The Vault never slept.
Even when the Circle retreated to the upper halls of Empire High to breathe, to bleed in private, to sleep if exhaustion stole them down, the Vault pulsed beneath the stone like a second heart. Its presence rippled through the wards, through the sky, through the marrow of every student who walked the grounds. It was alive, and every beat whispered: Come deeper. Come closer. Come break.
Seraphina woke to that rhythm.
She sat upright in her narrow tower bed, the sheets tangled around her legs, her chest slick with sweat. Her arms burned, the shifting map beneath her skin frantic and insistent, lines spiraling toward the new convergence point they had uncovered beneath Empire High. She pressed her palms against her knees, forcing herself to breathe, but the Vault's call did not ease.
A knock at the door startled her. She knew who it was before he spoke.
"Seraphina." Elijah's voice was low, steady, but it held an edge that mirrored the tension inside her. "It's starting."
She swung her legs over the side of the bed, not bothering with shoes, only her cloak. When she opened the door, Elijah stood there, shadow clinging to him like armor, eyes so dark they looked almost hollow.
For a moment, neither spoke. They didn't need to. The Vault's hum between them was enough.
"Gather the others," she said.
He gave a single nod.
The Circle met in the library, though the place no longer felt like a library at all. Shelves had warped, wood splintered, and entire sections had collapsed under the strain of magic leaking upward from the Vault. Books lay open on the floor, their pages turning in phantom winds, words rearranging themselves into warnings and riddles.
Kaelina kicked aside a half-burned tome as she stalked in. "Tell me we're not doing this now. I barely got two hours of sleep."
"Better than me," Tobias muttered, tossing a flask back into his pack. "I got thirty minutes and a nightmare that probably qualifies as a prophecy."
Riv ignored them, eyes sharp as she leaned against a shattered desk. "We don't have a choice. The wards are failing faster. If we wait, the Vault will open on its own."
Mei had already begun sketching sigils on the marble floor with salt and ash, her precision frightening in its calmness. "The convergence point aligns with the eastern catacombs beneath the school. The wards there are older than the Tower itself. If the Vault is forcing us there, it wants something buried deeper than stone."
Seraphina's glowing arms confirmed it, the map pulsing violently as though to tear her skin open. She met Elijah's gaze across the ruined chamber, and the words neither of them said burned hotter than fire.
It wanted her.
"Then we go," Sera said.
No one argued. Not because they agreed, but because choice was an illusion they no longer had.
The descent into the eastern catacombs felt different than their previous trials. The air pressed tighter, damp stone weeping water as though the school itself was bleeding. Torches flared, then sputtered as they passed, and every echo of their footsteps returned multiplied, like unseen things were walking with them.
Kaelina shivered. "I hate it here. Feels like we're walking into our own graves."
"Cheerful," Tobias muttered.
"Accurate," Riv replied flatly.
Mei's chalk glowed faintly on the walls as she marked their path. "These tunnels were sealed for a reason. The Vault isn't the only thing down here."
Seraphina didn't ask what she meant. She already knew.
When they reached the convergence point, her arms blazed like fire. The wall ahead shimmered, stone dissolving to reveal an archway rimmed with black glyphs. Beyond it stretched a chamber larger than the Tower's dome, its floor covered in mirrors.
Hundreds of mirrors.
They stood upright in rows, cracked and warped, some taller than towers, some as small as hand-held glass. Their surfaces reflected nothing of the Circle, only shadows shifting restlessly inside.
"The Sanctum of Memory," Mei whispered.
The Vault had opened the trial.
They stepped inside as one, and the mirrors came alive.
Each surface rippled, then settled into images—moments from their pasts.
Kaelina froze, her face bleaching pale as one mirror showed her younger self clutching her brother's hand, fire closing in around them. The boy's lips moved in a plea she couldn't hear. Her own reflection dragged him into flame.
"No," she breathed, staggering back. "That's not—"
Another mirror trapped Riv's attention. She saw herself as a child, kneeling over a battlefield, blood coating her hands. Her parents lay among the fallen, and she stood, expressionless, sword raised against her own kin.
Her silver braid trembled as she gritted her teeth. "Lies."
Tobias cursed violently as a dozen mirrors showed him the same scene—stealing, conning, lying—and in each one, someone he cared for turned away from him. His father. His sister. His friends. He laughed bitterly, but the sound was close to breaking. "Well, Vault, thanks for the greatest hits reel."
Mei's mirrors whispered with her voice, endless versions of herself abandoning those she loved for knowledge, choosing books over people. Her hand shook as she traced a ward in the air, but her face remained hard, unyielding.
And Seraphina—
Her mirrors hurt the most.
One showed her as a child, screaming as her home burned, her parents' faces vanishing in smoke. Another showed her in the Tower now, hands stained in shadow, Elijah broken at her feet because she had chosen power over him.
Her breath caught, her heart lurching against her ribs. She couldn't move. She couldn't look away.
Until Elijah's hand closed around hers.
"Don't," he said, voice low, steady as steel. "Don't let it in."
She jerked her gaze toward him—and froze. His mirrors had changed too.
They showed him standing over bodies, his blade red, his face blank. They showed him crowned in darkness, his eyes bottomless void. They showed him cradling Seraphina, her light extinguished because of him.
For the first time since she had known him, Elijah looked shaken.
His grip on her tightened. Her marks flared in answer.
The mirrors shattered.
All of them.
The sound was deafening, a rain of silver shards that cut the air, slicing their skin, their clothes, the floor beneath them. Shadows poured out, coalescing into figures born of memory and regret. They attacked.
The Circle fought back with desperate fury.
Kaelina's blades of light tore through illusions of her brother only to have them reform with fire in their eyes. Riv cut down ghosts of kin who rose again, bloodless but unyielding. Tobias hurled spell after spell, laughing through tears, his grin carved with rage. Mei's wards burned the ground, but her doubles adapted, precise and merciless.
And Seraphina—her shadows and light lashed the chamber, colliding with her parents' faces, Elijah's dying body, herself twisted in flame. Each strike left her shaking, but Elijah was always there, a wall at her back, his sword cutting through what she couldn't.
Their magic fused, dark and gold, until the chamber trembled.
Finally, Seraphina slammed both palms to the ground. Her marks blazed, lines shifting into a single word that burned across the mirrors' remains: ENOUGH.
The illusions froze. Shattered. Dissolved into dust.
Silence fell.
In the center of the chamber, where the last mirror had stood, a shard floated in the air, black shot through with gold veins.
The next key.
Seraphina reached for it, but Elijah caught her wrist.
His eyes locked on hers, dark and raw. "Every time you touch them, it costs you."
Her throat tightened. "And if I don't, it costs us all."
For a moment, he didn't move. His hand trembled against hers, restraint tearing him apart. Then slowly, painfully, he let go.
She took the shard.
Its heat ripped through her, searing, her vision flooding with memories—her childhood, her parents, Elijah's face too close, too untouchable. She gasped, her knees buckling. Elijah caught her before she fell, his arms wrapping around her as if she were the only anchor he had left.
"Breathe," he murmured into her hair, fierce and broken at once. "Breathe, damn you."
She did. Somehow.
When the shard dimmed, she opened her eyes. The others were staring, battered and silent. The Vault was quiet, but not still. It never was.
Seraphina met Elijah's gaze. Something had cracked open between them in that chamber, something the Vault had tried to weaponize but instead had bared raw.
For the first time, she didn't look away.
And neither did he.
They emerged from the catacombs hours later, bloodied and exhausted. Students scattered from their path, whispering of storms that followed the Circle wherever they went.
But Seraphina didn't hear them.
All she heard was the Vault's heartbeat in her chest.
All she felt was Elijah's hand, still hovering close enough to touch but never quite closing the distance.
Not yet.
But soon.