Much more time had passed. Cal continued to stare out the window of the runecarriage, while Vincent slept soundly on his shoulder. Nothing swam through Cal's mind besides the conclusion he arrived at some time ago.
It should've come as a surprise to him. Yet every time he continued to ponder on it, the more sense it made. The more the pieces connected.
The more he felt was hidden from him.
Did Granddad... did he know this whole time, and just didn't tell me?
The thought prodded with no end, and it kept on filling Cal with more doubt. If he really was an Ecliptic, then would the signs have been there from the start?
Was I always like this? That light... could I have always used it?
The question refused to leave him alone.
He'd always been told he was ordinary. Too quiet. Too observant. A boy who lingered on the edges of conversations instead of stepping into them. But now, looking back, the memories felt… skewed. As if something subtle had been threaded through his life, something he'd never been given the words to name.
But what if it really had been this?
Cal's jaw tightened.
And if it had been, then there was no way Darius wouldn't have noticed.
He always watched Cal closely — never an inattentive man, more like someone waiting for a blade to slip free of its sheath. Every question thus far about Ecliptics, the Empire, Cal's own parents, had been met with sharp dismissal. Either it drew out cold silence or something worse.
Anger. Raw and unfiltered.
At the time, Cal had chalked it up to grief. To bitterness. To a past better left forgotten and never spoken of. But now, that pattern was impossible to ignore.
You knew! You had to have known... and you didn't even think to tell me!
Cal felt a bitter edge creep in with these thoughts. The realization burned hotter the longer he sat with it. Not just the secrecy — but the choice behind it. The decision to say nothing. To let Cal stumble through ignorance while the truth festered just out of reach. If Darius had truly been trying to protect him, then why did it feel so much like abandonment?
His fingers curled slowly in his lap.
He didn't want to be angry. Not after leaving Darius and not after leaving the life he's always known. But resentment seeped in all the same, quiet and corrosive. He'd rather have been warned. Prepared. Told.
As his shoulders sagged — and he began to truly accept the reality of it all — something shifted.
A sudden tug pulled sharply behind his eyes, like an unseen thread being drawn taut. Cal sucked in a breath as a faint chill crept down his spine, cold and deliberate, settling deep beneath his skin. It wasn't pain. It wasn't fear.
It was awareness. The same as the time before he entered the tunnel in search of the fugitive with Vincent. And it continued to linger.
It did not fade the way fear often did, nor did it dull with time. It stayed taut, coiled just behind Cal's eyes, like a finger resting lightly on a trigger. The hum of the runecarriage — once steady and rhythmic — seemed to shift around it, the sound growing uneven, subtly arrhythmic.
At first, Cal thought it was his imagination.
Then the carriage lurched.
Not violently. Just enough to break the illusion of smooth motion. The floor trembled beneath his boots, and the faint rattle of metal echoed down the length of the cabin. Outside the window, the sigil-etched rails glowed as they usually did — but only for a moment.
One flickered. Then another. Until it all stopped completely. And the runecarriage responded in kind, its forward momentum slowing as if pushing against unseen resistance.
Cal straightened.
The tug behind his eyes sharpened.
"Vincent," he murmured.
Vincent stirred against his shoulder, his eyes flickering open and his brow furrowing as consciousness started to seep into his bones. He yawned softly, lifting his head, blinking away sleep.
"Huh?" he asked with a yawn. "What's up?"
His gaze drifted past Cal, toward the window opposite them. The drowsiness vanished from his expression, replaced by something sharp and alert. His eyes widened.
"Cal," he said quietly.
Cal turned his head to follow Vincent's line of sight.
The cityscape of Vireldawn had now diminished completely. Stone and steel gave way to soil and shadow. But that wasn't what seemed so concerning. This was an entirely different matter.
Trees rose in the distance — tall, skeletal shapes with twisted limbs and bark darkened by age and rot. Their branches tangled overhead, forming a jagged silhouette against the dim sky. A thin mist clung low to the ground, curling around their roots like something alive.
The runecarriage crept forward now, its speed reduced to a crawl.
"That's not right," Vincent said, staring down at his seat and the rest of the transport. "The runecarriage shouldn't be slowing down, or else that means the protective charm isn't working."
Cal quirked an eyebrow. "Protective charm?"
Vincent nodded in response. "Yeah. I heard that runecarriages that head to Nareth always pass by this place. And because of that, it bears a protective charm that makes it invisible to the outside as it runs."
Cal's eyes widened, now starting to connect the dots together. "Are you saying...?"
Vincent looked out the window again, noticing that the runecarriage was almost at a complete stop. "Yeah, the charm's stopped working. And at the worst possible spot."
Cal's stomach tightened.
The trees loomed closer with every passing second. As the carriage crossed the threshold where stone gave way to soil, the sigils beneath them flickered wildly, their glow sputtering and snapping out of sync entirely. Several went dark altogether.
The hum of the runecarriage faltered.
Once. Twice.
Then it coughed — a harsh, grinding sound reverberating through the cabin — before lurching forward one final time and grinding to a halt.
"...Cal," Vincent started. "You recognize those trees, don't you?"
Cal didn't need to be told twice.
He knew them.
Not from sight — but from stories whispered in low voices, told only when the fire burned low and the night pressed close. Tales Darius had spoken sparingly, always with a warning in his tone and a tension in his shoulders Cal hadn't understood at the time.
Trees that never fully died. Roses that smelt of rot. A forest that grieved yet caused the reason behind such grieving.
"The Mourning Forest," Cal breathed.
Vincent nodded. The name struck like a hammer.
Cal could feel his stomach drop. He remembered lying in bed one night as a child, his body pressing into the mattress, listening to his grandfather's voice harden as he spoke of this place.
"The Mourning Forest feasts on everything with what it bears," Darius once said. "If a man enters that place, he'll have only succumbed to death or madness. Or, he'd have emerged from it as a beast. And even if he didn't look like one, you could never be sure."
Cal swallowed. With a final, jarring shudder, the runecarriage slowed completely, stopping in its movements. No hum, no vibration. Just the distant creak of branches swaying somewhere beyond the glass, and the faint, unnatural stillness of the forest pressing in from all sides.
Cal sat unmoving, eyes fixed on the darkened sigils beneath the carriage, half-expecting them to flare back to life. They didn't. The runecarriage remained inert as though the rails themselves had gone dormant.
Then footsteps sounded. They were measured. Unhurried.
Cal and Vincent's heads snapped up as they saw a man was walking down the aisle toward them.
He hadn't noticed him before. In fact, Cal was certain there hadn't been anyone else in the cabin moments ago. Yet there he was now — a tall, lean figure in a conductor's uniform of deep indigo and brass trim, his polished boots echoing softly against the floor with each step.
The man stopped a few feet away and inclined his head politely.
"Sorry for the inconvenience, gentlemen," he said with a calm voice. "It seems the runecarriage has stalled."
Vincent blinked, glancing around the cabin, then back at the man. "Stalled?" he repeated. "Here?"
"Yes," the conductor replied simply. "I'm afraid the sigils beneath us have fallen out of alignment. These things happen from time to time."
Cal frowned. "From time to time? Here of all places?"
The conductor followed his look without turning his head, eyes sliding toward the trees as if acknowledging an old acquaintance. "Especially here."
That did nothing to settle Cal's nerves.
"So, what now?" Vincent asked. "Can it be fixed?"
The conductor clasped his hands behind his back. "Not by me, I'm afraid. However, there is another terminal a few miles north of our current position. You should be able to catch another runecarriage there — one that will carry you the rest of the way to Nareth."
Vincent's jaw hit the floor. "A few miles?"
The conductor nodded.
"IN THERE?" Vincent asked incredulously, gesturing to the forest.
The conductor's expression did not change. "It's the most direct route."
Vincent sputtered in response, his eyes frantically switching between the conductor and the forest in bewilderment and confusion.
"Y-You're kidding," he said. "You're just letting us off here? With no protection?!"
The conductor reached into his coat and withdrew a small slip of parchment, folded once down the middle. He extended it toward Cal.
"Take this," he said. "It bears my signature. Present it at the next terminal, and the fare will be accounted for. You will not be charged for the inconvenience."
Cal hesitated before accepting it, staring at the parchment like it grew three heads. The ink was dark and precise, the script elegant. At the bottom sat a looping signature, the name unfamiliar to him.
Vincent leaned closer, lowering his voice. "You're serious."
"Entirely," the conductor said.
Cal looked up at the conductor, disbelief and a slight sting of perfidy etched along his expression. "And the forest?"
At that, the man finally turned his head fully toward Cal. His eyes were sharp, reflective — like glass catching moonlight.
"You need only head north," he said. "Follow the moonleg lilies. They grow in clusters where the ground remains passable."
"Moonleg lilies?" Vincent echoed. "Those are real?"
The conductor smiled faintly. "Very."
Cal opened his mouth to say more — to object, to demand an explanation, to ask why an adult would ever think this was acceptable — but something tugged at him again. That same sensation behind his eyes. A warning. An urgency.
The conductor stepped back.
"I wish you a safe journey," he said, inclining his head once more.
And then he turned and walked away.
Cal rose halfway from his seat. "Wait-!"
His voice echoed down the aisle. The cabin was empty.
No retreating footsteps. No closing door. No sign the man had ever been there at all.
Cal's breath caught. He turned in a slow circle, scanning the length of the runecarriage. Rows of vacant seats stared back at him, untouched and silent.
Vincent stood abruptly. "No. No, that's not-" He moved down the aisle, peering between seats. "He was just here."
Cal's fingers tightened around the note.
The forest pressed close beyond the glass, its twisted limbs swaying despite the absence of wind. The carriage lights flickered once, then dimmed, casting long shadows that stretched and bent unnaturally along the walls.
Vincent stopped, running a hand through his hair. "So… what now?"
Cal didn't answer right away.
Lost. That was the word that settled in his chest. Lost in a place he'd been warned about his entire life, armed with nothing but a story, a scrap of paper, and a direction whispered by a man who may not have existed at all.
His gaze drifted to the window again.
North.
The tug behind his eyes tightened — not painfully, but insistently. Like a hand at his back.
"Cal?" Vincent asked. "Are you okay?"
Cal exhaled slowly. "Yeah. I just…" He looked down at the note, then folded it carefully and slipped it into his coat. "We don't have many options."
Vincent frowned. "You're not actually considering doing what he said."
"Do we have any other choice?" Cal asked.
"That's insane! You know how dangerous this place is! We'll die!" Vincent responded.
"Maybe," Cal admitted. "But staying here isn't any better."
The runecarriage sat dead on the rails, a metal shell surrounded by rot and shadow. Whatever protection it had once offered was gone. Cal could feel that much clearly.
He stepped toward the door.
"North," he said quietly. "Moonleg lilies."
Vincent hesitated, then followed. "I hate this."
Cal paused at the threshold, resting his hand against the door. For a moment, he thought of Darius — of the stories, the warnings, the things left unsaid. Then he pushed the door open.
Whatever lay ahead of them both was far better to face than going back to being caged by expectations. The forest air spilled in, damp and heavy, carrying the faint, unmistakable scent of flowers tinged with rain and decay.
Somewhere ahead, pale figures resembling legs rose from the soil, reaching just below the knee. Their stalks were the color of exposed bone, smooth and unnatural. Each bloom curved downward into a crescent, petals overlapping but never fully opening.
The petals were as dark as a moonless sky — yet from within them, a soft glow pulsed, faint but steady, casting just enough light to reveal the forest around them.
Moonleg lilies.
"Cal..." Vincent began shakily. "I'm not sure we should-"
"Stick close to me, will you?" Cal asked, cutting him off. "Nothing's going to happen to us. We're making it to Nareth! Alright?"
Vincent's eyes widened momentarily before he nodded. "Okay..."
Cal stepped down onto the soil, the tug behind his eyes easing just slightly — as if satisfied.
Whatever waited for them in the Mourning Forest, it had already begun to move. And most that came before were never the wiser.