Elara's POV
Forgive me. He's listening.
I stare at Thalia's note until the words blur. My hand crumples the paper into a tight ball. Forgiveness? She wants forgiveness for sending me to my death?
The door crashes open.
Get up! A soldier barks. Time to go.
Six armed men stand in the doorway, faces hard as stone. They don't look at me like I'm a person. They look at me like I'm a package they need to deliver.
I stand slowly, legs shaking. I spent six months sitting in darkness. My body isn't strong anymore.
One soldier grabs my arm roughly. Move.
They march me through the palace corridors. Servants press against walls to let us pass, their eyes full of pity. I lift my chin higher. I won't be pitied.
Outside, morning sun blinds me. I haven't seen daylight in so long it actually hurts. A horse-drawn cart waits, surrounded by supplies. This is it. The journey to the Shadowlands.
To the Dark King.
To my death.
They push me into the cart. I land hard on wooden planks, white robes twisting around my legs. The soldiers mount their horses, and we start moving.
I don't look back at the palace. I don't want to remember anything about this cursed place.
The Whispering Forest appears on the horizon by midday.
Even from a distance, it looks wrong. The trees are too tall, too dark, twisted in shapes that don't make sense. Fog curls between trunks like fingers reaching out.
I hate this forest, one soldier mutters.
Shut up, another snaps. Just get the tribute delivered and we leave. Fast.
They're afraid. Good. They should be.
We enter the forest as the sun begins to set. Immediately, everything changes.
The temperature drops. My breath comes out in clouds even though it was warm a minute ago. The trees press close on both sides of the narrow path, branches reaching overhead like a cage.
And then I hear it.
Whispers.
Soft voices echoing through the trees, speaking words I can't quite understand. They sound like warnings. Like screams. Like laughter.
Do you hear that? A young soldier asks nervously.
There's nothing, the captain lies. Keep moving.
But everyone hears it. The whispers grow louder with each step. They seem to come from everywhere and nowhere at once.
I close my eyes and let the sounds wash over me. Instead of fear, I feel something else.
Anger.
These soldiers are taking me to die because my sister betrayed me. Because Lord Cassian wanted me silenced. Because I dared to tell the truth about the plague.
A memory crashes into me, sharp as a knife.
Three years ago. Our small house in the lower district.
Mother lying on a thin mattress, skin burning with fever. The plague had taken hold two days earlier. Her breath came in wet, rattling gasps.
Please, I begged the healer who came to examine her. There must be medicine. Something to help her.
The healer looked at me with sad eyes. Medicine exists. But only for those who can pay. The nobles have bought it all.
That's not fair! People are dying!
Life isn't fair, child.
Mother died that night. She was only forty-two years old.
Father held her body and wept. I didn't cry. I was too angry.
Another memory follows.
Two years ago. The palace square.
Father stood on a platform, hands bound, facing the crowd. He'd spent months investigating the plague, searching for proof that nobles were hoarding the cure.
He found it.
And they arrested him for spreading dangerous lies.
The royal family controls the medicine! Father shouted before they could silence him. They're letting people die while they profit! The warehouse on
The executioner's blade fell.
I screamed. Someone held me back as I tried to run to him.
Father's last words were the truth. And the truth killed him.
I open my eyes, tears streaming down my face. But they're not sad tears.
They're furious tears.
Stop crying, a soldier orders. You'll need your strength.
I wipe my face with the back of my hand. I'm not crying from fear. I'm crying because I'm angry.
He looks confused. Angry at what?
Everything.
By the second day, two soldiers have deserted.
They left during the night without a word. Just disappeared into the forest.
The remaining four are jumpy, constantly looking over their shoulders. The whispers have gotten worse. Now they sound like actual voices calling names, making promises, threatening violence.
The trees seem to move when no one's looking directly at them. Shadows slide across the ground even though there's nothing to cast them.
One soldier swears he saw eyes watching from the darkness between the trunks.
I believe him. I've seen them too.
How much longer? someone asks.
Another day, the captain says. Maybe less.
I want to turn back.
We have orders. Deliver the tribute or face execution ourselves.
So I'm not the only one trapped.
The third morning, I wake to shouting.
Two more soldiers are gone. Only the captain and one young guard remain.
This is cursed! the young one yells. The forest is taking us! We need to leave NOW!
We're almost there, the captain insists, but his voice shakes. Just a few more hours.
They argue while I sit silently in the cart, watching shadows dance between trees.
Then I see it.
Ahead on the path, the forest ends. But it doesn't end in normal sunlight and open ground.
It ends in a wall of dark mist.
Thick, black fog that doesn't move like normal fog. It churns and swirls like it's alive, like something breathing.
The veil.
The barrier between our world and the Shadowlands.
Oh gods, the young soldier whispers. We're here.
The captain brings the cart to a stop twenty feet from the veil. Neither soldier moves.
Well? I say. Aren't you going to deliver your tribute?
The captain dismounts slowly. He walks to the cart and grabs my arm, pulling me down roughly. My legs almost give out three days of sitting have made them weak.
He drags me forward toward the veil.
Ten feet away, I can feel it. Cold radiating from the mist like winter air. The whispers in the forest have gone completely silent, like even they're afraid of what lies beyond.
Five feet away, the young soldier breaks.
I can't do this! He screams and runs back toward his horse.
The captain shoves me forward. Get in there. Go!
I stumble, catching myself before I fall.
The veil looms in front of me, massive and terrifying. I can't see anything through it. Just darkness.
Behind me, I hear horses running. The soldiers are fleeing, screaming about curses and death.
I'm alone.
I should be terrified. I should be crying and begging for mercy.
Instead, I think about Mother dying while nobles hoarded medicine. About Father executed for speaking truth. About Thalia in her silk dress, standing beside the man who sentenced me to death.
I think about everything that was stolen from me.
And I realize something.
I have nothing left to lose.
The Dark King might kill me. The Shadowlands might consume me.
But at least I'll die on my own terms, not theirs.
I take a deep breath, filling my lungs with the cold air.
Then I step forward into the veil.
Darkness swallows me whole.
For a moment, there's nothing. No sight, no sound, no feeling. Just absolute emptiness.
Then I hear a voice deep, ancient, and definitely not human.
Another sacrifice. How... disappointing.
My foot touches solid ground on the other side.
Light returns, but it's not normal light. It's twilight purple and silver, like perpetual sunset.
And rising before me, massive and impossible, is a castle made of black glass.
The Obsidian Citadel.
I'm in the Shadowlands.
And I'm not alone.
Something moves in the shadows ahead.
Something watching me.