The vault trembled.
It wasn't just the echo of boots anymore. It was something older. Heavier. Living stone groaning to wake after centuries of slumber. Dust fell in waves from the ceiling. Symbols on the walls began to shift, slowly rearranging themselves into patterns neither Jonas nor Elena could read.
And the statue—Fen'kaar, the First Fang—was no longer still.
Its eyes flared with cold blue fire.
Its jaw opened wide.
And from the heart of that stone chest came a pulse so loud, Jonas felt it crash through his bones.
The five Shade Hounds stood in silence. Even they hadn't expected this.
The leader—the girl with the ancient eyes—took a slow step back.
"What… did you awaken?" she murmured.
Elena moved first. She grabbed Jonas's arm, dragging him away from the pulsing statue.
"Don't look at it," she hissed. "Don't listen."
"Why? What's happening?"
"He's remembering."
"Who?!"
She didn't answer.
Because Fen'kaar wasn't just remembering.
He was recognizing.
His eyes—glowing blue and filled with fire—locked onto Jonas.
And in that moment, every glyph on the walls lit up at once.
Jonas screamed.
Not from pain.
From memory.
He saw it all.
He saw the First Pact, forged beneath a twin eclipse by wolves and humans, bound by the blood of the moon. He saw the Hollow Court rise in secret, guiding the kingdom from the shadows, protecting the sacred balance between beast and man.
He saw the betrayal—Malik's ancestors breaking the Pact, hungering for pure bloodline rule. The burning of the Hollowborn, the slaughter of the Moonblooded, the exile of the Fangmarked. A thousand years of lies built on the bones of truth.
And then he saw himself.
Standing at the edge of a battlefield, fire behind him, a pack of werewolves at his back—not snarling, but noble. Warriors. Kings. Guardians.
His voice, older and deeper, called out over the roar of war.
> "This kingdom was never yours."
> "It was ours."
And then the vision shattered.
He collapsed to his knees in the present, gasping like he'd run through a thunderstorm. Whisperfang, still glowing in his hand, pulsed once—twice—then dimmed.
Elena knelt beside him.
"You saw," she whispered.
He looked up, pale and dazed. "It was real."
"It always was."
Across the vault, Fen'kaar's statue stilled again—but its mouth remained open, its howl echoing faintly in the chamber, like a prophecy still unfurling.
The Shade Hounds recovered quickly.
The girl leader stepped forward, drawing two short crescent blades from her back.
"I don't care what you just unlocked," she said. "You're coming with us. Dead or breathing."
Jonas rose slowly, Whisperfang pulsing in his hand.
But his stance had changed.
No longer defensive.
No longer confused.
He stood like a memory reborn.
Elena drew her blades.
"Jonas," she said calmly, "whatever happens next—don't die."
He smirked, teeth sharper than they should've been.
"I'll try."
They struck first.
The Shade Hounds were fast—inhumanly so. Trained in shadow corridors beneath the Citadel, they moved like whispers wrapped in blades.
But Jonas moved on instinct.
He parried the first strike without thinking. Whisperfang sang as it met steel. Sparks burst. The impact rattled the floor. One Shade Hound slid back, dazed.
Another leapt in from the left.
Too fast.
Elena was already there—her blades flashing silver in an X-strike, carving through air and metal. The Hound stumbled, blood marking the floor.
But there were five.
And only two of them.
Jonas moved on reflex. His body acted before his thoughts caught up. The blood in his veins screamed with inherited memory—not just from dreams, but from the ancestral pact. A growl escaped his lips as his eyes flared—wolf-bright, burning gold.
He didn't shift fully.
Not yet.
But his bones threatened to.
His skin rippled with pressure.
One Shade Hound stabbed toward his chest.
He caught the blade with his bare hand.
It didn't pierce him.
It melted.
The Hound stared, trembling.
"What are you?" he whispered.
Jonas's voice came through like thunder cracking wood.
"Something they should've never forgotten."
He flung the soldier back across the chamber.
Stone shattered.
But the fight was not without cost.
Elena took a hit to the side—shallow, but bleeding.
Jonas caught her before she collapsed.
"Go," she groaned. "I'll hold them."
"I'm not leaving you."
"You're not ready."
"Neither were you," he said, rising again, Whisperfang alight.
Only two Shade Hounds remained now.
One of them whistled sharply—a signal.
From the shattered entrance, a new form emerged.
Tall. Wrapped in silver-and-black armor. Cloaked in a mantle of hollow feathers.
A figure with no face—only a mirror mask reflecting their own fear back at them.
Jonas took a step back.
"What the hell is that?"
Elena's expression turned cold.
"That's not a Shade Hound," she whispered.
"It's a Shadowborn."
The vault dimmed again.
All light retreated.
Not from magic.
From presence.
The Shadowborn stepped forward, and every glyph on the wall went dark—as if the very stone rejected his existence.
Jonas tried to move.
His legs refused.
The Shadowborn raised a gloved hand.
The air warped.
Then—
A voice, low and monstrous, echoed across the chamber.
> "I smell the blood of Fen'kaar…"
Jonas shook.
Every bone in his body screamed at him to run.
Elena stood tall—even bleeding—and faced the figure.
"You're not welcome here."
The Shadowborn turned its mask to her.
"Neither are you."
With one sharp gesture, the chamber shattered.
Not physically—but the space around them warped. The temple flickered, twisting into shadows. Memory bled into reality. The floor cracked beneath them.
Jonas fell—
And the world went dark.
He awoke in fire.
Not real flames, but memory fire.
He stood on a battlefield again.
Alone.
Across from him, Malik stood—crowned, cloaked in blood-red, with an army of shadows at his back.
Behind Jonas, only silence.
Only ghosts.
Malik smiled.
"It always ends here."
Jonas gripped Whisperfang.
"No," he said.
> "It begins here."
He gasped awake.
Elena knelt over him.
He was still in the vault—but it was half-ruined now. The Shadowborn was gone. The Shade Hounds—either dead or fled. Fen'kaar's statue was cracked, and the ceiling was bleeding dust.
"Elena…"
"Shh. You passed out for a minute."
"How?"
"The vault protected you. Just barely."
He struggled to sit up.
She helped.
His voice was raw. "What… was that thing?"
She didn't answer right away.
Then: "A piece of what Malik serves. They're no longer men. They're what happens when prophecy is eaten, not fulfilled."
He shivered.
"Why me?" he asked. "Why did I survive?"
She looked him dead in the eye.
"Because the wolf in you woke before it was time."
From above, rubble crumbled.
The vault was collapsing.
Elena stood.
"We have to move. There's another way out."
He looked back one last time—at Fen'kaar's broken face.
The fire in the statue's eyes had gone out.
But Jonas felt it now.
Burning inside himself.
He followed Elena into the dark corridor, deeper into the forgotten bones of Kaladorn.
Unaware that two cloaked figures now watched them from the shadows beyond the ruin.
One whispered, "He's not supposed to be this strong yet."
The other replied:
> "Then we kill him before the moon calls his name."