Morning returned to the Hollow like an old friend knocking gently at the door. The mist had thinned to a faint shimmer clinging to the grass. Light filtered through the broken windows, warm and golden, catching in the dust like flecks of memory.
The estate still stood, but it was quieter now. Not dead—just finally at peace.
Lyra stepped barefoot into the garden that had once been strangled by thorns. It had changed. Not entirely—some of the roots remained blackened, twisted—but between them, new green shoots had emerged. Small buds. Pale flowers curling open to a sky they hadn't seen in years.
She crouched to touch one.
It was warm.
Alive.
---
Elias stood beneath the archway, watching her.
"You've been out here since dawn," he said gently.
"I needed to see if anything could grow," Lyra replied.
He walked toward her and knelt beside a vine that had once been a snare. Now it twined harmlessly along the garden wall, blooming with small violet blossoms.
"It's not perfect," she added. "But it's not dead either."
"That's enough," Elias said.
They sat in silence for a while, listening to the wind rustling through the leaves. Somewhere deeper in the house, Velan was collecting what remained of the rituals—books, bones, bindings—and preparing them for burial. Not destruction. Not denial. Just rest.
---
"Do you think she'll come back?" Lyra asked.
Elias tilted his head. "Amaris?"
"She's part of the Hollow. Even if she's free."
He didn't answer right away. Instead, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a charm made of root and thread. One of the old warding tokens—only now it pulsed with a gentle red glow, not the harsh flare of protection.
"She left something behind," he said. "Not just to warn. To teach."
Lyra took the charm and tucked it into her coat. "Then we'll remember her the right way."
---
Later, they returned to the atrium.
It was brighter than before. The stained-glass dome above had shattered weeks ago during the Binding, but now it let in a halo of pure light. The floor was cracked, the pillars scorched—but it didn't feel haunted. Just old. And honest.
Velan stood beside a crate of relics.
"I'll take these to the old monastery," he said. "The monks there guard forgotten things. They'll know what to do."
Lyra nodded. "Thank you. For helping me see what the Hollow really was."
He bowed. "You gave it a new name. That's more than any of us ever managed."
---
They walked Velan out through the gates. The old arch, once carved with warnings and hexes, now bore only moss and sunlight.
At the edge of the forest, Velan turned and gave Lyra a small object—an iron key, rusted and worn.
"It still belongs to you," he said. "Even after all this."
"I don't want to lock it anymore," Lyra said.
"Then keep it open," he replied, smiling.
With that, he disappeared into the woods, the relics clinking faintly in his satchel like glass bones.
---
That night, Lyra sat alone in her room.
The mirror was gone. So were the eyes in the shadows, the whispers from beneath the floor. She stared out at the stars—clear, clean, no longer warped by the Hollow's gaze.
And for the first time, she didn't feel like a prisoner in her own legacy.
She felt like a keeper.
Of memories.
Of healing.
Of the garden that remained.