Chapter XXVIII: The Fractured Ascent
Falling should have an end.
Wind, ground, impact—that is the promise every descent makes. Yet Nathaniel Cross does not strike earth. He does not feel wind clawing at his clothes or rushing past his ears. His fall is silent, suspended, as though gravity has forgotten him.
Silver light stretches around him, thick and suffocating, not air but liquid that pretends to breathe. His body tumbles through it slowly, like he is sinking into milk. And within that light he sees—himself.
Hundreds. Thousands. Each version of Nathaniel swims beside him, tumbling in the endless drop. Some are screaming. Some are clawing their eyes out. Some are silent, broken, hollow as mannequins. He wants to shut his own eyes, but he can't. Every version of him forces him to watch.
The scar sears brighter against his chest, a brand pressed into skin, its glow leaking through fabric. He clutches it as though he could tear it out, but the light only flares hotter, veins crawling up his neck and arms like molten wires.
And then, the descent halts.
Nathaniel's body slams against something invisible—no ground, no floor, just an unseen threshold that knocks the air from his lungs. He gasps, wheezing, dragging himself upright.
The silver sea around him shifts. Shapes ripple through it. Edges. Towers. Bridges.
London is forming again.
But it is wrong.
He stands at the edge of an impossible street. The Thames coils above him instead of below, a black river hung upside down, its surface clinging to the sky like glass. Buildings sprout downward from that water, their spires dangling like the teeth of a jaw ready to snap shut.
Nathaniel staggers backward, pressing a hand against the nearest wall. It pulses faintly under his touch—warm, alive, as though the city itself has veins pumping through brick and mortar.
The street beneath his shoes shivers, then steadies. Fog curls from the cracks, silver tendrils weaving across cobblestones.
And voices rise.
Not whispers this time. Not echoes. A choir. Layered voices spilling from the walls, the sky, the ground—voices that are all his own, overlapping in countless tones.
"Nathaniel..."
"Nathaniel..."
"Nathaniel..."
Every corner of the city speaks his name.
He grips his head, teeth gritted, panic sharpening into rage. "STOP!"
The voices obey.
Silence slams down so violently his ears ring. For a long, breathless moment the inverted city holds still, its towers dangling above like executioners.
And then—movement.
From the cracks in the cobblestones, shapes crawl forth. Not porcelain creatures. Not statues. Shadows. Pure silhouettes of human form, featureless, their edges leaking silver mist. They rise one by one, dozens, then hundreds, forming a crowd that fills the street from wall to wall.
All of them face Nathaniel. All of them tilt their heads in unison.
His chest constricts, fear pressing in like iron bands. But then something—new—cuts through the terror.
A warmth.
Not the burning of the scar. Not the invasive light. A warmth of his own. Somewhere beneath the chaos, beneath the knocking, beneath the suffocating tide of voices, a small ember stirs inside him.
The crowd of silhouettes steps forward as one.
Nathaniel staggers back, hand pressed to his scar. The ember flares, responding. The glow spreads across his arm, coiling like molten veins—but this time, it does not burn.
This time, it feels like his.
The silhouettes lunge.
Nathaniel thrusts his hand outward. Silver light erupts, blasting down the street in a shockwave. The shadows shatter like glass struck by a hammer, exploding into clouds of dust. The force rattles the walls, cracks leaping up the buildings like lightning.
Nathaniel stares at his trembling hand, chest heaving. The glow fades slowly, but its residue lingers.
For the first time, he realizes—
The scar is not just a curse. It is power.
And for once, it bends to him.
The silence does not last.
A sound booms across the city, shaking the inverted river above. A bell toll. Deep, resonant, vibrating through stone and flesh alike.
Nathaniel lifts his head. Across the fractured horizon, the spire of St. Paul's Cathedral rises—but upside down, dangling from the black water-sky like a stalactite. Its bells swing in impossible rhythm, their sound falling upward and downward at once.
The ground trembles beneath him. Streets collapse in slabs, tilting toward the cathedral. Whether he walks or not, the city drags him closer.
He stumbles, trips, catches himself. His heartbeat syncs with the tolling bells, faster, harder. The scar sears, but not with helplessness. With urgency.
The cathedral gates loom ahead, impossibly massive, their wood blackened and pulsing. They groan open slowly as he nears, a wound splitting wider to let him through.
Inside, gravity forgets itself again.
The floor tilts sideways, then upward. Pews float like driftwood in water. Candles burn with silver flame, their wax dripping upward toward the ceiling. The air is heavy, dense as syrup.
And at the center of it all—
The hourglass.
Enormous. Taller than the cathedral dome itself. Suspended midair, its glass cracked, its sand caught in perpetual hesitation. Some grains fall downward, others spiral upward, others hang motionless in the space between.
Nathaniel steps forward, his scar thrumming in resonance. His veins glow faintly through his skin, pulling him toward the relic.
The choir of voices returns, thunderous now, echoing through the cathedral walls:
"YOU ARE THE MEASURE."
"YOU ARE THE SAND."
"YOU ARE THE FRACTURE THAT BINDS."
Nathaniel's fists clench. His teeth grind. "No," he whispers, voice trembling but firming with each word. "I am not your measure. I am not your sand. I'm not your—"
The hourglass shudders violently.
Cracks burst across its surface. Silver light spills out in spears. The choir screams as one, deafening, a storm of voices all his own.
Nathaniel throws his arms up—
And this time, he does not collapse.
The scar flares with him, the ember inside igniting into a blaze. Light erupts from his body, not wild and devouring but sharp, directed. A barrier forms around him, a sphere of silver fire that bends the cathedral's storm back.
The hourglass shatters.
A shockwave tears through the cathedral, hurling pews, splintering stone, toppling statues. The fragments of the hourglass scatter into the air, each shard glowing like a dying star before dissolving into dust.
The choir's voices cut off. Silence reigns.
And Nathaniel stands at the center, unbroken.
The cathedral dissolves around him like smoke. Stone peels away, candles melt into air, the dome tears itself into strips of silver fog.
Nathaniel is left standing on nothing.
Above him, the inverted Thames ripples violently, waves breaking across the black water-sky. From its depths, something colossal shifts—an outline too massive to comprehend, dragging itself slowly against the surface.
The sight should shatter him. Instead, he feels the ember burning steady in his chest, the scar glowing not with possession but with defiance.
The city may breathe. The hourglass may fracture. The voices may scream.
But Nathaniel Cross is still here.
He takes a breath, the first deep, steady breath in days. His lungs no longer feel like glass. His body no longer feels like a puppet.
And as he exhales, the world begins to tilt again. The inverted river folds in on itself, the city collapsing like paper burned at the edges. The silver fog rushes inward, consuming everything.
Nathaniel closes his eyes, bracing.
When he opens them—
He is lying on the floor of his flat.
The radiator hums. The blinds filter pale morning light. The notebook lies open on the desk, its pages fluttering softly in the still air.
But the cracks are gone.
The veins of silver that once crawled across his ceiling, his walls, his floor—gone. The flat is whole. Silent. Ordinary.
Nathaniel sits up slowly, his head spinning. His chest still glows faintly beneath his shirt, but the burn has dulled. The ember lingers, not scorching but steady, a reminder of what he touched.
His gaze drifts to the notebook.
New words cover the page, written in the same jagged ink:
You are learning.
Nathaniel's throat tightens. His hand trembles. But he does not shut the notebook this time.
He closes his eyes. Breathes.
For the first time, the silence in his flat does not feel like a threat.
It feels like a pause.
A fragile pause before the next toll of the bells.
And Nathaniel Cross—scar burning, veins humming, heart alight with defiance—knows he will not run forever.
Not anymore.