NORA POV
The ground remembered death.
I felt it the moment we stepped into the Vale of Broken Ties.
The air was thick with old pain—echoes of betrayal so strong they clung to my skin like frost. No birds. No wind. Just silence.
“This is where the Blood Rebellion ended,” Reya said, her voice hushed.
I nodded. I already knew.
The soil here was still red. Not just from bloodshed, but from the rituals that followed.
Blood oaths. Vows that couldn’t be broken without consequence.
And the Heretic had hidden the next part of his journal in the heart of it.
Of course he had.
REYA POV
The trees whispered.
That was my first warning.
No birds. No beasts. No signs of life. But the wind made the branches creak like old bones. And the ground cracked under our feet as though it remembered e
