Thalyn remained on the ancient throne as it returned to its upright state, her breath shallow from the weight of her experience.
Across the chamber, Korr and Elara leaned over a strange artifact, their voices like sharp blades cutting through the quiet. Korr, in his worn suit, turned the device over in his hands, his beady eyes bright with an almost feverish intensity. “It’s a scanner,” he muttered, running his thumb along its edges, a scavenger with a prize. “It diagnoses something, but what?”
Elara watched him with a slight smile, her face a mask of calm, fingers tapping lightly against her thigh. “We’ll figure it out,” she said softly.
He stood crouched over the half-lit scanner as it whined softly in the quiet. He didn’t look up as Thalyn approached, but the moment he registered her shadow, his face snapped up, sharp and expectant.
“Thalyn, let me try this on you,” he said, holding the device out.
She hesitated, eyeing the dark screen, then nodded. “Go ahead,” she said, forcing her voice to remain steady.
A pale line swept her form, crawling upward in slow increments. The scanner clicked twice.
“Something’s different.” Korr’s brow furrowed, his focus narrowing to a point as his eyes locked on the shifting glyphs. “Your scan… it’s not like ours.” He turned slightly, muttering to himself as he adjusted the device, his mind fully engaged in the puzzle.
Thalyn took a half-step back, letting her eyes drift. Something in the air had shifted.
A hiss broke the silence.
Stone shuddered behind them, followed by the slow exhale of pressure equalizing. The sealed door at the rear of the chamber peeled open. Dust spiraled in the threshold light, backlit by flickering glyphs. The sentinel droid, silent since their brush with the guardian, stood framed in the passage.
Now it moved, head tilted, optics flaring.
“You are welcome to remain, mistress. For as long as you choose.” Its voice was even, almost reverent.
Then, without ceremony, it turned and strode into the dark corridor beyond. The door whispered shut behind it.
For a stunned moment, no one spoke. Somewhere deep in the ruin, machinery sighed and went still. Korr swallowed, looking at Thalyn as if seeing her for the first time. Whatever invisible line they’d just crossed, it wasn’t one they could step back over.
Heavy footsteps hammered on stone.
Jaxon burst into the chamber, mask dangling from one hand. In his other, still caked in rock dust, he gripped the drill like a club. He swept the room in a fluid motion, eyes hunting for a target.
“What happened, Elara? Why the call?”
She pointed toward the closed door. “The droid. It opened the passage... and spoke to her.”
Hurst stalked forward, boots grinding on grit, and peered at the closed doorway, eyes narrowing at the darkness beyond the viewport.
His gaze snapped to Thalyn. “Spoke to you?”
She shrugged. “It called me 'mistress'. Said we are welcome to stay.”
Hurst’s jaw worked. He stared at the door for a long, tense moment, waiting for the shadows to shift. When they didn't, he let out a harsh, ragged breath and finally lowered the drill.
“Korr, rig a proximity alarm on that threshold,” Hurst barked, his voice rough. “If anything breathes on the other side of that wall, I want to know about it.” He rubbed a dirt-stained hand over his face, the adrenaline crash hitting him visibly. “I've been chewing through solid granite since dawn. If we aren't under immediate attack, I am getting some sleep.”
He dropped his gear with a heavy clatter, gave Thalyn one last, unreadable look, and slipped behind the curtain into the makeshift washroom.
Korr watched him go, the scanner slack in his hand. “Maybe the scan triggered it.”
“It didn’t move until you pointed that thing at her,” Elara said. “Maybe it recognized something in her.”
Thalyn shook her head. “Doesn’t matter. It happened.” Her jaw set. “I’m fine.”
“Sure you are,” Korr said.
She stepped toward the throne. “Arvie told me about Echo’s physiology… it isn't normal. The regeneration, the way his lungs filter out the fog, he’s a biological anomaly.”
Korr scowled. “So, what, he’s a custom job?”
“Looks that way.” Thalyn shrugged. “Arvie’s database has zero genetic matches for his race, and there’s a diary running in his head, recording everything since waking up.” Her lips twitched. “Like me now.”
She looked at Elara, her green eyes shadowing. “When I was him… I saw his reflection. He looked... engineered. Perfect. Hair like spun silver.” She paused. “His face was sharp, calculating. His skin had this faint glow. But his eyes… green like mine, but deeper, like they didn't miss a single shadow.”
Korr went still for a moment, blinking hard like he'd lost the thread, then his head snapped up. “I might've heard of a race like that,” he said. “Tall. Ethereal. The old stories call them Druvvak, near-mythical, treated like the divines. Barely more than a rumor, even in the records.”
Elara’s violet lips curled. “A race so rare and treasured like the divines. There’s a kind of poetry to that.”
Korr’s eyes flickered between them. “If Echo was a Druvvak... then the stakes just changed. Why was a myth wandering the ruins?”
Thalyn felt the chill slide beneath her skin. She turned and looked again at the throne, its metal frame still gleaming with an otherworldly light.
“Only one way to find out,” she said.
She stepped forward and eased herself into the throne’s embrace, feeling its ancient, cold touch spread across her back. The crown hovered nearby, waiting. With a deep breath, she reached up and set it on her head, the heavy metal pressing perfectly into her temples.
As the chamber dissolved into darkness, Arvie’s teasing voice slipped into her thoughts. “Be ready milady,” it whispered, a laugh lingering at the edges. “To be captured, interrogated, and abducted.”
Thalyn closed her eyes as the world fell away, the present slipping like water through her fingers. The pull of the past tightened, coming alive again. With a final breath, she let herself go.559Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkI7WW0WvKi
and then Add to home screen.