Smoke curled in thin fingers from the broken altar, and with it, silence—too complete, too wrong.
Elian stood slowly, dust and ash clinging to his skin, chest still heaving from the effort. Vlad limped toward him, his blade bloodied, his expression unreadable.
But Luka didn't move.
He was staring at the far wall of the crypt—where the stone had begun to crack.
"What now?" Elian whispered.
Luka didn't answer. Instead, he stepped toward the fracture.
Behind the stone, something moved.
The wall split with a groan, revealing not earth, not bone, but a hollow void—a chamber older than the crypt, lined with twisted carvings and black moss pulsing like a heartbeat. In its center stood a cradle.
Inside: a body.
Small. Withered. Bound in red silk.
Elian felt the air change. Heavy. Electric.
Vlad spoke low. "What… is that?"
Luka's voice shook. "The firstborn."
"What do you mean?" Elian asked. "I'm the seventh—"
"There was an eighth," Luka said. "Before all of you. Born of ritual. Buried alive to start the chain. His soul never passed on… only fed the curse."
The body in the cradle moved.
Its eyes snapped open—milky white, ancient and knowing.
"Then why awaken now?" Vlad hissed, stepping back.
Elian stared at the thing—this ancient being, not quite dead, not quite alive.
And it smiled.
Because the seal was broken. Because seven sons had bled. And the Hollow Child had waited.
Not for their deaths.
For his return.
—