"What a waste," his guards muttered. "She'll die for the ink she can't even understand."
Just as the Zerem turned away, a strange flutter broke the silence. A lone black butterfly landed gently on Layra's limp wrist.
Then it happened.
Zerem paused.
The air shifted.
It was subtle at first, like a warm breeze before a wildfire. An ancient breath. Thick weighted. Laced with something that numbed the lungs.
A bitter perfume laced in ancient dread, as through the desert itself exhaled its buried secrets. Its like rotting wood soaked in liquor and blood.
He stumbled, trying to keep his footing. Zerem's eyes narrowed. His breath shortened. He swayed slightly. Blinking as the world began to twist around him.
"Wh...what is this?"
His limbs felt foreign. His fingers loosening around the scroll. The ground beneath him seemed to pulse, not with movement, but with presence.
Drunkness washed over him– not of wine, but of horror. The sky grew heavier. The blood-hued clouds swirled as if whispering warnings to those below.
Each movement was delayed, as if the time had been stretched thin.
A low metallic ringing echoed through the the dunes– not from anywhere visible. Not temple bells. But something older. Hollow. Echoing from within the bones of the world.
The guards turned, searching for the source in confusion.
"What's this sound?!"
Then came the voice, hollow yet thunderous. A chime... no bells. Hundreds of them. Zerem's heart sank into his stomach. It not human at all.
"Everyone! Form the ranks! Something is–"
Before he could finish, one by one his man collapsed like puppets with their strings cut. No cry. No screams. Just unconsciousness.
Zerem's knees buckled. He collapsed, his face drenched in sweat, teeth gritted as a coldness swept into his bones. His chest heaved. His mind reeled. The world drenched in red light. His breath came in shallow gasps.
And then–
Footsteps.
Delibrate. Slow. Measured. Soft against the dust, yet they struck like war drums inside Zerem's skull.
He forced himself to raise his head.
A man cloaked in black approached like a ghost. His figure was blurred, as though shadows clung to him like a living veil. Zerem could not make out his face. All he saw were black boots, dusted with sand and blood.
Only the outline, tall and broad, with a presence that bent the air.
The figure said nothing. His presence darker than the void itself.
Zerem body screamed to run out of fear, but he could not move. The ghost's hand reached forward, gently, almost reverently, took the scroll without a word from Zerem's limp grasp.
As aoon as his fingers left the parchment, Zerem collapsed entirely.
- - -
"Commander! Commander Zerem! Wake up!"
Zerem's eyes snapped open. A young guard was kneeling beside him, slapping his cheeks gently.
"Are you alright?!"
He sat up abruptly, gasping. His entire body was trembling. Around him, the guards groaned as they slowly gained consciousness.
"The scroll... it's gone... as well as the girl..." Zerem muttered. "And that man in the black."
The scroll was gone.
Layra was gone.
The other soldiers, confused and shaken, were still stirring awake. They remembered nothing.
"Where is he?! The man in the black! That figure!" Zerem shouted.
The guards looked puzzled. "Sir... there was no one. Only you and that girl. We found you only, unconscious."
Zerem stared at his empty palm, the memory of the man's presence burning into him like a scar.
"A ghost...? A man...? What the hell was that..."
He stood up on wobby legs, brushing sand from his uniform. He waved off help, his pride too strong to allow support.
"We must return to the palace. Now!"
"Y-yes sir!"
As they began to march back, Zerem took one final glance at the spot where Layra had bled.
- - -
Back at the Royal Palace of Terra, General Ovrek stood upon the balcony with General Merix of Richha. The wind howled through the crimson sky. The palace halls trembled under the weight of unease.
Merix tilted his head, his eyes half-lidded. "The sky bleeds again... just like the Fourth One."
Ovrek crossed his arms, eyes locked on the scarlet heavens. "The snakes of the desert have bitten the sun again."
Merix chuckled softly. "Such poetry from a soldier. But you mean something else."
"You know what I mean," Ovrek replied sharply. "And I won't let 'that thing' return again."
"We'll see about that," Merix said, his voice touched with venom and mirth.
A servant suddenly burst in, breathless. He dropped to his knees.
"All hail to the Majesty! King Veylor summons both his generals to the Hall. Urgently."
Ovrek and Merix exchanged a sharp glance. Silence hung between them. Merix straightened his coat.
"Looks like the fate has moved ahead of schedule. We are being called into judgement."
"Or into war," Ovrek muttered, his tone unreadable.
Merix glanced upward. "Do you think they knew this day would come?"
Ovrek did not respond this time.
The two commanders turned toward the stone corridor that led to the king's chamber, the sky behind them glowing darker with every breath. There were no clouds in the sky. Only blood red light.
And a silence... too heavy to be natural.
On the top of the palace, a black butterfly landed on a window sill, twitching its wings. Its eyes glowed faintly. Watching. Waiting.
In-front of it, the shadow of a man disappeared into the corridor– the sacred scroll tucked beneath his cloak.
And in the depths of the woods, beneath the shadow of the broken trees and and roots, Layra still breathed. Just barely.
The scroll had been saved, or stolen?
Either way, a new storm is coming.
The eclipse had begun.