Chapter 58 The Gold And The Stone

Chapter 58 The Gold And The Stone
The Iron Peak did not want stones. It did not want the black sand of the lake. It wanted the Gold.
​Lila sat in the centre of the Great Hall, her back against a pillar that felt like frozen bone. The battle with the SOC was over, but a different kind of war was beginning inside her veins. She could feel her Thorne Blood moving. Usually, the Gold felt like a warm sun living under her skin, giving her strength and fire. But here, inside the mountain, the Gold felt heavy. It felt like it was being pulled toward the floor by a thousand tiny, invisible hooks.

​The mountain was a machine, and it was hungry for a battery.

​Across the hall, the pack was trying to settle. They were eating dry rations, their eyes darting toward the shadows where the Bone-Wolves waited. In the middle of them sat the woman, Sarah, and the boy.

​"Toby, eat your bread," Sarah said.
​Lila flinched. That name was a wound that refused to heal. She looked at the boy. He had messy hair and a small smudge of dirt on his nose. He looked exactly like a child should look after a long journey through the woods.

​But Lila knew the truth. Her brother, the real Toby, was dead. He had died ten years ago in the fire that took everything from her. She had felt his last breath. She had seen his body become part of the ash.

​So why did this boy have his voice?

​Lila closed her eyes. She tried to remember the real Toby’s face. She searched for the memory of the day they found the stream behind the manor. She tried to see his brown eyes eyes the colour of the earth.

​But she couldn't see them.

​Every time she tried to picture her dead brother, the image of the boy sitting by the fire pushed its way in. It was like a parasite. The mountain was erasing her real memories of her family and replacing them with these living "puppets."
​And she realised why.

​If she accepted this boy as her brother, loved him, and stayed here to protect him, the mountain would win. It wouldn't have to fight her for her Gold. She would give it up willingly to stay in the dream. The mountain was offering her a fake family in exchange for the power in her blood.
​"It’s a trade, isn't it?" Lila whispered into the dark.
​"It is a mercy," a voice answered.

​The Keeper of the Toll stepped out from behind the pillar. He looked at the boy by the fire, then back at Lila. "The world outside wants to kill you for your Gold, Thorne Queen. The SOC wants to put you in a cage and drain you like a well. But the mountain... the mountain offers you a home. It offers you the one thing the SOC can never give back."

​"My brother is dead," Lila hissed, her eyes glowing with a faint, angry violet light.

​"Is he?" The Keeper pointed a long, bony finger at the boy. "He breathes. He laughs. He calls your name. Does it matter if he was made by the mountain? If you stay, he is real. If you leave, he vanishes. Can you really kill him a second time, Lila?"

​Kieran approached her from the shadows. He didn't walk; he moved with a blurred, violet grace that made him look like a phantom. His skin was pale, and the gold spark that used to live in his chest was now buried deep under the violet weight of the mountain’s "gift."

​"Lila," Kieran said. His voice was low, sounding like stones grinding together. "Don't listen to him. Look at the Gold."

​Lila looked down at her arms. The veins in her wrists were pulsing. But the colour was wrong. The bright, pure Gold of the Thorne line was starting to turn a dark, bruised purple.

​"The mountain is drinking from you," Kieran said. He looked at Sarah and the boy with eyes that saw only the truth. "That boy isn't a child. He’s a mouth. Every time you look at him and feel love, you are opening a vein. You are feeding the Peak."
​Lila looked back at the boy. He was looking at her now. He stood up and took a step toward her.
​"Lila? Why are you talking to the scary man?" the boy asked.

​The voice was perfect. It was the exact pitch of her brother’s voice. It had the same slight lisp he had when he was excited. It was the voice that had cried for her when the roof of their house collapsed.

​"Stay away from me," Lila gasped, backing away.
​"Lila, it’s me! It’s Toby!" The boy ran toward her, his arms open for a hug.

​For a second, Lila wanted to believe it. Her heart screamed at her to reach out and hold him. To be a sister again. To forget the blood and the war and the SOC. But as the boy got closer, the violet light from the walls hit his face at a sharp angle.
​For one heartbeat, the mask slipped.

​Lila didn't see a boy. She saw a hollow shell made of grey mountain ash. She saw eyes that were nothing but empty holes filled with red light. She saw the Gold from her own body leaking out of her skin and flowing toward the boy like liquid light.

​He wasn't a brother. He was a straw, sucking the life out of her.

​"NO!" Lila screamed.

​She slammed her hands against the floor. A wave of violet fire exploded from her, throwing the "boy" backwards. He didn't fall like a person; he bounced like a piece of dry wood.

​Sarah screamed a high, mechanical sound that didn't come from a throat. She rushed to the boy’s side, her face twisting into a mask of pure horror.
​"You hurt him!" Sarah shrieked. "You hurt your own blood!"

​The pack scrambled back, confused and terrified. Ronan reached for his sword, his eyes darting between Lila and the crying child. "Lila, what are you doing? He’s just a boy!"

​"He’s not a boy, Ronan!" Lila shouted, her silver hair whipping around her face. "Look at him! Search your head! Tell me what colour his eyes were yesterday!"

​Ronan stopped. He looked at the boy. He blinked, his face contorting in pain. "They were... blue. No, green. They were... I... I can't..."

​He fell to his knees, clutching his head. The mountain was punishing him for trying to remember the truth.

​Lila turned to the Keeper. "You’re using my family to steal my Gold. You're using my grief to turn me into a battery for this mountain."

​The Keeper didn't deny it. He simply smiled, showing rows of grey, jagged teeth. "The Thorne Queen must reign. A Queen cannot reign without a throne. And a throne must be fed. You can leave, Lila. But if you walk out those doors, you leave your mother and your brother behind in the dark. You will be alone. Truly, forever alone."

​Lila looked at the boy. He was crying now, fat tears rolling down his cheeks. He looked so real. He looked so much like the Toby she had failed to save ten years ago.

​She felt her Gold surging, wanting to go to him. It wanted to heal him. It wanted to comfort him.
​But she looked at Kieran. Kieran, who had died to save the pack. Kieran, who was becoming a monster just to stay by her side.

​"I'm already alone," Lila said, her voice turning as cold as the mountain stone. "My family died in the fire. Anything else is just a ghost."

​She reached out and grabbed Kieran’s hand. The violet power between them flared, creating a shield of jagged energy that pushed back the shadows.

​"We're leaving," Lila told the pack. "If you want to stay in a dream that eats you, stay. But if you want to live, follow the Knight."

​The "Toby" boy stopped crying. He stood up, his face becoming smooth and blank once more. He looked at Lila, and for the first time, his voice wasn't her brother's. It was the voice of the mountain itself deep, ancient, and hungry.
​"The Gold stays," the mountain whispered through the boy’s mouth. "One way or another, the Gold stays."

​The iron doors of the Great Hall slammed shut.

The violet veins in the walls turned blood-red.

​The Midpoint had been reached. The sanctuary was a trap. And the only way out was to destroy the memories Lila had spent ten years trying to protect.