EMPIRE HIGH: SCHOOL OF SHADOWS

Sleep had become a luxury Seraphina no longer trusted.

Each time her eyes closed, something pulled at her. Sometimes it was the girl in the mirror—sometimes it was a door opening. A whisper. A hand reaching from a place beneath her name.

Now, even in the waking world, she felt the shift.

The veil between magic and madness had thinned.

They called it the Crimson Thread—a ritual no longer practiced at Empire High.

Too dangerous. Too unpredictable. Too... binding.

It was once used to link wielders of unstable magic to an anchor—someone capable of balancing their raw energy, guiding them until they gained full control.

But most bonds forged through the ritual were permanent. Soul-deep. And if one died, the other suffered. Sometimes physically. Sometimes spiritually.

Sometimes both.

When Elijah told her what he'd found in the Archives—how the Vault chose him too—he also told her the next step.

"I need to bind to you," he said flatly. "Before the mirror takes you completely."

Seraphina stared at him. "That's not a small decision."

"No, it isn't. But we're running out of time."

Nyra agreed. "Two Vault-bound students haven't existed in the same generation for over three hundred years. If you spiral, and no one's there to ground you, we lose more than just the school."

Seraphina sighed, pacing. "So, I tie my soul to someone who barely talks to me unless I'm bleeding or cursed."

Elijah raised a brow. "You'd prefer someone louder?"

She glared. "Don't tempt me."

But beneath her sarcasm, she felt the pull.

They were already connected—fragments of shared visions, overlapping memories. She had seen him cry in a dream he'd never told anyone about. He had heard her whisper to her mother's locket in her sleep.

They were tethered.

The thread just made it literal.

The ritual was held in the Sanctum Noctis, deep beneath the House chambers. No one else was allowed to witness it—not even Nyra, though she argued until the very threshold.

The room was circular, the air heavy with the scent of iron and parchment. Ancient runes covered the walls in spirals, and in the center was a shallow basin filled with black liquid. It shimmered like oil, yet reflected no light.

Elijah stepped into the circle. Sera followed.

Professor Vellum himself officiated.

"This bond is not a contract of control," he said, voice low and echoing. "It is one of recognition. A thread spun by fate, sewn by will. Once linked, the pair shall share magic, burden, and dream. If either falls to the curse, the other shall follow—unless they break it first."

Seraphina's heart thudded in her ears.

Elijah held out his hand. She took it.

Their marks pulsed—his shimmered in shadow, hers glowed faintly with crimson.

The basin lit up, and a thread rose from it like smoke, twisting toward them, spiraling through the air before sewing itself into the center of their joined hands.

Pain stabbed her palm. She winced.

Then a voice echoed—not Vellum's.

"Witnessed."

The light flared, then faded.

The thread vanished.

But the link remained.

She felt it.

Him.

His heartbeat. His breath. His fear.

And something else.

A name.

Asphodel.

It echoed in her skull like a broken bell.

She staggered.

Elijah caught her.

"Did you hear it?" she asked.

He nodded slowly. "It's the Vault. It's waking."

They left the Sanctum in silence. Neither spoke until they reached the east garden, where wind rustled through black-leaved trees and the moon loomed above like a silent witness.

"I saw you," Elijah said at last. "When the bond linked. I saw... you as a child. Crying in a room filled with mirrors."

Seraphina tensed. "I was looking for my mother. She left me there for hours. I think she was trying to teach me something. Or break me."

"She wasn't just anyone, was she?"

"No. Her name was Evelyn Cole. But the school erased her. Every record. Every page. It's like she never existed."

"Because she found the Vault too."

Sera looked at him. "You're sure?"

He nodded. "The ledger confirmed it. Evelyn was the first to survive an attempted severance."

She swallowed. "What happened to her?"

"No one knows. Only that her last words were carved into the wall above the Vault before she vanished."

He took a breath.

"'The shadows aren't the enemy. They're the echo of what we left behind.'"

Seraphina shivered.

That week, everything accelerated.

Three more students vanished.

One was found—but broken. Silent. Eyes glazed. Sitting in the courtyard as if waiting for someone who would never come.

Elijah and Sera began experiencing shared visions. Sometimes they woke in each other's memories. Sometimes they saw things neither had lived.

And always, they heard the same name.

Asphodel.

In Library West, they finally found it.

Not a place. Not a person.

A spell.

Forbidden. Final. Described in a tattered scroll written by a seer who had sewn her lips shut after transcribing it.

Asphodel: A curse's cradle. A door to purge memory, soul, and form. The key to resetting the Vault.

"Resetting," Elijah murmured. "It's not just a seal. It's a cycle."

Seraphina ran her fingers over the scroll.

"It means every Vault-bound gets a choice. Fight the curse. Or become it."

The next day, the Headmaster summoned them.

Aurelius Thorn.

Tall. White-haired. Eyes like polished obsidian. Always calm, always watching.

"I've allowed this to continue," he said, voice as cold as winter. "Because I believe in convergence. In fate. But the school is breaking, and I cannot afford sentiment."

He placed a key on the desk.

"This opens the Chamber of Null. It was where the original founders first bound the curse into the Vault. You are not allowed inside. I'm telling you this because you'll disobey. And when you do, you must not fail."

Seraphina stared at him. "Why help us?"

He met her eyes. "Because once... I loved someone who bore the mark. And I watched the Vault take her."

He stood.

"If you fail, I'll seal it forever. With or without you inside."

They waited until midnight.

The chamber lay beneath the Mirror Hall. Beyond even the sealed staircases. They moved silently, cloaked by an invisibility charm Nyra had cast—one that burned through her reserves like wildfire.

The door opened with a sigh.

The Chamber of Null wasn't made of stone.

It was made of bone.

The walls were layered with skulls and runes carved into marrow. The air was cold. Too cold.

In the center stood a pedestal with a bowl—half filled with black water.

A mirror hovered above it.

Not a reflection.

A window.

To something else.

Seraphina stepped forward.

The mirror shimmered.

And she saw herself—not as she was. But as she could be.

Eyes glowing. Floating. Crowned in shadow.

She turned to Elijah. "This is where we end it."

"No," he said quietly. "This is where we choose."

She reached for the bowl.

The black water leapt up.

And everything shattered.