Chapter 19: The Hollow Reflection
Aria stood motionless in the clearing, staring at Rael’s petrified form. The silence was unbearable—thick and suffocating. Every tree around her creaked as though whispering a warning, yet she couldn't move.
The voice from the obsidian shard had faded, but its words clung to her skin like frost.
You can’t stop what’s coming, Flame Queen.
Her hand hovered above the Crown of Bone. The air around it was colder than the Vale itself. Something about it vibrated in tune with the ember burning in her chest, as if both were fragments of the same whole—broken in two across centuries.
But she wouldn’t touch it. Not yet.
“I won’t trade my soul for answers,” she whispered to herself, turning away. “Not unless I have to.”
She dropped to her knees beside Rael aga
