a trap lately. Even breathing."
Kael placed his palm on the runes. Frost spread instantly. The symbols pulsed.
The door groaned open.
The air behind it smelled like grief.
They stepped inside.
It was a circular chamber, deep beneath the City of Saints. No sunlight had touched it in decades. The walls were lined with melted candles. Books, bones, and strange scribbles littered the floor.
At the center sat Valdrik.
Or what remained of him.
His body was wrapped in layers of torn red robes, soaked in ink and dried blood. Chains looped around his limbs. His hair had turned white. His eyes glowed softly, like dying embers.
He was smiling.
"I've been waiting," he rasped, voice like cracked stone. "So long… for the children to arrive."
Alera froze. "You know who we are."
"Of course," he said. "I carved your fates before you were born."
Kael stepped forward. "Then uncarve them."
Valdrik laughed. It echoed, unholy. "Oh, if only it were that simple, frostling."
Kieran's hand drifted to his blade.
Valdrik saw it. "Kill me, shadow prince, and you'll never break the seal. Only I know the rite."
"What rite?" Alera asked.
"The Rite of Unbinding," Valdrik said. "The only spell strong enough to undo prophecy."
Her heart leapt.
But he smiled again. "It requires a price."
"What kind of price?" Kieran growled.
Valdrik's eyes locked on Alera.
"A life for a fate."
Silence.
Cold. Heavy. Crushing.
"You want a sacrifice," Alera said.
"No," Valdrik said. "I require a willing sacrifice. One bound by blood to the child. Only then can the prophecy be rewritten."
She swallowed. "You mean… me?"
Valdrik didn't blink.
"I die... so my son can live free?"
"You choose," Valdrik whispered. "Freedom or control. Chaos or order. Shadow or sin."
Kieran stepped forward. "No. There must be another way."
"There isn't," Valdrik said. "That's the curse. One life must fuel the spell to break the gods' will."
Alera turned to Kael. "If I don't do this… what happens to you?"
"I fade," he said, quietly. "Like breath on glass."
She looked at her stomach. Her child stirred. A slow, steady heartbeat beneath her palm.
She had known from the moment she escaped the palace that her life was no longer hers. But she had thought… maybe there would be time.
A few years.
A few smiles.
Now, it was all crashing down in one ugly choice.
"I'll do it," she whispered.
"No," Kieran growled. "No, Alera. Don't"
"I won't let them choose who lives or dies anymore," she said, voice trembling. "This ends with me."
But Valdrik wasn't finished.
"There is… another way."
Kieran turned, furious. "Now you say that?!"
Valdrik shrugged. "I said willing. Not that it must be her."
He pointed to Kieran.
"He is bound by blood too. Not to the child but to the throne. His shadow magic was born of the first pact. His life can fuel the Rite."
Everyone turned to Kieran.
"You," Alera breathed. "You could take my place."
He stepped back.
Eyes wild.
"Is this true?" Cayle asked.
Kieran didn't answer.
Valdrik chuckled. "Ah, even gods tremble when choices rise."
Alera stepped forward. "Kieran…"
He looked at her no mask, no shield, no lies. "If I die, who protects you? Who protects him?"
Her voice cracked. "If I die, who raises him?"
He looked away.
Kael said nothing. Just watched. Like someone watching a thread unravel.
"Then let me decide," Kieran whispered.
And he turned to Valdrik. "Tell me the rite."
That night, the chamber glowed red.
Valdrik drew ancient sigils with blood and ash.
Kael stood on one side of the circle. Alera, the other. Kieran in the center.
Cayle held a blade made of starlight.
And the spell began.
Words were spoken in a tongue the world had long forgotten.
Kieran bled from his palms. His veins glowed black.
Alera screamed once something tore from her soul, wrapped in shadow.
Kael trembled as frost cracked across his skin, his form flickering like light on ice.
Valdrik screamed the final line
And the room exploded in silence.
When the light returned, Kieran was gone.
Alera collapsed to her knees.
Kael gasped, then stood fully solid, fully alive.
The prophecy was broken.
But Kieran had paid the price.
Or so they thought.
Because from the dark corner of the chamber came a voice faint, broken.
"Not… yet…"
Kieran.
Barely breathing.
Half-shadow, half-man.
Changed.
Reader's Note:
Would you have chosen Alera's life or Kieran's to fuel the Rite?
Drop your thoughts and tears in the comments
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Author's Note:
The prophecy is broken but at what cost? Kieran lives... barely. Kael is whole. Alera must lead what comes next.
If your heart's still beating after that ending, smash that Power Stone.
Chapter Seven coming soon and it will break more than just fate.