He was Caelum Thornmoor , sixteen years old , sharp-eyed and quiet, with the kind of presence that made people forget he was in the room until he spoke—and then wish he hadn't. He was the youngest of the duke's three children, often dismissed as soft, too thoughtful, too strange. But there was something in him—something his tutors couldn't name, something that hummed beneath his skin like thunder waiting for sky.
Caelum sat in the shadows of the east tower, the cold seeping into his bones as rain traced silent paths down the window. Far below, the castle courtyard filled with the clatter of hooves and hushed commands. The healers had already left. The priests were arriving.
He should have felt something—grief, anger, something. But mostly, he felt hollow. Like a door had closed somewhere inside him, quietly, with no intention of opening again.
His father was dead.
And tomorrow, they'd start fighting over what was left of him.
A sudden flicker of heat danced through Caelum's fingers. He glanced down, startled, expecting to see a lantern flame, but there was nothing. Just a brief warmth pulsing through his skin, then gone. He flexed his hand.
This wasn't the first time.
"Caelum?" came a voice behind him—clear, quick, familiar.
Seraphina.
He turned as his sister stepped into the room, brushing damp hair from her face. She wore black, of course—everyone would, until the mourning period ended—but she made it look elegant. Effortless. She always did.
"I thought I'd find you up here," she said. "It's where you used to hide."
"I don't hide," he muttered.
She gave a faint smile. "You do. But you hide well."
She came to stand beside him at the window, quiet for a moment. The storm cast flickers of lightning across the sky, and for a moment, Caelum could see their reflections in the glass—two young nobles, side by side, watching their childhood wash away in the rain.
"He was cruel," she said. "But he was our father."
Caelum said nothing.
"I don't miss him," she added, softer now. "But I'll miss the world where he still breathed. It's strange. The world's changed, but nothing looks different."
Caelum's throat tightened. "Everything looks different to me."
She looked at him, brow furrowed. "Why?"
He didn't know how to explain it. There was a pressure in the air—not just the storm, not just the grief. It was like something inside him had shifted the moment his father's heart stopped beating. As if something long asleep had stirred.
Before he could answer, the bell tolled from the great hall—three long strikes. Summoning them.
Seraphina sighed. "Well. Shall we begin the war?"
---
The great hall of Castle Thornmoor had never felt so cold. Rain battered the tall windows. Torches sputtered in the damp air. At the long table sat the remaining children of Duke Halric Thornmoor.
Roderic, the eldest. All smiles and steel, his broad shoulders wrapped in a ceremonial mantle he'd probably had tailored before their father's body had gone cold.
Seraphina, poised and unreadable.
And Caelum. Youngest. Smallest. Most overlooked.
At the head of the table stood the Duchess Dowager—still as stone, eyes sharp. Her black gown swept the floor like a shadow.
"You are here," she said, voice even. "Because your father left no clear heir. Because he believed strength, not birth, should rule."
Caelum's heart pounded.
"You are not children anymore. You are contenders. There will be three trials. Each will test a different quality: strength, wisdom, loyalty."
Seraphina shifted slightly. Roderic gave a low chuckle.
"And when the trials are done," the Duchess continued, "one of you will become the next Duke—or Duchess—of Thornmoor."
"What if we refuse?" Caelum asked suddenly, surprising even himself.
The Duchess turned to him. Her eyes narrowed.
"Then you die unknown," she said, with the barest trace of a smile. "And someone else rules this house."
Roderic stood. "Let's not pretend this is about merit. You want a spectacle. You want to see which of your children is most like him."
"I want to see which of you deserves to rule," she said. "That's not the same."
The air shimmered slightly around Caelum—just for a heartbeat. No one else seemed to notice. But he did. A warmth at the base of his spine. A prickling behind his eyes. As if the storm outside had pressed its fingers against his skin.
The first trial would begin in three days.
When the council filed out, and his siblings dispersed like lions from a kill, Caelum stood alone near the fire, trembling—not from fear, but from something older. Something nameless.
His fingertips sparked again—only briefly, like static—but this time, he didn't look away.
Something was waking inside him.
And it would not go quietly.