Everyone waited…
Not out of patience.
But dread.
A silence so sharp
it carved through breath,
through bone,
through the very room.
But Cassie said nothing.
Still as stone.
Heavy as guilt.
So—
Jet spoke.
Voice calm, but carved from iron.
"Care to share?"
No reply.
A moment passed.
Then another.
"Cassie?"
A whisper, brittle as frost:
"I'm sorry…"
Nephis moved.
Stepped forward.
Hands firm on Cassie's trembling shoulders.
"Dammit, Cassie…"
Her voice cracked.
"Show me what you saw."
Cassie turned,
eyes dull, cheeks pale,
and removed the blindfold
she had only just returned to its place—
like shame tucked under a veil.
Without a word,
she opened her eyes
and met Nephis's gaze.
And shared it.
The walk.
The darkness.
The death without dying.
The years without years.
The father-shadow and the serpent who loved him still.
The end without end.
Nephis stood still—
until the vision left her.
Until the weight of it collapsed from her soul
and slammed into her hands.
Her eyes closed.
Her teeth clenched.
Then—
A slap.
Not out of fury.
But heartbreak.
A single strike.
No strength behind it.
But enough sorrow to shatter skies.
Cassie's cheek bloomed red.
It would fade.
Skin always heals.
But the wound she had carved into Sunny's soul?
That…
That wound might never close.
And in its wake—
silence.
A silence so heavy, it pressed against bone.
So deep, it drowned the breath.
Nephis…
Their anchor.
Their unshakable, radiant-flamed spearhead—
Had lost control.
And struck Cassie across the face.
Effie's lips parted, but no words came.
Kai's brows drew tight, worry and disbelief warring behind his eyes.
Jet… remained unreadable—
Then—
Nephis spoke.
"Hey… Sunny."
Her voice, low.
Thick with grief.
Regret soaking through every syllable.
"Want to go somewhere else?"
She turned, not to plead,
but to warn.
"You can figure out yourselves what she showed me."
Her hand found his.
Gentle.
But sure.
And together,
without another word,
they left the room—
the sound of their steps echoing like a funeral bell.
And in the quiet that followed…
Tension curdled.
Cassie stood frozen.
Blindfold back on.
Head bowed.
Like she was waiting for someone to pass judgment—
or a blade.
No one moved.
Not at first.
Then—
Jet exhaled.
Loud. Shaky.
"Well… shit."
Kai rubbed his jaw, still staring at the door.
"She slapped her."
"Hard," Effie whispered.
"Didn't think Princess had it in her."
Jet finally spoke.
Calm. Controlled.
But her words cut deeper than a scream.
"Because of what she saw…"
Cassie flinched.
But said nothing.
Kai sat down slowly, as if the gravity of it all had finally dragged him down.
His voice was quieter now.
"…He was alone. All that time."
Effie turned away, eyes glassy, arms crossed tight across her chest.
"Alone… and we did that to him."
Jet's gaze fell on Cassie.
Flat.
Cold.
"Not 'we.'"
Another silence.
A colder one.
Jet stepped forward.
"Show us," she said.
Not a command.
Not a request.
Just truth, shaped into sound.
Cassie's shoulders tensed.
Her head lowered—
but she nodded.
Wordless, she removed the blindfold.
Her hands trembled.
Then, one by one,
she met their gazes.
Jet.
Kai.
Effie.
And like a current,
the memory flowed.
In its place…
Darkness.
Endless. Absolute.
Not the kind that blinds—
but the kind that erodes.
And in it…
A figure.
Cloaked in shadows,
but unmistakable.
Sunny.
Walking.
Alone.
Behind him—
a flicker of light.
The last echo of hope.
Growing smaller with every step.
He did not stop.
Did not speak.
Did not scream.
Cassie skipped forward—
centuries passed,
then millennia.
Still he walked.
She skimmed ahead again.
And again.
Until—
A creature.
Monstrous. Towering. Made of formless dark.
Sunny didn't flinch.
He summoned a sword.
Tenebrific. Long as death.
He killed it.
It didn't fight back.
Time didn't move.
But he did.
Cassie skimmed forward once more.
More walking.
More silence.
More death.
Not death as a climax—
but as a routine.
Until…
He stopped.
Just one step.
He looked down at his hands.
Summoned a mask—
Weaver's Mask.
And then…
he saw something.
Something even the memory couldn't share.
Even they, as witnesses, were denied.
Whatever it was—
It ended him.
He fell.
Not with a scream.
Not with a fight.
But with a breath too tired to continue.
One tear fell.
Not sorrow.
Not rage.
Regret.
And then…
from his shadow,
rose the Serpent.
Loyal.
Silent.
His.
It nudged his body.
Once.
Twice.
Hoping—
though shadows don't hope.
Praying—
though shadows don't pray.
But he did not rise.
So the Serpent coiled around him.
Not to protect.
Not to wait.
Just to be with him.
To die…
as it had lived—
beside its Father.
Back in the room…
Jet's lips parted, but no sound came.
Kai was pale.
Effie winced with sorrow, quietly, biting the inside of her cheek.
Cassie was still trembling.
And suddenly—
their pain felt small.
Their survival, selfish.
---
"Hey Sunny… can you pass me the flour?"
Nephis asked, voice careful. Almost too careful.
Like someone stepping across broken glass barefoot,
unsure which shards might still cut.
She wore a white blouse traced in silver,
its sleeves dusted faintly in flour already.
Sunny didn't turn.
He stood by the kettle, the hiss of water faintly audible—
the kind of sound that once meant warmth,
now just a habit.
Without speaking,
he raised one arm—
and from his shadow,
another unfurled.
Effortless.
Silent.
Inky fingers stretched across the room,
grasped the sack of flour with gentle precision,
and floated it to her side.
"Thanks," Nephis mumbled.
She tried to smile.
It didn't land.
The kind of expression meant for someone still human.
Still whole.
Sunny's gaze lingered on the steam curling above the coffee pot.
It reminded him of something.
A memory, maybe.
Or just the idea of one.
He didn't respond.
Instead, he poured the dark brew into a mug—
black, as always.
Behind him, a quiet clang.
Nephis had dropped a spoon.
"Sorry," she said quickly, kneeling to pick it up.
He didn't look.
Didn't ask.
But after a breath,
he placed a second mug beside her mixing bowl.
Hot. Steaming. Fresh.
She paused, surprised.
Then picked it up.
"…You remembered how I like it?"
"I remember everything," he said.
Just that.
No tone.
No warmth.
No pain.
Just the truth.
The silence stretched again.
Comfortable for neither.
But perhaps… familiar.
Outside, the world still spun.
Inside, two people tried to remember how to live.
One beat at a time.
One breath after another.
And maybe… one pancake at a time.
---
A young woman stepped onto the grass,
where the Ivory Tower stood tall.
Dark waves framed her face,
and her crimson eyes—
the eyes of Valor—
scanned the horizon.
Morgan.
Princess of Clan Valor.
Daughter of The King of Swords, heir to steel and pride.
Her breath was steady, but her heart?
It beat with unease.
She felt it.
That ancient, crawling weight beneath the skin.
The echo of a throne not built, but borne.
A Sovereign treaded these lands.
And though her father—as one himself—had spoken of caution—
of Sovereigns as storms in human shape—
he had still sent her.
Her, and three Saints:
Varo.
Crass.
Schtad.
They were to parley.
Or if that failed… demand.
She sighed, and pushed open the towering doors of ivory and myth.
And there he was.
Sunless.
The Master.
The Shadow Who Was Lost.
The one who vanished into a whispered death after the Third Nightmare.
He stood hand-in-hand with Nephis,
who glowed faintly like dawn beside dusk.
They had been about to leave—
perhaps to walk the world again.
Perhaps to remember how.
But the moment froze.
Morgan looked into his eyes…
and what she saw was not fury.
Not peace.
Not even pain.
Nothing.
Just hollow skies,
where once stars burned.
This was the man her father wanted surrendered?
This was the Sovereign of Shadows?
She steadied herself, squared her shoulders,
and raised her voice:
"Sovereign Sunless.
By the command of Clan Valor…
you are to surrender yourself."
There was no silence.
No drumbeat.
Just—
A word.
Low, quiet,
but heavy enough to bend the wind around it.
"No."
The word struck like a silent hammer.
No flourish.
No force.
Just finality.
The Saints moved—
hands twitching toward the echoes of memory,
where their weapons waited in coiled readiness.
But they were halted before breath could deepen.
"Stop."
Morgan's voice sliced the tension like tempered steel.
"Draw your blades and he'll kill you where you stand—
without even moving."
It wasn't a guess.
It was a certainty.
One inherited, not through blood, but through the pressure in her bones.
She turned to him—
to the man who once carved gods from nightmares.
"You still need to come with us," she said, trying diplomacy where defiance would fail.
"The King wishes to meet you."
Sunless stood still.
Not in defiance—
but in detachment.
He did not think.
He recalled.
Not emotions…
just echoes of them.
Long-faded shadows, blurred by the erosion of time and silence.
And from that silence, he spoke.
"If the King wishes to see me…
he can come here.
Or wait."
He didn't raise his voice.
Didn't glare.
Didn't try to provoke.
He simply remembered the shape of the world, and acted accordingly.
And still—
the weight of his words crushed like a verdict.
The Saints bristled again,
but this time, not from pride.
From fear.
Morgan held firm,
even as her gaze turned wary.
"You want him to leave his domain and come to you," she said,
"To weaken him."
Her tone cooled, eyes narrowing as she faced Nephis.
"This isn't another one of your schemes… Sister?"
But Nephis said nothing.
Because the silence had shifted.
Because something in those last words—
just one word—
stirred something deeper than memory.
Sister.
That word echoed too close to a claim.
And though Sunny no longer felt rage…
no longer felt much at all…
Some things did not fade with time.
Some lines could not be crossed,
even in a soul that had long since forgotten how to bleed.
Nephis was not Morgan's sister.
She did not belong to Clan Valor.
She belonged to no crown.
To no title.
Not anymore.
And in the crooked, frayed logic of a man shaped by solitude,
something inside Sunny responded.
A fragment stirred—
not quite jealousy,
not quite protectiveness…
just an old, nameless truth that refused to die.
The Serpent coiling on him shifted.
It had no words,
but its ink tightened with shared understanding.
It had seen the truth in the dark.
Had curled around the body of the man who'd died without warmth,
and chosen to wait beside him—still.
And now, that same instinct unfurled like a blade sheathed in silence.
Sunny spoke.
"I care nothing for his domain."
A pause.
"Even blessed by every Citadel,
even armed with time and knowledge,
he would still fall."
Not a threat.
A law.
Flat. Emotionless. Immutable.