Rain fell over Valeris like silver threads pulled from the sky.

Kael Aderin stood beneath the shelter of his father’s blacksmith forge, staring out into the dark streets while thunder rolled over the rooftops. The flames behind him hissed and snapped against steel, but tonight their warmth felt distant.

Something was wrong.

He could feel it in the air.

The villagers had hurried indoors before sunset. Doors were locked. Lanterns extinguished early. Even the dogs had gone quiet.

Kael tightened his grip on the hammer in his hand.

Then he heard it.

A whisper.

Soft.

Faint.

Close enough to brush against his ear.

“Kael…”

His chest tightened.

He turned sharply.

No one.

Only shadows stretching along the wet walls.

Another whisper came.

“Kael Aderin…”

His heartbeat kicked hard.

He hated that voice.

Or maybe he feared it.

Ever since he was a child, he had heard things no one else could. Murmurs in empty hallways. Names spoken from abandoned fields. Footsteps behind him when he walked alone.

People called him cursed.

His father called it imagination.

Kael knew better.

The dead spoke.

And tonight they sounded afraid.

Lightning flashed.

For a split second he saw her.

A pale woman standing in the rain.

Her long dark hair clung to her face. Her white dress drifted as though underwater. Her feet hovered inches above the mud.

Kael froze.

Every instinct screamed at him to run.

But her eyes—

they were filled with terror.

“Please,” she whispered.

Thunder cracked.

The forge fire behind him died instantly.

Darkness swallowed everything.

Kael stumbled backward.

His hammer hit the stone floor.

The woman glided toward him.

Not walking.

Floating.

Rain passed through her like smoke.

“You must listen,” she said.

His voice came out rough. “What are you?”

“A warning.”

She lifted one trembling hand.

A strange symbol burned across her palm—silver and ancient, glowing brighter than moonlight.

Kael stared.

He had seen that mark before.

Hidden inside an old book his late mother kept locked away.

The Mark of the Veil.

Impossible.

“The gates are weakening,” she whispered. “They are coming back.”

“Who?”

Her face changed.

Fear became horror.

The wind exploded through the forge.

A deep growl echoed from the darkness beyond the village.

Not human.

Not animal.

Something older.

Something hungry.

The ghost stepped back.

“They found me.”

A shadow detached itself from the rain.

Tall.

Massive.

With burning red eyes.

Kael grabbed the fallen hammer.

The creature lunged.

The ghost screamed.

And the mark on Kael’s chest—hidden beneath his shirt since birth—burst into blue fire.

The world shattered.

And the dead began to scream.