The fall felt endless.
Light tore across Ethan's vision until he no longer knew which way was up. His stomach lurch, air ripped from his lungs, and then, impact. He struck stone hard enough to rattle his bone, rolling across a cold, unyielding floor.
Silence.
His shard lay a few paces away, dim but pulsing faintly, like a heartbeat struggling to keep rhythm. Ethan dragged himself upright, wincing, searching desperately through the haze.
"Elara!" His voice echoed, bouncing off unseen walls.
"Elara!"
No answer.
The chamber around him was vast, circular, its walls shifting like smoke caught in glass. Shadows writhed across the surfaces, reshaping themselves into jagged ridges and then smoothing into mirrored planes. The Tower itself seemed alive, breathing, aware.
Ethan swallowed, his throat raw. Alone. The word pressed down on him heavier than the stone beneath his feet.
He retrieved the shard, gripping it right. Its faint glow illuminated the floor, patterns carved into the stone in spirals and lines, like veins of silver etched by some ancient hand. They pulse faintly in rhythm with his shard, as though the Tower was listening.
A whisper drifted through the chamber. "Ethan.."
His heart leapt. "Elara?" He turned sharply.
But it wasn't her.
Sofia stood there, half in shadow, her hair falling loose across her shoulders. She looked exactly as she had on the bridge, exhausted, but real, heartbreakingly real.
"You don't have to keep running," she said softly. "Come back. You know this isn't your world. It never was."
The air thickened. Ethan's chest clenched, torn between belief and denial. He force himself to look away, jaw tight. "You're not her. You're a trick."
Her voice tremble. "Or maybe this is the only truth left."
The shard flared in his hand, and the vision dissolved into smoke. The chamber stretched before him, and with it, a corridor opened, long, narrow, lit by shifting light.
Ethan took a steadying breath. Don't stop. Don't look back. He stepped forward into the maze.
Elara's landing was harsher. She slammed into glass-like stone that cracked beneath her weight, the sound sharp in the silence. She rolled, gritting her teeth, and scrambled to her feet, sword drawn in one fluid motion.
But no enemy waited.
Instead, she found herself in a hall of mirror. Each wall reflected her image, but not quite. In some, her face was twisted with rage. In other, hollow with despair. And in more than one, Rowan stood behind her shoulder, smiling that familiar cruel smile.
Her stomach churned. "Not again."
The mirrors whispered, their voice layered and echoing. You'll betray him. Just as you betrayed me. You can't be trusted. You never could. Ethan will see it soon.
Her grip on the sword faltered, just slightly. The voices pressed deeper, slicing where armor couldn't reach. Rowan's reflection stepped closer in the glass, lips at her ear.
"You were mine," he whispered. "You'll always be mine."
Her rage surged. With a sharp cry, she swung her blade, shattering the reflection. Glass exploded across the floor, shards spinning into smoke. But where one broke, three more formed, each showing Rowan in new guises, pleading, mocking, accusing.
Elara's chest heaved. This isn't real. This isn't real. But the doubt still gnawed, quiet and merciless.
Somewhere between them, the Tower's voice echoed. Smooth, distant, endless.
"Every bond is tested. Every oath breaks. Which of you will endure?"
Ethan froze mid-step, hearing the words vibrate through the stone itself. At the same moment, Elara lifted her gaze as the whisper shivered across her hall.
Their marks, the crescent on Elara's wrist, the wing on Ethan's flickered faintly, glowing through the haze, pulsing like beacons. For an instant, they felt each other's presence, faint but undeniable.
And then it was gone.
Ethan reached the end of the labyrinth. His legs tremble, his breath ragged, but he pressed on until the corridor widened into another chamber. shard pulsed stronger, sensing... something.
He froze.
A figure waited at the chamber's center. Tall, cloaked, its face hidden by a smooth mask of shadow. In one hand it held a blade. Not just any blade,. Elara's sword.
The shadow tilted its head, as though studying him. "You are far from where you belong, Ethan."
The shard in his hand throbbed violently, as if in warning.
At the same time, Elara staggered deeper into the mirrored hall. She paused staring at one reflection that didn't shatter, no matter how fiercely she struck.
Her stomach dropped.
In the glass, Ethan stood. But not with her. His hand was wrapped around Sofia's, his expression softer than she'd ever seen. They looked... whole. At peace.
Elara's sword clattered against the floor. Her throat tightened, breath catching as the words she'd fought so hard against finally rooted in her chest.
He doesn't need you.
Her reflection smiled cruelly back at her.
The shadow did not move. Its mask gleamed faintly in the chamber's dim light, blank and unreadable, yet Ethan felt its gaze pierce straight through him.
"You've taken something that isn't yours," Ethan said voice hoarse, trying to steady his breathing.
The Shadow tilted its head. "Do you even know what is yours, Ethan?" Its voice was neither male nor female, but layered, echoing, as though spoken by a dozen mouth at once. It raised the sword, Elara's sword, and let the edge drag across the stone floor. Sparks hissed in the silence.
Anger surged through Ethan. He tightened his grip on the shard, though it felt pitiful compared to the steel blade. "Where is she?"
The Shadow stepped closer, slow and deliberate. "She is where you left her. Where you will always leave them."
Ethan's pulse hammered. "You're lying."
The mask tilted again. "Am I?"
The chamber shook, and suddenly the stone under his feet rippled like water. For a heartbeat, Ethan wasn't standing in the Tower at all. He was in his living room, Sofia seated at the table, bills scattered around her, her face drawn with exhaustion. His daughter's laugh echoed faintly down the hall.
"Ethan," Sofia said softly, not looking up. "You always run when it matters most. Will you run again?"
He staggered back. "No. No, this isn't real."
The Shadow stepped through the vision, Sofia vanishing behind it like smoke burned away. The mask leaned close until its blank face nearly touched his.
"Then prove it."
It thrust Elara's sword into his hands. Ethan gasped, almost dropping it, but the weight was real, cold, and solid.
The Shadow's voice coiled around him: "if you truly mean to fight for her, fight for yourself first."
And then it was gone, dissolving into a swirl of smoke that bled back into the chamber's walls, leaving Ethan alone with the sword shaking in his grip.
Far away, Elara's knuckles were white where they clenched her own blade, the real one, she thought. But doubt crawled inside her. The reflection hadn't shattered. Ethan, hand in Sofia's, had looked so utterly at peace that it carved something raw inside her chest.
The mirrors whispered. You were never chosen. He'll leave you, just as Rowan did. You are a weapon, not a heart.
Her breath came fast, shallow. She wanted to scream, to deny it, but her voice struck in her throat.
The reflection shifted. Sofia leaned closer to Ethan, pressing her forehead to his. The intimacy of it struck like a blade through Elara's ribs. She stumbled, pressing her palm to the cold glass. "Stop," she whispered. "Stop this."
Rowan's face replaced Sofia's in the reflection, his smile vicious. "You were mine, and you'll be his ruin too."
Something cracked inside her. With a wild, desperate cry, she swung. Her blade cleaved the mirror straight through. Glass exploded outward in a storm of shards that cut across her skin, drawing lines of blood across her arms and cheek. She didn't care.
The fragments fell, but instead of vanishing, they hovered in the air, dozens of jagged shards spinning slowly around her, each reflecting a different version of her. A warrior. A lover. A betrayer. A killer.
The voice layered together. Which are you, Elara? Which one will he see?
She dropped to one knee, clutching her mark as it flared, burning against her wrist. "I am not yours," she hissed. "I am not Rowan's. And I am not broken."
The shards froze in midair, and then fused into a doorway of glass, gleaming and translucent. On the other side, faint light flickered.
Elara stood, raising her chin, blood dripping from her cuts. She stepped through.
Ethan wandered the chamber, Elara's sword heavy in his grip. The Tower twisted around him, walls stretching impossibly high, then collapsing inward, the floor trembling as though it had no end.
The shard at his belt pulsed once more. A faint voice reached his ears.
"Elara?"
It was her voice. Faint, strained, but real. He froze, head snapping toward the sound.
"Elara!" he shouted, running forward. His voice echoed endlessly, swallowed by the shifting walls. The path opened ahead, corridors bending like roots of a great tree. He chased the sound, deeper, faster, ignoring the way the air grew heavier with every step.
But when he rounded a corner, he stopped short.
A figure stood there. Not the Shadow. Not Rowan
It was himself.
Another Ethan faced him, same eyes, same weary lines, same shard glowing faintly at his side. But this one carried a strange serenity, as though unburdened, free.
"You can't save her," the doubt said quietly. "You couldn't save Sofia. You can't save your family. You will lose her too."
Ethan's chest clenched. He raised the sword, hands trembling. "Get out of my way."
His double's lips curved in sad smile. "I'm not your enemy. I'm the truth you refuse to face."
The wall closed in, pressing them together. Ethan gritted his teeth, fury and fear tangling in his chest. He lunged.
The double caught his blade with one hand. Metal rang, sparks flying, and then the figure dissolved into light, scattering across the chamber.
Ethan stumble forward, chest heaving. Alone again. Always alone.
Elara emerged from the glass door into a chamber vast and empty, save for a single pedestal in its center. Upon it rested a shard like Ethan's, only fractured, cracked down the middle, leaking light like blood from a wound.
Her breath caught. She stepped forward cautiously, sword still slick with her own blood.
As she neared, the shard pulsed violently. A voice filled the room. Not Rowan's this time. Not Tower's.
Ethan's
"You will betray me."
Her knee almost buckled. The voice was his, low and certain, craved into her bones. She reached for the shard, blinding her, and she fell back with a cry.
When her vision cleared, she saw a silhouette standing at the far side of the chamber. Tall, familiar. The wing-mark glowing faintly at his wrist.
Her heart lurched. "Ethan?"
But the figure didn't move toward her. Didn't even look at her. It turned its back, walking into the shadow until it was gone.
"Elara!" she shouted, voice breaking. But the chamber swallowed the sound.
She was alone.
Ethan stumbled into another vast hall, clutching the sword with white-knuckled hands. His shard dimmed, barely glowing. He collapsed to one knee, gasping, and pressed his forehead against the cold stone.
A whisper brushed against his ear. "Every oath breaks. Every bond shatters."
The floor split beneath him, cracks of light spiderwebbing outward, and the chamber quaked violently.
Ethan's head snapped up just as the stone gave way, opening into a yawning abyss. He scrambled, grabbing the edge, his sword clattering down into the void below.
From the darkness rose a hand, pale, clawed, reaching for him. The Shadow's voice echoed up from the pit:
"You cannot save her. You never will."
Ethan's grip slipped. He cried out as they abyss swallowed him whole.
At the same time, Elara pressed her palm against the pedestal, desperate for any sign of Ethan. Her mark flared, and a vision seared across her mind. Ethan falling swallowed by lightless depths.
Her scream tore through the chamber, raw and shattering.
The Tower answered with silence.