They found the entrance to the Vale at dusk.
The sky here had always been a muted blue--neither day or night. As Lucian took a second look at the trees, he noticed they didn't have any leaves. Instead, there were glyphs etched into their trunks, like someone had carved out memories with a trembling hand.
Lucian said nothing as they crossed into the threshold.
But the moment he stepped over the boundary stone, the world shifted.
A ripple, like breath caught in a throat.
The others kept walking—Merry, Cadrel, and Alice. They didn't notice he'd stopped.
That was because in their eyes, he hadn't. Not visibly.
But the world around him had become surrounded by fog, and then slowly peeled back.
+
He stood now in a wide, cold room with slate-colored floors. A black desk. A chair that creaked. And shelves upon shelves of mortuary textbooks, ritual guides, and Crown-approved ethical frameworks.
Lucian's eyes widened when he realized.
This looks like my mortuary school on Earth.
