Prologue: Ashfall Dreams
Start writing here…The dream came in smoke and whispers.
Elara stood at the edge of a field of thorns, their tips glinting like obsidian under moonlight. The stars above her pulsed with unnatural rhythm, as if trying to speak in a language she’d forgotten. Her bare feet sank into ash—warm, soft, endless.
A voice called her name.
“Elara…”
But it was not Feyrien’s voice. Not the lover who now shared her bed and bled for her crown. This voice was ancient, brittle, like wind through a crypt. It slithered through the seams of her mind, pulling at something hidden deep within.
She turned.
In the distance, a throne loomed atop a staircase made of bone and vine. It pulsed with an inner glow, veins of violet magic crawling along its twisted surface. Something waited there. Something bound in chains of starlight and fire.
“Elara, daughter of dusk… you have awakened the old blood.”
She tried to speak, but her voice caught in her throat. Her hands were slick with red. Not hers. Not anymore.
From the shadows, eyes opened—dozens, hundreds. Watching. Judging.
A wind screamed across the field. The thorns shuddered. The stars blinked out, one by one.
Then the voice came again, closer now, brushing against her ear like a cold kiss.
“Power without sacrifice is hollow, child. The thorns know. The Veil remembers.”
Suddenly, the ash beneath her feet shifted. It wasn’t ash—it was bone dust.
Elara staggered back. The ground crumbled beneath her.
She fell.
Down through blackness. Through memories not her own. Through screams. Through the scent of blood and burnt silk.
And then—silence.
She awoke, gasping, in her own bed. The silk sheets clung to her damp skin. Feyrien stirred beside her, his arm reaching out on instinct to pull her close.
“Elara?” he murmured, voice rough with sleep. “It’s still night.”
She didn’t answer. Couldn’t.
Because in her hands, shaking and cold, rested a single black feather.
Not from any bird she’d ever seen.
And outside the window, the sky bled violet.
