Chapter 58: The unwelcomed soul within

Chapter 58: Chapter 58: The unwelcomed soul within

His eyes dropped slowly toward his own hands. His fingers were trembling, faint but unmistakable, and he stared at them as though they belonged to someone else entirely.

"My body..." He looked back up at Ifrith. "My body was possessed?"

Ifrith said nothing.

"By who?"

Still nothing. Theon’s expression hardened, the pain in his chest momentarily forgotten beneath something sharper.

"Ifrith."

The primordial demon lowered his eyes to the floor. "This is not the time for you to know that, Master."

Theon stared at him for a long beat, then his voice rose, cutting through the quiet of the room. "I order you to tell me."

The air seemed to tighten around them both. "Who possessed my body?"

Ifrith’s whole body stiffened. An order was an order, and no matter how badly he wanted to swallow the words, his nature wouldn’t let him refuse one. "The man responsible," he said slowly, each word dragged out of him, "is the lover of the woman sleeping on the bed beside you."

Theon’s head turned toward the other bed. She was still unconscious, her chest rising and falling in slow, even breaths, utterly unaware of the storm she’d just been dragged into.

His expression shifted. "Who is she? And who is this lover you’re talking about?"

Ifrith drew a slow breath, the kind a man takes before stepping off a ledge. "His name is..." His voice dropped into something unusually grave. "Cryvathar Elnor."

{For pronunciation; kry-VAH-thar EL-nor. }

The name struck Theon like a bolt of lightning through the skull. His head throbbed violently, and he pressed both hands against his temples.

"Ah!"

"Why," he gasped, breath coming uneven now, "why does that name sound familiar?"

Then the vision hit him.

A man stood beneath a sky smothered in darkness, silver hair streaming out behind him like a banner caught in a gale. Tall. Slender. In his right hand hung a sword unlike anything Theon had ever seen, not a fragment, not a broken shard of something greater, but whole. Complete. The Eternal Frostblade in its entirety, humming with a cold that seemed to bleed out through the vision itself. The man’s eyes were the color of glacier ice, ancient and merciless, and when he moved, he moved like the end of something.

He swung the sword once.

A nation froze. Mountains folded under sheets of ice that hadn’t existed a heartbeat before. Rivers seized mid current, crystallizing from bank to bank in an instant. An entire army vanished beneath a wave of primordial frost that swallowed screams before they could finish leaving anyone’s throat.

The vision shifted. Another swing. Another kingdom brought to its knees in a single motion, another landscape buried under white silence, the destruction stretching further than Theon’s mind could hold.

Then it shattered, and he was back in the room, gasping for air.

"It’s him." His hand dropped slowly from his skull. "It’s actually him."

His eyes widened as the full weight of it settled in. "He took over my body." He turned to Ifrith at once, panic rising fast in his chest. "Did he cause any chaos? Did anyone die? Ifrith, explain everything!"

"Calm down, Master."

"No! Tell me!"

"No one died."

Theon froze mid breath.

"The only person who nearly died," Ifrith continued, "was the ancient elf."

"The ancient elf?" Theon frowned, confusion cutting through the panic. "What ancient elf?"

"The one you sealed."

"The one *I* sealed?"

Ifrith nodded once. "Wave your hand, Master."

Theon hesitated, then lifted his hand, and his storage ring flared with light. A cage materialized in the middle of the room, ice bars humming faintly with restrained magic, and inside it sat the ancient elf, arms folded, looking thoroughly unimpressed with his accommodations.

The moment Theon saw him, his expression changed completely.

"What?"

The elf lunged forward and slammed both hands against the bars. "Let me out!"

Theon pointed at him, bewildered. "What is he doing in my storage ring?"

Ifrith scratched the back of his head, sheepish. "You put him there, Master."

"I did?"

"Yes."

The elf’s face twisted with outrage. "I am the Dean ( headmaster) of the Imperial Academy!" He gripped the bars hard enough to whiten his knuckles. "Release me immediately, or I will see to it that you’re expelled!"

Lyra, who had been standing quietly by the bed, stared at him for a long moment, and her small face went dark. She walked toward the cage without a word.

The elf glanced down at her. "What does this little..."

*Smack.*

She slapped him.

The room went dead silent.

The elf turned his head back toward her slowly, disbelief written across every line of his face. "You..."

"You almost killed my brother!" Lyra’s voice shook with fury, small fists clenched at her sides. "And you still have the audacity to threaten us with expulsion?"

The elf’s eye twitched. "What does a little child know?" He jabbed a finger toward Theon. "Do you even understand what kind of monster your brother is?"

Lyra stepped forward again, chin raised. "He’s not a monster!"

The elf’s expression sharpened into something colder. "He is the Child of the Prophecy."

Everyone in the room went still.

"You don’t understand what will happen once that boy grows." His eyes cut toward Theon, and something almost like dread moved behind them. "The chaos he will bring upon this world..."

"Shut up."

Ifrith’s voice was flat and cold, cutting the elf off mid sentence. The elf stopped, and Ifrith’s eyes had gone frighteningly calm, the kind of calm that sat right on top of something much worse.

"Don’t."

The elf slowly lowered himself back down, looking, almost like a scolded animal. He muttered something under his breath. "But the magic he used..."

"I said shut up."

He closed his mouth at once.

Theon looked between them, lost. "What is he talking about? What magic did I use?"

Lazaria stepped forward, brow furrowed. "I don’t understand either." Her eyes moved between Ifrith and the elf. "Master deserves an explanation."

Eiralyth nodded beside her. "She’s right you know."

Ifrith sighed, long and heavy, the sigh of a man who’d known this moment was coming and had hoped it wouldn’t. "You used Grand Magic."

Theon’s eyebrows lifted. "Grand Magic?"

"Yes."

Something clicked in Theon’s memory. "The Eternal Frost Tome. I read about Grand Magic in it." He frowned, piecing it together. "It said Grand Magic was the highest form of magic that existed aside from the chains of levels like Primodial realm."

Ifrith nodded. "Correct."

"It said only beings approaching the level of demigods could wield it."

"Correct again."

"And it said even Primordials avoided using it, because of the cost."

Ifrith’s expression grew heavier with every word, and Theon caught it.

"What cost?"

Silence.

"Ifrith."

Still nothing.

"What is the cost?" Theon’s voice rose, and the windows nearby rattled faintly with it, an echo of power he didn’t fully control yet. "Tell me!"

Ifrith finally lifted his eyes to meet his. "Five years."

Theon blinked. "What?"

"Five years of your life."

The words landed harder than any blow he’d taken in that cave. "Five..." His lips trembled around the number. "Years?"

Ifrith nodded once, slow and grim.

Theon looked down. Five years. Gone, just like that, spent without his knowledge or consent. Five years of a life he’d barely begun to live. He’d been reborn into this world hoping for something different, a quiet life, an ordinary one, and instead, before he’d even learned the shape of this world properly, something ancient had reached inside him and taken the wheel. And now five years of whatever time he had left were simply gone.

The elf laughed, sharp and sudden. "Yes."

Ifrith’s head snapped toward him as he said.

"And your little friend isn’t innocent either." He pointed at his own chest. "That spell you used, Absolute Zero, it isn’t some ordinary ancient spell." His expression darkened. "You know exactly what it costs."

Ifrith’s fists clenched at his sides.

The elf smiled. " It chips away the caster’s lifeline."

Theon’s eyes cut toward him. "So you lost part of your lifespan too?"

The elf shrugged, unbothered. "Perhaps."

"Ifrith?"

Ifrith nodded grimly. "The Absolute Zero he used isn’t the version most casters know. The one he used was a blizzard domain. Its power spreads across everything within its range." He looked toward the elf, jaw tight. "If he had released it at full strength, he could have killed every person in that cave. Including all of you."

The elf’s smile faded, and for a moment something bleak crossed his face. "That would have been better," he said quietly.

Ifrith’s eyes went dark. "At least I wouldn’t have gone down alone."

Something in Ifrith snapped. He crossed the room in a blur and grabbed the elf by the throat, slamming him hard against the bars of the cage.

"You deserve to be killed."

The elf smiled through the pain, unrepentant. "I

Try it if you can."

"Ifrith." Theon’s voice cut through the room, steady despite everything.

The demon stopped, hand still locked around the elf’s neck.

"Don’t."

Ifrith let go. The elf dropped back into the cage in a heap, coughing but still faintly grinning.

Theon stared at the floor, the weight of it all finally settling into his bones. "I was possessed." His voice was quiet now, hollowed out. "And Grand Magic cost me five years."

Then the pain exploded in his chest without warning.

"AAAGH!"

He grabbed at his heart, doubling over.

Lyra screamed. "Big brother!"

Theon collapsed forward onto the bed.

"What happened?" Lazaria rushed toward him. "Theon!"

Ifrith’s eyes locked onto him, and his expression shifted into something close to alarm. "No."

Theon gasped between breaths. "What?"

"It’s coming out."

"What is?"

"The one who possessed you."

Theon’s eyes went wide. His body began to shake, tremors running through him that he had no control over.

"Get it out!" Lyra grabbed fistfuls of the blanket, terror plain on her small face. "What’s happening to my Big brother?"

A strange mist began seeping from Theon’s chest, blue shot through with veins of black, curling upward like smoke from something burning underwater. It rose from his shoulders, his back, gathering in the air in front of him and slowly folding into a shape. First an outline. Then a body. Then, finally, a face.

An invisible presence took form before them, and though no one could truly see him with their eyes alone, everyone in that room could feel him pressing down on the air itself. The pressure was suffocating. Ifrith’s knees buckled beneath it. Lazaria was forced down onto the floor, unable to hold her footing. The windows rattled violently in their frames, and somewhere across the room a chair leg cracked under strain that had no visible cause.

Ifrith gritted his teeth, forcing himself upright by sheer will. "What," he managed, breathing hard, "why is his pressure this strong?"

The figure opened his eyes slowly.

Theon looked up at him. "You."

The figure turned toward him first, then toward Ifrith. "You little child."

Ifrith’s eyes narrowed to slits. "Why did you choose him?"

The figure said nothing.

"Why Theon?" Ifrith took a step forward despite the crushing weight in the air, his voice rising. "Why him, of all people? What did you see in him?"

The figure’s gaze drifted toward Theon, and something like a smile touched the edges of his mouth. "Why don’t you ask the Emperor?"

Theon went still. "My father?"

The figure’s gaze sharpened further. "The current Emperor." A pause stretched out, heavy with implication. "Or should I say," and here his voice grew strangely distant, as though speaking from somewhere far removed from the room, "what am I even saying; he has always been the emperor."

Theon’s heart skipped. "What are you talking about?"

"The first Emperor."

Silence swallowed the room whole.

"The first... Emperor?" Theon repeated, the words feeling foreign in his own mouth.

The figure looked away from him. "Your father has a great deal of explaining to do."

Theon’s hands curled into fists. "Answer me!"

The figure’s head turned slowly back toward him, and a terrifying pressure erupted outward without warning. "Who do you think you are, to speak to me like that?"

Theon’s body trembled under the sheer force of it, but he didn’t look away, didn’t bow his head. "You’re inside my body." His eyes burned. "So answer me!"

Before the figure could respond, a weak voice broke through the tension from behind them.

"My..."

Everyone turned at once. The woman on the other bed was stirring, struggling to push herself upright, one hand gripping the mattress for support. Exhaustion still clung to every line of her face, but her eyes found the figure across the room, and everything about the moment changed in an instant.

"My love..."

The figure went rigid. The crushing pressure vanished all at once, like a held breath finally let go. The room fell quiet. Lazaria pulled herself off the floor. Ifrith could finally draw a full breath again.

The figure crossed the room before anyone could react, kneeling beside the bed and catching her just as she began to sway.

"You’re fine," he said, and his voice had changed entirely. Soft now. Gentle in a way that seemed impossible for something that had just shaken the whole room with a look.

She stared up at him, dazed. "Why," she whispered, lifting a hand to touch his face, "why are you in this form?"

Then her head snapped back, a sudden spike of pain twisting her features.

"Ah!"

She screamed, and her memories came flooding back all at once, not gently, not in pieces, but in a single overwhelming wave. Blood. Fire. A sword raised against a sky torn open. A battlefield stretching endlessly in every direction. Cryvathar, his silver hair matted with red, his body falling, one hand still reaching toward her even as he went down.

*Run. Don’t let them take you. Whatever happens, never let their hands touch the sword.*

The memory shattered and another rose to take its place. A dragon’s shadow passing overhead. Herself, running. The cave, cold and dark. Chains closing around her wrists. The sword, and her own blood on it. Cryvathar’s body, still and broken. The blade splitting apart, its power divided between two fragments that scattered into the world.

Then darkness, and she was back in the present, tears streaming freely down her face.

"You..." She stared up at him. "You’re dead."

The figure said nothing.

"What happened?"

He met her eyes. "Before I died, something happened." He paused, and whatever lay behind that pause seemed to cost him something.

"What happened?"

He didn’t answer. His gaze moved instead toward Theon, then Ifrith, then swept across everyone else gathered in the room. "I know this isn’t the time to discuss it."

She lowered her hand slowly, understanding settling over her features even through the grief.

Theon stepped forward. "Then explain it to me."

The figure turned to face him, expression composed once more, the softness from a moment ago folded away like it had never existed. "What am I supposed to explain?"

"What are you doing inside my body?"

"Haven’t I already told you?" He looked directly into Theon’s eyes, unblinking. "Ask your father."

Ifrith’s expression darkened like a storm rolling in. "You shouldn’t speak to my master like that."

The figure turned toward him slowly. "You may be a Primordial." His eyes went cold as glacier water. "But watch your tongue."

Eiralyth, who had stayed silent through all of it, finally spoke. Her eyes burned with quiet fury as she raised one hand.

Ifrith’s eyes widened. "Wait, don’t..."

Too late.

"Soul Prison."

A magical formation erupted beneath the figure’s feet, spreading outward in rings of light. The space around him twisted, folding in on itself, and in the next instant he was simply gone.

The elf, still slumped in his cage, blinked and glanced around in confusion. Then the invisible figure appeared beside him inside the bars.

The elf stared at him for a long beat. "Well." A grin spread slowly across his face. "Welcome, buddy." He shuffled closer. "Can’t we be friends?"

The figure turned toward him with slow, deliberate menace. "You." His teeth clenched. "I will still kill you."

The elf laughed. "You know you can’t."

The figure’s eyes narrowed further. "You know what happens if you do."

The elf tapped a finger against his own chest. "You know exactly what I’m talking about."

The figure’s jaw tightened until a muscle jumped along his cheek. He looked away, saying nothing more, and the elf’s smile only widened at the silence.

Across the room, Ifrith reached over and took Eiralyth hand. She looked up at him.

"That was too loud," he said.

"You almost brought the entire dormitory down."

She smiled faintly, unrepentant. "I was angry."

Theon sat back on his bed, holding his aching head, questions drowning his mind faster than he could sort through them. He looked toward the cage. "What did he mean? That you can’t kill him?"

The elf glanced up. "What?"

"He said he can’t kill you."

The elf’s smile returned, slow and knowing. "I suppose I can explain that much."

Cryvathar’s voice cut through the room at once, sharp with warning. "You don’t need to tell him."

The elf turned toward him, unbothered. "You don’t control my mouth." Then he looked back at Theon, and his smile settled into something almost gentle, which somehow made it worse. "My soul is bound to hers." He pointed toward the woman. "If he kills me, she dies as well."

The room went utterly silent.

"Every injury I take," he said, touching his chest lightly, "she feels."

"And every injury she takes," he added, glancing toward Cryvathar, "I feel."

Theon stared between them, understanding dawning slowly. "So that’s why."

The elf nodded. "Exactly."

"All those attacks in the cave."

"Transferred. Every one of them."

Ifrith’s eyes narrowed sharply. "You actually used that spell."

The elf looked over at him, and a knowing smile crept across his face. "The forbidden magic," he said softly. "Just like you."

Ifrit’s expression went cold as stone. "You know what it is."

The elf laughed quietly to himself. "You also used forbidden magic, didn’t you?" He stared directly into Ifrith’s eyes, unblinking, savoring the moment. "Or should I say," and his smile stretched wider, "the Dark One?"

A heavy silence dropped over the room like a curtain falling.

Ifrith’s expression changed, just for a moment, in a way Theon had never seen before.

The elf’s smile never wavered.

And Theon realized, sitting there with his head still throbbing and his chest still aching, that there were far more secrets buried in the people closest to him than he had ever let himself imagine.