Echoes of Ruin
Stale dust drifted in thin streams of stained sunlight, bled through dragon-forged windows far above, throwing fractured halos across the stacks.
I wasn’t sure exactly what I was looking for. But I knew it when I saw it.
And I did.
Three floors down, slipped into the binding of an incomplete book: The Aurelian Reckoning, I found it, folded parchment, the edges singed, sealed with wax that crumbled at my touch. Inside, an illustration of the brand on Kellan’s hand.
Beneath it was a name.
Seraphine Aurelian.
Notes were scribbled in the margins. References to something called Dracofatum. The Dragon Fate. A prophecy from a hundred years ago, hidden after the clan wars. I kept reading.