The ruin loomed like a wound upon the horizon. Black stone clawed at the sky, jagged and broken, the skeletal remains of what had once been a proud watchtower. Now, its silhouette bent beneath centuries of rot, whispering of things best left buried.

  Brother Nile stood at its threshold, hand brushing the moss-slick wall. “Strange,” he murmured. “I feel as though I have walked here before.”

  Zavana snorted, tossing her red hair. “You’ve said that about every other ruin and road sign we’ve passed.” Still, she gripped her sword tighter, as if the spire itself threatened her.

  Fayama lingered close to Nile, his pale fingers clutching the strap of his satchel. His crimson eyes darted from stone to shadow, wary but unwilling to turn back.

  The three gravitated into the spire.

  The interior stank of rot and ash. Charred beams split the gloom, fractured murals sprawled across the stone walls; heroes and monsters locked in forgotten wars. But where faces should have been, only cracks and burns remained, as though time itself had erased them.

  Then came the sound. A rattling. Bone against stone. From the shadows, a corpse dragged itself into view, its jaw slack, eyes hollow. Behind it, more skeletons stumbled forward, and from the ceiling seeped shapes like smoke; spectres, their mouths wide in eternal screams.

  Zavana’s blade gleamed as she swung it into the first skeleton, shattering bone in a burst of dust. “Finally,” she spat, “something I can hit!”

  Fayama flinched as a spectre lunged for him, its wail clawing into his mind. But instinct took hold. He raised a trembling hand, arcane light flaring from his palm. The spectre shrieked and recoiled.

  Nile lifted his staff, lips forming words of warding. Light rippled from him, a dome of protection. But as he turned, a skeleton lunged past Zavana’s guard. Its rusted blade pierced Nile’s left eye.

  He screamed, falling to one knee, blood streaming hot across his face. His staff clattered away.

  “Nile!” Fayama cried.

  The spectres seized their chance. They swarmed, their shrieks piercing Nile’s wound, dragging his mind into darkness.

  Suddenly, he was no longer in the spire. He was falling; into fire, into endless pits of flame. Children screamed, their voices echoing through the smoke. He saw them chained, dragged by shadowy figures cloaked in symbols that burned like coals. Their flesh was carved with red tattoos that pulsed and writhed, twisting as though alive.

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  “Nile,” they whispered in voices that burrowed into his skull. “You could not save them.”

  The vision crushed him. His body convulsed, helpless, as the spectres clawed at his soul.

  Zavana planted herself over him, snarling, fists raised. “We protect him. That’s all that matters!”

  The skeletons pressed in, their weapons clanging. The spectres swarmed closer, feeding on fear. Fayama shook violently, clutching his head, but Zavana’s roar cut through his panic.

  “Fight, damn you! If you can burn shadows, then burn them!”

  Fayama’s gaze snapped to Nile; bleeding, broken, but his lips still whispering prayers even in his torment. Something sparked in Fayama’s mind. The way Nile’s hands shaped the light, the rhythm of his words, the faith carried not by certainty but by will.

  It clicked.

  Fayama raised his hand, his book flying open in mid-air. Flames erupted; but not the raw fire he had conjured before. These burned white-gold, radiant and searing, holy fire born not from prayer but from his mimicry of Nile’s divine casting.

  The spectres shrieked as Fayama unleashed the burst of light, banishing them in a storm of sacred flame. Shadows dissolved into smoke. Bones collapsed to ash.

  For a heartbeat, the chamber was silent.

  Zavana stood panting, her fists cracked and bleeding from shattering skeletons bare-handed. Fayama trembled, the holy fire fading from his fingertips. His chest heaved, wide crimson eyes staring at what he had just done.

  On the ground, Nile stirred. His visions retreated, the cult’s whispers fading; but his left eye still burned, no longer bleeding.

  He opened it.

  Where his eye had been, there now glowed a circle of crimson runes, endlessly shifting. Black and white ripples radiated from it, like ink spilling across water. The mark pulsed with a rhythm that was not his own.

  He shut his eye quickly, pulling his hood low. Neither child noticed; Zavana busy wiping her fists clean, Fayama clutching his book as if it were the only thing tethering him to this world.

  “Brother Nile?” Fayama’s voice trembled.

  “I’m here,” Nile said softly, steadying himself against the wall. “You both… did more than I could have asked.” His voice cracked, pride and unease mingling.

  Zavana smirked despite her exhaustion, tossing her bloodied hair from her face. “Told you I could handle it.”

  But Nile’s thoughts lingered on the glow he had seen in both of them: Fayama’s white hair shimmering red, Zavana’s black eyes burning like embers, both wreathed in a crimson aura. And his own cursed eye, whispering truths he could not yet understand.

  He said nothing of it. Not yet.

  For the first time in months, Nile felt both dread and hope; because whatever they were, these children were not ordinary. And neither, any longer, was he.