Chapter #6 - The Riftborn Hunt

The warning came at dusk, if you could call it that.

The moons hung low, twin eyes bleeding silver and red through a sky that pulsed like a living thing.

When the Sanctum bells began to toll, the sound wasn’t metallic. It was bone-deep, echoing through the roots of the Lumenwild. Even before Cael burst into my chamber, I knew what it meant.

“They’ve crossed the veil,” he said, breath sharp, eyes alight with gold. “The Riftborn are hunting.”

He didn’t wait for an answer. He tossed me a cloak lined with silver thread, grabbed his blades, and strode into the light. I followed, heart hammering against my ribs.

The courtyard was chaos with wolves shifting mid-run, weapons drawn, magic searing the ground in glowing trails. Auren’s voice carried through the din, steady and commanding. “From the eastern line! Keep them away from the roots!”

The roots. The heart of the forest. The place I’d only heard about in whispers.

“Cael ”..

He turned, already shifting, not fully, but enough that his eyes blazed brighter than the moonlight. “Stay close to me. Don’t use the Moonfire unless you have to.”

“What happens if I have to?”

He hesitated. “Then pray it listens.”

We plunged into the forest.

The air was electric, humming with ancient tension. Trees leaned inward, their bark gleaming faintly as if trying to contain something too large for their roots. Every few seconds, the ground shuddered and the sound of claws against soil, of something breaking through.

When we reached the glade, I saw them.

The Riftborn weren’t creatures so much as fractures in existence and humanoid silhouettes made of shadow and light, their forms flickering like smoke caught in a storm. Their eyes glowed hollow white. Every step they took bled the world around them gray.

The wolves struck first.

Gold and silver light clashed against shadow, a violent dance that painted the air with streaks of magic. I ducked as a Riftborn lunged, its claws slicing through a tree trunk like silk. Cael caught it mid-strike, his blade igniting in molten gold.

“Go!” he barked. “Find Auren and follow him!”

“I’m not leaving you!”

“Elara ”..

A burst of silver erupted between us it's not from him, from me. The mark on my chest flared, bright enough to blind. The Riftborn recoiled with a shriek that sounded like tearing metal.

The Moonfire had moved on its own.

When the light faded, I was gasping. The symbol still burned under my skin, pulsing like it had a heartbeat.

Cael’s expression was unreadable. “It’s responding to the Rift.”

“Isn’t that good?”

His jaw tightened. “It shouldn’t know how.”

Before I could ask what he meant, Auren appeared, his twin daggers gleaming like liquid lightning. “They’re driving the Riftborn toward the Hollow,” he said. “We need to reach the Heart before they do.”

“The Heart?” I asked.

Auren’s gaze flicked to me, then to Cael. “You didn’t tell her?”

“She wasn’t ready.”

I stepped between them. “Tell me now.”

Cael met my eyes. “The Heart of the Veil is where this realm breathes. If the Riftborn corrupt, the veil collapses. Your world and ours ”..

“ will bleed together,” Auren finished grimly.

A howl tore through the night. Not wolf but something else. Something hungry.

Cael drew closer, his presence grounding and terrifying all at once. “Stay behind me. No matter what happens.”

We ran.

The deeper we went, the stranger the forest became. Trees bent backward, their branches forming archways that pulsed with veins of light. The air was heavy with magic, alive and trembling. Every step I took, the Moonfire in me seemed to hum louder, like it recognized the path.

By the time we reached the Hollow, the air shimmered. The ground split open in a ring of silver roots, and at its center floated the Heart with a sphere of light suspended in air, breathing in rhythm with mine.

It was beautiful. Terrifying. Alive.

But the Riftborn were already there.

Dozens of them, crawling from the cracks in the earth, their bodies twisting in and out of shape. The air smelled like ash and metal.

Cael raised his blade. “Auren, flank left!”

Auren vanished into the mist, his laughter cutting through the chaos. Cael turned to me once more. “Elara ”..

“I know,” I said. “Stay behind you.”

But I didn’t.

When the Riftborn surged forward, instinct took over. The mark on my chest flared again, but this time I didn’t fight it. I let it burn.

The world exploded in light.

Silver fire poured from my hands, ribbons of it wrapping around the Riftborn like chains. Their screams weren’t sound, they were static of waves of pressure that made the ground tremble. The flames twisted upward, forming runes in the air I didn’t recognize but somehow understood.

“By the twin moons,” Auren whispered from somewhere behind me. “She’s channeling the Veil itself.”

Cael reached for me, but the magic wouldn’t let him close. The fire spun faster, circling me and the Heart like a storm. I couldn’t tell where my power ended and the forest began.

“Elara, stop!” he shouted.

“I can’t!”

The Riftborn howled, their forms shattering into fragments that dissolved into mist, but the light didn’t fade. It grew brighter, pulling at me, drawing me toward the Heart.

Images flashed through my mind and the girl in the Mirror Lake, the whisper in my dreams, the pull of another life.

Then, a voice. Soft, familiar.

You were never meant to stay hidden.

The light burst outward.

When I opened my eyes, I was on the ground. Smoke curled from the soil. The Heart still pulsed above us, brighter now, steadier and alive again.

The Riftborn were gone.

So were most of the wolves. Only Auren and Cael remained, both staring at me like I’d just torn open the sky.

“What… what happened?” I whispered.

Cael stepped forward slowly, his expression raw. “You bound the Heart.”

“I“What?”

“You didn’t just save it,” Auren said, still catching his breath. “You connected to it. The Moonfire and the Veil, they’re linked now. Through you.”

I stared at them both, heart pounding. “So what does that mean?”

Cael’s voice was quiet. “It means you don’t belong to either world anymore.”

The wind shifted. The forest sighed, relieved and mournful all at once.

Above us, the two moons glowed in perfect alignment for the first time since I’d arrived with silver and red overlapping until they looked like one.

And somewhere, in that impossible light, a shadow moved.

Watching. Waiting.

The battle might have ended, but the hunt had just begun.