Veal

Intro Veilrend 45: “When the Shard Broke” It cracked in her hands—clean, sharp, final. Vael stared in disbelief as the shard split along a fault she hadn’t known existed, splinters of strange crystal raining down in slow, soundless cascades. No explosion. No light. Just the shatter, and then a terrible stillness. Something passed through her. A breath not her own. A pulse beneath her skin that didn’t belong. The city moaned in response. She pressed forward. She had to. The twisted streets of Dars-Myel stretched like a wound, every turn familiar and unfamiliar at once. Buildings she’d seen dozens of times now slouched in impossible ways. Windows blinked. Cobblestones pulsed underfoot, like they were breathing. Or waiting. Vael didn’t know what was wrong. Only that something had changed—subtly, profoundly. The shard was gone, but it had left a residue. A presence. Inside her, maybe. She couldn’t say. There were no answers here, only dread. A bone-deep unease that clung to her like fog. And the laughter. Soft at first, like a child’s game in the distance. She saw it then. Velith. A hunched little silhouette standing just beyond the streetlamp’s orange halo, swaying like a puppet on tangled threads. Its head cocked, too far. Its eyes were endless pits filled with delight. And hunger. It loved her confusion. Her grief. Her fear. It fed on it. Danced in it. And it followed. Always just out of reach, always smiling. Vael’s chest tightened with each step. The city rippled. Her shadow twitched wrong. The walls wept fluid that steamed on contact. Reality was unraveling and she didn’t understand why. She was lost. Alone. Then Velith lunged. She felt its joy before its body moved—glee at the kill. And then—it stopped. Mid-motion. Mid-strike. It reeled back. A shriek like a blade across glass ripped from its throat. It turned and fled, shriveling into the dark, howling all the while. Not from pain. From fear. Seris.