The forest didn't welcome them back. It tolerated their return. The trees, once familiar, now loomed taller and more crooked. The wind carried whispers that didn't match the breeze. Birds still wouldn't sing. Even the insects were silent, as if nature itself had learned to hold its breath.
Alex walked between Harper and Liam, the three of them moving quickly over uneven terrain. The path Liam had used to reach the court of the Vampire King no longer existed. It had unraveled behind them like a burnt thread, leaving only thickets and moss-covered stone in its place.
Alex's legs felt heavier with each step. Not from fatigue—but from weight. Not physical. Not fully. Since leaving the throne of bone and shadow, something inside him had changed. It had curled tight around his spine, heavy and electric. Like something ancient had crawled inside his skin.
Harper noticed.
"You're glowing," she said bluntly.
Alex frowned. "What?"
"Not like—literally. I mean... your aura. Whatever it is. It's different now."
Liam gave him a side glance. "The king touched you. He doesn't just leave wounds. He leaves marks."
Alex stopped walking. "What kind of mark?"
Liam paused. "We won't know until it shows itself."
"Comforting," Alex muttered.
They found shelter in the ruins of an old railway station tucked in the cliffs west of a forgotten mountain. The place had once buzzed with noise and life, but now it was nothing but rusted rails and ivy-choked platforms. It still had walls, at least. And no windows.
That night, Harper set up salt lines while Liam inscribed wards on the crumbling concrete pillars. Alex sat near a dead fireplace, arms wrapped around his knees, trying to ignore the slow humming inside his head. Not a sound—more like a presence.
He could still hear the king's voice.
You were never meant to exist.
Alex closed his eyes. But instead of sleep, the mirror returned.
The same dream. The glass room. The Hollowborn. The cracked reflection.
But this time, something changed.
The hand from the mirror reached again. But it didn't grab him. It pointed.
Behind him.
Alex turned—and saw a door.
Tall. Ancient. Carved with symbols that shimmered like starlight.
He stepped toward it. The mirror shattered behind him, the Hollowborn's grin splitting wider as it disintegrated.
The door pulsed.
He placed his hand on it.
And it opened.
---
Alex woke screaming.
Liam was already kneeling beside him, Harper pacing in the background.
"What did you see?" Liam asked.
"A door. I... I opened it."
Liam's face paled.
"You what?"
"I didn't mean to. It was in the dream. There was a mirror, and the Hollowborn was watching, but then a hand pointed behind me. I followed it. I touched the door."
Harper looked at Liam. "He said he's the key. And now he's opening doors in his sleep?"
"Dreams are thresholds," Liam murmured. "Some say they're the oldest kind. Older than blood magic. Older than time."
Alex sat up. "Then what did I open?"
Liam didn't answer.
But he looked scared.
---
They didn't sleep again that night.
Instead, they read. Liam unearthed a box hidden beneath one of the broken benches—old tomes wrapped in skin-like leather, smelling of mildew and secrets.
Harper stood guard while Alex translated symbols from his memory. Surprisingly, the meanings came easier now. As if something inside him already knew the language.
He found it by dawn.
One of the books described a ritual door—not metaphorical, not symbolic, but real. A door that lived within certain bloodlines. The Veilborn.
"You're one of them," Liam said. "I thought they were extinct."
"So did your father," Harper added.
Alex shook his head. "What are they?"
Liam flipped through another book. "Part myth, part curse. Bloodlines that bridge dimensions. They're not supposed to exist anymore. Not since the Great Silence."
Alex swallowed. "And the Hollowborn?"
Liam hesitated. "They were sealed behind those doors. After the Veilborn vanished."
"So I didn't just open a door," Alex said. "I opened their door."
"No," Liam said. "You opened your door. And they followed the scent."
---
That afternoon, the air grew too still. The trees no longer moved. The wind stopped altogether. Birds didn't return. The world held its breath again.
Harper readied her bat.
"We're not alone."
Alex stood slowly. The humming in his spine had grown stronger. Louder. Like something beneath his skin was knocking.
"Something's wrong," he whispered.
That's when the walls shook.
The salt lines burst into flame.
The runes screamed.
And something stepped through the wall.
Not burst. Not broke. Stepped.
Like walking through fog. Its shape was indistinct at first, a ripple in space. Then it solidified.
Tall. Twisted. A hollow grin.
Another Hollowborn.
No—more than one. Three. No, five.
A nest.
Harper swung. Her bat met resistance—not bone, not flesh, but cold shadow. One creature shrieked, mouth unhinging wider than possible.
Alex didn't run.
He stepped forward.
The humming in his body became a roar.
And he screamed.
But not in fear.
In command.
The air trembled. The creatures reeled. One burst into black ash. Another stumbled backward, screeching.
Liam stared at him. "What did you just do?"
"I don't know," Alex said. "But I think it was mine."
Harper grabbed his arm. "We need to go. Now."
They ran again. Through forest, over water, beneath hidden bridges where even ghosts feared to tread.
Every step, more questions.
Every step, more power thrumming under Alex's skin.
And that night, when they finally stopped at a circle of standing stones older than maps, Alex looked up at the stars—and saw something staring back.
A shape among constellations. A pattern in the darkness.
A watcher.
He didn't sleep.
Instead, he whispered to the air:
"If I'm the door... what's trying to come through me?"
And something in the dark whispered back:
You.
The sky above Hollowridge was an inky canvas, pricked with stars that shimmered like tiny watchful eyes. Alex sat alone on the grassy hill that overlooked the school courtyard, his arms tucked around his knees, the night air cool against his skin. Crickets chirped lazily in the distance, and a soft wind rustled through the trees, carrying the scent of pine and distant rain.
It was the first quiet he'd had all day. After everything that had happened, Harper's nervous glances, and Liam's unpredictable shifts between cold detachment and blazing intimacy—Alex had needed space. Somewhere far away from the suffocating silence of his room and the whispering halls of the school.
And yet, the solitude only deepened his thoughts.
He leaned back and stared at the stars. They were beautiful. Cold. Distant. And yet they burned so bright.
"Beautiful night," came a voice behind him.
Alex's heart skipped. He didn't have to turn to know who it was. He'd memorized that voice—the way it dipped into velvet when Liam wasn't pretending to be aloof.
Liam stepped into view, hands in his pockets, eyes reflecting silver from the starlight. He didn't say anything else at first. Just stood beside Alex, gazing upward as if trying to find a specific star among the millions.
"I thought you were avoiding me," Alex finally said, voice soft.
Liam tilted his head, the corner of his mouth twitching. "Maybe I was. Maybe I was afraid."
"Afraid?"
Liam sat beside him. Close. Too close. Their shoulders brushed. "Afraid of what happens when I stop pretending. When I let myself… want."
Alex swallowed hard. The ache in his chest returned, but this time it wasn't fear. It was something deeper. Something that burned.
He turned to Liam. "So stop pretending."
The world stilled.
Liam leaned in, slowly, like the world might shatter if he moved too fast. His fingers brushed Alex's cheek, thumb ghosting over his skin like a question.
Alex didn't pull away.
Their lips met in a kiss that was anything but gentle.
It was heated, urgent, starved. Liam's hand tangled in Alex's hair, pulling him closer, deepening the kiss with a hunger that had clearly been buried too long. Alex clutched the front of Liam's shirt, the fabric bunching beneath his fingers as their mouths moved in desperate sync.
Liam tasted of copper and sweetness—like blood and candy.
It should have terrified Alex.
But it didn't.
When they finally pulled apart, their breaths were shallow, mingling in the space between them.
Liam's eyes burned with something ancient, something tender and terrifying all at once.
"I shouldn't want this," Liam whispered, forehead pressing against Alex's. "You make me forget what I am."
Alex closed his eyes. "Then forget. Just for tonight."
Liam was silent for a moment. Then, he nodded.
They lay back side by side, staring at the stars, breaths slowly evening. The sky hadn't changed, but everything between them had.