The rain had been falling for hours, soft and relentless, soaking the Whisperers' training yard until it gleamed like black glass beneath the stormlight. Kael stood at the edge of the sparring circle, cloak clinging to his frame, his boots sunk half an inch into the churned earth. Across from him stood two recruits—Soren and Deln—both seasoned enough to bear smug confidence on their faces.
"Three-on-one again?" Kael asked, voice dry.
"No," said the third, stepping forward from the shadows. "Four."
It was Riven.
Kael barely knew him beyond reputation. Riven was older, quicker, scar-slicked from a past he never shared. And his eyes bore that whisper-born gleam—shadow-touched but not like Kael. Not bonded. Not haunted.
A fourth-on-one session wasn't protocol. Not anymore. Not since Bran had left for the southern perimeter mission two days ago and the instructor's watch grew loose. But no one had stopped this match. No one had even questioned it.
"Let's see if the Veilbound prince bleeds like the rest of us," Soren muttered.
The jeer stirred something sharp in Kael. His jaw clenched. He'd held back in training. Always. A shard of caution, of fear perhaps, constantly reminded him that the darkness inside him—whatever made him different—could unmake more than just his enemies.
But today… there was no Bran to pull him aside. No Eline to cast a sideways glance that meant don't. She'd stopped looking entirely.
"Begin," said Ser Whitmer from the far side of the circle, his tone unreadable.
They came fast.
Kael dropped low, shifting between Deln's thrust and Riven's sweep. He caught the hilt of Soren's blade with his bracer, twisted, and drove an elbow into the boy's ribs. Pain flared in Kael's shoulder where Deln's blade skimmed past, but he pivoted, grabbed Soren by the collar, and flung him out of the circle.
Two seconds. One down.
Deln cursed and surged again, but Kael moved with instinct now—his shadow whispering a half-beat ahead of every strike. It wrapped around him subtly, sliding along his boot, darkening his stance, predicting his foes. He ducked under Deln's blade, struck with the back of his gauntlet—hard—and Deln crumpled.
He shouldn't have dropped that fast.
Kael exhaled, flexing his fingers. Just bruised. Probably.
Riven smiled, slow and hungry.
"Not bad," he said, circling. "But you're not hiding it anymore. You feel it, don't you? The hunger. You think the Veil whispers for nothing?"
Kael stared. "What do you know of it?"
Riven laughed and lunged.
They clashed, blades hissing through mist, steel biting against steel. Riven was fast, brutal—fighting with a mix of blade and whispercraft. Shadow stepped from his arms in tight coils, meant to confuse Kael's perception. But Kael had lived in the dark longer.
He countered, swayed, struck—once, twice, nearly drove his knee into Riven's gut—
Until Riven whispered something under his breath: "She's afraid of you, Kael."
Everything stopped.
Eline.
Kael's blow halted a breath from Riven's face, his fingers curled tight with power that pulsed at the edge of release. The tendrils of Tenebris stirred around him, expectant.
Riven stared into Kael's eyes and said, "If you don't let go of it, you'll never leave this place."
Kael's fist trembled. Every instinct screamed to let loose—to show them what power lived in his blood, in his bones, in the very air around him.
Instead, he dropped his arm.
The crowd watching—silent till now—exhaled in a confused wave.
Riven stepped back, expression unreadable. "You've got more control than I thought," he murmured. "Or more fear."
Kael didn't respond.
Ser Whitmer motioned for the match to end, but his eyes stayed on Kael, narrowed.
Kael left the circle without a word, his breath tight, fists clenched at his sides. Rain hid the sweat on his brow but not the fire in his veins.
As he passed by the outer ring of recruits, his gaze caught on a familiar shape half-silhouetted under the awning beyond the yard. Eline.
She didn't speak. She didn't nod.
She simply turned and walked away.
Kael froze.
Something in him hollowed out just a little more.
⋅•⋅
The corridor outside the dormitories was quieter that night. The rain had eased to a faint mist, and torches crackled low in their sconces. Kael moved through the hall without purpose until he found himself standing before Bran's door.
Still sealed. Still empty.
"Gone again," he muttered. Bran hadn't sent word. No one had. Even Ser Whitmer had dodged the question when Kael had asked.
Inside his own quarters, Kael tossed his soaked cloak across the chair and sat on the edge of the bed. His breath still hadn't evened out.
Riven's words returned—sharp-edged and calculated. "She's afraid of you."
He leaned back and closed his eyes.
And then the dream returned.
Not the kind bred of shadow or relic.
No, this one was simpler.
He stood at the foot of a stairwell, the hall painted in golden torchlight. Eline stood at the top, her expression unreadable, hair tousled from sleep. That same night—the one that kept returning—when she had come to his door but hadn't spoken. Hadn't entered. Hadn't said why.
But the memory warped.
Suddenly, she spoke.
"I wanted to stop you."
"From what?" he asked.
"Becoming what you're meant to be."
And then her eyes turned dark—not shadowed by night or sorrow, but veiled, as if the Duskveil itself coiled behind her gaze. And she wept.
Kael bolted upright in the dark, heart pounding, sweat beading at his temples.
But he wasn't alone.
The whisper was back.
Soft, a single syllable of his name… spoken from nowhere and everywhere at once.
"Kael…"
He turned toward the window. Nothing. Only the night.
Until the coin shimmered faintly where he'd left it on the table. Not with light. With presence.
He picked it up slowly. The surface was cool, etched with a symbol he didn't know—a crescent threaded with jagged marks that looked almost like veins or vines.
As he turned it over, a rush of shadow brushed against his thoughts—not malevolent, but familiar. Like being watched by something older than memory.
His breath caught.
A flicker of something moved inside him, not quite a voice, not quite thought:
He who bears the blood, shall choose the veil.
The coin flashed once—and then went still.
Kael sat motionless, the weight of that phrase lingering in the silence.
He had been taught to fear the legacy of the Veilbound, warned against chasing echoes.
But he wasn't chasing.
They were coming to him.
And perhaps they always had been.
⋅•⋅
Outside, Eline stood by the training circle, watching the mist curl low across the field. Her arms were folded tight, her hair wet, her brow furrowed in a storm of thoughts.
When Kael had held back today—when he could have broken Riven and hadn't—something inside her cracked.
Not because he had mercy.
But because she'd felt the moment it nearly vanished.
And what lived beneath it.
Just like the old texts whispered.
Just like her mentors had warned.
He doesn't know yet.
But soon, he would.
And she would have to decide—sooner than either of them wanted—whether to stand with him…
Or stop him.