They left Skopje in silence.
No one spoke after Thren turned to ash. Not Madalena. Not Lucien. Not even Amara.
Lucien's shadowfire hadn't faded. It coiled around his arms like ink in water, pulsing softly, humming with power he didn't recognize — or maybe wouldn't admit to.
It didn't burn. But it didn't stop.
Madalena had said nothing since they boarded the backroad train across the Balkans. She watched Lucien from her seat like she was waiting for him to slip into something else.
Amara finally broke the silence.
"What's happening to you?"
Lucien looked down at his hand. The shadow curled up his wrist like it was listening.
"I don't know," he said. "But it's not Spiral. And it's not Flame."
"It devours," Madalena said, her voice sharp. "That's not power. That's hunger."
Lucien met her gaze, steady. "If I can use it to protect her, I'll deal with the cost."
"You might not have a choice," Madalena muttered.
The train slowed near the Slovenian border. The skies darkened. Wards around the tracks shimmered — until Lucien stepped out.
And they broke.
No sound. No shatter. Just collapse.
The moment he set foot on the ground, the sigils lining the protection wards blinked once — then vanished like smoke in water.
Amara stared. "You're disrupting magic now."
"Not trying to," Lucien said.
"That's what makes it worse," Madalena muttered.
They reached a small village rumored to be home to a "seer untouched by Flame or Spiral." No names. No alliances. Just rumors.
And power.
They found her sitting on the roof of an old stone tower, barefoot, hair the color of bone ash. She looked no older than sixteen, but her eyes were impossible — like looking through a keyhole into the void.
Amara called up to her. "We're looking for guidance."
The girl didn't move.
Then, slowly, she turned.
And smiled.
"I know."
She climbed down with unnatural ease, like gravity didn't care what she did.
Lucien stepped forward. "Who are you?"
"I don't use names anymore," she said. "They wear out. But my sigil remains."
She lifted her hand.
And carved into her palm — a symbol no one recognized.
Three intersecting rings. Faintly glowing. Soft gold.
Madalena's breath caught.
"That's not Flame. That's not Spiral," she whispered. "That's… Third Path."
Lucien frowned. "That's a myth."
"No," the girl said. "We're real. We just stepped back when you all started playing gods."
Amara stepped forward. "Why now? Why show yourself?"
The girl tilted her head.
"Because you broke fate," she said, looking at Amara. "And he—" she pointed to Lucien, "—brought something with him that wasn't supposed to return."
Lucien went cold. "What do you mean?"
"You were forged in death, touched by the Hollow Crown, pulled from the first silence," the girl said. "And now the old realm is watching."
"Which realm?" Amara asked.
The girl turned slowly.
"The one that existed before magic."
A wind tore through the village. Every ward flickered. Birds took off into the sky as if the world had blinked wrong.
Amara stepped toward her. "What's the Third Path?"
The girl's voice dropped to a whisper.
"The path of balance."
"The one that eats gods."