The wind howled through the rigging, a relentless force that threatened to rip the ship apart. Rain battered the deck in heavy sheets, drowning out the shouts of the crew as they fought to keep the vessel steady. Waves, black and churning, rose like the jaws of some ancient beast, dragging the ship into the abyss before hurling it skyward again.

  Somewhere below deck, in the dim glow of a swaying lantern, a young man sat with his back to the wooden wall, fingers curled tight around the edge of his tattered cloak. He had not spoken much since boarding, nor had he given his name freely. The others had called him "the branded one," muttered of bad omens, but none had dared question why he was on this forsaken voyage. Until now.

  "You’re too quiet," the woman across from him said. She was small, hooded, her features shadowed by flickering light. "Quiet men always have stories. And from the way you watch that door, I'd wager yours is a good one."

  He exhaled, tilting his head back against the wall. "It's not a good story," he murmured, voice rough from days of silence. "Just an unfortunate one."

  An older man, a mercenary sitting to his left chuckled, a sound as dry as old parchment. "Unfortunate enough to land you here? No man gets on this ship willingly."

  The young man did not answer immediately. Instead, he closed his eyes, listening to the groaning wood, the distant crash of waves. He had tried to forget, but the past clung to him like a stain, refusing to be washed away.

  The kingdom of Kamoran. The streets of its holy city, Veymar, gleaming with banners of faith. The sound of bells ringing in judgment, calling the faithful to witness his end.

  His hands clenched.

  "You want a story?" His voice was barely above the whisper of the sea. "Fine. I was meant to die five nights ago."

  "I was a thief."

  And then, the past dragged him back.

  The Holy City of Veymar, Five Nights Before the Voyage

  The marketplace was alive with noise. Merchants peddled their wares under brightly colored awnings, the scents of spice and roasted meat thick in the air. Holy banners fluttered from marble archways, golden embroidery glinting in the setting sun.

  Mathias moved through the crowd like a shadow, hood drawn low over his face, bare feet padding lightly against the cobbled street.

  He had done this a hundred times.

  A quick hand. A flick of the wrist. A purse lighter, a thief richer.

  His stomach growled.

  That roast duck hanging in the baker’s window called to him like a lover’s whisper. He had spent days scraping together enough stolen coin for passage out of the city—he deserved something before leaving this damned place behind. Who knows what was in that parcel, but it had to be valuable. *Should’ve kept your eyes on your things.* He thought.

  His fingers twitched as he neared the stall. The merchant was arguing with a customer, his back turned.

  Now.

  Mathias reached forward, fast and precise, his fingertips grazing the wrapped parcel—

  And then, a spark.

  A wrongness.

  It happened before he even realized what he’d done.

  A pulse of heat spread from his palm, golden embers crackling to life in the air. The spell surged unbidden, an arcane whisper he had never spoken aloud, a language he should not have known—

  The wooden stall ignited in an instant.

  The flames burst upward, hungry and wild, swallowing the awning in a rush of heat. The merchant screamed, stumbling back as crates of spices caught the blaze, filling the air with acrid smoke.

  Mathias staggered away, his breath caught in his throat.

  No. No, no, no.

  This wasn't supposed to happen.

  Magic was forbidden.

  Magic was a crime.

  Footsteps thundered against the stone. Gasps rose from the crowd.

  A steel-clad knight pushed through the masses, his eyes burning with righteous fury.

  "In the name of the Holy Tribunal," the knight’s voice rang like a hammer against steel, "you are marked."

  Mathias turned—and ran.

  His heart slammed against his ribs as he weaved through the panicked crowd. Behind him, the knight gave chase, his steel armor glinting in the firelight.

  The alleys twisted in on themselves, narrow streets choking him in stone and shadow. He had to lose him. Had to find a way—

  A dead end.

  He whirled, hands raised in useless defense. The knight slowed, stepping forward with deliberate intent, his longsword gleaming with sanctified steel.

  "By order of the Church of Veymar," the knight declared, "you will be judged for practicing forbidden magic."

  The sword lifted.

  Mathias' breath hitched—

  And the world shifted.

  The Gallows, Dusk of the Fifth Day

  The rope bit into his skin.

  Mathias’ hands were bound before him, his knees pressing against rough wooden planks. The platform was high, the noose tight, the assembled crowd a sea of silent faces beneath the morning sun. The bells had tolled at dusk, ringing through the gilded spires of Veymar with solemn finality. The city streets had emptied, save for the crowds gathering in the Grand Square, their torches flickering like fireflies against the encroaching night. He had been dragged from the dungeons, wrists shackled, his skin raw where the irons had bitten into his flesh. The scent of incense and damp stone clung to him, and above the jeers and murmurs of the gathered faithful, the High Inquisitor’s voice had rung clear and cold.

  "Mathias Renwyck, you stand condemned of heresy, witchcraft, and consorting with the unholy. Your soul is forfeit, your magic an abomination. By the decree of the Holy Tribunal, you are to be hanged, cleansed, that your taint may be purged from this world."

  The High Inquisitor stood before him, draped in robes of deep crimson, his face hidden beneath the white-gold mask of judgment.

  "You are an affront to the Holy Law," the Inquisitor intoned. "You have been blessed by the wrong god. You wield a gift that is a curse. And thus, you shall be cleansed."

  The crowd had roared in approval.

  Mathias clenched his teeth, his jaw locked in defiance, though his hands trembled against the bindings. He had known it would end this way. He had known it since the moment he had survived the fire. He had wanted to speak—to curse them, to deny them the satisfaction of his fear—but he had remained silent, his breath shallow, his mind racing. The noose of fate had tightened, and there had been no escape.

  The executioner had grasped the lever, his gloved fingers curling around the timber, ready to pull and end his fate in a snap. He wore a mask, face devoid of features, his eyes hidden. The mark on Mathias' wrist—the brand he was marked with in the dungeons for having summoned a flicker of unnatural flame—it burned. "I’m cursed" Mathias thought.

  A whisper, soft as a sigh, had brushed against his thoughts.

  "It doesn't have to be a curse."

  It had not been his own voice.

  "Do you wish to live?" The voice asked Mathias again. The voice pierced his mind like a needle. Not painful, but just noticeable enough to draw his attention to the crowd. There was nothing odd to see, the same 'people' who had roared in approval, a few onlookers clearly unwilling to watch the event unfold. Torches, pitchforks, a sea of faces and cloaks. And yet, amidst all of them, a single figure, stared right at him. Through him.

  The inquisitor continued. "May your sins be forgiven in the afterlife, wherever that may be. For you. Thief. Mage. The saint will guide you through." He hissed the words. His voice judging, tinged with malice.

  The surrounding torchlight caused shadows to cover half of the cloaked figure’s face. Though he could see their eyes, silver eyes. Like pinpoints of starlight in the endless void of the night sky. The eyes glowed, a golden hue, and he heard the voice once more.

  "It's a simple question." Mathias didn't understand, there was nothing simple about it, was there? Of course he wanted to live, but not here, this was a curse, he had been condemned. There was no life to live here, not for him. He had nothing left to lose, he was scared, angry, lost. This life had been his hell.

  "Yes." He finally spoke up, not sure if his voice would be heard.

  The inquisitor cocked his head in reaction. "What did you say? Any last words before you meet the saint?"

  Mathias looked up at the Inquisitor, smiling. "Fuck you, and your saint." He turned his gaze back onto the crowd, the figure was gone.

  The torches flickered, twisting and writhing, taking on a shape that was not wholly flame.

  The executioner pulled the lever.

  The noose snapped—loosened around his neck.

  The floor fell away beneath him.

  And so did reality.

  A pulse—deep, resounding, wrong.

  The rope severed, not by blade nor wind, but by something unseen.

  Mathias hit the ground hard, gasping as the air was knocked from his lungs. The weight of death had been upon him—then suddenly gone. The crowd erupted into chaos.

  "What—?" the executioner stumbled back.

  The Inquisitor’s masked face turned sharply toward the heavens. He saw it too.

  A flicker of something invisible, a resonance that hummed against the fabric of the world.

  The gallows exploded above, embers scattering like falling stars, and in the confusion—

  A voice in Mathias’ skull, distant and fragmented.

  "Run."

  Mathias did not hesitate.

  He bolted from beneath the gallows, shoving through the riotous crowd. Shouts and orders rang out behind him, the clang of armored boots striking stone.

  He had no plan. No destination.

  Just run.

  Through the twisting streets, through alleys choked with filth and smoke and stifling incense, past the golden statues of their saints, dodging patrols of city guards. The docks—he had to get to the docks. The only way out of here.

  His breath came ragged, his legs burning as he vaulted over crates, barrels, the detritus of the slums. He had not known where he was running—only that he had to get out, to flee the holy city before they could bind him again. A shadow darted beside him, someone else running, keeping pace.

  A rough hand yanked him into a side alley.

  "Keep quiet," a low voice muttered.

  Mathias’ wild eyes snapped toward his captor—a man, broad-shouldered and grizzled, his face half-hidden beneath the hood of a weathered cloak. He smelled of salt and old leather.

  A sailor. A smuggler.

  "Yer running from the Order, aren’t ya?" the man muttered, peering toward the alley’s opening.

  Mathias tried to catch his breath. "You don’t—understand—"

  "Don’t need to," the man cut him off. "You wanna live, boy?"

  Mathias nodded, desperate.

  The man jerked his head toward the docks. "Then come with me. I know a ship leaving tonight."

  Mathias swallowed hard.

  He glanced back toward the Holy City, toward the looming spires of its grand cathedral, toward the gallows where he should have died.

  "Was it you?" Mathias asked.

  "No, boy, and keep up."

  Then he turned—and ran toward the sea.

  In the end, it had been the docks that had saved him. A ship bound west for Equinar, taking on cargo and passengers desperate enough to pay. He had given them the last coin he had stolen before his arrest, hidden away in a stash and had boarded without a name, without a past.

  The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

  And now, he was here. A storm-tossed ship, surrounded by exiles and mercenaries, with no future beyond the next wave. The mercenary beside him let out a slow breath. "Damn." He leaned back against the hull, crossing his arms. "Holy bastards never did like people with a bit of magic."

  The woman in the hood remained silent, studying him with keen, thoughtful eyes. When she finally spoke, her words were quiet.

  "And what of the voice?"

  Mathias stiffened. She had caught the detail most would have ignored.

  "You said something spoke to you," she continued. "Was it your own magic, or something else?"

  A shiver crept down his spine.

  "Do you wish to live?"

  It had not been his voice. But before he could answer, the ship lurched violently, and the warning bell clanged from above.

  "Storm’s worsened!" a voice from the deck bellowed. "And—Gods! There’s something in the water!"

  The ship shuddered, a deep, unnatural groan echoing from the hull, and for the first time since escaping Uthremius, Mathias felt something colder than fear. The woman stood, her gaze lifting toward the ceiling.

  "Something’s found us," she whispered.

  Lightning split the sky, its jagged veins illuminating the churning ocean in brief, blinding flashes. The deck tilted sharply, sending loose barrels and ropes tumbling, while the ship’s timbers groaned like the ribs of a dying beast. Mathias staggered as the floor beneath him lurched, catching himself against the wall. Above them, the warning bell continued to toll, its frantic ringing swallowed by the howling wind.

  "This storm—" The mercenary beside him braced himself, eyes narrowing. "It wasn’t supposed to be this bad. We weren’t even near the damn coast yet."

  The woman in the hood did not move. She was listening—listening to something beyond the storm, her head slightly tilted as though catching whispers in the howling wind.

  "Brace yourselves..." she muttered.

  Mathias’ skin prickled. And then he felt it. A pulse—deep, throbbing, like a heartbeat buried beneath the waves. It rumbled through his chest, made his teeth ache, sent a wave of nausea curling in his stomach. The storm was not just wind and water. Something was wrong. And the sea knew it. Thunder cracked, deafening and close. The ship jerked sideways as if something beneath them had struck it—a force so massive, so deliberate, that the entire vessel lurched out of alignment with the waves, its hull screaming in protest. Shouts rang out from the deck above. Mathias locked eyes with the woman.

  "What the hell is happening?"

  She did not answer. Not immediately. Her hands were clenched, her breath sharp and steady as she whispered—not a prayer, but a reckoning.

  "This isn’t natural."

  Another pulse rumbled through the ship, like a second heartbeat hammering against reality itself. This time, the water responded. The ocean around them, previously chaotic in its rage, began to bend, ripple, and move in patterns that did not match the wind.

  Mathias stumbled toward the stairs, gripping the wooden railing as he hauled himself up onto the deck. And then—he saw it. Beyond the heaving waves, half-shrouded in sheets of rain, something stirred beneath the surface. Not just waves. Not just the sea. A shadow, deep as the abyss, moving with slow, deliberate purpose. A shape so large it should not have been real. Crew members shouted, their voices ragged with terror. The ship’s captain stood at the helm, knuckles white against the wheel, his face pale beneath the rain.

  "By the Gods," someone choked. "What is that?"

  Mathias felt his blood run cold. Because the shadow was rising.

  And as the lightning flashed again, he caught a glimpse of something impossibly ancient—a form so vast it could not be comprehended in a single look. A glistening expanse of scaled flesh, stretching for what seemed like miles beneath the storm-lit water.

  A single glowing eye, the color of drowned gold, rolled open beneath the waves, its pupil too large, too knowing. And then came the sound—a deep, resonant groan, not of rage or hunger, but of pain. Mathias gasped.

  "It’s not supposed to be here."

  A younger woman’s voice was beside him now, though he had not heard her move. She, too, was staring at the beast, her hood thrown back, soaked strands of dark hair clinging to her face. She was afraid. And then, the leviathan screamed.

  It was a noise unlike anything Mathias had ever heard—a deep, reverberating wail, something not meant for mortal ears. The sound split through his mind like a blade, his vision flashing white-hot with pain. The sea convulsed. And the world tilted as the leviathan’s anguish reached into the heart of the storm. The waves rose, towering walls of water crashing toward them from all sides. Wind and rain screamed through the ship’s tattered sails, tearing them apart as the vessel spun wildly, caught in the monstrous pull of the leviathan’s turmoil.

  Then—impact.

  A wave struck the hull with impossible force, splitting the deck as though it were paper. The mast snapped like brittle bone, crashing down into the sea. The ship’s frame buckled, splitting apart—boards shattered, men screamed, bodies were flung into the water. Mathias felt himself being lifted, the world turning into a blur of rain, wind, and darkness. And as he was pulled beneath the waves, his last thought was not of death. It was of the leviathan’s eye, gazing at him, knowing him. That same golden hue... And the whisper of something far older than the storm, reaching into his mind.

  "Veythar'kaan dosh irel'anakh."

  And then—nothing.

  Darkness closed around Mathias like a vast and endless tide. The weight of the sea crushed him, filled his lungs, wrapped him in a shroud of drowning silence. He tumbled through the abyss, the storm above a distant memory, swallowed by the cold embrace of the deep.

  But then—light. A flicker, faint and wavering, pulsed before him. No, not light—flames. The scent of incense filled his nose, the press of bodies in a crowded alley, the murmur of whispered deals. The storm was gone. The ship was gone.

  He was somewhere else.

  Somewhere he knew.

  Darkness.

  Not the suffocating black of the ocean closing in, not the mind-numbing abyss swallowing Mathias whole—no, this was something older. A space between thought and silence. Between fate and choice.

  And in that space, they watched.

  He had answered. Five nights ago, he had spoken the words.

  "Yes."

  The city of Veymar shimmered in the distance, its golden spires piercing a blood-orange sky. The streets, crowded with the faithful, pulsed with righteous fury. The bells tolled—their chime hollow, distant. Time fractured. A moment relived, reshaped, rewritten.

  There—on the gallows.

  The boy knelt, the noose tight around his throat, his wrists bound before him. He was young, barely past nineteen summers, but his eyes—those damned eyes—burned with something more. He was afraid. Yes. But deeper still—beneath the fear, the defiance—there was something else.

  A whisper of what he could be.

  The Tribunal’s decree rang out like thunder, the inquisitor’s voice soaked in venom. "You are an affront to the Holy Law. You wield a gift that is a curse. And thus, you shall be cleansed."

  Lies.

  The Tribunal did not understand what they sought to destroy. They never did.

  "You have been blessed by the wrong god." Ridiculous. If only they would stop seeing this world as black and white... If only they would see that *intent* is what differentiates right from wrong.

  In the crowd, unseen, they stepped forward. A slow, measured pace, weaving through the sea of faceless zealots. The torches flickered as they passed, flames bending, shifting. The brand upon the boy’s wrist pulsed, a mark of condemnation—but also of something else.

  "Do you wish to live?"

  They did not speak. Not aloud. Their lips never moved. And yet, the words curled into the boy’s mind like drifting smoke. His body tensed. His breath hitched.

  He had heard them.

  A flicker of silver light cut through the dark, barely noticeable, hidden beneath the dancing flames. His gaze found them, locking onto where they stood at the edge of the crowd.

  "It’s a simple question."

  He hesitated. Longer than most.

  Some would beg. Some would plead. Others would curse the gods, the Tribunal, the unfairness of it all. But this one—this boy with fire in his veins and ruin in his wake—he measured the weight of his answer before giving it.

  "Yes."

  The word rippled through the air. A single choice, a single moment. And in that moment, the path splintered.

  The inquisitor continued his ritual. The executioner’s gloved hands curled around the lever. The noose stretched, taut as the fate they had written for him.

  But they were already moving.

  The torches flared. Not fire. Not truly. Something that only those attuned could see. The Tribunal would call it blasphemy. The ignorant would call it trickery.

  They called it a beginning. A force to be reckoned with.

  The rope frayed—not cut, not burned, but unraveled, thread by thread, undone by something older than faith and far more patient. The moment the lever dropped, there was no weight to carry. The floor vanished beneath the boy’s feet—but the noose did not catch.

  Instead, flames bloomed from the gallows—a bright, searing rupture of heat and force. Not his doing. Not yet.

  The Tribunal screamed. The crowd reeled.

  "Run."

  He ran.

  Good.

  They turned before the embers settled, before the shouts rang out for soldiers and steel. Their task was not to carry him. Only to push him forward. The choice had already been made. The fire had already started.

  They walked away before the city burned.

  "Proud are we?" A patient voice questioned.

  "No, why do you ask, G????????a????e???????l???v???????y?????r?????n??????" They answered calmly, balanced.

  "Leave him be." Another voice pressed, commanding, powerful.

  "That's the plan."

  "What if he does not survive the journey? You should keep an eye on him..." Another voice continued, loving, caring, worried.

  "He'll survive—but as you wish, U?????????r????????y???????s???s??????a??????r?????a??????. I'll keep an eye on him. Though we have other things to worry about. A realm to explore, others to find."

  The vision frayed, dissolving like smoke beneath water. The gallows blurred, swallowed by the abyss.

  The darkness surged again, and the vision collapsed.

  The Depths – The Present

  Pain snapped him back.

  The darkness twisted, the memory of the past unraveling like sand in the tide. Mathias felt himself sinking, the weight of the ocean pulling him further down. The ocean gripped him tight, its cold fingers wrapping around his throat. The storm above was a distant echo, muffled beneath leagues of unfeeling black.

  But something watched him still. Not the Tribunal. Not the inquisitor. Not the hooded figure who had spoken into his mind ten nights ago.

  Something deeper.

  The leviathan’s eye.

  It glowed—vast and golden beneath the waves, that same hue, unblinking, unreadable. It was not a creature. Not merely. It was not beast, nor god, nor monster.

  It was a question.

  Just like before.

  "Do you wish to live?"

  Mathias' lungs burned. His body screamed. The ocean crushed.

  And yet—he knew the answer.

  "Yes."

  And then, the voice returned.

  "Wake."

  The golden glow faded from the leviathan's eye.

  Light.

  "Remember, it doesn't have to be a curse."

  A surge of golden light erupted from the depths, coiling through the abyss. The ocean convulsed.

  And Mathias breathed.