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Inside the suffocating silence of Salile, Thane becomes the group’s only guide when a strange melody leads him through the city’s shifting paths and away from the deadly shadows waiting in the mist. The chapter ends with the group reaching a domed stone building marked by the Broken Circle, as Thane begins to realize this world is changing him in ways he can no longer dismiss.
Chapter 16 - Unreality
Thane stepped forward and pressed against the stone door. It didn’t budge—until Kaelir and Cael stepped up beside him, adding their weight.
Slowly, the door opened with the sound of stone remembering how to move.
It wasn’t loud—but in the silence of Salile, it felt seismic.
As Thane stepped across the threshold, a faint sound stirred—like a breath caught in stone. One by one, ethereal blue torches flared to life around the perimeter of the chamber, their flames hovering just above iron sconces without touching them. Each lit in a slow progression, circling the room until the last ignited on the far wall—casting pale light over the pedestal at the center.
In the torchlight, the chamber didn’t so much unfold as awaken—walls rounding into view, shadows shrinking back to reveal age-worn stone.
No golden altars. No gleaming thrones. Just a wide, circular space built entirely from stone. The ceiling domed high overhead, traced with crumbling frescoes that curved like constellations. Dust drifted in the stillness like the chamber had been holding its breath for centuries, waiting for someone to disturb it.
And now they had.
Thane moved further in. Each step echoing as if marking time—like he was late to something that had already begun.
Behind him, the others stepped in one by one, eyes scanning the walls, boots whispering against stone.
None of them spoke. They all knew better.
The frescoes curved down from the dome, bleeding into the chamber walls—paint faded by time, but not lost. Scenes worn thin, edges blurred, yet the stories endured. A figure with light in their chest, reaching into something vast and dark. Another cradling something broken—curved like the crescent of a dying moon. Another walking into fire, alone.
Erynn and Cael moved along opposite sides of the chamber, studying the frescoes in silence. Their hands never touched the walls, but they traced above them, gesturing to symbols, pointing at motifs. The Broken Circle appeared more than once—subtle in some places, overt in others. The entire chamber seemed built around these painted stories.
At the center stood a pedestal, carved from the same cold stone as the floor. Its surface was smooth and featureless—except for two small, dark openings carved into the flat surface of the pedestal, one on each side. Nothing marked them. No symbols. Austere. At its base, the symbol appeared again—the Broken Circle, carved deep into the stone, its edges shadowed by the torchlight.
Erynn circled slowly along the curved wall, her fingers tracing the air just above the faded paint. She paused near one panel—tilted her head, studying a shape barely visible in the torchlight—and motioned for Cael.
He joined her, eyes narrowing. They exchanged a few subtle gestures, silent but precise. Cael nodded once, his expression tightening like something had clicked into place.
Whatever they were reading in the frescoes, it wasn’t random. They clearly saw something they felt was the key. At the same time, they both turned to Thane, then pointed toward the pedestal—specifically, the dark openings carved into its surface.
Thane glanced between them and the pedestal, frowning. What were they expecting him to do? He literally had no idea—only that all eyes were now on him.
Cael exhaled, then stepped past him. With deliberate slowness, he raised both hands and hovered them just above the openings—then eased them toward the stone as if demonstrating what was required. He didn’t complete the motion. Just let them hang there, glancing back for Thane’s reaction.
Thane stepped back half a pace. His gaze bounced from the openings, then to Erynn and Cael.
Did they want him to put his hands in those holes?
No fucking way! For all he knew, they were full of spiders, snakes, or worse. This place had been abandoned for ages—anything could be living in there now. Did they think he’d just do it because of some ancient fresco?
But before he could properly protest, Erynn stepped forward, pulling a scrap of parchment from her cloak. She knelt near the pedestal and scribbled quickly, her brow tight. When she stood and handed it to him, her expression was grave.
You must leave your hands in until it ends—no matter what. If you pull them out early…
The rest wasn’t written.
But Thane didn’t need the rest—he already knew.
This was it, then. The Test—waiting in the dark, just like everything else in Salile.
He took a breath, but it didn’t help. The pedestal now looked distinctly like a trap, perfectly placed to draw him in. Every part of him screamed to step back. To log out. This was their future, not his.
He turned, already halfway to saying something—to mock the rules of this city, to mock the prophecies of Arbelon. Their demands for silence and reverence were ridiculous. He was over it.
But Lirien was there.
She hadn’t moved from the doorway, but now she stepped forward—slow, steady, like the moment might break if she rushed it. Her fingers found his hand. Warm. Certain.
She didn’t speak. This place wouldn’t allow it.
As the others watched from the edges of the room, she mouthed the words: I believe in you.
He hated how easily she cut through his armor.
Hated that part of him needed to hear it.
Thane looked back at the pedestal. No glowing glyphs. No dramatic fanfare. Just two openings. One for each hand. The broken circle etched into its base—calling to him.
He didn’t know what would happen. Didn’t know what it would ask of him. But he was done pretending he didn’t belong here.
The others had made their move.
Now it was his.
He stepped forward. And reached in.
The stone was cold.
Not biting. Not sharp. Just still—too still.
Thane slid his hands deeper into the openings.
He expected cobwebs. Roughness. The gritty feel of age and decay.
But the inside was too smooth. Wrongly smooth. Like something had sanded the stone from the inside. Prepared it for him.
Then it moved.
Not the stone. Something inside it.
Fingers.
Too long. Too many. Human-shaped, but not. Like they’d been carved from darkness.
They wrapped around his wrists—not yanking, not violent. Just… enclosing. Like they’d been waiting for him. Or maybe he imagined them.
Panic rose fast. He tried to pull back—instinct, nothing more.
But the hands inside wouldn’t let go. As if the Test had decided for him.
A hiss of breath caught in his throat.
And the world fell away.
He was back in the hospital.
Fluorescent lights humming overhead, the antiseptic sting of bleach in his nose. The hallway stretched too far in both directions, impossibly long. He knew this place. Knew it down to the ache in his bones.
Except it wasn’t right.
The lights glitched—flickering into torchlight, then back again. The walls rippled with carvings he didn’t understand that vanished when he blinked.
Something skittered along the ceiling.
He turned—and he was in Arbelon again.
But the chamber was gone, replaced with a garden half in bloom, half in rot. One side bloomed with impossible color. The other—gray, brittle, withering to dust.
A woman stood in the center. Her face obscured by a veil of light. But she radiated something ancient and mournful—the world pausing in her presence.
She raised her hand, and the garden dissolved.
Behind her, Arbelon crumbled. Cities smoldering in ruin. The sky cracked like old glass. And at the center of it all—the Heart of Arbelon. Beating faintly. Weak. A dying thing.
“Only you can heal it,” she said.
But her voice…
Her voice was his mother’s.
Whispers now. The hospital. The garden. Salile.
They folded in and out of each other like pages in a book written sideways.
Somewhere, someone was sobbing.
He blinked.
Now he stood in the hallway again.
This time a dozen glowing monitors lined the walls. Each flickering.
One showed Cael wounded, crawling. Another, Erynn in prayer. Yet another, Lirien’s laugh echoing under stars.
Then one screen changed.
It showed him.
But not him.
A twisted version—skin stained with wild magic. His eyes were sunken, lost.
The Heart of Arbelon shattering behind him.
Then Lirien’s voice.
“Only you can stop this.”
He turned to her.
But it wasn’t her.
Instead, Dr. Hughes stood before him. Calm. Sad. Familiar.
“You’ve been hallucinating again,” the doctor said. “Side effects of your disease. Dissociation. Delusions.”
“You’re not real,” Thane whispered—but he didn’t sound sure.
The doctor tilted his head. “So you believe this is real? Arbelon. Wild Magic. Her?”
A pause.
“It’s just your brain trying to survive what’s already killing it.”
“Then why does it feel like it matters?” Thane asked.
The doctor just smiled. Sadly. Like someone watching a mistake unfold.
“Thane, you just need to ask yourself this: Is it more likely that you’re really in some magical video game, or that it’s your brain trying to cope with the reality of your disease?”
Thane staggered.
He looked down—and the floor was gone.
He was falling through Arbelon. Through fire. Through stone.
Through memory. Dragging every broken thing to the surface.
His father’s watch.
No—not just a watch. It pulsed now, faint and strange, as if syncing with the rhythm of the Heart itself.
Thane lifted his wrist, instinctively, but the space around him had changed again. He was no longer falling—just floating in stillness, the watch burning cold against his skin.
What are you?
A symbol appeared on its face—the Broken Circle—glowing briefly. The same symbol that pulsed through Arbelon. Through the Heart. Now through him.
A feeling stirred. Not memory. Not logic.
Recognition.
This mattered.
He didn’t know why.
But it mattered.
There was a blinding pulse of blue light from the watch, and he was back in the garden again.
Only this time, Lirien stood in front of him. No veil. Just her.
“I believe in you,” she said. Her voice was soft. No urgency. No demand.
Only belief.
“You have to decide what’s real,” she added. “Me. This world. The Heart.”
A beat.
“It doesn’t matter what’s real, Thane. Only what you choose to fight for.”
She reached for him—but didn’t touch. Just hovered there, her hand open.
And then she was gone.
Thane stood alone.
The Heart pulsed beneath the ground in time with his father’s watch.
The Test wasn’t asking him to prove anything.
It wasn’t about prophecy. Or fate.
It was about choice.
What do you believe in—even when you don’t believe in anything?
The pressure vanished.
The hands—if that’s what they were—let go.
Thane gasped and yanked his arms free.
They were clean. No wounds. But he shook. His breath ragged.
For a second, he thought he was still falling.
But the stone was under him.
He was back in the chamber—silent, still.
The blue torchlight flickered.
He stumbled again.
And Lirien caught him.
She said nothing. Only held him, grounding him in the silence, her hand gripping his, her eyes steady.
I’m here, her look said. I’ve got you.
And for the first time in a long time, Thane let someone catch him.
Something inside him had changed.
Thane steadied himself, leaning on the stone pedestal, Lirien’s silent touch still grounding him. His arms throbbed from the Test. His chest burned like it still carried echoes of whatever truth had been carved into him.
Kaelir’s hand shot up—warning. His eyes darted to the entrance.
A shadow moved beyond the torchlight.
From the far side of the chamber, a figure stepped through the gloom—confident, deliberate.
Bostick. Alone.
He didn’t speak. Just walked in with a hunter’s patience, sword drawn. His eyes swept the room, pausing only when they landed on Thane.
That pause was long. Measured. And silent—as if he too knew the guarded secret of Salile.
Then—a tap.
The tip end of Bostick’s sword struck the stone floor. A slow, rhythmic knock. One. Two. Three.
It echoed louder than it should have in the hush of Salile, like someone drumming on the lid of a sealed tomb.
No one moved. No one spoke.
Because they all knew—words had weight here. And summoning the Unseen took only a whisper.
Thane’s heart raced. But his hands didn’t shake. Not anymore.
Bostick’s head tilted ever so slightly. He didn’t smile. Didn’t threaten. But the message was clear: You’re not what they say you are. You’re just a scared little boy playing a game you don’t understand.
But something had changed.
The watch on Thane’s wrist pulsed—once. Then again.
And something in the air shifted.
A low vibration hummed through the floor. The glow of the Broken Circle on the pedestal pulsed like a warning.
The fog thickened—not swirling, not drifting, but creeping inward like it had a mind of its own.
Then the stone walls began to bleed shadow.
Shapes peeled from the surface—figures slouched and wrong, too long in limb and too thin in frame. More rose from cracks in the floor, silent and stretching. Not summoned. Released.
They didn’t walk. They emerged. Like the chamber had been holding its breath, holding its secrets until now.
The Unseen were coming.
Even Bostick froze, his sword dipping as the first Unseen turned toward him. Not fast. Just… inevitable. His confidence faded as his eyes darted between Thane and this new emerging threat.
The chamber darkened.
The torchlight shrank.
The Unseen surged forward.
Cael stepped in front of Thane, as if to shield him—until Thane raised his wrist. Because, for some reason, he knew that his father’s watch mattered here.
In this place.
To them.
His watch glowed hot against his skin. He lifted it high, and the Unseen froze mid-step. They had no eyes, no faces, but it was clear their attention was on him. Waiting.
His voice wasn’t loud. But it didn’t need to be.
“Hold,” he said, seeing Cael’s shocked eyes. “You are mine.”
The Unseen paused. Their impossible shapes quivered—but they obeyed.
Bostick backed away, fast now, his blade coming up between him and the nearest creature. His eyes moved away from Thane, fixed on the Unseen. Backing toward the door.
The Unseen quivered in place, like hunting dogs being held back. Bostick swung—fast, efficient, precise. His weapon passed right through the nearest.
No impact. No blood. No scream.
Just a shimmer of cold.
His weapon had no use in this place. Salile and the Unseen had different rules.
Thane raised his watch higher, the light flickering like it was alive. Beating. Ticking. Both at the same time.
“Go,” he said, his voice hollow with command. “Make sure he doesn’t make it out of this city.”
A ripple passed through the Unseen.
And then—they peeled away.
A dozen of them surged after Bostick, who had now turned, desperate, in full sprint out of the door. The fog swallowed them all.
And just like that—Bostick was gone.
But not alone.
The remaining Unseen stayed behind. Still. Watching. Waiting for Thane’s next command.
Thane lowered his arm slightly, breath sharp in his chest. His skin was damp. His limbs felt like glass.
He hadn’t been sure that would actually work, but now that it did, he knew what needed to be done.
He turned to the remaining Unseen, voice low but tense.
“Lead us out,” he said.
The Unseen moved. Not drifting this time—but jerking forward in slow resistance. Each step seemed labored, unwilling. The magic was forcing them. Not guiding them.
Thane stepped in behind them. The others followed, blades drawn, nerves frayed.
Cracks of light spidered along Thane’s skin—his wild magic leaking as he held the power steady. The watch pulsed like a heartbeat—too fast, too stressed.
The city’s fog shifted at their approach, but not in retreat. In defiance. It watched. It pressed. It waited.
Behind them, more Unseen emerged. At every corner, every new path, more joined the slow procession. They weren’t leading the group. They were being herded by them. And the pursing shadows were barely held back by whatever Thane was doing.
The space around the group tightened. The air thickened. The silence felt like a scream waiting to break.
Sweat poured from Thane’s brow. His steps slowed. His chest rose and fell like he’d run a mile uphill. Still, he said nothing. He pressed on, trying to save them.
Cael broke the silence. “Are you—can you hold them?” he whispered.
Thane nodded. Didn’t speak. Couldn’t. All of his effort was just on holding them back. Away from the others. Away from Lirien.
The cracks on his arms glowed brighter, spreading out to the rest of his body slowly. The magic holding back the Unseen was beginning to fray at the edges, wavering like heat on stone.
Erynn stumbled. Lirien caught her. Kaelir’s hand twitched on his blade.
And then—they saw it.
The archway.
Stone. Tall. Just like the one they’d entered on the Steepes. But through this one—sunlight. A road. The way out.
But the Unseen pressed closer. The bubble of Thane’s magic was shrinking.
Kaelir reached in, throwing Thane over his shoulder, and shouted—“Run!”
The group broke into a sprint.
The last yards stretched like a dream. The Unseen surged. Thane’s magic flared—wild, burning—then vanished.
They tumbled through the archway—into sun, into warmth, into sound.
Behind them, the Unseen slammed into the archway like a wave. Faces formed now—twisted with fury. Bodies crashed against the threshold, unable to pass.
They screamed. Not with sound. But with motion. With fury. With denial.
The group collapsed onto the sunbaked ground. Gasping, but alive.
Cael dropped to a crouch, face pale. Kaelir stared at the sky like he didn’t believe it was real.
Thane sat, hands on his knees, staring back at Salile.
The city pulsed like it hated them for leaving.
“It’s not just a game,” he muttered.
Lirien touched his shoulder, kneeling beside him.
“Whatever you think it is,” she said slowly, gently. “You’re part of it now. We all are.”
Thane didn’t answer. But he didn’t argue either.
They stood there a long time, catching their breath.
Then Cael turned to Thane.
“What did you see in there?” he asked quietly. “What did you learn?”
The others turned too. Not with suspicion, but with belief that he had to be the one.
Thane hesitated. His mouth opened. Closed.
He thought back to the Test. What he’d seen, or thought he’d seen. It was hard to know what was real, and what wasn’t. But he had a choice to make.
“The Heart,” he said. “I need to heal it. If I don’t, this place falls apart.”
Erynn’s brow furrowed. She exchanged a glance with Cael.
“That’s… tricky,” she said. “The Heart is everywhere and nowhere. It’s—”
“No,” Thane cut in, his voice firm. “It does have a home. I’ve seen it. We need to find it.”
The faces that looked back at him were full of skepticism, like he’d said something blasphemous.
Erynn glanced at Cael, and him at her, their expressions conflicted. A moment later, she leaned toward Cael, whispering, “He speaks the words of the Oracle. We need to go to Veydris.”
Cael shook his head, his lips pursed.
“Absolutely not,” he whispered back. “That place is a graveyard for fools chasing illusion and fantasy.”
“We don’t have any other options,” Erynn shot back, her whispers sharp but measured. “If anyone can help us, it’s Aelith,” Erynn insisted. “Her followers swear she can see the Heart.”
Cael let out a long breath, then looked at Thane.
“Fine,” he muttered, resigned. “We go to Veydris. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Thane nodded. “If that’s where we need to go, then let’s go.”
Without another word, they turned from Salile—no more debate, no more delay.
He didn’t know where Veydris was. Or what waited for them there.
But for the first time, Thane wasn’t running away.
He was walking toward something.
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