Ashengar. Dusk. The light dies like a prayer unanswered.
The shattered temple rose from the heart of the forest like the bones of a god long forgotten. Vines choked its cracked spires. Moonlight filtered through the collapsed roof, silvering the bloodied sigils carved into the altar. The air pulsed with ancient curses and secrets that refused to die.
Lysara Vale stepped over the corpse of a corrupted priest, her boots slick with ash. Her blade, still warm from battle, trembled faintly in her grip—not from fear, but recognition.
He was here.
She felt him in the air, like a scent she once wore close to her heart.
"Come out, Raven Prince," she called. "Or must I bleed your name into the walls to summon you?"
Silence. Then: soft footsteps echoing on stone.
From the shadowed arch emerged Valcian Myrrh.
He moved like poetry written in sin—black leather embroidered with silver thorns, lips curled in a smirk that held both cruelty and charm. His eyes, violet and wrong, glimmered with knowing. Behind him, crows whispered and took flight, as if obeying his unspoken call.
"Lysara Vale," he purred. "Still as sharp-tongued as when you interrogated me in chains."
She didn't flinch. "And still as slippery as the day you disappeared with a bishop's heart in your mouth."
He laughed—rich and decadent. "I left you a gift. You never said thank you."
She raised her sword. "Speak your purpose, or I carve it from you."
Valcian stepped closer, unafraid. The ruined temple seemed to pulse around him, as if he'd bled part of his soul into its stone.
"I come bearing riddles," he whispered. "And desire. But mostly? I come with answers about him."
Lysara's grip faltered.
He smiled wider. "Yes. Dren."
Her blade lowered half an inch. "Speak."
But Valcian didn't speak.
He lunged.
Their blades clashed—silver on obsidian. Sparks danced. She pivoted, slashing low, but he caught her ankle with his boot and sent her spinning. She rolled, kicked off a column, and slashed again, nicking his cheek.
Blood bloomed red down his jaw.
He licked it.
"You dance well, inquisitor," he said breathlessly. "But do you kiss as fiercely?"
She rushed him, blade aimed for his throat—but he parried and spun her into the altar. Her back hit stone. He pressed close. Too close. The heat of his body, his scent—violets and ash—wrapped around her like poison perfume.
His hand gripped her wrist. "You're not here just for truth. You want memory. You want him."
"I want to kill him."
He leaned in, his lips brushing her ear. "Then why do you tremble?"
Lysara shoved him away—but his fingers caught her jaw. She should have sliced him open.
Instead… she froze.
"I see it in your eyes," he murmured. "You loved the monster before he became one. You still do."
She snarled, "You know nothing—"
And he kissed her.
It was not tender.
It was war.
His mouth claimed hers with savage grace, tasting her shock, drinking her defiance. She bit his lip, and he moaned into her mouth like a man starved. For a breathless heartbeat, she kissed him back—not because she wanted him, but because he was the closest thing to Dren she could reach.
Then she shoved him away, her blade against his throat.
"Do that again," she hissed, "and I'll make you a eunuch."
Valcian's grin only widened. A drop of blood slid down his mouth.
"You taste like fury and regret," he said. "No wonder he still dreams of you."
She stiffened. "What did you say?"
Valcian stepped back, arms wide. "Dren sends dreams now, little inquisitor. But not just to you. To me. To the others. He's building something... dark. And you? You're the center of it."
Lysara's heartbeat thundered. "You're lying."
"Am I?"
He reached into his coat and tossed something at her feet.
A bloodstained feather. Raven-black, but veined in glowing blue.
A relic. From Dren's sanctum.
Only a handful existed. And she'd held one before—on the night she spared his life.
"You have a choice," Valcian said, his voice now edged with something colder. "Kill me now. Or follow me deeper into the ruin. To where the first seal broke."
He began walking, his boots echoing.
"Wait," she called.
He didn't stop.
Above, unseen in the shattered rafters, Selene Mirthvale watched. Cloaked in silence and shadow, she gripped the hilt of her dagger so tightly her knuckles turned bone-white. Her breath was shallow. Her eyes burned—not with rage, but betrayal.
Lysara had kissed him.
And he had spoken Dren's name.
Selene's whisper ghosted into the dark: "You don't even see me anymore."
Far below, Lysara stood alone in the ruined light, torn between memory and madness.
And deeper still, the temple's stone glowed faintly… as if something beneath the altar had begun to awaken.
************************
Years ago, Lysara walks into Dren's war tent, soaked in enemy blood. He's asleep on a cot, one hand still clutching a spell-scroll. She kneels beside him, brushes hair from his brow… and for the first time, wonders what it might be like to love the boy behind the monster.