The creek’s water glittered like shattered gss under the afternoon sun, and Zerith Stormveil’s ughter echoed off the mossy stones as he lunged, his broadbde Stormhowl slicing air. Veyne Duskthorne sidestepped effortlessly, his sleek bck hair barely stirring as he deflected the strike with the ft of Shadowveil.

  “Predictable,” Veyne said, his voice as cool as the steel in his hand.

  “Says the man who still jumps at thunder!” Zerith shot back, grinning despite the dirt smeared across his freckled cheeks.

  Seraphine Emberheart sighed from her perch on the willow branch, her ptinum braid slipping over her shoulder like a ribbon of moonlight. “Must you two turn every spar into a tavern brawl?”

  Veyne sheathed his bde. “He started it.”

  “And I’ll finish it!” Zerith hooked his foot around Veyne’s ankle, sending them both crashing into the creek. Water sprayed over Seraphine’s gray travel coat, and she yelped, clutching her leather-bound journal to her chest.

  “Children,” she muttered, though her lips twitched.

  They’d been like this for years since the day a scrappy, auburn-haired lord’s son had challenged a silent orphan squire to a duel, and a sharp-tongued Ashnd girl had stolen both their swords. Back then, they’d sworn an oath in this very creek, palms bleeding into the water: No borders. No kings. Just us.

  Now, soaked and breathless, Zerith wondered if Veyne still believed it.

  The ughter began that night.

  Zerith heard it first a sound like wind chimes and cracking bones while pacing the castle walls. The fields y quiet under the moon, but the noise coiled around him, sharp and hungry. He found Veyne in the armory, polishing Shadowveil with a cloth as bck as his hair.

  “You hear that?” Zerith leaned against the doorframe, dripping creek water onto the stone floor.

  Veyne didn’t look up. “Hear what?”

  “Like… crying. Or someone dragging a knife over gss.”

  The rag stilled. “Go to bed, Zerith.”

  But the ughter followed him into his dreams.

  Three days ter, Seraphine found the fox.

  It y twitching in the sun-bleached grass, its fur patchy, eyes glowing poison-green. Zerith crouched beside her, Stormhowl’s hilt digging into his palm. “Blight?”

  “Don’t touch it,” Veyne warned, hand already on Shadowveil.

  Seraphine ignored him. Her gloves peeled back, revealing silver runes etched into her palms Ashnd healing magic, ancient and brittle. The fox shuddered as her light brushed its fnk, then screamed, dissolving into ash that stained her fingertips charcoal.

  Veyne turned away, “We shouldn’t be here.”

  “Since when do you fear stories?” Zerith said, forcing a grin.

  “Since they bite.”

  Seraphine stared at her hands. “The Blight’s never reached this far south.”

  “Not unless someone carried it.” Veyne’s voice was barely audible.

  The temple ruins loomed at the forest’s edge, its obsidian walls carved with consteltions that made Seraphine’s breath catch.

  “That one’s wrong,” she whispered, tracing a serpent swallowing its tail. “The Ashnds’ sky has no serpents.”

  Zerith kicked open the rusted gate. Inside, the air hummed like a plucked harp string. “Look! A Stormveil dagger!” He held up the bde, its hilt engraved with a stormwolf.

  Veyne froze. “First Age steel. Your family crest didn’t exist then.”

  “So?”

  ...

  “So this is a grave.”

  Above them, the ceiling rippled.

  The stars were alive.

  Violet and gold and wrong, they pulsed around a void shaped like a crown. Seraphine colpsed, blood trickling from her nose as her dress’s consteltions bzed silver. Zerith reached for her, but the vision swallowed him whole:

  Veyne, older and gaunt, kneeling in ash, a crown of thorns tearing his brow.

  Seraphine burning, her braid turning to smoke.

  Himself, hollow-eyed, driving Stormhowl into Veyne’s heart.

  The void blinked.

  When the world snapped back, Veyne was gone.

  Zerith found the note nailed to the willow tree at dawn, its edges fluttering like a trapped moth.

  Gone to the Eclipse Sanctum. Don’t follow.

  Seraphine’s hand tightened on his arm. “The Sanctum skins Blightweavers alive.”

  Zerith crumpled the paper, his scarred forearm throbbing a relic of the fire he’d dragged Veyne from years ago. “Then we’ll skin them first.”

  As they rode north, the ughter followed, needling Zerith’s skull. Above them, a lone star burned crimson.

  Watching...