Chapter Five: The Library of Doors

I didn’t look back as I left him. I couldn’t.

The corridors were too quiet.

Not silent. The silence here had teeth. But quiet in the way a room gets when it’s waiting for something to go wrong.

The moment I crossed the threshold of his chamber, the air changed. The scent of lavender lingered faintly on my skin, too soft to wash away. The corridor beyond stretched long and curving, lined with identical doors—tall and locked, marked in languages I couldn’t read.

I didn’t know where I was going.

I only knew I had to move.

I passed doors with symbols shaped like bones, feathers, moons, teeth. None opened. None rattled. I was surrounded by the weight of things sealed away.

The light dimmed the farther I went. Not by magic—just by distance. I followed the curve of the hall until I reached a small alcove. A dead end.

No doors. No runes. Just a bare stone wall.

No. There had to be more.

I pressed my palms to the stone, heart racing. It felt warmer than I expected. Almost… expectant. Like it was listening.

A hum stirred through the floor. Not a sound—a vibration. My fingertips tingled. My breath caught.

"Let me out," I whispered, unsure if I was speaking to the wall, the prison, or something deeper.

Nothing happened.

I tried again. Louder. "Let me out. Please."

The wall stayed still.

I stepped back, frustration burning in my throat.

And then—I ran.

Back through the corridor. Past the doors again. I didn’t stop. I didn’t think. I just ran until the air changed again.

Until the lavender scent was gone.

Until I passed a door I didn’t remember—a door that wasn’t locked.

It stood slightly ajar.

I froze.

Not because I was afraid.

Because for the first time, I felt something on the other side.

Not breath. Not presence.

Hope.

It leaked through the crack like light through a shutter, faint and golden. A thread of warmth not born of firelight or false comfort. It was raw. Wild. Real.

I reached for the door.

My hand trembled as my fingers brushed the edge—smooth wood, worn by time or touch. The air that slipped through the opening was cooler, drier. The scent of lavender had been replaced by something older. Earth. Dust. Leaves.

I pushed it open.

The hinges didn’t creak. The door swung soundlessly inward, and I stepped through like crossing a threshold I didn’t remember building.

The room beyond was round. Lined with shelves. Books towered to a ceiling I couldn’t see, their spines glowing faintly in the dark. There were no runes here. No traps. Just silence.

And still—I felt watched.

Not seen. Watched.

Like a held breath waiting for me to misstep.

I moved deeper, steps echoing despite the thick rug beneath my feet. The silence here had changed—no longer just absence of sound, but the presence of attention. My hand hovered over the nearest shelf. The leather-bound spines shimmered faintly, pulsing with unread words and things better left unsaid.

Something about the space pulled at me. Not violently. Not cruelly. But insistently. Like a dream that wanted to be remembered. Like a memory I hadn’t made yet.

Then I saw it.

Another door—half-hidden between the books.

It pulsed.

Once.

A slow, living throb of light beneath the frame. Like a heartbeat held just beneath the surface.

Hope surged again.

It struck so hard I nearly stumbled. I ran to it, breath catching, limbs trembling with the effort not to fall to my knees.

My hand closed around the latch. Cold. Smooth. Real. My vision swam. For one blinding second, I saw stars—

And the moment I touched it—the light died.

Abrupt. Final. Like a candle snuffed in the dark.

The books slammed shut around me, one by one, like mouths closing after a secret.

The walls groaned. Not loud, but long. Like something deep beneath the floor had shifted its weight.

And from somewhere behind me, a voice breathed:

"That one isn’t yours to open."

Hope shattered like glass in my chest. I felt every piece fall.

I turned, slowly, heart in my mouth, breath lodged somewhere too deep to reach.

Miren stood at the edge of the room.

Smiling.

And I saw red.

A flare of betrayal. Of fury so sharp it silenced the air itself.

He had let me hope.

And that was the worst cruelty of all.

"Why?" The word cracked from my throat like a whip. "Why do you get to decide what’s mine? Why do you pretend to be kind while keeping me locked away?"

My fists clenched. I wanted to throw something. Scream. Break every one of those glowing books until they bled truth. But I didn’t. I just stood there—furious and shaking.

His smile didn’t falter.

"You’re upset," he said gently. "That’s expected."

I stepped back. My chest heaved.

"Don’t do that. Don’t make my anger small. Don’t act like this was inevitable."

Still, he came closer.

I backed away until my shoulders touched the sealed door.

"I could make you regret it," I said, even though I couldn’t. Not yet. Not here. But the words tasted good. Sharp. Like something mine.

"You could try," he replied, almost fondly. "But you won’t. You don’t want to hurt me."

I wanted to deny it. Wanted to say yes, I do, yes, I would—but my throat tightened instead. Because part of me didn’t. And that terrified me more than anything.

So, I tried to bargain.

"Just let me see. Let me choose something. Anything. You said this place isn’t like theirs. Prove it."

His eyes darkened—not with rage, but with something colder. More permanent. That soft, endless patience that made it feel like I was a story already told.

"You already chose, Elarys," he said. "The moment you said your name. The moment you drank the tea."

"That’s not—"

He raised a hand. Not to strike. Just to still me.

"This isn’t punishment. It’s protection. You don’t know what waits behind that door. But I do."

The air between us seemed to harden, like breath frozen mid-motion.

I stared at him, breath shallow, hands curled tight at my sides. Every inch of me wanted to lash out, to break something, to matter in the face of that awful serenity. Everything inside me screamed at the stillness—at the way he spoke as if I belonged to him already. As if the story had ended and I just hadn’t accepted the final page.

And in that moment—I hated him for the calm. For the love. Because it wasn’t a performance. It wasn’t a trap baited with sweetness.

It was real.

Twisted, broken, possessive—but real. And real things, I was learning, were the most dangerous.

I could feel it circling me, that quiet devotion. Wrapping around my ankles like fog, threading through the breath I hadn’t meant to take. It didn’t need chains. It didn’t need force. It only needed me to stay.

I didn’t speak.

I didn’t scream.

I stepped away from him like every inch cost blood.

And walked back through the door I’d come from.

One step.

Then two.

My spine was straight, but my stomach churned. I didn’t look back.

Because I couldn’t fight him—not here. Not yet.

But I could choose to leave.

Even if the prison let me go only in pieces.

The corridor felt different now.

Not just dimmer—but tighter. Like the walls had moved closer when I wasn’t looking. The air pressed in with a weight I hadn’t felt before, thick with something old. Ancient.

I walked faster.

Then faster still.

The doors no longer looked like doors. Just shapes. Runes. Eyes without pupils. Watching.

I didn’t stop. I didn’t breathe. I searched for the outer wall—the edge. Wherever this place ended, I would find it.

I ran until the corridor widened. Until the stone grew darker, rougher, flecked with dust and veins of faint gold. The temperature dropped. The breath in my lungs turned sharp.

And then—

There it was.

The wall.

Massive. Seamless. Towering like a god asleep. Its surface stretched endlessly in both directions, smooth as polished obsidian, yet humming with power just beneath the skin of stone. Runes glowed faintly across its face, shifting between patterns too complex to follow. None of them familiar. None of them human.

The very presence of it made the breath catch in my chest.

I stepped forward, legs shaking, and pressed my palms to the stone. It wasn’t cold. It was warm—alive. It pulsed faintly under my touch, a deep, low sound that vibrated through my bones like a memory too old to belong to me.

"Let me out," I whispered, the words barely rising above the roar of my own blood.

And this time, the stone responded.

A pulse.

A single heartbeat of light passed beneath my palms, threading like lightning across the runes.

Then—

Silence.

The light faded. The hum collapsed inward. Like a breath drawn and never exhaled.

My breath caught. My fingers curled against the surface.

It had responded once before—to blood.

I bit into the side of my palm.

Not gently.

My teeth sank deep until skin broke, sharp and fast, the taste of iron blooming on my tongue. Pain flared up my arm, bright and honest. My knees trembled beneath me as I pressed my bleeding hand to the wall.

"Take it," I whispered through gritted teeth. "You want it? Take it again. Open. Let me out."

For a second, the runes pulsed.

Then stuttered.

Then died.

The hum returned—but it wasn’t sound anymore. It was pressure. Heavy. Low. Drowning. The runes flickered once—sharp. Then again—slower.

Then nothing.

A chill rolled down my back like breath from something vast and unseen.

The prison had heard me.

And decided.

The wall beneath my hands pulsed again—this time with force.

The stone shoved me back.

Not violently. Not cruelly. But decisively. My feet slipped. I stumbled, breath knocked from my chest as I landed hard against the cold floor.

The hum returned, louder now. Rhythmic. Intentional. The runes began to shift—not fade, not blink, but rearrange. I watched them snake and curl along the wall like vines seeking purchase.

"No," I hissed, dragging myself upright. "No, you don’t get to choose for me. Not again."

I pushed forward.

The wall pushed back.

The runes flared with blinding light. The vibration in the air turned sharp, dizzying, like sound passed through my bones instead of my ears. The corridor groaned. Doors slammed behind me—one by one, echoing like thunder in a tomb.

My knees hit the stone again. A crack tore through the floor beneath my palm.

"I said—"

The wall spoke.

Not in words.

In feeling.

A pressure more intimate than pain. A hush more final than silence. It crawled into my chest like fog and sank in deep—gripping not my body, but the raw nerve of want. Of will. Of escape. It clawed through the places in me that still reached toward light, and whispered a truth I didn’t want to hear:

You are meant to stay.

It didn't say no.

It made refusing feel like betrayal. Like stepping away from the wall would be the same as tearing out a part of my soul. Like leaving meant hurting something ancient that had already forgiven me before I even begged.

My breath hitched. Tears spilled freely now, hot and furious, painting streaks down my face I didn’t have the strength to wipe away.

I pressed my forehead to the stone—not to plead anymore, but to connect. To feel anything outside of the ache.

The stone pulsed back.

Gentle.

Final.

"Please," I whispered again, but even I could hear it weakening. "Please. I didn’t ask for any of this."

The runes flickered—slow, dim.

Then stilled.

Held.

Unchanged.

Unyielding.

The prison had made its decision.

And I was not leaving.