The Gate of Thorns
Cuco reached the edge of the forest just as dawn fractured the sky. But the light didn't reach this place. The trees here were ancient—twisted things with bark like armor and roots that curled like fingers in prayer or warning.
The whisper grew stronger.
> "Come closer.
This is where it begins."
He stepped into the clearing.
At the center stood an archway—not made of stone or metal, but living wood, woven from roots that pulsed with golden and black light. The Gate. The one the Tome had shown him in dreams. The one that was never supposed to open.
But it was open now.
Behind it: a void of green and gold mist, swirling like a memory unspoken.
Cuco approached slowly, the mark on his skin glowing, the Tome's power thrumming through his bones like a second heart.
> "You were never meant to be a weapon," the voice said.
"You are the seed. The hinge. The dream turned root."
Cuco reached out.
But before he could touch the Gate, a figure stepped from the mist.
Not Hollow.
Not Dreamer.
Echo.
Or something wearing him.
---
Back at the Circle, chaos reigned.
The walls were being consumed. The Dreamers who remained tried to flee, but the vines—now sharp, no longer gentle—lashed at them with intent. The Circle had become a chrysalis, a prison for what Echo was becoming.
Nox and Isabela stood at the last intact archway, warding symbols etched in blood and desperation between them.
"He's gone," Nox whispered. "That's not him anymore."
"We don't know that," Isabela hissed, her voice cracking. "We can't give up—not yet."
But her hope was slipping through her fingers.
And in the center of the Circle, Echo rose, limbs elongated by magic, his mouth split in a grin that didn't belong to him.
> "The Dreamers built their walls.
But roots grow through stone."
---
Cuco faced him across the Gate.
For a moment, he didn't move. His hand dropped to the hilt of the blade—but didn't draw it.
"I didn't want this for you," Cuco said. "You were the one who always believed we could hold the world together."
Echo tilted his head. The voice that came out was warped, a duet of the friend Cuco had known and the thing now speaking through him.
> "I still believe.
Just not in you."
The Gate pulsed, its light flaring as the magic between them thickened.
"I'm not your enemy, Echo."
"You're the reason the Hollow found me," the creature spat. "Your power—your blade—it called to them. And I answered."
Cuco's fingers tightened.
"If I have to stop you," he said, quietly, "I will."
---
In the Circle, the last ward fell.
And Echo—no longer Echo—vanished in a burst of green flame.
Isabela's breath caught in her throat. "He's gone."
"No," Nox said, turning toward the forest. "He's going to the Gate."
---
Cuco stood alone beneath the archway of thorns.
The Gate shimmered.
And from its depths, the Hollow's true form stirred.
Not a creature.
But a consciousness.
Old.
Hungry.
Waiting.
> "You've tasted what it is to be unbound," it whispered in a thousand threads of thought.
"You could root deeper than them all.
Join us.
Grow into something more."
Cuco stepped forward.
"I've seen what you grow," he said. "And I won't be your seed."
He drew the blade.
The forest shook.
And Echo stepped through the Gate.