Chapter 6: Veinborn
The battlefield flickered like a broken memory ash sweeping across the dying plains, flames twisting through the air like breath held too long. Kael's feet touched scorched soil, and yet they felt weightless, like their body hadn't followed them into this place. Like they were only a thread here, pulled taut across time's bleeding edge.
They weren't alone.
A younger Aeris Solari stood not ten paces away, blood painting her left cheek, her time-blade clutched in one shaking hand. She wore no crown, no robes of prophecy, only the bare, brutal steel of a warrior refusing to let go. Her expression cracked when she saw them.
"You came back," she whispered, almost disbelieving. "Gods… you came back."
Kael opened their mouth to answer, but no words emerged.
Because past them standing in the center of the battlefield was themselves.
Not the person Kael knew. This version was taller, cloaked in ethereal armor composed of light and shadow interwoven like threads. A burning sigil flared over their heart: half sun, half spiral. Their eyes were pools of cosmic storm.
They weren't human. Not anymore.
Aeris turned toward the spectral Kael. "Don't go back there," she said. "If you walk into the Vein again, you'll forget everything."
The Veinborn Kael didn't speak. They only closed their eyes, raised their hand, and willed the sky to tear.
The clouds opened. Not with light. But memory.
Kael present Kael screamed.
Reality shattered around them.
---
They awoke to the sound of their own breathing.
Sharp. Shallow.
Their back was pressed against cold stone, and Thorne's hand braced their shoulder.
"Kael," he said softly. "You're back."
They blinked rapidly, blinking away the image of themselves armored in warlight. Their throat was raw. Their hands trembled.
Aeris knelt beside them, studying them not like a priestess or witch but like a woman who'd seen a ghost.
"I remember nothing," Kael rasped. "But it felt true."
"It was," Aeris murmured. "Fragments of your past self, sealed away when you chose mortality. But the seal is fracturing. You are remembering not with your mind, but with your thread."
Kael sat upright slowly, the chill of Lunaryn Peaks slicing through their soaked clothing. The sky above the summit had turned pale silver, clouds drifting like parchment inked with prophecy. Wind brushed across them, carrying scents of starlight and burnt sage.
"You said I was Veinborn," Kael said. "What does that actually mean?"
Aeris rose, her eyes soft and calculating. "Follow me."
She led them down a narrow path veined with moonmetal roots, winding toward a cliffside hollow hidden beneath crystal arches. Inside, the world changed. The wind hushed. Sound flattened. Time bent.
The chamber pulsed like a beating heart.
A basin stood at the center circular, filled with mirror-smooth liquid not unlike mercury. Surrounding it, twelve stone thrones lay in ruin, symbols carved into each one worn smooth by centuries.
"This was once the Council of Threadbearers," Aeris said quietly. "The ones who first learned to see the Vein's weave. This basin is the Eye of Threads."
She gestured to the liquid.
"Gaze into it. Let it reflect you."
Kael approached slowly. The liquid didn't reflect their face. It reflected light. Twisting strands of energy violet, gold, scarlet, and midnight blue coiling around a central thread.
"Your soul is braided," Aeris whispered. "Born of mortal heart and divine will. You weren't just born from magic. You were designed for it. The gods didn't expect you to awaken. They thought they'd won when they buried your power in flesh."
Kael's voice came out rough. "Why would they be afraid of me?"
"Because you represent choice," Aeris said. "And the Vein is a river that remembers every choice that was ever almost made. You can touch those almosts. You can rewrite them."
Kael looked down at their hands. "That's why the other version of me… could command time, light, fate…"
Aeris nodded. "You ended a war by undoing it. And the cost was memory. Mortality. Isolation. You chose to fall asleep inside yourself, to preserve peace."
Thorne approached from the archway, arms crossed over his sea-steel armor. "And now peace is cracking apart again."
Kael turned to Aeris. "You said I was made. By who?"
Aeris hesitated.
Then the ground trembled.
It was subtle at first. A pulse. A warning. Then the sound followed like bones grinding against iron. Like footsteps echoing through a dying star.
Aeris froze.
"They found you."
"Who?" Kael asked.
"Remnants."
Before they could ask more, a shriek tore through the cavern.
They came through the mountain like smoke. Not through tunnels. Through walls. Shadowy, trembling bodies without true form just suggestion. Teeth. Jaws that split their heads sideways. Eyes that weren't eyes but pits of unraveling time.
Kael stumbled back. "What are they?!"
"Fragments of what was," Aeris snarled. "Dead timelines. Aborted destinies. They were drawn to the Vein's awakening."
Thorne pulled Kael behind him, sword gleaming. "Get ready."
The Remnants howled.
The basin cracked.
Kael reached for the Vein inside them and it answered. Power unfurled in their veins like fire and frost, their bones humming with light. Their pulse echoed like war drums.
The first Remnant lunged.
Kael raised their hand.
A wave of golden energy slammed into the creature, disintegrating it into ash and fractured music.
The others shrieked. Dozens now. Climbing down the walls. Crawling from the mirror-basin. Tearing reality with every movement.
"Stand behind me!" Thorne roared, sword swinging through a second Remnant.
Aeris lifted her hands. Time shattered around her, freezing three in place.
Kael moved on instinct. They summoned a barrier of light, hexagonal symbols pulsing around them. Every part of their body burned with motion, memory, magic.
The Vein sang.
Another Remnant split in half midair. Another exploded in a cascade of fragmented screams.
But they kept coming.
Endless.
Kael's shield faltered. Their knees gave.
Then the ground cracked beneath their feet.
Not from battle.
From something beneath.
Chains clanked.
Stone shattered.
A figure rose from the basin's heart, ripping through the cracked Eye like a phoenix through ice.
Massive. Winged. Chained.
His body was carved of shadow and ember. Wings like scorched iron curled behind him, tattered and half-broken. His face familiar. Terrible. Divine. Eyes like twin dying stars.
Kael froze.
"Riven."
He towered above them, power crackling in the air like a storm too long caged.
His voice was smoke.
"You called."
Behind him, other shapes stirred. Winged. Masked. Not human.
Aeris gasped. "Gods... he didn't come alone."