Somedays have passed

  At first, it was cracks.

  Thin fissures of raw, unfiltered light opening between the stalls of the bazaar, glowing beneath the shade of a spice vendor’s awning.

  The sand trembled as if feverish, rising in restless swirls without wind.

  People stepped back, whispering prayers that broke before reaching the air.

  Then came the rumors.

  Shadows walking without owners.

  Echoes of emotions that belonged to no one.

  Constructs forming beside adobe homes, breaking walls with the same calm one uses to break bread.

  I was there.

  We were there.

  And we knew exactly what was causing all of it.

  Yareen was spilling over.

  The first night after her death, we kept vigil for Ahlia.

  There was no grand ceremony.

  No perfect hymns.

  No parades of incense or sacred processions.

  Just a wounded refuge, the faint scent of burning resin,

  and a body far too still wrapped in blue cloth.

  Zayrah did not release her hand. Not once.

  Irsah whispered ancient verses with a voice so thin it felt afraid of breaking the silence more than the grief itself.

  Luma… Luma knelt at Ahlia’s side, rocking gently, as if the motion alone could pull her back into the world.

  Behind them, the tall woman with the white braid knelt in utter stillness, guilt carved into every line of her posture.

  The pale one stood rigid, staring at the body as though judging herself for every breath she continued to take.

  Azhara did not cry.

  She did not speak.

  She touched Ahlia’s cheek with a devotion so tender it hurt to witness.

  The emotion that had awakened inside her still vibrated under her skin —

  a desert trying to hold back a storm.

  We, the Shadows, watched from the side.

  We weren’t family.

  But all of us understood that something in Al-Rahad had lost a heartbeat.

  Three nights later, chaos returned.

  Not with screams.

  Not with fanatics.

  With fissures, breathing like open wounds in the desert’s magic.

  A construct of black sand materialized beside the outer wall; another shattered a water cistern as if it were wet parchment.

  Each crack pulsed with sick emotion — the same signature Yareen had left behind.

  Velka ran beside me, breath ragged, her broken sword sparking like it, too, was tired of surviving.

  —Lyss! If I don’t make it out— burn me yourself! But do it with style, okay?

  She tried to smile.

  But the tremor in her hands told the truth her mouth couldn’t.

  Neyra, drunk on raw magic, leaned against a worn column.

  —The… distortion… it’s saturating me…

  Caelia appeared behind her, eyes electric blue, finding weak points none of us could see.

  A whisper of shields.

  A lance of certainty.

  She saved Neyra.

  And me.

  Five nights later, another attack.

  Ruins illuminated by living fractures of untamed magic.

  People running.

  Children crying.

  The desert singing like a wounded beast.

  Zayrah shouted orders with a voice broken by grief.

  Luma burned from the inside out, every strike a silent vow to Ahlia.

  The tall guardian moved like a ritual given form, calling clean shadows that stitched cracks shut.

  The pale one spoke sentences that felt like verdicts — and constructs split apart under her words.

  I could not stop staring at the empty space among us.

  The place where Ahlia used to stand.

  Velka watched me every night.

  Watched my wounds, my burning scar, my sword rising from my abdomen like a serpent of ancient fury.

  Her jokes dulled into blunt knives.

  I heard her mutter to herself — words meant to keep her together, even as every construct we shattered cracked something inside her.

  Silence ended today.

  We returned to the palace.

  Azhara waited for us in the great hall, the grief still visible in her eyes, her presence heavier than any armor.

  She watched us walk in covered in sand, sweat, ash…

  and the fresh absence of Ahlia that clung to us like dust.

  Zayrah and Mahtani —still broken, still standing— stood at my side.

  Velka held my arm, as if afraid something might pull me away.

  Caelia inhaled deeply, as though even the palace air understood what was coming.

  My scar burned.

  The sand beneath our feet vibrated, restless, sensing the storm approaching.

  Azhara lifted her hand.

  Her voice no longer sounded like a sultana’s.

  It sounded like a mother who had lost a daughter

  and refused to lose another.

  —Good.

  You’ve spoken with the Mother.

  You know what lies beneath this palace… and what it means if Yareen gets here first.

  It wasn’t a revelation.

  It wasn’t instruction.

  It was a reminder.

  Sharp.

  Inevitable.

  Nerys —the last anchor of Al-Rahad’s equilibrium— rested directly below us.

  The Sanctuary of Silence held her… and held the desert together.

  And Yareen was coming for her.

  Not out of devotion.

  Not out of hatred.

  Out of hunger.

  Azhara stepped toward us, the emotion reborn inside her vibrating like a storm waiting for release.

  —You will protect this palace —she ordered—.

  You will not let her breach these walls.

  If Yareen reaches the Sanctuary… the desert itself will break.

  Velka tightened her grip on my arm.

  Neyra exhaled like she’d been struck.

  Caelia nodded once, jaw locked.

  We moved into formation.

  Shadows and Guardians —eleven wills gathered like fragments of different eras under one roof.

  And though one of us was gone, the space she left behind felt painfully present.

  We knew what was coming.

  We knew what we would have to face.

  And if Yareen managed to break the ground beneath our feet…

  I didn’t want to name that ending.

  I didn’t want to picture it.

  I only knew one thing:

  Tonight would be the last night the desert slept in peace.

  The silence inside the palace was different from the silence of the desert.

  Out there, silence was just wind without a voice.

  In here… here it weighed.

  Zayrah was rubbing her hands as if searching for something she’d lost.

  Luma stared into nothing, breathing unevenly.

  Velka’s grip on my arm was so tight her knuckles had gone white.

  Caelia stayed upright, but her breath was a thin, trembling thread.

  Neyra kept studying the floor, watching the way the sand beneath it vibrated like it wanted to speak.

  My scar throbbed—slow, deep, inevitable.

  No one wanted to break that silence.

  Until someone did.

  Shadira — the tall woman with the white braid — lifted her head.

  Her eyes, always so ceremonial, suddenly looked painfully human.

  —“They never taught you any of this, did they?” she said, her voice a worn blade.

  —“Not what you carry in your chest.

  Not who came before you.

  Not what you could become.”

  Her words went through us like a smooth, cutting edge.

  Velka snorted, bitter.

  —“We grew up training to die properly. That they teach.

  But never…” She clenched her jaw. “Never any of… this.”

  Neyra’s brow tightened.

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  —“Hiding the second heart… hiding the Mothers… that’s not ignorance. That’s strategy.

  Why bury something like that?”

  Caelia’s voice was steady when she spoke — steadier than any of ours.

  —“How many died without knowing they could’ve held on longer?

  That their body had something else inside it?

  That magic doesn’t end when you do?”

  Shadira lowered her gaze, a faint tremor running down her braid.

  —“Because they could be lost too,” she whispered.

  —“Lost without guidance. Without an anchor. Without knowing how to return.

  And no one wanted to watch more witches be born.”

  Nazeera, the pale one, stepped forward.

  Her ritual markings seemed darker under the dim palace light.

  —“Power that can corrupt is always forbidden before it is taught,” she said, voice flat and cold.

  —“Seravenn rewrote history. Turned the Mothers into myth, not even that it was never a thing.

  The second heart also was never something…

  and we were left carrying the ruins of that fear.”

  A pulse hit beneath my skin.

  The scar burned hotter.

  —“Then what are we?” I asked before I could stop myself.

  —“Weapons?

  Heirs without memory?

  Mistakes they preferred to keep at a distance?”

  Velka barked a humorless laugh.

  —“What, are you going to tell us now that all this time we were more than… meat in a uniform?”

  Nazeera held my gaze.

  Her grey eyes were a verdict.

  —“You’re not weapons,” she said.

  —“You’re possibilities.

  And the world fears anything it cannot control.”

  Azhara, who had been silent until now, finally spoke.

  Her voice sounded like a crack that still glowed.

  —“The Mothers weren’t goddesses.

  But they weren’t human either.

  They were born when this world could still feel freely…

  and they paid a price no one wanted repeated.”

  Her eyes settled on me.

  —“And you carry echoes of them without knowing.”

  My scar pulsed again.

  As if answering.

  Luma’s voice was a fragile tremor.

  —“So what do we do with all this…?”

  No one answered at first.

  Then the air — the air beneath the palace, where the sanctuary lay — vibrated softly.

  A voice, gentle as a memory that didn’t belong to me, brushed the walls:

  —“Do not fear what you are…

  fear the weight of what you may feel.”

  Nerys.

  Silence returned, deeper than before.

  Azhara straightened.

  —“Yareen will come,” she said.

  —“Not for power.

  Not for vengeance.

  She will come because only one emotion remains for her to cling to.

  And we will not let her in.”

  Her words sealed the room.

  No doubts left.

  No room for fear.

  No time for more questions.

  We were no longer just Shadows.

  Or just Guardians.

  We were eleven hearts beating against the end.

  And the night was coming hungry.

  Azhara walked a few steps ahead of us—steady, composed, as if the power she had unleashed minutes ago had never existed. I watched her speak with Zayrah, review maps, issue orders with the same poised calm as any other day.

  But something in her… was wrong.

  The first sign came when she leaned over a table to read a report.

  The golden lantern light brushed her face… and for an instant—a single blink—her gaze blurred.

  Unfocused.

  As if the whole world dissolved right in front of her.

  She blinked.

  Breathed.

  Smiled as if nothing had happened.

  Kept talking.

  Then came the cough.

  Just one.

  Dry, deep, far too deep.

  She hid it by clearing her throat, taking a sip of water.

  But I saw the tremor in her hand.

  Neyra noticed before any of us.

  She tapped my arm—a silent warning.

  We waited until the Sultana walked a few steps farther, and then Neyra pulled us into a shaded corner where most of the refuge’s noise faded.

  —“The Sultan…” she whispered, brow tight, “something in her is giving way.”

  Velka stiffened.

  Caelia’s gaze sharpened, dangerous even in silence.

  —“Giving way how?” I asked.

  Neyra inhaled, sorting her thoughts.

  —“I’m not certain,” she admitted—rare for her.

  “But that cough… that lapse in vision… I’ve seen something similar.

  When an emotion is pushed beyond what the body should sustain.”

  Velka frowned.

  —“And how do you know that, Neyra? Since when do you know anything about emotional limits in adults?”

  Neyra lowered her gaze—not out of shame, but because the memory itself weighed on her.

  —“Since Caecum.”

  A cold thread slid down my spine.

  Caecum.

  The first Dominus we ever faced.

  The first time a broken emotion looked at us with hunger.

  Neyra continued:

  —“When we returned to Seravenn, I… needed to understand what we’d seen.

  What had happened to her.

  What had happened to us.”

  Her voice didn’t tremble, but there were cracks in it.

  —“So I went to the archives after training.

  I wasn’t looking for a manual; I knew there wouldn’t be one.

  I was looking for… remnants.

  Anything.

  Forgotten pages.

  Notes without names.

  Things someone didn’t manage to burn.”

  Velka blinked hard.

  —“You broke into the restricted archives?”

  —“They weren’t forbidden… just abandoned,” Neyra replied, though the shadow in her eyes told a different story.

  “What I found were fragments:

  ? unsigned medical reports,

  ? sketches of bodies altered by forced emotions,

  ? testimonies about adult women who used magic again and… changed,

  ? pages torn from a treatise on emotional fractures…”

  She paused.

  —“Nothing complete. Nothing certain.

  But every fragment aligned on one point:

  when an emotion awakens too strongly in an adult…

  the risk is real.

  No rules.

  No warnings.

  Just… dangerous possibilities.”

  Velka’s jaw tensed.

  —“You think Azhara could… break?”

  The unspoken word hovered in the air.

  A witch.

  Neyra breathed in slowly.

  —“I don’t know.

  No one knows what turns someone into a witch.

  But I recognize when something begins to fracture.

  And in her… it has.”

  Caelia clenched her fists.

  —“The Sultan is not going to become that,” she said—her voice firm despite the tremor beneath it.

  “We won’t let it happen.”

  I looked at Azhara from afar.

  Regal.

  Untouchable.

  Walking as though nothing in her body was failing.

  But I had just watched a magical girl die.

  I knew what it looked like when someone held themselves upright with nothing but will.

  I swallowed hard.

  —“We watch her. Without letting her notice.”

  Neyra nodded.

  —“And if anything shifts… if her emotion begins to fracture… we pull her from the fight. Whatever it takes.”

  Velka whispered:

  —“If Yareen attacks again, she’ll go straight for the Sultana.

  We won’t let her touch her.”

  The four of us looked toward the corridor where Azhara kept walking—tall, regal… and with a shadow behind her that shouldn’t have been lagging half a second late.

  Eleven hearts beat inside that refuge.

  And one—Sel?nrah’s most precious—was already beginning to crack.

  After speaking with Neyra, the air inside the refuge felt heavier.

  We had watched too many things fracture in just a few days: Mahtani nearly dying, Ahlia falling, the Sultana unraveling, the Guardians trembling… and Yareen’s shadow stretching closer.

  Velka was quiet.

  Too quiet.

  I saw her slip away from the group without a word, her shoulders held in that rigid tension she only had when she was close to breaking. She walked to a corner of the refuge, sat on a blanket, and let her head drop—her braid falling like a crooked veil over her face.

  No laughter.

  No sarcasm.

  No fire.

  Just silence.

  And something hollow behind her eyes.

  I approached carefully, hand trembling as I reached for her shoulder.

  But before I touched her, she brushed my hand away with a sharp movement.

  —Princesa de la magia… —her voice was a broken whisper—. Please. Not now. Don’t touch me.

  She stood, still limping from her wound, and disappeared into the shadows.

  My hand hung in the air.

  Something opened in my chest—empty and heavy.

  Caelia appeared at my side like a sigh.

  She didn’t speak. Just opened her arms.

  I clung to her instantly, burying my face in her neck.

  —It’s going to be alright, Lyss —she murmured, steady as a shield that never cracks—. I promise.

  And for a heartbeat… I believed her.

  Velka was curled up in a corner

  arms wrapped around her knees.Her breathing shook.Her eyes were fixed on the sand clinging to her boots—unmoving, distant.

  Neyra appeared behind her without a sound, as if she had been following the invisible thread of Velka’s pain.

  —What’s the great Velka Aurel doing, all alone and quiet? —she tried to joke, nudging her back with two fingers.

  Nothing.

  —If you don’t talk, I’m going to assume you burned another one of my scarves —she insisted, crouching in front of her.

  Still nothing.

  Neyra’s expression shifted.

  —Velka.

  Talk to me.

  The answer came in a tiny laugh—small, hollow, like cracked glass.

  —You want the truth? —Velka lifted her face just enough for her eyes to glisten—.

  I’m tired, Neyra.

  Tired of pretending I don’t feel anything.

  Tired of being… this.

  Neyra waited. She knew better than to interrupt.

  —You all think I’m the spark —Velka murmured—. The one who makes things bearable. The one who laughs when everything is breaking. The one who hides the fractures with jokes.

  But I… I’m just scared.

  Her grip tightened on her knees.

  —It started in Eiswacht —she said, voice sinking—.

  When we pretended to be wives.

  When I saw her sleep without nightmares for the first time.

  When I realized how easy it is to love someone who isn’t falling apart.

  She exhaled, shaky.

  —But then came Seravenn.

  Then Al-Rahad.

  Then Ahlia.

  Then Mahtani on the brink.

  Then the Sultana… cracking.

  And Lyss —she said my name like it hurt— losing control against Yareen, fighting like she didn’t care if she died as long as she protected everyone else.

  Her voice trembled.

  —And I can’t… —she swallowed— I can’t lose her.

  I can’t watch her break.

  I can’t watch her die.

  I can’t.

  Silence—heavy and raw.

  —Everyone sees her as the heir —Velka whispered—. The blade. The storm.

  But to me she’s always been… just Lyss.

  My Lyss.

  And I don’t know how to carry that when everything around us is falling apart.

  Neyra took her hand—steady, warm, grounding.

  —It hurts because you love her —she said plainly.

  Velka closed her eyes.

  One tear slipped down.

  Then another.

  —I love you, Neyra —she whispered—.

  Not like her… but I love you.

  Neyra leaned her forehead against Velka’s.

  —And I love you, idiot.

  But don’t use my love to hide from the other one.

  When this is over… tell her.

  You owe yourself that much.

  Velka breathed—really breathed—for the first time in days.

  Slow.

  Deep.

  Alive.

  —Promise —she murmured.

  And for the first time since we lost Ahlia…

  the night felt a little less heavy on her shoulders.

  The refuge was breathing a tense silence.

  A silence that tasted too much like the moment before death.

  Mahtani stood with us—barely.

  Her body showed no wounds anymore, but her eyes… her eyes were still shattered, glassy, as if her soul hadn’t fully returned.

  Ahlia had saved her.

  And she carried that weight like a chain wrapped around her ribs.

  She stayed close to Zayrah, as if she needed a human wall to keep herself upright.

  She had spent days trying not to cry.

  Now, she couldn’t even blink.

  Then the sand trembled beneath my boots.

  Just a whisper.

  As if something was dragging itself beneath the palace.

  The hanging lamps flickered.

  One, two, three times.

  Mahtani clutched her second heart, as if something inside her had yanked violently.

  Neyra lifted her head at the same moment I did.

  —“You feel that…?” she murmured.

  There was no need to answer.

  Everyone felt it.

  Zayrah straightened with a reflex so sharp it didn’t seem human.

  Nazeera dropped a judgment talisman; the metal hit the stone like a sentence.

  Shadira muttered old words—too old, too forbidden to exist in her memory.

  Caelia rested a hand on her weapon, posture ready.

  Velka clenched her jaw; her fingers trembled with instinct.

  Mahtani’s breath stuttered, each inhale like a stab of emotion.

  My scar burned so fiercely I had to lean against the wall.

  And then we heard it.

  The screams.

  Not from inside the palace.

  From outside.

  Dragged screams.

  Screams that bent in the air.

  Screams riding a sound like sand grinding bone.

  A dull thud crashed against the doors.

  BOOM.

  A spill of sand rained from the ceiling.

  BOOM.

  The doors shook as if something monstrous slammed into them.

  BOOM.

  The emotional seal of the refuge vibrated.

  Azhara’s eyes flew open.

  Her breath hitched—small, sharp.

  —“She’s here,” she whispered.

  Mahtani stepped back instinctively.

  Not out of cowardice.

  Out of memory.

  Out of visceral fear.

  The doors burst open.

  And they came in.

  Fanatics—but not like before.

  Their bodies looked twisted from the inside, tense, wrapped in torn black bandages, their eyes completely white.

  Some held weapons like they had forgotten how they worked.

  Others came bare-handed, trembling, ready to tear.

  They all whispered the same word, sticky and rhythmic:

  —“Mother… mother… mother…”

  Zayrah barked the command:

  —“Formation!”

  We aligned instantly.

  Mahtani swallowed hard and raised her spear…

  but her hand shook so badly Caelia reached over, steadying it just once:

  —“Breathe. With me.”

  (An order. A lifeline.)

  Mahtani obeyed.

  And the spear stopped trembling.

  Then the side wall cracked—like old skin splitting open.

  An emotional fissure ripped itself across the stone.

  Black sand poured through it.

  First came her shadow.

  Then… Yareen.

  Dragging the void with her.

  Armless.

  Unsteady.

  Inhuman.

  —“The one who healed what should have broken…” she whispered, head tilting unnaturally—

  “Where is she?”

  Mahtani stepped back, terror biting the breath from her throat.

  And Yareen smiled.

  The battle began.