Chapter 6: The Cathedral of Ash
1247 Words
Sleep did not come easily.
Long after her conversation with Joshua had ended, Maria remained awake.
The journal lay open on the dining table.
Rain continued falling outside.
Thunder rolled occasionally across the distant sky.
Every few minutes, Maria found herself rereading the same sentence written in Miss Reyes's journal.
The Forgotten are returning faster than before.
The words refused to leave her mind.
Eventually, exhaustion won.
Sometime after midnight, she closed the journal, turned off the lights, and made her way to bed.
Yet even as she drifted toward sleep, she couldn't shake the feeling that something was waiting for her on the other side of her dreams.
Something patient.
Something ancient.
Something that already knew her name.
The cathedral stood beneath a sky of ash.
Maria knew immediately that she was dreaming.
The air felt wrong.
The sky was neither day nor night.
Gray clouds stretched endlessly overhead, unmoving and silent.
Ash drifted downward like snow.
It covered the massive stone steps.
It gathered between the cracks in the ancient floor.
It swirled around towering pillars that vanished into darkness far above.
The cathedral was larger than she remembered.
Much larger.
The first time she had seen it, she had been too frightened to notice details.
Now she could.
The stained-glass windows were broken.
Massive cracks ran across the stone walls.
Entire sections of the ceiling appeared damaged, as though something enormous had struck the structure centuries ago.
The symbol appeared everywhere.
Circles.
Seven lines.
One broken.
Carved into pillars.
Etched into doors.
Embedded within the shattered floor itself.
Maria slowly walked forward.
Her footsteps echoed through the vast emptiness.
The sound seemed unnaturally loud.
The cathedral felt abandoned.
Yet she couldn't shake the feeling that unseen eyes followed her every movement.
Watching.
Waiting.
The farther she walked, the colder the air became.
Ash continued drifting from above.
Silent.
Endless.
Like the remains of a fire that had never stopped burning.
Then she saw the altar.
And standing before it—
The shadow.
Maria stopped.
A chill raced through her body.
The figure was exactly as she remembered.
Tall.
Dark.
Distorted.
Its shape shifted constantly, as though reality struggled to contain it.
The edges of its form blurred and twisted.
At times, it almost looked human.
At others, it resembled something far older.
Far less familiar.
Far more frightening.
Yet this time, it wasn't hiding.
It was waiting.
Waiting for her.
The shadow slowly lifted its head.
Maria couldn't see a face.
Only darkness.
Endless darkness.
Then it spoke.
"Maria Santos."
Her breath caught.
The voice echoed through the cathedral.
Deep.
Ancient.
Neither male nor female.
The sound seemed to come from everywhere at once.
"You know my name."
The shadow remained still.
"We have always known your name."
A tremor ran through her.
The words felt wrong.
As if they carried a meaning she wasn't supposed to understand.
Maria swallowed.
"What are you?"
The shadow ignored the question.
Instead, it took a slow step forward.
Ash swirled around its feet.
"You should stop searching."
The warning echoed through the cathedral.
Stop searching.
Stop searching.
Stop searching.
Maria's fear returned immediately.
Not because of what the shadow said.
Because of how certain it sounded.
As though it already knew what would happen if she continued.
The journal.
Ethan.
Miss Reyes.
The Fractures.
The shadow knew everything.
"You know about Ethan."
The figure remained silent.
"You know about the journal."
Still silence.
Maria felt frustration rising beneath her fear.
For days, she had been chasing mysteries.
Finding clues.
Asking questions.
Every answer only led to more confusion.
Now, for the first time, she stood before something that might actually know the truth.
And she refused to waste the opportunity.
"What are the Fractures?" she demanded.
The cathedral became silent.
Even the drifting ash seemed to pause.
The shadow stood motionless.
For a moment, Maria wondered if it would answer at all.
Then the figure spoke.
One word.
"Scars."
The response echoed endlessly through the cathedral.
Scars.
Scars.
Scars.
Maria frowned.
"What does that mean?"
The shadow slowly raised one hand.
Darkness gathered around its fingers.
The air began to tremble.
"The world remembers wounds."
Maria stared.
"I don't understand."
"No."
The shadow's voice softened slightly.
"Not yet."
Before she could ask another question, the floor beneath her feet cracked.
A sharp sound echoed through the cathedral.
Then another.
The cracks spread rapidly across the stone.
Ash exploded upward.
The walls began to shake.
Maria stumbled backward.
"What is happening?"
The shadow looked upward.
For the first time, uncertainty entered its voice.
"They are waking."
The cathedral trembled violently.
Massive chunks of stone broke free from the ceiling.
One crashed onto the floor only a few feet away.
The impact shook the entire structure.
Maria looked around wildly.
The cathedral was collapsing.
The cracks raced across the walls.
Across the pillars.
Across reality itself.
The symbol of the Fractures began glowing throughout the cathedral.
Hundreds of them.
Thousands.
Every circle.
Every broken line.
Burning with pale silver light.
The shadow turned toward her.
For the first time, urgency entered its voice.
"Leave."
"What?"
"Wake up."
Another section of the ceiling collapsed.
Ash filled the air.
The cathedral groaned.
The sound reminded Maria of something dying.
"Wake up!"
The shadow's voice thundered through the structure.
The floor vanished beneath her feet.
Maria fell.
Darkness swallowed everything.
And then—
She opened her eyes.
Maria bolted upright in bed.
Her heart hammered against her ribs.
The room was dark.
Silent.
Safe.
At least it should have been.
She pressed a hand against her chest and tried to steady her breathing.
Just a dream.
A strange dream.
Nothing more.
Yet the memory felt painfully vivid.
The ash.
The cathedral.
The shadow.
The word.
Scars.
The answer lingered in her mind.
What kind of scars?
Whose scars?
The world's?
Reality's?
She glanced toward the clock.
4:17 AM.
Too early.
Too quiet.
Too dark.
Maria rubbed her eyes.
Then froze.
Something sat on her bedside table.
A small dark object.
She frowned.
It hadn't been there when she went to sleep.
Slowly, she reached for the lamp.
The light flicked on.
The object remained.
Maria's stomach dropped.
A feather.
Black.
Perfectly black.
Not dark gray.
Not brown.
Black.
The feather lay motionless beside the lamp.
Its surface reflected faint traces of silver when the light touched it.
Maria stared.
Her mind raced.
She lived alone.
No open windows.
No pets.
No explanation.
The feather should not have been there.
Yet it was.
Her hand trembled as she picked it up.
The feather felt surprisingly cold.
A chill immediately traveled through her fingers.
Maria's breath caught.
Because suddenly she remembered something.
A drawing.
One of Jake's drawings.
Not recent.
Several weeks ago.
A creature standing on the edge of a cliff beneath a storm-filled sky.
Massive wings spread behind it.
Black wings.
Every feather is drawn in extraordinary detail.
Jake had spent days working on that sketch.
She remembered complimenting him on it.
Remembered how proud he had been.
And now she held one of those feathers in her hand.
An impossible feather.
A feather that matched the wings of a creature that existed only in a drawing.
Or perhaps...
Not only in a drawing.
Outside, thunder rolled across the sleeping city.
Maria stared at the feather.
And for the first time since this nightmare had begun, she wondered if the things in Jake's sketchbook weren't being imagined.
Maybe they were being remembered.
- Writer
