Aurora stood before the Council of Seven in a chamber carved from moonstone and memory.
The walls were alive with light — no torches, no flame, only the gentle thrum of old magic seeping through the stone. At the center of the room was the Sigil Platform, a slab of white-veined obsidian etched with dozens of house crests.
All of them pulsed faintly.
Except one.
A blank circle carved into the center, untouched, unclaimed.
Waiting.
"State your name for the record," a voice said.
Aurora stood straighter. "Aurora Lane."
"No." The speaker — an old man with twisted horns of white bone crowning his temples — leaned forward. "Your true name."
Aurora hesitated.
She glanced toward Atlas, who stood on the outer ring of the chamber in formal robes, eyes locked on hers.
Then she looked to Ethan.
He was still.
Still, but burning.
She inhaled.
"Aurora Aestrael."
The runes on the floor flared instantly.
Magic rushed through the chamber like a wave.
The old man nodded grimly. "So it's true."
The ritual was ancient — older than any house still standing.
Sigilbinding was meant to force a reaction. To assign a magical identity when one could not be found. It had been used only once in the last hundred years. It often broke the subject's mind.
Aurora stepped onto the platform.
The air shifted.
The crests on the floor spun around her, sigils rising into the air, each glowing with the color of their bloodlines.
None of them responded to her touch.
Not flame. Not mirror. Not night. Not root.
They pulsed… then dimmed.
The silence in the chamber stretched.
"She is unclaimed," one council member murmured. "An orphaned name."
"She is not," another snapped. "She is Aestrael. It's not that the bloodlines don't know her. They remember."
"Too well."
Suddenly, a symbol lit beneath her feet.
Not one from the academy.
The blank space in the center of the platform ignited, violet and gold — a sigil of spiral and thorn, flame wrapping a hollow circle.
A new house. Or rather — a forbidden one, resurrected.
Aurora screamed.
Her mind split open.
And the world around her burned.
She saw herself as a child — standing before a council, surrounded by robed figures.
They were afraid of her.
No, not her — her magic.
She was chanting. Something old. Something banned.
And the relic before her cracked open.
A flame in the shape of a name.
She saw Atlas — years younger, eyes wild, standing across from her, reaching out before the spell took effect.
"Don't—"
Seal her
Pain surged through her skull. She collapsed to her knees.
The chamber spun.
Hands reached for her, but the sigil around her flared.
A wall of magic burst outward.
The platform cracked.
"Get her off it!" someone shouted.
But it was too late.
The crest of Aestrael had burned into the floor.
It could not be erased now.
And everyone in that room saw it.
Later, they brought her to the Infirmary of the Veiled, her body whole, but trembling with aftershock. Her head throbbed. Her thoughts flickered like broken glass.
Atlas sat beside her bed, silent.
He didn't speak until she opened her eyes.
"You remembered," he said.
"Yes."
"I was there."
"I know."
He lowered his head. "I should've stopped it."
"You tried."
She looked at him.
"Now help me finish what they started."
He looked up. Met her gaze.
And nodded.
When Ethan found her that night, she was sitting beneath the crystal vines on the Mirror Terrace, staring at the moonlight dancing across the glass dome.
"They branded you," he said softly.
"No," she replied. "I branded myself."
He sat beside her.
"You're not afraid anymore."
"I'm always afraid," she said. "But now I know why."
She turned toward him.
"Do you still want to know what I am?"
Ethan's voice was quiet.
"Yes."
She leaned in, close enough to feel the heat of him.
"Then don't follow," she whispered. "Walk beside me. Or get out of the way."