CHAPTER 172: WAITING FOR TONIGHT.

Liora’s breath caught mid-thought, her spine locking as the temperature around her seemed to drop several degrees. The creature stood motionless just beyond the flickering torchlight, its stitched mouth twitching, hollow eyes glowing faintly like the last embers in a dying fire. It didn’t charge, nor did it growl, but its stillness was worse, unnatural. Wrong. It stared at her not with animalistic rage, but with the terrifying patience of something ancient. As if it had been waiting. For her.

Lucien instinctively moved forward, his body shielding hers. His sword hovered inches above the ground, angled with silent promise. "Don’t move," he murmured lowly, almost to himself, his jaw clenched tight. The dim light danced on his blade and the sweat gathering at his temple.

The silence stretched taut, and just as Liora began to question if this was some hallucination, some trick of the darkness, the creature’s arm began to lift. Its movements were jagged and deliberate, the sound of its joints crackling like dry branches snapping underfoot. It didn’t reach for them. Instead, it pointed directly at her.

Her.

Liora’s stomach turned. Her heart beat faster, not from fear, but from the chilling recognition that this wasn’t random. This creature knew her. Somehow. It had found her deep beneath a palace built on secrets. Why?

Then the sound came. A grotesque tearing as the black thread sealing its lips frayed and snapped, one by one. The tension in the room thickened until it was nearly suffocating. And then, barely louder than a breath, it spoke.

"Miral."

Liora’s entire body locked up. Her vision tunneled. It wasn’t just the word—it was the weight behind it. Her family name. One she hadn’t heard uttered in years, not since she was cast aside like she was nothing. Not many outside her disgraced household even remembered it. She hadn’t spoken it aloud in so long that it no longer felt like hers. And yet, this creature, this... thing, knew it. Remembered it.

Lucien shifted, his arm instinctively outstretched as if trying to shield her from that name, from its implications. "How do you know that name?" He barked, his voice more commanding now, blade raised.

The creature didn’t answer. Instead, from the veil of shadow behind it, another figure emerged. Cloaked in black so deep it drank the light, this new presence was taller, more composed, and eerie in an entirely different way. Unlike the monstrous figure, this one moved with grace, with eerie poise. Its steps made no sound. It came forward, knelt beside the now-wavering creature, and gently placed a hand on its shoulder. It whispered something in a forgotten tongue, lyrical and sharp. The creature’s shoulders slumped with a sigh, if a corpse could sigh, and then it crumbled, its skin and bones giving way like brittle parchment. No fire. No scream. Just silence and dust, disintegrating as if its purpose had ended.

Liora’s hand reached out involuntarily, but Lucien caught it mid-air. "Don’t," he warned in a low tone that vibrated with unease. His eyes never left the cloaked figure.

The new figure stood slowly and elegantly and finally lifted its head in their direction. The veil obscured their face, but the presence they exuded was unmistakable, powerful, deliberate, and watching. Without a single word, they raised a hand and traced a symbol in the air, one that shimmered briefly in gold light. A crescent entwined with a thorn. Liora’s heart thudded again. She knew that symbol, though she couldn’t remember from where. It lingered for a breath... then vanished.

The torches flared back to life.

The tunnel was still again.

But nothing felt the same.

Lucien lowered his sword slowly. "That wasn’t just a warning," he said, eyes on the empty space where the cloaked figure had stood. "That was a message."

Liora’s fingers brushed over her forearm, where her gooseflesh had not yet subsided. "They called me by my name," she whispered. "My real name."

Lucien looked at her, the storm in his eyes unspoken but clear. Someone out there knew her past. And they weren’t just watching.

They were calling her home.

The torches along the corridor flared back to life, their sudden light pushing away the suffocating darkness that had consumed them moments ago. But the warmth they offered felt hollow now. Liora’s eyes remained fixed on the spot where the creature had vanished—where ashes still floated in the air like sorrowful snow. Her heartbeat hadn’t slowed. Her hand trembled at her side, and when she reached up to brush hair from her face, she realized she was sweating, her skin cold.

Lucien didn’t move right away. His gaze remained on the symbol that had hung briefly in the air before disappearing. "That mark," he murmured, more to himself than to her. "It’s not from any magic we study in the court." His voice held both awe and a tension she hadn’t heard before.

"It said my name," Liora whispered, still trying to process it. "Miral. How could it know?"

Lucien turned to her then, and his expression, usually unreadable, carried a shadow of worry now. He didn’t like surprises, not ones that left more questions than answers. "Someone’s watching you," he said quietly. "Not just us. Not just the palace. Someone older. Someone... deeper."

Liora swallowed hard, her voice hoarse. "Do you think it was one of your brother’s tricks?"

"No," Lucien said immediately, without hesitation. "Alden wouldn’t dare toy with this kind of force. This is older than him, older than me, than this kingdom."

A moment passed, thick and unspoken.

"Then what was it?" she asked, voice wavering.

Lucien glanced down the hallway, as if expecting the shadows to answer. "I don’t know. But it knew you. And that changes everything."

He took her hand without asking, a rare gesture of comfort. His grip was firm, warm, and grounding. "We need to get out of this wing," he added, looking around warily. "Now."

But as they turned to leave, neither of them noticed the faint glimmer pulsing on the stone floor behind them, the mark traced in the air now etched subtly into the ground, glowing like an ember waiting to reignite.

And far beyond the palace walls, in a place untouched by time, a figure cloaked in dust and forgotten power opened a book bound in blood. On the first page was a single name.

Liora Miral.

And beside it, a date that had not yet come to pass.

The silence in the eastern wing deepened as Liora and Lucien left it behind, their footsteps echoing like whispered secrets on the marble floor. The weight of what had just transpired clung to her shoulders like a shroud. Though Lucien led with his usual composed demeanor, Liora could sense the stiffness in his grip and the subtle increase in his pace. He was worried, more than he let on.

When they returned to Lucien’s chambers, the guards at the door stood stiffly, their eyes flickering with unease. They must have felt the disturbance too. Magic that ancient didn’t slip through the walls unnoticed.

Inside, the room was still dim. Lucien didn’t light the lamps. He walked straight to the fireplace and threw in a log, igniting it with a flick of his fingers, an old spell, one she’d seen him use countless times, but tonight it felt colder, sharper. The flame danced unnaturally blue before settling into a normal hue.

Liora stood by the door, arms wrapped around herself, her body still trembling. "That creature," she finally said, "it said something about my soul being chosen... that I would remember eventually."

Lucien turned, his gaze hard. "And that’s exactly what terrifies me."

She blinked. "Why?"

"Because whatever that thing was, it wasn’t bound by our laws. It wasn’t conjured. It appeared on its own. Which means... either it’s been watching you for a very long time..." He paused, eyes narrowing. "Or it was waiting for tonight."

A shiver crawled down her spine.

"I need to speak with someone," he said after a moment, striding to his desk and retrieving a sealed scroll hidden in a false bottom drawer. "Someone who’s been exiled for knowing too much."

"You’re leaving?" Her voice cracked slightly.

Lucien’s gaze softened, just barely. "Only for a few hours. I’ll leave Rowan here. You’ll be safe."

But Liora wasn’t convinced. "What if it comes back?"

He stepped forward, placing a hand on her cheek. "It won’t. Not yet." His voice was quiet. "You heard it too...it was a warning. And a beginning."

She nodded slowly, though dread coiled tighter inside her.

Lucien straightened. "Lock the doors. Trust no one except Rowan." Then he added, more softly, "And whatever happens, don’t touch that mark if it reappears."

Before she could ask more, he was already gone, his cloak trailing behind him like a shadow severed from the man.

And Liora stood alone in a palace that had never felt more foreign, more haunted.

Behind her, in the silence, the air trembled faintly...just once...like a breath being drawn in the walls.

Something was awakening.