Chapter 129: Visions
The way for the Veil had begun. As the others prepared for the descent into the Dead Valley, Brienne lingered near the crumbling archway of the tower, one hand still pressed to her ribs where the bruises from Cassian’s blast bloomed beneath her clothes. But it wasn’t the pain that unsettled her, it was the pull, like something deep in her bones was calling to her. Thats when she mind traveled, and connected with her other half, who she didn’t want to acknowledge. She had a vision of a conversation, it was too really to be just a vision, oddly enough she had been having more of these visions lately…
She glanced toward Vincent, who stood with his arms crossed, his eyes fixed on the horizon. His jaw clenched, golden irises glinting in the morning light. There was something wild just beneath his surface, barely restrained. The storm had stirred more than just memories; it had awakened fragments of who he had once been, of the Umbrazin blood that still ran dormant in his veins.
“Are you going to keep pretending you don’t feel it?” she asked him quietly.
He didn’t look at her. “Feel what?”
“The way everything hums when we’re near the Veil. Like it remembers us and it’s waiting.”
At that, he turned to her. Shockingly, she saw fear in his eyes, but it wasn’t the fear of an enemy. It was fear of truth. Fear of what might happen if the past uncoiled itself fully.
“I dreamed of it last night,” he admitted, voice low. “The Umbrazin temple. The altar. Blood in the water. My hands... not mine. Someone else’s memory.”
Brienne stepped closer. “Then we’re both remembering.”
He nodded once. “And I think the Veil isn’t just a doorway, it's some sort of test.”
Brienne couldn’t snap out of it because it was such a wonderful sensation to be chatting with Vincent so eloquently, without suffering and large doses of torture. However, she was snapped out of it as Alaine past by her side and elbowed her with a grin.
Alaine continued lunging herself forward, and walked ahead with Leo, their boots crunching through ash and frost as they descended the outer slope toward the valley’s edge. The wind shifted with a hiss, carrying voices that didn’t belong to the living.
Leo rested his hand on the hilt of his blade. “This place gives me the creeps.”
Alaine smirked. “Everything gives you the creeps.”
“No, I mean it. That’s not wind. It’s... whispers.”
She stopped, frowning, and then she heard it too. Barely audible, but there: a chorus of murmured names, like prayers or curses echoing from the mouth of the Dead Valley.
“I think the Veil is thinning,” Alaine said. “And we’re about to walk right through it.”
Above them, on the ridge, Isla stood next to Damian as the group below began their descent. Her palm rested over the pendant Lucia had given her, and through it, a strange clarity bloomed. Their daughter stirred gently inside her, small, but already powerful and aware.
“She knows,” Isla murmured.
Damian tilted his head. “Knows what?”
“That we’re close… to something important.”
Damian’s hand moved to cover hers. “Then we stay together. No matter what’s down there.”
Behind them, Lucia arrived with Rohen. Her face was pale, but her voice was strong. “The Umbrazin bloodline isn’t as dead as we believed.”
Damian turned, startled. “You’re sure?”
Lucia nodded. “I saw them in the vision. Not just Vincent…others. Bound in shadow, sealed beyond the Veil. Whatever Cassian and Vincent want… it might not be Isla’s child he fears most.”
Rohen crossed his arms. “Then what?”
Lucia looked toward the valley, her eyes distant. “He fears what the girl might awaken.”
Night fell by the time the group reached the inner edge of the Dead Valley. The land stretched out like a wound beneath the moonlight, black stone and cracked earth, steam rising in coils where magic still simmered under the surface.
Here, the whispers were louder.
Brienne dropped to one knee, clutching her head as memories surged hers, not hers, fragments of lifetimes woven through the blood.
“They’re calling,” she choked. “The Umbrazin.”
Damian grabbed her before she fell, holding her upright. “Don’t listen to them. It’s a trick.”
“No,” she gasped, meeting his eyes. “It’s not. They’re asking us to remember who we are.”
Isla stepped forward. “Then maybe that’s the key. Maybe they’re not enemies. Maybe they’re waiting for us to wake them.” Damian shook his head in disbelief he could also feel it but did not allow for himself to fall into such a tedious, recurring and hindering situación.
From the shadows, the wind carried a new sound, one not of whispers, but of weeping.
Lucia stiffened. “We’re not alone.”
Damian stepped in front of Isla, his wolf on the verge of breaking through. “Show yourself.”
The mist thickened, and a figure emerged, tall, cloaked in fabric that seemed stitched from smoke. Its face was hidden, but its voice rolled like thunder muffled through centuries.
“You walk the path of the forgotten. The blood of the Umbrazin rises. The Veil will test you and only truth can pass.”
Isla held her ground. “What truth?”
The figure raised one hand. A ripple spread through the stone underfoot.
“The child is not the end. She is the gate.”
Gasps broke through the group. Damian moved to speak, but the figure was already gone, vanished in a swirl of mist.
Rohen drew his blade. “This is a trap.”
“No,” Brienne whispered. “It’s a trial.”
Isla reached for the pendant. It was burning hot now.
“She’s the gate,” she repeated. “Not just our hope. Our link to the ancient power.”
Lucia whispered, “And maybe that’s what Cassian truly fears. That she’ll open something even he cannot control.”
Damian’s voice was iron. “Then we control it first.”
Silence fell. The Dead Valley loomed ahead, a sea of shadow and old magic.
But this time, they would not walk it as prey. They would walk as heirs and the Veil would tremble.