Chapter 158: What Lies Between

The wind was different here.

Not colder. Not warmer. Just wrong.

Serena stood at the edge of a canyon none of them remembered passing. The map Kael carried didn’t show it. No birds circled above. No beasts stirred below. It had simply… appeared.

A wound in the earth.

A mirror of the wound inside her.

Elias stood behind her, tense. “Don’t do it.”

She didn’t answer. Her gaze was fixed on the crevice ahead—where light and shadow twisted unnaturally, and faint whispers clawed at the edges of her mind.

“I have to know,” she said quietly. “What I am. Why they keep pulling me in.”

“You’re Serena,” Elias said firmly. “That’s all that matters.”

She shook her head. “It’s not enough anymore.”

They made camp a safe distance from the canyon.

Caine’s body twitched more frequently now. Mira was worried—every pulse from the Gate, every shift in Serena’s power, caused a reaction in him. At this rate, he’d wake as something else… or not at all.

Kael drew Elias aside that night. “She’s unraveling.”

“No,” Elias replied. “She’s transforming.”

“And we’re just letting her walk into the storm?”

Elias didn’t answer.

Because part of him agreed.

But another part knew—this was the only way forward. Not just for Serena.

For all of them.

That night, Serena walked alone to the canyon.

No fire.

No armor.

No weapons.

Just herself—and the gate mark burned into her skin.

When she stepped forward, the world didn’t resist.

It opened.

She stood between stars and ash.

That’s what it felt like.

The space was endless, floating—sky and earth blurred together in shades of violet and silver. The air wasn’t air, but memory. The ground wasn’t solid, but real enough to walk on.

And in the distance…

A throne.

Waiting.

She stepped forward.

Her boots didn’t make a sound.

With each step, the voices grew louder. Not chaotic. Not terrifying.

Familiar.

Her mother’s lullaby.

Elias whispering her name.

Kael laughing in the dark.

Then—

Lyra’s voice.

Screaming.

And Darian’s.

“You were born of the Gate.”

Serena froze.

He appeared beside her. No warning. No sound. Just there.

Dressed in his signature black, hair tousled, eyes silver.

But not mocking.

Soft.

“You think you’ve been resisting us,” he said. “But everything you’ve done has only drawn you closer.”

“I’m not yours,” she snapped.

“No,” he agreed. “But you’re not theirs either. You belong here.”

She faced him. “Why me?”

“Because the Gate didn’t make you. It answered you.”

Serena’s breath caught.

“What?”

“You cried out before you were born. In a world that rejected you. And the Gate heard.”

He raised a hand.

A vision unfolded in the space before them.

A woman—Serena’s mother—running through a battlefield. Wounded. Pregnant. Desperate. Surrounded by enemies. No one came to help.

Until the sky cracked.

And silver fire rained down.

Not to kill.

To protect.

A whisper from another realm.

And Serena was born under a bleeding moon, screaming not like a child, but like a queen.

Serena staggered.

“No,” she whispered. “That’s not true.”

“It is,” Darian said gently. “You didn’t become this. You were always this. The power didn’t corrupt you. It recognized you.”

The throne called louder now.

She looked at it.

Then at Darian.

And for a terrifying moment—she considered it.

What if she sat?

What if she took it all?

Then—

A voice broke through.

Elias.

“Serena!”

She turned.

The space behind her cracked.

Elias stood in the real world, clutching a silver dagger, knuckles white.

“You’re fading,” he shouted. “Come back!”

She looked at Darian.

He smiled faintly. “He’ll never understand. None of them will.”

“They don’t have to,” she whispered. “I do.”

Then she turned from the throne—and ran.

Crossing back was like ripping herself from silk and stone.

She collapsed into Elias’s arms, sobbing, the mark on her skin blazing gold and blue.

He held her close. “You’re okay. I’ve got you.”

“I saw it,” she gasped. “I saw where I came from. What I could be.”

“What did you choose?”

She looked up at him.

And smiled.

“Not the throne.”

Back at camp, Mira rushed to her side.

“You crossed the threshold,” Mira said. “And came back. That… shouldn’t have been possible.”

“It is now,” Serena murmured.

And then—

Caine screamed.

He sat up, back arching unnaturally.

Silver light exploded from his chest.

Mira and Kael tried to pin him. Elias pulled Serena back.

But the light wasn’t rage.

It was remorse.

Caine’s body calmed, slowly. His eyes—still silver—blinked.

He saw Serena.

And knew her.

“I fought him,” he rasped. “In the dark. I saw you… and I remembered who I was.”

“Caine,” she breathed.

He reached for her—and collapsed again.

Not unconscious.

Just human.

Just… exhausted.

That night, Serena sat beside the fire, her friends asleep around her. Caine breathing slow and steady. Elias at her side, silent but steady.

And inside her?

Stillness.

Not silence.

Just… stillness.

For the first time since this began, she felt something she’d long forgotten.

Control.

But deep in the Gate’s realm, Darian watched her retreat—and smiled.

“She’s returning on her own,” he said.

Beside him, Lyra stood silently, eyes half-lidded.

“She’ll come,” she said. “Because we’re the only ones who know what she truly is.”