Chapter nineteen

Smoke still lingered in Lyra’s lungs, even days after the return from the sea. Not the acrid stench of battle, but the cloying, electric residue of ancient magic,it was a scent that clung to her hair and skin no matter how many times she bathed. It had followed them back to the Accord like a shadow that didn’t know when to leave.

The Council chambers were quieter than usual.

There were no arguments amongst the council members.No raised voices. Just the unease that hung between the leaders like an unspoken pact.

Kaelen stood behind her, arms folded, gaze fixed on the massive stained-glass window at the back of the hall. It depicted the first moonrise after the Great rising—a historical myth more symbolic than true. And yet, something about it felt... prophetic now.

“They’re afraid,” Lyra said softly.

“They should be,” Kaelen replied, his voice low. “The second Gate was sealed. But sealing it wasn’t the same as destroying it. They know that.”

Lyra turned toward the Council, where Elder Ysara and three representatives from allied packs sat in stern contemplation. The Northern alpha, Varek of Icewind, had not even attempted to hide his disdain.

“You touched the seal,” Varek said for the third time. “You activated it. How do we know you didn’t... alter it?”

“I didn’t,” Lyra answered, her patience thinning. “The seal was a lock. I locked it.”

“With a child’s help,” muttered Jarel of the Emberfang Clan, his arms tattooed with scorched runes. “You brought a girl to a place none of our elders dared go.”

Lyra’s eyes narrowed. “Iris is more than she seems.”

“She always has been,” Ysara interjected. “And none of you have dared ask why she’s drawn to these seals in the first place.”

Everyone fell silent.

Kaelen shifted. “What matters now is control. That heart is no longer inviting anything through. We’re not out of danger, but we’ve bought time.”

“Time?” Varek spat. “We don’t need time. We need certainty.”

“Then you're in the wrong world,” Lyra snapped. “Because certainty is dead.”

Then Ysara stood. “This council is adjourned until the next moonrise. We will reconvene once our scouts return from the Blightfields.”

Grumbles followed. Footsteps echoed down the corridor. Kaelen waited until they were alone before moving beside Lyra.

“Something’s changed,” he said.

“I feel it too.”

She looked toward the window again. This time, the moon in the glass seemed darker. Thinner. Like it had been bled of light.

Later that night, Lyra walked the inner corridors of the Accord alone. The old stone felt restless. She paused beside a mural.one painted long before her birth. It depicted the original sealing of the Hollowed realm. The guardian had been a nameless figure, cloaked in silver and crowned in bone.

But the face—faint and shadowed—resembled her.

A soft sound echoed behind her.

Iris.

The child stood barefoot in the hall, her hair was dripping with water, a faint greenish shimmer to her eyes that hadn’t been there before.

“I can hear them again,” Iris said.

Lyra stepped closer, voice gentle. “Hear who?”

“The ones beneath. The ones who drowned but never died.”

Chills rippled up Lyra’s spine. “The seal is closed.”

Iris blinked slowly. “But the gate dreams. And dreaming things are never quiet.”

She reached into her tunic and pulled out a stone. Not just any stone—the same shard of heartstone from the Drowned City.

“I didn’t tell Kaelen,” Iris whispered. “It followed me. Or maybe I followed it.”

The stone pulsed faintly in Lyra’s palm when she took it. A whisper, like a heartbeat.

Lyra’s voice was steady. “You can’t keep this. It’s a beacon.”

“I know.”

But the girl made no move to take it back.

In the morning, word arrived from the scouts.

The Blightfields were stirring.

Patches of corrupted soil had moved but without the sound or violence of an earthquake. Life around the region had withered. Wolves sent to track the terrain returned mad or didn’t return at all.

“We didn’t close it fully,” Kaelen said, brow furrowed as he studied the reports.

Lyra shook her head. “No. We closed one half of it. The other is still tethered to this world.”

Kaelen looked up. “You mean there’s another heart.”

“I think the heart isn’t a place,” Lyra murmured. “I think it’s a being.”

Silence.

Then Kaelen said, “You mean the Hollowed Sovereign?”

Lyra exhaled shakily. “I mean someone still trapped—or choosing to remain—on the other side. Someone old. Someone who remembers Elana’s betrayal.”

Kaelen crossed the room, set his hands gently on her shoulders. “Then we need to find them.”

“We need to stop Iris first,” Lyra whispered. “She’s unraveling. And I think… she’s not just drawn to the gates. I think she’s part of them.”

That evening, Lyra found Iris in the north tower, sitting alone in the dark chamber.

The mirrors were dark.

“I can’t see anymore,” the girl said without looking up. “The visions are clouded. Something’s veiling them.”

“What do you think it is?”

“I think it’s me.”

Lyra’s chest ached. “Iris, you’re not a monster.”

“I never said I was.”

“Then what are you?”

The girl’s eyes glowed faintly. “A key.”

“To what?”

“To all of it.”

The chamber trembled slightly beneath them.

That night, Lyra dreamed of the Hollowed realm.

She stood on a bridge of bone, suspended over a black ocean. Thousands of wolves howled beneath the surface, their voices twisted with pain.

At the far end of the bridge stood a throne.

And on it,a figure cloaked in fog, its eyes the same silver as Lyra’s own.

It didn’t speak.

It simply raised one hand and Lyra knew what it wanted.

Iris.

The girl was more than a guide. More than a seer.

She was the final link.

The one who could either open the last gate.

Or bury it forever.