Rain whispered against the window, soft and steady like a lullaby for the grieving. Outside, dusk settled over the street, casting long shadows that crawled across the living room floor.
Elias Mori sat curled on the corner of the couch, wrapped in a worn gray hoodie that still smelled faintly of home, cinnamon, lavender, and his wife's shampoo.
His fingers, thin and trembling, gripped the edges of the book resting on his knees.
CovenantofAshes.
The cover was creased, the spine warped from the way he had devoured every chapter in stolen midnight hours.
Now, only a dozen pages remained, but he couldn't finish it.
"Not yet."
The laughter from the kitchen was too beautiful to leave behind.
His wife was humming. A half familiar tune, probably something from a lullaby. Their daughter giggled as she stirred the bowl, trying to sneak sugar while her mother pretended not to see. The smell of baked apples drifted in like a memory.
It was warm here.
Like a nostalgic memory from childhood.
But Elias felt miles away, his body in one place and his aching heart in another. The ache had nothing to do with them, not with his family, but with himself. It had been growing for years, like rot beneath painted wood.
He had a home.
He had love.
But some part of him had always been reaching, as if he were a man standing in the wrong life, wearing the wrong skin.
He opened the book.
His thumb brushed the dog-eared page where he'd paused last night. He would stare at the name Reilan Ardyn.
Reilan Ardyn is the main character of Covenant of Ashes.
The boy with a broken oath and too much to prove.
The one who sacrificed everything.
Elias had cried for Reilan once.
Not for the pain, but the purpose.
Reilan's suffering meant something.
Elias's didn't.
He turned the page.
"Just one more line won't hurt."
He would mutter under his breath.
"Thebloods of the namelessfeedsthenamesthathistoryremembers."
His hands began to shake.
And the ink… the ink started to move.
At first, he thought it was the tears that blurred the words. But the letters bled like open wounds. The page warped, the paper pulsed like skin.
The room twisted.
The smell of apples vanished.
A sharp noise behind him, his daughter calling his name.
But it was too far.
Too far now.
The book dropped from his hands.
And the world
broke.