The next morning, Lumen refused to go past the edge of the garden.
Cira had never seen him afraid.
That was the first warning.
The second was the fog.
It hadn't rolled in slowly—it was just there.
Clinging to the ground like spun silk, stretching between the trees, unnaturally thick even for Everveil.
Cira knelt beside Lumen, brushing her fingers over his fur. He flinched at her touch. His ears lay flat, eyes locked on the trees.
"Lumen?" she whispered. "What's out there?"
The fox made a low sound—part growl, part whimper.
"Elian?" she called, glancing over her shoulder.
But he wasn't there.
He stood already at the edge of the forest, back to her, the mist curling around his legs. His posture was tense. Still. As if something beyond the trees had beckoned him silently.
"Elian—wait!" she said, rising quickly. "Where are you going?"
"I just need to see something," he replied, barely louder than the wind. "I'll be back."
Cira didn't hesitate. She grabbed her bow from the wall and strode toward him.
"Well," she said firmly, "you're not going in there alone. I'm coming with you."
He finally turned. His eyes met hers—surprised, almost conflicted—but he didn't protest.
He simply nodded once, then stepped into the fog.
And Cira followed.
The forest felt different this time.
Even though it was morning, the trees stood darker, quieter. The air was thick with damp and whisper-thin tension. Moss clung to their boots, and strange runes shimmered faintly on the bark of trees neither of them had seen before.
"I don't like this," Cira muttered.
Elian didn't answer.
She glanced at him. "You really weren't going to say anything before walking into cursed fog?"
"I wasn't expecting you to notice," he replied, brushing past a fern.
"Oh, so now I'm supposed to ignore you going off and dying in the forest alone? Not happening."
Still, no reply.
She crossed her arms. "You know, you could try saying thank you sometime. Or maybe stop being such a shadow all the time."
Elian glanced sideways at her. "I didn't ask you to follow me."
That stopped her.
She stared at his back. Her heartbeat stumbled.
He kept walking, but slower now.
Cira turned her face away and laughed once—dry and bitter. "Right. Of course. I keep forgetting you'd rather be alone."
"That's not what I meant."
She snapped, "You never say what you mean. You just—stand there and burn, and act like no one's supposed to notice."
He stopped walking.
The fog curled around them both.
Elian turned toward her. His face, unreadable, but his voice; lower than before. "I didn't want you to get hurt."
"You already made sure of that," she muttered, eyes sharp and glassy. "That thing in the woods—it saw me too. This is my forest. My life. If you're cursed, then I'm cursed with you now."
His lips parted slightly.
Something behind his eyes softened—just for a moment. A flicker of something real.
"I just…" he began. "I don't want you to regret this."
"I won't," she said. "But you might if you keep shutting people out."
They walked in silence after that. Not the heavy silence of anger—but something fragile, uncertain.
The deeper they went, the more the mist seemed to shift and breathe.
Birds didn't sing. No leaves rustled.
At one point, they both stopped—eyes drawn toward a break in the trees, where strange markings lined the ground. Old, as if clawed into the earth by something not quite natural.
Elian crouched beside one. "I've seen this before…"
"Where?" Cira asked.
His voice was distant. "In a dream. Or maybe a memory. It's hard to tell the difference."
She watched him quietly. The way his fingers hovered over the mark but never touched it. Like touching it might wake something up.
And somewhere deep in the forest, far behind the fog and roots,
something… shifted.
Lumen let out a sharp, high-pitched cry from the edge of the trees.
Elian stood instantly, body tensing. Cira followed his gaze—and froze.
There it was.
Far off, standing between two trees where the fog thinned just enough—
a tall, thin figure cloaked in something darker than shadow. Its face hidden beneath a veil of branches and bone. Its arm's far too long, and still.
It didn't move.
It didn't have to.
Cira's breath caught. "It's the same one…"
Elian didn't speak.
He stepped forward, slowly. But the moment he moved, the figure—vanished.
Not walked away.
Not turned.
Just ...gone.
Like a flicker of flame snuffed out in the wind.
Silence returned, heavier than before.
Elian didn't look at Cira when he said, barely above a whisper:
"It's following me."
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