The Binding Sanctum lay beneath the ruined city of Solvane, carved from obsidian and salt-bone. The walls pulsed with living veins, filled not with blood, but memory. Every drop stored a secret. Every vessel a vow.
High Priestess Vesh knelt before the altar of veins, her hands slick with crimson ink. The ink was blood. The words she wrote were a ritual. The truth she scribed was forbidden.
She spoke softly, each word a blade.
"The First Vein has awakened."
Around her, twelve masked figures stood in silence. Their robes marked them as Bloodbinders—servants of control, wielders of the Law of Containment. They did not chant. They did not move. But the air around them thrummed with pressure.
One stepped forward.
"High Priestess. A name?"
Vesh looked up, her eyes gleaming silver in the torchlight.
"Rael of Hollowmere."
The name lingered like ash.
A second Binder stepped forward.
"His status?"
Vesh dipped her fingers into the bowl of blood beside her.
"Flicker Vein no longer. He touched the Cradle."
Murmurs broke the silence. One Binder removed their mask. Underneath, their skin was cracked with glyphs.
"That is impossible. The Cradle is sealed."
"It opened for him," Vesh replied. "He did not enter it. It answered him."
A cold wind blew through the chamber. The glyphs on the walls began to glow.
Vesh stood slowly.
"If he survives the Veinscarred trials, he may reach Bloodforged. If he remembers the echoes, he may become more."
The Binder with the cracked face stepped back.
"We cannot allow that."
"No," Vesh said. "We cannot."
Another voice spoke from the shadows. Low. Dry.
"Then what is your will?"
Vesh turned toward the sound. An ancient figure sat on a throne made of petrified hearts. His skin was ashen. His veins moved beneath the surface like worms.
"I give you leave," Vesh said.
"Bring the boy to the Sanctum. Bound or broken."
The ancient man's mouth cracked into a grin.
"And if he resists?"
Vesh did not blink.
"Then bleed him. And bind what remains."