"The storm does not ask. It claims. And the ones who dare meet its eye are never the same again."
— Fragment of the Lost Songs of Velasyr
The veil clings to my shoulders as I step into the dying light, the earth trembling beneath my boots.
The village is deserted. Doors barred. Windows shuttered.
No one to see me go. No one to call me back.
Only the wind, curling sharp and metallic around my ankles. Only the heavy hum of the air, pressing down like a second skin.
I walk. Past the well where I used to race my sister. Past the smoke-blackened forge. Past the tidepools that once held my laughter.
Every step feels like sinking. Like being buried alive in a world that decided it didn't need me anymore.
The veil flutters, catching the rising wind. The stones underfoot are slick with salt.
Above, the sky splits. Not with clouds. With light.
Lightning without thunder. Silent. Merciless. Blinding.
And from the torn seam between sky and sea—he comes.
At first, he is just a shadow among the mist. A shape too tall, too still, too wrong to be human.
The wind howls around him, but he moves through it untouched, a storm wrapped in flesh. Cloak billowing. Boots silent.
Eyes—Gods, his eyes—They find me before I find them.
Silver. Not like moonlight, but like the blade of a knife still wet from battle. Ancient and endless and terrible.
They see me. Not the veil. Not the offering. Me.
I want to run. My body screams for it. But I don't move.
I lift my chin instead. I let him see the girl no one else dared fight for.
If he came for a sacrifice, he chose wrong. If he came for a bride, he chose a wildfire.
He stops a few paces from me. The air between us crackles, sharp and electric, smelling of rain not yet fallen.
For a long moment, we simply stand there, storm to storm, waiting to see who will break first.
It isn't me.
When he speaks, his voice is low and rough, like a cliff crumbling into the sea.
"You wore the veil," he says.
Not a question. A verdict.
I swallow, my throat raw. The veil shifts against my skin, heavy now, full of every word no one ever said to me.
I square my shoulders.
"I wore it for myself," I say. "And I will take it off the same way."
Something flickers across his face. Not surprise. Not anger. Recognition.
Like he was hoping I would say that. Like he was waiting.
He lifts his hand. The world shifts.
The veil on my shoulders trembles—and with a sound like a sigh torn from the throat of the earth, it is ripped away.
It rises into the sky, a scrap of memory devoured by the storm.
A corner of his mouth lifts. Not quite a smile. Something sharper. Something almost—fond.
"So much for tearing it off yourself, ah?" he murmurs, voice rough with storm and dry amusement.
The words strike harder than they should. Not cruel. Not mocking. Almost as if he likes that I wanted to fight.
The air around us sharpens, crackling with unseen magic. The mist shivers.
And from the empty space between us, something new forms.
A veil. But not one woven by mortal hands.
It shimmers like spun glass and cloudlight, threads of crystal braided with the breath of the storm itself.
He steps closer. Closer than anyone has ever dared.
Without breaking our gaze, without asking permission, he lifts the new veil—and lays it over my shoulders himself.
His hands linger for a moment longer than necessary. Heavy. Certain. Possessive in a way that makes my breath catch.
The weight of it settles against my skin. Not crushing—claiming.
The circle of stormlight ignites beneath our feet, carving runes of fire into the mist.
He leans down, his voice a thread of thunder stitched with something quieter. Something almost broken.
"You are not theirs anymore," he says. "You are mine."
The storm roars in answer.
The veil clings to me now, crackling with the power of a thousand tempests.
The world tilts. The air hums with something deep and inevitable.
And before I can say a word, before I can catch a single final breath—
the storm takes me.