Chapter 1 — The Perfect Days Before
Rowan Ashfall was thirteen the day the sky stopped meaning safety.
He had never known hunger.
Never feared the dark.
Never once wondered if his parents would come home.
In a world where most children whispered stories of monsters beyond the city walls and prayed not to be Chosen, Rowan lived like a prince behind glass.
His parents worked for the Trial Containment Facility—one of the best-funded in Kael'var, the continent-sized fortress-city still fiercely defended against the wasteland beyond.
It paid well. Dangerously well.
But they were survivors. Old Seeker-Class veterans who'd returned from their own Trials decades ago.
People like that didn't die easily.
Their home sat on a tiered hillside overlooking the sprawling city-fortress below. The villa was built with thick walls of Riftstone, humming faintly with wards and ancient sigils, standing as a bastion of safety against a world gone mad.
Inside, the hum of air purifiers filtered clean air through every room, a constant whisper of life within stone and steel.
Outside, in the garden, lavender stalks swayed gently, their scent thick and sweet in the air. Tiny engineered bees buzzed lazily around the flowers, their delicate wings stirring soft currents of warm air.
Rowan's father's hands were rough but gentle, calloused from years of tending grass and stone, coaxing each blade to stand tall and even in the perfectly trimmed lawn.
His mother smiled often, her eyes bright with quiet strength and endless patience, the kind that promised safety even when the world outside offered none.
The stars above Kael'var flickered faintly against the night sky, their cold light bathing the city's silver towers, as if watching, protecting.
From Rowan's bedroom window, he could see the Containment Dome rising in the distance—a great silver arc cutting into the sky like a half-moon, sacred and untouchable. It shimmered softly in the sunlight, a constant reminder of the delicate barrier between the controlled world inside and the chaos beyond.
School was easy for Rowan. The bright rooms and synthetic sunlight of the academy felt worlds away from the shadows in the streets below.
He excelled at memory games, historical recounts, and simulation puzzles—his favorite distractions from boredom. The rare moments when he felt alive were buried between lessons and chores, safe but dull.
His parents never spoke of their past Trials, those dark days when they faced the Veil's merciless judgment and returned broken but alive. And Rowan had long since learned not to ask.
Once a month, his father would take him into the Containment Hall—not deeper than the main entrance, but enough for Rowan to peer through thick glass walls.
Below, dozens of teenagers floated in stasis tanks, faces serene and eyes closed, untouched by time.
Boys and girls between fourteen and nineteen—each called by the Veil.
None older. None younger.
Until him.
It happened on a Thursday.
Rowan was out in the garden, watering lavender stalks that buzzed with tiny bees, his fingers tracing the smooth leaves. The scent wrapped around him like a cloak—soft, calming, unreal.
His mother's voice came from the open kitchen door, half-laughing at something he didn't catch.
The sun was warm, slipping toward afternoon, the shadows stretching long and slow.
Then, his knees buckled.
A soft, sudden pull at the back of his skull, like a thread caught on a jagged nail.
His breath caught. The watering can slipped from his hand, water splashing onto the soil.
His vision tunneled, narrowing until all he could see was a pinprick of light.
His mother's voice called his name—faint and distant, dragging like melted wax.
Slow. Unreal.
His body collapsed before the panic reached his heart.
And then
Silence.
No pain.
No light.
Only the sensation of being scraped clean, as if his very self was peeled away in layers.
Rowan tried to scream—
But he had no mouth.
Tried to move—
But he had no body.
The Veil had taken him.
And nothing, not even all the wealth in the world, could bring him back.