Tian stood in the silver circle, breath held like glass.
Kaelin circled him slowly, one hand raised.
"Again."
He summoned the first glyph. It was not drawn. It emerged from the center of his chest, where instinct met memory.
The shape appeared in the air. A single curve that bent inward, lit with the color of truth.
Kaelin narrowed her eyes.
"Not enough. Dig deeper. You are not human when you summon this."
Tian clenched his fists.
He let go of the fear.
And the second glyph came.
It did not glow. It darkened the space around it, drawing light inward like a dying sun.
Elara watched from the stair, her hands wrapped in linen. She had not slept. Her voice had begun to echo when she spoke alone. When she wept, no tears came, only fragments of starlight that vanished before touching the ground.
Kaelin turned to her.
"You must leave the chamber. His glyph is not safe."
Elara did not move.
"I will stay. I have stood inside fire. I can stand near him."
Tian's eyes flicked toward her. A second too long.
The glyph pulsed.
It struck the air in all directions, shattering part of the sanctum's outer circle.
Tian fell to one knee.
Kaelin steadied the room with a snap of her wrist, weaving stabilizing sigils into the air.
"Let your mind speak first," she said. "Then let the glyph answer. Do not try to control something older than control."
Tian breathed. Nodded. Tried again.
Outside, the sky fractured.
Not with lightning.
But with light.
A column fell from the heavens, silent and sharp, cutting through clouds like thread through silk.
It landed in the center of the great courtyard.
From it stepped a figure.
Neither man nor woman.
Clad in white cloth that did not touch the ground.
Hair like melted ice. Skin that did not reflect light.
Eyes like polished judgment.
They walked forward slowly, leaving no mark where their feet touched stone.
At the edge of the courtyard, instructors fell silent. No guards reached for weapons. No glyphs were summoned.
The figure did not need threat.
They were threat.
Kaelin looked up from the sanctum stair.
Her face went pale.
"They have sent the Bound."
Elara stood beside her.
"What is the Bound?"
Kaelin's voice was a whisper.
"Not chosen. Not born. Made. Forged from purpose alone. It has no name. No history. It exists only for trials. It will not speak. It will not negotiate. If Tian fails, it will erase him without hesitation."
Elara's hands trembled.
"He is not ready."
Kaelin shook her head.
"He never will be. But he is all we have."
Down in the sanctum, Tian felt the change.
He rose to his feet.
The glyph behind him burned softly in the air.
He turned to Kaelin as she descended.
"They sent it."
"Yes."
"Is this the test?"
"No. This is the warning."
Elara walked to him.
She reached up. Touched his face.
"You saw what you are becoming. I have seen what I am becoming. Maybe the heavens built us for their end."
Tian held her hand.
"Then let them regret their design."
They stepped out of the sanctum together.
Up into the courtyard.
The Bound stood waiting.
It did not blink.
Did not move.
But it watched them with the silence of stars.
Kaelin followed but did not intervene.
The trial had not begun.
But the end had entered the room.
And the sky had turned its eyes upon them both.
The courtyard was still.
Tian stood beneath the weight of the sky. Elara at his side. Kaelin just beyond the circle, her hands folded behind her back, her eyes fixed on the figure of the Bound.
It had not spoken.
It had not drawn a weapon.
Yet the air bent around it, like wind around gravity.
The Bound stepped forward.
Once.
Tian tensed, ready to move.
But the figure only raised one hand.
A flicker of light passed from its palm and touched Tian's forehead.
He did not fall.
He vanished.
Elara gasped.
Kaelin caught her arm.
"Do not break the circle. He is inside the test."
"What kind of test?"
"The kind that turns memory into judgment."
---
Tian stood in a desert of mirrors.
No sun.
No sky.
Only endless reflections.
Each one showed a different version of himself.
In one, he wore a robe of fire.
In another, a crown of broken stars.
In a third, his eyes were gone, replaced by swirling glyphs.
He reached toward one mirror.
The glass melted into smoke.
A voice spoke, not from outside, but from within.
"You are not the first. You are the echo of failure."
Tian clenched his fists.
"I am not a copy."
"You are a continuation."
The mirrors flashed.
One showed Elara turning away from him.
One showed her lying still beneath a shattered sky.
One showed Tian alone, glyphs spinning madly from his skin until he dissolved.
"You were made to choose. And you always choose wrong."
Tian stepped forward.
"I choose again."
The voice hissed.
"Then remember what came before."
---
Elara swayed.
Her vision blurred.
Her fingers gripped Kaelin's arm.
"Something is pulling me too."
Kaelin turned sharply. "They are testing him. Not you."
"But they are showing me something."
Her eyes went wide.
She was not looking at the courtyard anymore.
She was inside a field of stars.
No ground. No breath.
And in the center, she stood — herself, but different.
Taller. Radiant. Unblinking.
And around her, hundreds knelt.
Bound figures.
Their faces were featureless. Their forms without flaw.
And they chanted a single name.
Not Elara.
Eleiyah.
Elara staggered back.
"I do not want this."
The vision shattered.
She dropped to her knees.
Kaelin moved to catch her.
"You were never supposed to see that. They are accelerating the test. It is not meant to be shared."
Elara looked up.
"I think it is not a test for Tian. It is a test for me. To see if I can be what they want."
Kaelin said nothing.
But her face said enough.
---
Tian emerged.
He stumbled forward, gasping.
His body was whole.
His mind felt split.
Elara ran to him.
He caught her.
Held her tighter than before.
"I saw what I could become," he whispered.
"I saw what they want me to become," she replied.
They held each other.
The Bound tilted its head.
Then it stepped back.
The light above it dimmed.
No words were spoken.
But a message was clear.
The heavens had seen.
And the trial was coming soon.
Kaelin approached.
"Rest while you can. They gave you one gift."
Tian looked at her.
"What gift?"
"Time."
Elara helped him stand.
But even as they walked back to the inner halls, both knew the truth.
Time was not a gift.
It was a blade held at the end of a heartbeat.
And their hearts were beginning to break in the same rhythm.