Chapter 86. A Daughter of Selune

I didn’t intend to walk alone, but night makes liars of plans. The path under the cliff was a ribbon of old stone holding fast to the mountain’s shoulder. Veilgrove slept above me, lanterns dulled under rain, the world gone soft at the edges. My breath ghosted. My fingers ached—a moonfire toll that lingered too long.

“Thessia.”

The voice didn’t come from behind or ahead. It came like a current through bone.

I turned into the grove without thinking. Moonroot trees leaned, their pale trunks shedding a faint luminescence, leaves the shape of sickles. In the center: the basin where the first Seers took oaths they couldn’t survive. The surface held a skin of light like breath held too long.

She stood on it.

Not the Goddess.

The woman whose shadow has always lived at the corner of my life. High cheekbones, eyes like night water, hair braided with thin moonwire that chimed when she moved. The scent of smoke and winter on her. Not a dream. Not a vision.