That smile haunted me.
Not cruel. Not mocking.
Just… knowing.
It felt more dangerous than the Threadbearer, more insidious than the Loom itself. It was the smile of someone not bound by destiny—someone who had waited for fate to break.
I couldn't sleep after I saw it.
Not because of fear—but because, somewhere inside, I could feel it calling me. Not with force or magic, but with curiosity.
And that was worse.
"What did you see?" Kael asked me, as we sat by a fire we created from thought and desire.
I shook my head. "Not what. Who."
"Another entity?"
"Something watching us from the void we made. Like it was… waiting for the Loom to fall."
Riven stirred the fire with a finger, watching sparks dance in the air like fireflies. "Of course there'd be something. Nature hates silence. Magic hates emptiness. We didn't just break fate—we opened a door."
Kael looked over at me. "And you think it's coming through?"
"I don't know," I answered. "But I think… I might've invited it."
The wind shifted.
A single black feather floated down from nowhere.
Kael caught it before it touched the fire. It pulsed softly—like a heartbeat.
"Sera," Riven whispered, "your eyes…"
"What?" I asked.
"They're changing. One of them is… gold."
I blinked rapidly, and magic flared in my veins like hot wine. Images flooded me—mountains with no names, cities of floating stone, creatures with bones like crystal and shadows for skin.
"I'm… seeing something," I murmured. "A place beyond this realm. Beyond even the Loom."
Kael stood beside me. "We're not alone in the void anymore."
I looked at the feather again.
It wasn't just an omen.
It was a message.
And whatever smiled at me through the rift—it wanted me to come find it.
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