Zara's breath burned in her chest.
Her mother's hand hovered before her, stretched across the void, fingers trembling in the space between what had been lost and what could be reclaimed. It was real. And yet, it wasn't.
She could feel it in the air—the weight of erasure, the unnatural stillness of something rewritten too many times. This wasn't just a reunion. This wasn't just memory.
This was the moment of undoing.
Noel shifted beside her, watching her carefully, his usual sharp movements tempered by something hesitant. He knew what this meant. Knew that if she reached out, if she took back what had been erased, she wouldn't just change herself.
She would change everything.
The Hollowed remained still, their bowed figures locked in place, awaiting the verdict.
The void-being, the one who had called her here, did not move.
"You hesitate," it said.
Zara inhaled sharply. "I think before I act."
"You believe there is choice," the voice murmured, colder now, more certain. "But there is only inevitability."
Her mother's hand moved slightly, her expression locked in something halfway between sorrow and hope. The phantom light in her eyes flickered, deep enough to carve through the war Zara had waged against herself all these years.
Noel exhaled slowly, barely audible. "Zara… if you do this, you might not be the same person when it's over."
She clenched her fists. "I haven't been the same person since the fire."
Then, before she could think further, before the weight of consequence could press harder into her ribs—she reached forward.
Her fingers brushed against her mother's.
And the world shattered.
Not in explosion.
Not in violence.
In rewriting.
Zara's vision tilted, space bending inward, swallowing every known thing in existence.
She was inside the fracture.
Inside memory itself.
The Singing Grave returned in waves—not its physical form, but the moment of resonance, the very second the phonograph had captured her scream. The truth roared into her skull, unfurling like woven threads, linking every erased life together in one long, uninterrupted symphony.
Her mother had not died.
Her father had not burned.
The Circle had edited them.
Removed them like sentences from a book rewritten too many times.
She wasn't the last Echo-bearer.
She was the failed revision.
Zara gasped, stumbling backward, her fingers still locked with the ghost of her mother, the weight of rewritten history pressing against her chest, threatening to crush what remained of her identity.
But the fracture did not let go.
The void-being stepped forward, watching without eyes.
"You begin to see," it whispered.
Zara grit her teeth. "I see enough."
Her pulse hammered against her ribs, her dagger burning in her grip. The Hollowed twisted, shifting in the air, reacting to her unraveling presence.
And then—
Her mother spoke.
Not in voice.
In memory.
Flashes of forgotten things poured into Zara's mind, cascading like light across a shattered mirror.
A hidden place beneath Aeroth.
A rebellion sealed behind a name she had never spoken.
A truth the Circle had buried so deeply that even the Echo could not reach it.
Zara choked out a breath, eyes flickering back to the void-being, to the fracture, to the Hollowed bending around her like threads of lost time.
She knew now.
She knew what had been stolen.
And she was going to take it back.
No matter what it cost.
***
The moment her fingers touched her mother's, Zara felt herself unravel.
Not in pain.
Not in death.
In memory.
Her vision blurred, the world twisting inward like an impossible fold in time itself. For a heartbeat—no, for eternity—she was not Zara Lune. She was every name, every scream, every erased breath the Circle had stolen.
The voices did not whisper. They did not scream.
They sang.
A melody of shattered truths wove itself through her bones, threading through every fiber of her existence. She saw them—the Hollowed before they were Hollowed, the faces they had worn, the lives they had lost.
She felt them—their final moments, the last time they had spoken before the silence consumed them.
Zara gasped, stumbling back, her grip tightening around the dagger like an anchor against the weight pressing against her chest. Noel's voice echoed distantly, sharp with concern, but she couldn't focus on it.
Her mother remained before her, her face flickering, shifting between reality and recollection. She wasn't just returning.
She was being rewritten.
Zara's mind burned with the truth of it.
This was no gift.
This was no blessing.
This was exchange.
Something had taken her place. Something had stepped into the fracture, pulling the Hollowed back from oblivion and leaving her at the threshold of something far worse.
Her brand was changing.
She looked down, breath caught in her throat.
The crescent had twisted, the serpent uncoiling into something fluid, something unknown. The mark pulsed beneath her skin, spreading ink through her veins, rewriting her body in ways she could not control.
She had undone their erasure.
Now, she was becoming it.
Noel moved suddenly, his grip firm on her arm. "Zara. Look at me."
She tried. She tried. But her vision was slipping, warping, bending in ways it shouldn't.
The void-being exhaled, amused.
"This is the price," it murmured.
Zara clenched her fists, swallowing the weight of every lost voice pressing against her ribs.
"I don't belong to them."
The void-being tilted its head, watching.
"You never belonged to yourself."
Her pulse thundered in her ears.
She couldn't let this happen.
She had fought too hard, bled too much, reclaimed too many truths just to be rewritten into something she did not understand.
She gritted her teeth, forcing herself to focus, forcing herself to resist.
She still had her voice.
She still had the dagger.
She still had choice.
The Hollowed trembled in the background, their restored figures waiting, their presence pressing against her mind in silent expectation.
They thought she would accept it.
They thought she couldn't refuse.
But they were wrong.
Zara exhaled sharply, driving her dagger into the earth.
The resonance exploded outward.
A shockwave of raw, undiluted force slammed into the fracture, tearing through the woven threads of rewritten fate. The void-being recoiled, its form flickering like broken glass.
Zara refused the trade.
She was not an offering.
She was not a vessel.
She was herself.
The mark on her skin burned with new purpose, twisting again, but this time, by her will.
The Hollowed staggered.
Her mother's presence wavered.
The fracture sealed.
The city exhaled.
And Zara stood in its silence, victorious—but changed.
Noel released his breath beside her, his grip steady, his eyes sharp with something between relief and warning.
"You stopped it."
She swallowed hard. "I took back what was mine."
The void-being remained for a moment, watching her, assessing her. Then, slowly, it retreated into the thinning void, its amusement lingering in the air even as the Hollowed faded into nothingness.
"This is not over," it murmured.
Zara didn't respond.
She already knew that.
She wiped the blood from her dagger, feeling the weight of something new settle into her bones.
The Circle had rewritten her once.
They would never do it again.