Chapter 24

  The tremor didn't arrive as a strike, but as a malevolent whisper through the soles of my boots. It wasn't a mechanical vibration such as a golem would cause, nor was it a geological rumble. It was an energetic dissonance. For a moment, the marble floor of the Trophy Room seemed to lose its solid substance, falling into a gelatinous oscillation. Suddenly, the metallic, foul scent of Tainted Mana hung in the air.

  Thivan reacted instantly. His body tensed, and the blue glow in his eyes took on a piercing sharpness. He gave no command, didn't even look at me; he simply jerked his head toward the heavy oak door and bolted. It was a wordless permission to follow—or a demand not to stand in his way.

  He moved with an unnatural grace. Small, twitching bolts of lightning jumped from his boots to the floor, and for fractions of a second, his physical form seemed to become unstable, as if he were half-transforming into a thunderstorm to ignore air resistance. I knew I couldn't keep up by sheer running.

  "Give me the leash, Luken," Gravor growled. I didn't hesitate. I felt the familiar, tearing pain in my shoulder blades as the black pinions erupted from my aura—leathery wings laced with violet runes that displaced the air in the room with a single beat. I lunged forward, flying just above the floor along the corridor, directly behind the blue trail left by the King of Caleon.

  We reached the entrance to a hidden staircase leading deep into the bowels of the mountain. The walls here were no longer clad in gold but consisted of bare, black basalt, interlaced with thick Atherium cables that glowed like luminous veins in the dark. But as soon as we crossed the first threshold, the vibration vanished as suddenly as it had come. The silence that followed was almost more oppressive than the tremor before.

  I landed heavily on the stone, letting my wings slide back into my essence with a painful hiss. Thivan stood at the top of the stairs, his hand on a crystal control console. His breath was steady despite the sprint.

  "Has this happened before?" I asked, half-savoring, half-repelled by the intense aftertaste of the tainted mana. I was certain this was a harbinger of Reyn’s influence, the Shadow Lord’s first cautious fumbling for the seal. "I assume this is new. A sign that he’s making cont—"

  "This happens almost every week," Thivan interrupted. He sounded shockingly unconcerned, more annoyed, as if I had pointed out a dripping faucet. "However... the intensity today was a bit stronger. The frequency was more unstable than usual." He turned to me, his gaze sliding over my shoulders where the remnants of demonic energy still rose like smoke. "I fear everyone in the lower salon noticed it. That won't exactly dampen the unrest."

  He paused, eyeing me critically. "By the way... could you please take off the helm? We are among ourselves here, and you're showing me less respect than my sister."

  I ignored the comment about his sister—a person I hoped never to meet—and the accusation of lack of respect. But I took off the helm. The cool air of the tunnel felt good on my sweat-beaded forehead.

  "How many know about the portal?" I asked curiously as we slowly descended the stairs. "A secret of this magnitude can't be hidden behind marble and gold forever."

  Thivan hesitated. His hand glided over the cold basalt of the wall. Finally, he sighed resignedly and shook his head. "Since you know everything anyway, I suppose I have no need for secrets from you. It would only waste time." He cleared his throat. "The whole truth is known only to the heads of three houses—Wolfsgrund, Barwan, and Ironfist—as well as the Guards of the Gate. Everyone here in the palace, including my personal guard, knows we guard something called the Seal or the Rift, but they don't know the details regarding the regular vibrations. They think they are discharges from the great golem forges deep within the mountain."

  He looked down into the darkness of the shaft. "I only hope Castor doesn't overreact. He is... well, he takes his duty very seriously."

  I tilted my head, confused on one hand by Thivan's sudden openness, and on the other... "Who the hell is Castor?" I asked.

  Thivan didn't answer directly. He closed his eyes for a moment, and I saw his temples light up blue. He sent out a telepathic message, a bolt of pure will that pierced through the thick walls of the palace.

  "Castor. Idas. This is the King. The tremor was a known anomaly. Maintain Status Yellow. No coercive measures against the guests in the salon. The Paladin is with me."

  He opened his eyes again. "Castor is the commander of my personal guard. He and his brother are currently guarding your friends. And believe me, you don't want Castor to believe the end of the world has come while he stands an arm's length away from your ex-fiancée."

  We continued our way, but my mind was already racing. "Thivan, listen to me carefully," I said, my voice now devoid of any diplomatic undertone. "I’m not giving you advice now; I’m giving you orders if we want to prevent Drymon from falling before Reyn is even within range of Wolfsgrund’s golems. You say this tremor happens every week? That is no coincidence, and it’s not—yet—directly Reyn."

  Thivan stopped and glared at me. "You give me orders? In my own palace?"

  "In your palace, yes, but in my field of expertise. More or less," I countered unyieldingly. "This vibration... it’s not an attempt to break open the gate. It’s a resonance. Think of it like a tuning fork. Something on Tirros has awakened or been activated that oscillates harmonically with the portal beneath us. Reyn isn't causing this, but he feels it. He’s using these vibrations as a compass. He’s riding the wave this portal emits."

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  I took a step closer to him. "If the intensity increases, it doesn't necessarily mean the seal is getting weaker. It means the 'something' out there is getting closer or more powerful. Reyn is just the vulture following the scent of carrion. The portal reacts to him because he radiates the same frequency of cosmic or corrupted mana."

  Thivan rubbed his chin. His pride was visibly struggling with the logic of my words. "What do you suggest, Paladin? If it’s a resonance... can we dampen it?"

  "No," I said, shaking my head. "If you try to dampen it with Atherium, you only amplify the signal. You have to change the frequency. You have to redirect the portal's energy, not just suppress it. You probably use the energy to feed the city's shields, right?"

  Thivan nodded slowly. "A large part of the city’s protection is passively powered by the leakage from the seal. It is efficient."

  "It’s a beacon!" I snapped at him. "You’re sending a signal to the North that tells Reyn exactly where to drill. You have to bleed the energy into the earth. Deep into the ley lines, away from the surface. Drymon must go energetically 'dark.' Turn off the ornate lights, throttle golem production in the lower quarter. We have to keep the palace’s signature flat, or Reyn’s next strike will shatter the seal like an eggshell."

  Thivan stared at me, and for a moment I thought he would have me arrested for my insolence. But then he looked back at his crackling hand. He understood the physical truth behind it. He was a being of energy himself; he knew how to track someone who glowed in the dark.

  "If I redirect the energy, the city's Arcane shields will drop by forty percent," he calculated quietly. "We will be more vulnerable to conventional attacks."

  "Conventional attacks we can repel with steel and courage," I said earnestly. "Against what comes out of that portal, there is no defense once it’s awake. Reyn wants you to focus on defending the walls so you don't notice him pulling the foundation out from under you."

  Thivan exhaled deeply. He suddenly looked older, the weight of his secrets pressing his shoulders down. "You ask a lot, Luken Lesko. You ask that I shroud my people in darkness while an army could soon be at the gates."

  "I ask that you survive," I replied.

  He looked at me for a long time. Then he nodded almost imperceptibly. "I will give the order. The Gray Lords will curse when their shields drop, but they will obey." He turned and continued down the stairs, his footsteps echoing lonely in the shaft. "Come now. We’re getting your friends. We must plan together. If you are right... then the burning forest in the North is just the smoke before the actual fire."

  I followed him, my heart heavy. I knew I had just convinced Thivan to weaken his strongest defense. It was a desperate gamble. If Reyn was faster than I thought, I had just made Drymon defenseless. But my instinct—and Gravor's mocking grin in my head—told me the danger didn't come from the walls. It came from below.

  We reached the end of the stairs, and another heavy portal opened. We stepped into the corridor leading to the lower salon.

  I saw Castor and Idas standing at the end of the hallway. They looked like immobile gods of gold, but I sensed the tension in their aura. They had felt the tremor. And they were waiting for the command to fight the inevitable.

  "Luken," Thivan said softly before we entered the salon. "If this goes wrong... if the seal breaks despite everything we’ve done... promise me one thing."

  "What?"

  "Kill Vin. Don't let her see what becomes of this world."

  I looked at him, shaken, but in his eyes lay no hate, only a deep, desperate love that had survived in the ruins of the vibrant part of his soul. I didn't answer, but I knew we would do everything so it never came to that.

  We entered the salon. Vin jumped up immediately, Maira put her book away, and Arik stepped protectively in front of them both. The air was charged with fear and questions.

  Thivan brushed past the scene with royal coldness. "We have no time for explanations," he said loudly. "Paladin, tell them what to do. We are preparing for the darkness."

  I took a deep breath and stepped into the center of the room. My gaze was fixed on the empty middle of the table as I attempted to weave together the information Gravor whispered to me and my own tactical reflections into a single image. I looked at neither Thivan nor the motionless golden statues at the door. In this moment, only the invisible currents of mana that interlaced this palace like a web existed for me.

  "We must mask the signal," I began, my voice echoing unnaturally loud in the sudden silence of the salon. "That portal down there... it is not a static entity. It is a source constantly emitting energy, and this energy is like a scent a predator follows. Reyn is far to the north, but he has picked up the trail. He is using the resonance of this place as a beacon to guide his magic and his troops."

  I placed my hands flat on the polished surface of the table. "My plan is simple in theory, but dangerous in execution. We must reduce the energetic signature of this palace to zero. We must make Drymon invisible to Reyn's senses."

  I paused briefly, without waiting for confirmation or objection. In my head, I visualized the map of Caleon. "This means we immediately divert all surplus portal energy that normally feeds the ornamental lights, the golem forges, and the outer decorative shields of the palace. We utilize the deep ley lines, the ancient veins of the earth, and channel the energy miles away from here—ideally into the deep mines to the south or southeast. We create a false target, an energetic echo that makes Reyn believe the portal is located somewhere else entirely."

  I felt the chill of the room as I continued speaking, unaware of the technical hurdles my proposal triggered for those present. "To do this, we must shut down all non-essential arcane systems. The palace must go dark. Physically and magically. We must dampen the portal’s vibration so much that it vanishes into the general background noise of the earth. By doing this, we take away Reyn’s compass. He will be staring at a wall of mist in the north while he tries to pinpoint our exact location."

  I raised my head and stared into the void as I weighed the consequences that came to mind. "There will be consequences. If we weaken the center, the network will become unstable. I don't know how the distant fortresses or the golems at the borders will react if the mothership suddenly changes frequency or throttles power. But it is our only chance to divert focus from this point here. We must use the time while Reyn is confused to physically reinforce the seal below."

  I did not know how Castor or Idas reacted to this technical monstrosity, or whether Thivan classified my words as a stroke of genius or high treason. I only knew that the vibration beneath my feet demanded an answer.

  "We shift the burden," I concluded. "We turn the palace into a shadow and the wasteland in the south into a burning sun of mana. Reyn will follow the brightest light because it is in his nature. While he turns his gaze south, we prepare here for the actual impact. It is a game of mirrors and shadows. But if we don't do it, he will find us before his army even sees the outer walls of Drymon."

  I fell silent and stepped back, hands now held firmly at my sides. I had thrown the stone into the water; now I waited to see what ripples it would make in this room of kings and warriors.