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Chapter 26 – Echoes in the Pines
Last Updated:
2025-11-12 21:10:30
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Beneath the Diamond Veil Chapter 31 – Father of Fire
For a moment, I could only stare.The man—if he even was a man—stood there as if carved from sunlight and rage. Flames licked around his shoulders like a living cloak, and each step he took burned the dark ground beneath him, turning it to glowing glass.His presence felt like standing in front of a star.Too bright.Too ancient.Too dangerous.“You…” My throat tightened. “You’re Phoenix's father?”He smiled—slow and sharp, like the fire was pleased with itself.“He calls me that.”A beat.“Others call me many things. But you—” he tilted his head, studying me with unsettling interest,“—you may call me Orin.”Orin.The name cracked through the chamber like a spark hitting oil. The shadows around us recoiled as though afraid of him.My palms were sweating, but there was a fire simmering in my chest too—left by the ember that had merged into me. My own heat answered his instinctively, rising like a defensive flare.He raised an amused brow.“So the Balance awakens.”I swallowed hard. “I
Beneath the Diamond Veil Chapter 30 – The Place Between Fire and Shadow
The first thing I felt was cold.Not the natural cold of winter or snow or wind.This was deeper—colder than bone, colder than memory.A cold that felt like it was made of silence.I opened my eyes.Darkness stretched in every direction, but not an empty one. It pulsed faintly, like a heartbeat hidden beneath the world. Shadows slid across each other like drifting smoke, forming shapes that dissolved before I could understand them.I sat up slowly, my palms pressing into ground that wasn’t exactly ground—smooth like glass, warm like skin.“Hello?” My voice echoed strangely, as if the darkness listened.And then—A soft flame bloomed in front of me.Not bright. Not blinding. A small, gentle fire, hovering a few inches above the shadow floor like a floating ember.It flickered once.Twice.Then it spoke.Not aloud.Inside me.“Little flame.”I froze.It wasn’t Phoenix’s voice.It wasn’t Alexander’s.It wasn’t even the voice I’d heard right before being pulled under.This one sounded… im
Beneath the Diamond Veil Chapter 29 – The One Who Knelt
For a moment, I thought my heart stopped.Not from fear.From the impossible sight unfolding in front of me—something enormous, ancient, and shimmering with silver light kneeling in the snow like a loyal sentinel.Its wings were massive, each feather like a shard of moonlit metal. Its eyes glowed the same molten silver burning beneath Alexander’s skin. And when it lowered its head, the weight of its presence pressed into the air, heavy enough to make the trees bend.I clutched at Alexander’s coat, barely finding my voice.“Wh-what… is that?”His arms tightened around me instinctively, as though shielding me from a creature that was clearly not here to harm him.“Elara,” he whispered, his breath warm against my ear, “don’t be afraid.”“Afraid?” I stared at the giant kneeling monster-bird-dragon-thing with a voice that cracked. “I’m… evaluating my options.”A breathless, shaky attempt at humor—but the truth was, my entire body was trembling, not from cold but from the sheer unrealness o
Beneath the Diamond Veil Chapter 28 – The Depths Remember
Cold didn’t feel like cold anymore.It felt like memory.It wrapped around me in a thick, luminous darkness, swallowing sound, swallowing thought, swallowing the last scream I’d almost released when the ice cracked beneath my feet. My lungs should have burned. My fingers should have numbed. But instead—I wasn’t sinking.I was drifting.Suspended in a water that didn’t behave like water. It glowed from below, gold and warm like sunlight filtered through honey. My hair floated around me like smoke, and when I reached out instinctively, the water caressed my palm like a living thing.“Elara.”The voice wasn’t outside me now. It was everywhere.Phoenix.I spun—though spinning didn’t really apply when there was no direction—and for the first time, he didn’t appear as shadows or whispers or a silhouette.He emerged from the water itself.Tall, radiant, impossibly beautiful in a way that wasn’t comforting. Beauty like fire: mesmerizing but dangerous. His eyes glowed faintly—gold, like the l
Beneath the Diamond Veil Chapter 27 – The Child in the Photograph
Snow pressed against my boots as if the earth itself wanted to hold me still. The photograph trembled between my fingers, but not because of the cold. Because the girl in it — small, wide-eyed, smiling faintly — was me.And she was holding Phoenix’s hand.Not Alexander’s. Not my mother’s. His.My breath fogged in the freezing air. “Tell me this is fake,” I said, my voice barely a whisper.Alexander didn’t answer immediately. His expression had gone blank — not emotionless, but unreadable, like a chess player realizing the board was rigged from the start.Sera stepped closer, leaning over my shoulder to look. “Holy hell,” she murmured. “That’s you.”“I know,” I said.She glanced at Alexander. “And that’s her, right? Her mother?”He nodded once, curtly. “Yes.”“Then what the—”“Enough.” His voice cut through the air like glass. He reached out, snatching the photo from my hand. The edges crackled with frost as if even the paper could sense his temper. “This isn’t possible.”“Not possible
Beneath the Diamond Veil Chapter 26 – Echoes in the Pines
The word slithered through the cabin like a ghost made of breath.Found you.For a heartbeat, none of us moved.Then Alexander was already at the window, every trace of warmth gone from his face. The air around him shifted—the quiet, still confidence of a man who’d spent a lifetime commanding fear instead of feeling it. He pressed two fingers to the frame, eyes flicking with recognition.“They’re not supposed to be able to cross this boundary,” he muttered.Sera stepped beside him, dagger loose but ready in her grip. “Then either your spellwork’s rusted, Alex, or they’ve upgraded.”“Who?” I demanded, my voice tighter than I meant it to be. “Who found us?”Neither answered right away.A dull thud echoed outside—boots on snow. Several. Heavy.Sera looked over her shoulder at me. “Stay low, sweetheart.”“I’m not—”“Not negotiable,” she cut in, tone razor-sharp. “Unless you know how to kill something that doesn’t technically breathe.”My mouth snapped shut.Alexander crossed the room and
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