The bell rang, signaling the last class of the day for Nova. Just as she came out from the class, Elara was out, waiting for her. The hallway didn't flood with noise the way it usually did. Whispers died. Footsteps halted. Even something about the air felt different, denser, like the academy held in suspense.
Elara's arm suddenly shot out, catching Nova by the wrist,
"Don't move," she hissed, eyes wide, "He's coming."
Nova blinked, "Who?"
The answer came in the form of silence, complete and smothering as Rhyd turned the corridor, black coat trailing behind him like smoke.
He didn't walk. He strode, slow and deliberate. His coat bore silver in laid runes curling up his sleeves, a rank no student dare questioned. He seemed angry, as if something had pissed him.
Students stepped aside. Not out of respect, but instinct.
Behind him came Jude, with a smile and Alex, silent and watching. The trio passed through the corridor like wolves through a field of rabbits.
Then, he stopped.
In front of her.
Rhyd turned his head, eyes locking on Nova like she'd pulled the sun from the sky and pocketed it.
The hallway held its breath.
He then dropped something, a single chess piece, matte black. A queen. He had been playing with it earlier. No words. The piece clinked as it hit the floor, rolled once then stopped perfectly at her feet.
"What just happened?" Jude whispered to Alex with a crooked smile.
Nova didn't move. Couldn't. Her heart thundered in her ears. When she looked up again, they were gone like shadows.
"You've just been marked." Elara exhaled.
Nova picked the chess piece, placing it in her pocket as she left the scene. The students there gave her some pitiful and disdain looks which put her in the spotlight which she tried to avoid. So with no choice she had to flee the scene.
~
Back in her dorm, Nova sat on her bed staring at the chess piece.
She wondered why on earth Rhyd gave her that, and why she was marked. She had so many questions.
The piece was smooth, darker than onyx. She turned it on her finger and winced. A tiny thorn on the crown of the queen pricked her thumb.
A bead of blood welled up, slid over the surface.
The piece shuddered.
With a sudden crack, it split down the middle, unfolding like it had been waiting, like a pod blooming. Inside was a silver thin parchment. She unrolled it, her blood smudging the edges and saw an outline of the school.
But this map had rooms, she'd never heard of. But then, she was still new.
One of them, far below the main floors, was marked in scrawled ink: 'Hollow Mirror - Below'
"What is this?" She whispered.
Behind her, Eris had just entered. She took one look at the opened chess piece and froze.
"Is that... his piece?"
Nova nodded mutely.
Eris voice dropped an octave. "That's the Virellian sigil. Rhyd doesn't give those. It's either a duel, death sentence... or an invitation to something worse."
Nova turned back to the mirror above her desk and gasped.
Her reflection wasn't moving.
It just smiled.
Previously, Rhyd was in the library in the west wing past curfew. Morwenna was making rounds to catch the trespassers when she spotted Rhyd.
"Are you looking for something?" She asked as she approached him.
Rhyd opened the next page taking his time before he looked up at her and said, "You know the Prophecy of the Celestial." Without waiting for her answer, "The new girl, the mirrors are calling her."
"Whatever you are planning, is not safe! The demons are starting to rebel and if they..."
"She's the last Celestial. The key."
"Rhyd, Whatever you're planning it's not safe. " Morwenna tried to persuade him.
"You already knew." It was more like a statement before he stood up and disappeared.
~
She should've turned back.
She knew that.
But some part of her, some deep, reckless instinct, pulled her forward.
The hallway beneath the East wing wasn't on any map she'd seem. Dust clung to the walls, strange mirrors lined the stone, each veiled in runes. All covered. All watching. She stepped into the grand hidden hall of Hartley's forbidden archives, the air hummed with ancient energy. The walls were lined with tomes bound in what looked like flesh.
Nova's steps echoed louder than they should have.
Until she reached the end.
And saw him.
Rhyd, at the center of the room, his fingers tracing a massive, obsidian door covered in celestial runes. Hos voice low, almost reverent.
"It is called it the Eclipse Gate. The last thing your ancestors ever sealed and locked away."
Nova's breath hitched in confusion, "What are you talking about?"
"You really don't know, do you? This is where they trapped them." he said, "Your ancestors called it mercy."
Nova walked back as she was becoming scared since Rhyd seemed scary and with the weird talk he was saying. She barely oved before black tendrils spear through the pillar behind her, inches from her throat.
"The last celestial..." he started approaching her.
"What are you doing?" Nova whispered as her legs shook in fear, not daring to move.
"Open the eclipse gate."