Chapter 133
Serafine POV
I see Xander shift his weight slightly, and adjust Eryx in his arms. The baby settles once again, his face burrowing into Xander’s chest and shirt. For a moment, none of us speak. There’s something in the air now, heavier, it goes deeper than the silence to. It presses in around us, like the forest itself is holding it’s breath and waiting for something more.
I step toward the Soulroot again, slower this time, and kneel near its base. The roots don’t recoil, if anything, they curl gently toward me, almost like they recognize me, like they’ve been waiting for me to come back. My fingers hover just above the soil. I don’t touch it yet. I’m not sure I should.
Behind me, Xander’s voice breaks the quiet. “If the magic is rotting from the source, then there’s no fixing the land until this place is healed.”
I know that he’s right in what he is saying but it’s not that simple. My eyes drift to the gnarled trunk, to where it’s split down it’s center, it seems to pulse with the same rhythm as my heartbeat. There’s something alive inside of the tree, something that can’t be seen yet, but I can feel it. It’s breathing, remembering and watching.
“It’s not just rotting,” I say slowly. “It was wounded and it was wounded a long time ago. I saw blood, by that I don’t mean metaphorical, or symbolic, I mean real blood spilled into the roots. Something was taking from it, or something was broken and it never recovered.
The words leave my mouth before i even have a chance to fully understand them, but the moment I say them, the Hollow seems to respond. A low him vibrates through the soil and into my bones. The petal shiver, and seem to open wider, and it makes my own magic stir again, curling through my fingers, even though I never summoned it.
“Maybe it wasn’t meant to be healed by one person,” I add, rising to my feet. “Maybe it needs all of us, the Threadborn and the Veyrathi together. Maybe that’s why it let us in.”
Xander steps closer and brushes his free hand along the bark of the Soulroot. It glows faintly under his touch, and I swear the split in the tree closes just a
fraction, like it’s reacting to him as well. His expression darkens, though, eyes locked on the glow that pulses beneath the bark.
“It’s not just waiting for healing,” he murmurs. “It’s afraid.”
I look at him, startled. “Of what?” How can he know that, how does he know?
He doesn’t answer right away. His jaw tightens, and his grip on Eryx shifts like he’s drawing him closer, instinctively shielding him. Then he meets my
gaze.
“Of what’s still coming.”
A chill slips down my spine, sudden and sharp. The forest beyond the clearing is too quiet. The trees no longer feel like they’re merely watching. It feels like they’re listening for footsteps and preparing.
I turn away from the tree and walk to the edge of the clearing, looking back the way we came. The archway we passed under is still there, framed by trees and mist. But something’s changed.
The forest behind it is gone.
Or at least, it’s wrong. Where the path had once stretched out through the dense woods, there’s now only shifting fog and the faint outlines of trees that don’t belong. They’re twisted, skeletal, with no leaves and they sway like there’s wind but I feel nothing, no breeze.
“We didn’t pass those trees,” I say quietly. “That’s not where we came from.”
Xander turns toward me, his expression sharpening. “What do you mean?”
“I think the Hollow’s sealing us in.”
Xander doesn’t answer me, he looks at the tree again, at the faint line of light that runs through the center of the trunk. Eryx stirs against his chest again, barely making a sound though.
1/2
Chapter 133
I turn back to the Soulroot and sigh, the clearing seems smaller now, brighter as if the Hollow has drawn a circle around us and is shutting out the rest of the world. The light above us dims slightly, though no clouds pass overhead. The tree pulses once then the air changes.
The ground beneath my feet hums and my breath catches. Magic tightens around my chest, threads tugging like invisible strings pulled beneath my dẫn –
Then the petals at the base of the tree begin to shift, they don’t bloom or open, instead they fall away, petal by petal they scatter in a soft deliberate motion. When I move closer I see it’s revealing a patch of bare earth beneath the Soulroot that glows faintly, not green or golden but silver
Kneeling slowly and carefully I watch it, my magic leans into it, as if it recognizes something, and I don’t even have to reach out myself, the threads move for me.
Xander watches silently, saying nothing, as the soil begins to shift beneath the surface. Roots draw back and the earth moves. The silver thread winds upwardand curls around my palm, the moment it touches my skin, my body locks up.
Another memory slams into me, but it’s not mine.
I’m standing in the Hollow, but it’s no longer quiet. People surround the Soulroot, warriors, cloaked figures, their hands glowing with threads of every color I’ve ever seen. White. Crimson. Violet. Gold. They’re chanting something out loud and crying. The tree is split wider than it is now, torn open and in the center, kneeling by the roots is a woman.
She’s young, barely older than I am now and I can see her skin glowing. Her eyes are black and her palms are cut open, bleeding into the tree. I can hear her voice, though her lips don’t move.
“They came through us, the Veyrathi, the Threadborn, we weren’t created. We were released.”
Her words flow into my mind and she looks up and it’s like she can see me.
“You are the end of the forgetting.”
The vision shatters so hard I gasp and fall backward, the thread snaps from my palm and sinks against into the earth, leaving my heart pounding in my chest and sweat building on my neck.
Xander’s at my side instantly, crouching low, but I hold up a hand to stop him.
“I’m alright,” I breathe. “I think… I think it showed me the beginning.”
He watches me closely. “What did you see?”
I stare at the Soulroot. It doesn’t move again and the petals are gone. The silver light beneath the roots is buried but the hum in the air remains.
“There was blood,” I whisper. “A sacrifice I believe or a willing. The first one, maybe. And she said… we weren’t made the way we thought. The Veyrathi and the Threadborn, we didn’t come from the Hollow. We were let out of it.”
Xander frowns. “Let out?”
“As if we were sealed and contained.” I shake my head. “Or grown.”
There’s more. I can feel it all it’s still buried in the Hollow’s memory, but whatever held us at the surface is gone now.
