Chapter 8: Chapter 7-No One Leaves Whole

The walls were made of stone. But not the kind that echoed when she screamed. The silence ate everything. She sat naked on the cold metal circle, legs too short to hang over the edge. Her arms were bound behind her back with iron clasps. A collar of gray steel held her throat in place against the upright slab.

The slab was warm.

The room was not.

She could see nothing clearly. The torches were kept behind misted glass, casting everything in shadow and smoke. There were voices, but not words. Like breath being exhaled by something too large to fit in the room with her. Footsteps. Then the hiss of a door locking shut. She turned her head, just barely, expecting someone to come. Someone to help or someone who remembered who she was. Instead, a figure in black robes approached. Featureless. Gloved. Faceless beneath a smooth ivory mask. They didn’t speak to her. They spoke to the room.

“Crystal takes. Crystal seals. Crystal remembers.”

She whimpered. The first noise she’d made since the screams stopped.

It was the last one she’d be allowed. A second figure brought the shard — small, jagged, black-veined with a heart of violet light. It pulsed in their hand like it breathed. They pressed it to her chest.

It didn’t pierce the skin.

It sank.

Like her flesh wasn’t solid enough to stop it. Her body arched. The light spread into her veins like fire. She gasped—and the sound caught. She tried to scream, but the collar stole the sound from her throat. Her chest convulsed. Her mind thrashed. There were shapes in the light. Voices that didn’t belong to her. But it wasn’t over. The second figure stepped forward again. Holding a thin obsidian knife. The blade dripped ink. But it wasn’t ink. It moved like it knew her. They began carving. The first cut was across her collarbone. It sliced not only skin but something beneath — something she couldn’t name but felt die. Then another. Then another.

Each line burned like molten glass.

Each one took something.

The ability to cry.

The memory of a hand that once held hers.

The sound of a voice that once whispered comfort.

The taste of something sweet.

The feel of a name on her tongue.

She didn’t know what was gone. She just knew it was.

A tearing sensation with no painkillers, no numbness—just white fire in her bones.

She blacked out once. They revived her.

A third figure whispered something into her ear.

“Do not forget the pain. It’s all you’ll have left.”

They carved until the blade was clean. Until the runes glowed black in the torchlight and the shard in her chest went dim. When they finished, they took her down. Not gently. Not cruelly. Just… mechanically. Like a tool being returned to the rack.

And when she looked up from the stone floor, she no longer remembered what had been taken.

She didn’t remember why she was afraid.

She didn’t remember the sky.

She didn’t remember a name.

But she remembered the fire in her chest.

And the voice.

The voice that burned.

The memory ended, but the ache lingered.

***

Shade blinked, eyes dry from not having closed in too long. Her body was in motion, walking through corridors she hadn’t seen in years but could navigate in the darkness.

The Hollow hadn’t changed.

The air still tasted of old stone and metal.

The halls still whispered with nothing.

She followed the silent attendant in gray wrappings and black gloves. No words were exchanged. There never were. The Hollow Vows did not waste sound. They passed through the iron gate, past the statue of the hooded figure with a broken sword. Her steps echoed. The smell of the forges from Containe’s streets above was gone. Down here, there was no smell at all. That was the first thing the Hollow took. Not your name. Not your thoughts. Scent. The first of the small joys. Her cell was just as she remembered. No windows. No bedding. Just stone, a bucket, and a bowl of pale gruel were waiting for her on a shelf. She sat quickly. Not because she wanted to — but because that’s what her body had learned. Reflex. Obedience is breathing. The gruel was lukewarm. Bland. Gray. She ate it anyway. Each bite burned against the memory of spice, of warmth, of roast ironboar and sweetmeat pies. Each swallow hurt.

Not her stomach.

Her soul.

And then… the second memory stirred.

***

The chamber had four cells. Each was cut from stone and reinforced with bars pitted from age, just wide enough for small hands to slip through. The torches burned low overhead, casting the floor in flickering half-light. The air smelled like metal and sweat and silence. They weren’t told what came next. Only that they were “close.”

Each child had a number, not a name. One was the twitchy girl with dark hair and a sharp gaze that never stopped moving. Four was a beastkin girl like her with fur on her forearms and a missing tooth she never spoke about. Two was a boy, lean, light-haired, too loud for the Hollow.

And then there was Three.

She didn’t speak much. Never had. But she listened.

“Hey,” Two called softly, tapping one of the bars with a knuckle.

“Three. I saved a crust from my last meal. Want half?”

Shade turned her eyes toward him but said nothing.

“C’mon. You’ve got the best dodge in our unit. If we get another drill, I want you watching my back.”

He slid the crust through the bars.

She took it. Ate without blinking.

“See?” he said with a grin. “Teamwork. That’s how we beat the next round.”

One scoffed from her corner.

“There’s no ‘next round.’ There’s just more blood.”

“Maybe,” Two replied. “But you’ll want me on your side when it comes, twitch.”

“Don’t call me twitch.”

“Sure, twitch.”

Four chuckled — a soft, rare sound. She was stronger than the rest, but rarely spoke. Her eyes lingered on Three often, though. As if they recognized something in her: pain folded neatly beneath stillness.

They had no idea what the Crucible was.

Only that it was coming.

That they were “special.”

That they had “survived.”

At that moment, they were still children. Not weapons. Not shadows. Just four bruised souls left too long in the dark. And for the briefest flicker of time, they were something close to friends. Shade didn’t smile. But she didn’t look away when Two smiled at her. And later, long after she forgot most things, she would remember his grin. The one that didn’t belong in a place like this.

***

The floor of the training hall was etched with old blood. Not enough to stain it red, but enough that the scent clung to the stones. It was a massive space, circular, domed above by cold iron and faint torchlight. Dozens of eyes watched from the gallery above — silent, masked figures. Operatives. Tools. Hounds. One of them would carve her tonight. She stood in the center, stripped to her undershift, muscles tight from cold and memory. Her fingers itched for weapons she wasn’t allowed to summon here. No dama. No shadows.

This was a raw assessment.

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

“Begin.”

Three Hounds stepped forward.

They didn’t speak.

Hounds never wasted words on Weapons.

The first came fast — a lunge that Shade barely ducked. She twisted, redirecting his strike, but the second was already behind her. A fist to her ribs.

A kick to the side of her knee.

Pain shot through her leg. Her vision doubled. The third hit her square in the jaw — a crack of knuckles against skin that sent her to the floor.

But she didn’t cry out.

Didn’t grunt.

Didn’t bleed — not yet.

She rolled, landed on her feet, caught the next strike, and twisted the Hound’s wrist. For a moment, she was in control.

Then the second Hound slammed her into the wall.

Hard.

Her back lit up in fire. Her breath vanished.

“Too slow,” one of them said.

“Your hesitation is spreading.”

Another blow came — a test. A punishment.

Her body screamed. Her thoughts blurred.

She could kill them, she knew.

If she used dama. If she stepped into the shadows. If she called Tenebrae—

But that wasn’t what they were testing.

They wanted her obedience.

Her compliance.

So she endured.

Strike.

Fall.

Rise.

Repeat.

Until the room spun, and her arms trembled, and blood ran down her temple in a quiet line of defiance. Then a voice echoed above them.

Not loud. Not sharp.

But final.

“Enough.”

The Hounds stepped back, breathing steadily. One of them nodded to the figure in the gallery. The one with the veil of shadows. She had watched the entire time. No words. No praise. Just a turn of her head toward the far door. Shade knew what that meant. The Dark Room waited. And as her body ached and her bones groaned, something deep within her began to shake. But she didn’t follow yet. Because something in the blood—in the sting of her limbs — had opened a door. And behind it, a memory rose.

***

The arena smelled of metal and cold. It was a circular pit, sunken into the stone. No sand. No markers. Just raw floor and old scars. The four of them stood in silence — One, Two, Four, and Three — Shade.

Their training uniforms were clean. Their hands were empty. They didn’t know why they’d been brought here. But none of them asked. Not even Two, though he glanced at Shade more than once with quiet hope. She didn’t return it.

A figure stepped out from the arch above them.

Robed. Masked. Holding a carved obsidian baton in one hand.

“You are the final four of this batch. This is the Crucible.”

“Only one may leave.”

Two’s face changed. He stepped forward, shaking his head.

“Wait—what does that mean?”

“We trained together. We—this isn’t right.”

Four moved first.

She tackled One. No hesitation. A scream rang out as teeth met flesh.

Two backed toward Shade.

“We can work together. Take them down. Maybe they’re watching to see if we—”

But Shade had already moved. She didn’t remember deciding to. She didn’t remember breathing. She just struck.

Two yelped, blocking her first blow — but her second caught him in the side of the throat. He stumbled. His eyes were wide. She tackled him. Pinned him.

“Three—wait—Three—please!”

She whispered it then.

“I’m sorry.”

Her hands closed around his neck. He kicked, clawed, and cried. She didn’t stop. Not until he was still. She didn't remember much after that, but when she came around, she was the only one breathing. The masked figure descended. Not hurried. Not impressed. Just… inevitable. They placed a single hand on her shoulder.

“Tool.”

They turned and walked. Shade followed. Her steps didn’t falter. Her fingers didn’t shake. But inside her head, she heard the whisper of breath, soft and cracking.

Like the sound of something small, breaking. They led her down a hall lined with blackened doors and rune-lit walls.

***

Snapping out of the few memories they had left her. She passed other operatives now — some silent, some watching. No one spoke. Her room was a square cell with a stone bed and a folded uniform. The door shut behind her. She sat on the edge; however, she did not cry, because she did not know how. Her body ached with every breath. Shade leaned against the wall outside the chamber, one arm cradling her ribs. Bruises were already blooming down her side — purple-black flowers of submission. Her lip had split. Her knees were raw from the fall. She hadn’t healed yet. They hadn’t let her. The assessment wasn’t about combat. It was about obedience. And she had obeyed.

The attendant who came for her didn’t speak. Just gestured toward the hall of blackened stone, the one no Tool ever walked twice without becoming something else. She followed. One step at a time. Like walking through her blood. The door was massive — smooth stone, unmarked, utterly still.

A familiar figure stood beside it. The one in the veil of shadows. Always silent. Always still. Shade didn’t know her name. No one did.

The Veiled One stepped forward. Held up a hand, palm out. It shimmered — not with dama, but with memory.

“You are here for honing,” she said. The voice was calm, but not cold.

“You have been found dulled by sentiment. Unsharpened by delay. The room will correct that.”

Shade didn’t respond. She was shaking now, not from fear, but from pain that wouldn’t numb. A bruise throbbed under her ribs. Her hands twitched.

“You may scream,” the veiled one said. “The dark hears. The dark does not answer.”

A pause.

“Do you remember what you were, before?”

Shade blinked. Just once.

“Good,” the voice said. “Then you will not mourn it.”

The door began to open — slowly, soundlessly. Darkness flowed like smoke from the seam.

And just as she stepped toward it, the Veiled One leaned forward.

So close her words brushed Shade’s ear like ash:

“Little Moon.”

Shade froze. The words meant nothing. But they hurt like they did. She didn’t look back. She walked into the dark. The room swallowed her. There was no light. No sound. No sense of time. She lay down when her legs gave out. Waited. Endured. And then — the pain. The new runes began. Not carved with blades — but with echoed memory and burned purpose. Each stroke carved silence deeper into her soul. Each rune screamed in a language that didn’t use sound. She saw the face of the boy she strangled, the curve of a smile that once made her pause, she saw the color of the sun before the Hollow took it from her. And then she fell again, beneath the pain. Past thought. Past body. Into the space behind memory.

***

A place she had never known — and yet had always feared. And in the dark, a voice spoke.

“Do not struggle.”

“The flesh is theirs. This place is mine.”

It was not a whisper, not a shout. It was a presence. A certainty. Like heat in a forge. Like ink poured over old words.

“You are not the first.”

“You are not the last.”

“But you are the only one who has not shattered.”

Light pulsed in the black. Not real light — memory light. A forge. A man. Hands soaked in raw dama, crystal forming between palms like frozen lightning.

His eyes were clouded. His voice, sharp as flint.

“I made the first key from a splinter of the gate.”

“I thought I could contain what slipped through.”

“I was wrong.”

He stepped forward. His robes were scorched with ancient runes. Some matched the ones carved into her. Others hurt to look at.

“You carry their screams. Their skill. Their failings.”

“You are the thirteenth vessel.”

“And the only one who stood.”

Her thoughts trembled. Her will fought to rise.

“What am I?”

The man tilted his head, and in that moment, he seemed sad.

“They want a door.”

“I gave them a vault.”

“You are what they built to break. And what I made to endure.”

“Sleep now.”

“I will hold you. As long as I can.”

The man stepped back, and the forge light behind him dimmed, flickering like a candle about to vanish. His voice was quieter now. Not softer. Just… further away.

“I will shield what I can.”

“But the flesh is fraying. The gate pulses. And soon…”

“…you will not return for a while.”

Something inside her tried to scream. Tried to ask what that meant. But she had no voice here. Only the echo did.

“I will keep your name.”

“I will guard your will.”

“But the body must burn.”

His outline flickered — not from weakness, but from distance.

“Sleep now, little one.”

“And if you wake in fire… remember who sealed the door.”

Not by will. Not by thought. Her body sat upright on the Carver’s slab, spine rigid, eyes blank. A faint violet gleam pulsed beneath her chest. No breath. No words. No sound. Only silence — and the weight of something watching from deep within.