Chapter 27. The Burned Seal

The moment Aria crossed the threshold of her dorm room, she felt it. The air was wrong—thicker, denser, laced with heat that seemed to rise from the floor itself. A faint tendril of smoke curled upward from the center of the wooden boards, marking the room’s silence with an almost reverent stillness.

She stepped forward, boots creaking softly beneath her weight, and the shape came into full view. It had been burned into the wood—not scratched or drawn, but scorched with precision, each jagged line and curve etched with a purpose far older than this school. The mark wasn’t just a symbol—it was a brand, a memory made physical.

Jules followed on quieter feet, stopping short as her eyes landed on the seal. “Don’t touch it,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper, as if volume alone might disturb the thing.

But Aria didn’t stop.

Something about the mark called to her—not with words, but with sensation, like a sound too low to hear but too deep to ignore. The p