Chapter 1: The Cracks in the Concrete

Chapter 1: The Cracks in the Concrete

The scream died in Elara Vance’s throat, a strangled gasp that left her choking on the cold, stale air of her dorm room. Her heart hammered against her ribs, a frantic drumbeat against the sudden, deafening silence. The dream was already dissolving like smoke, but the after-images were burned onto the backs of her eyelids: a sky the colour of a dead television screen, a splintering mirror that reflected a twisted version of her own face, and the chilling, metallic scent of ozone and dust.

And Leo. Always Leo. His voice, not a sound but a feeling, a desperate echo calling her name from an impossible distance.

Just a dream, Elara. Get a grip.

She kicked away the tangled duvet, her bare feet hitting the frigid floorboards. A tremor ran through her thin frame, a familiar aftershock of the nightly terror. For years, they had called it night terrors, anxiety, delusional psychosis. Labels slapped on by tired doctors and even more tired parents. But the labels didn't explain the Ashen Mirror, the entity that haunted her sleep, or the gut-wrenching certainty that her brother, who had vanished without a trace five years ago, was still out there somewhere, trapped behind its fractured surface.

Her reflection in the darkened window was a pale, haunted thing. Dark, wavy hair a chaotic mess around a face that was all sharp angles and wide, intelligent eyes permanently shadowed with exhaustion. She tugged at the hem of her oversized hoodie, a useless gesture to hide the bones that pressed too sharply against her skin.

Clinging to routine was the only way to keep the cracks from showing. Shower. Coffee. Lecture. Repeat. She moved on autopilot, her mind a buzzing hive of leftover fear. As she stepped out of the residence hall, the damp chill of a British autumn morning bit at her cheeks. Blackwood University, with its gothic spires and ancient stone, looked more like a prison than a place of learning in the grey morning light. It was a world she didn't belong to, a working-class girl on a scholarship, the charity case, the weird one who sometimes stared at nothing with a look of sheer terror.

She was cutting across the main quad when it happened. A recent downpour had left slick, dark puddles on the flagstones. Her gaze dropped to one, and for a heart-stopping second, the reflection wasn't the overcast sky.

Staring back at her was a thing of writhing, grey limbs and too many joints, its body a glistening knot of chitin and shadow. It skittered across the reflected stone, its movements jerky and unnatural, before dissolving back into the ripples of the water as a group of students walked past.

Elara froze, her breath catching. The world tilted, the familiar buzz in her head sharpening to a piercing whine. It was happening more often now, these waking nightmares. The cracks weren't just in her mind anymore; they were splitting open the concrete beneath her feet.

“You saw it, didn’t you?”

The voice was low and sharp, cutting through her panic. She spun around to face a young man who hadn't been there a moment before. He was tall, dressed in a tailored black peacoat that made him look severe and out of place among the students in their jeans and university sweatshirts. His profile was aristocratic, his eyes a piercing, storm-cloud grey. He looked at her not with concern, but with a cold, assessing intensity.

Julian Thorne. She knew his name. Everyone did. He was from one of those old-money families, aloof and untouchable. He was also in her Art History seminar, where he never spoke but watched everything with an unnerving stillness.

“I… I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Elara stammered, clutching the worn silver locket around her neck. It was her anchor, the small weight that held a faded picture of her and Leo, smiling in a summer that felt a lifetime ago.

His eyes flickered to her hand, then back to her face. A muscle twitched in his jaw. “The things in the reflections. The whispers in the static. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll learn to ignore them.” He took a half-step closer, his presence feeling immense, suffocating. “Stay quiet. Don’t draw attention. Or they won’t be the only ones who notice you.”

Before she could form a reply, he turned and walked away, melting into the crowd with an unnatural ease. It wasn’t that he was fast; it was as if reality had simply forgotten he was there for a moment. Elara stood trembling, his words echoing in her mind. He knew. He had seen it too.

The encounter left her so rattled she barely registered her lectures. By late afternoon, a pounding headache had settled behind her eyes. She was heading back to her dorm, desperate for solitude, when two women intercepted her near the ancient oak tree by the library.

One was older, with warm brown eyes behind stylish glasses and auburn hair in a neat bun. She wore a tweed jacket and had the calm, scholarly air of a professor. The faint scent of old books and dried herbs seemed to cling to her. The other was her opposite in every way. Lean and athletic with a sharp pixie cut of silver hair, her gaze was intense and watchful. A faded scar cut through one eyebrow, and a black leather jacket was stretched taut across her shoulders.

“Elara Vance?” the scholar asked, her voice gentle but firm.

Elara’s anxiety spiked. “Who are you? Are you from the university administration?”

The silver-haired woman gave a short, cynical laugh. “Hardly. We’re the people you should have been talking to instead of those shrinks.” Her voice was blunt, with a street-smart edge that was utterly at odds with the academic setting.

“Seraphina, please,” the older woman chided softly, before turning her focus back to Elara. “My name is Kaelen, and this is my associate, Seraphina. We know what you’ve been experiencing, Elara. The nightmares, the visions… the Ashen Mirror.”

Elara’s blood ran cold. No one knew that name. She’d never spoken it aloud, not to a single soul. It was a secret locked away in the deepest, most terrified part of her mind. “How…”

“Because it’s not an illness,” Kaelen said, her eyes filled with a profound empathy that stunned Elara into silence. “It’s real. All of it. And you’ve been seeing it your whole life without the protection you need.”

Seraphina stepped forward, her expression impatient. “Look, we can stand here and talk all day, or we can show you. But we need you to trust us. Just for a second.”

Elara was trapped between years of conditioned self-doubt and the shocking validation in their eyes. Julian’s warning—stay quiet—flashed in her mind, but it was drowned out by a desperate, rising hope. What if she wasn’t broken?

She gave a tiny, jerky nod.

Kaelen smiled gently. “This might feel… strange.” She reached out and placed two fingers on Elara’s forehead. She whispered a single word in a language that felt older than stone, a word that vibrated in Elara’s bones.

For an instant, there was a sound like shattering glass, but it was inside her head. The world didn’t just sharpen; it fractured into a million new layers of reality. The air itself was no longer empty but thrummed with a web of ethereal energy, shimmering lines of faint blue and silver light connecting the trees, the stones, the very people walking by. A pale, ghostly creature with moth-like wings clung to the side of the library, invisible to everyone but her. The faint shimmer she sometimes caught around her own hands now blazed, a visible aura of power.

The sensory overload was staggering. She stumbled back, gasping, her headache exploding into a firework of pure shock. It was too much. It was everything.

And then, something new appeared.

Floating in her vision, as clear and sharp as a computer display, a translucent blue screen flickered into existence. White text scrolled across it.

[System Initializing...] [Calibrating Metaphysical Interface...] [Welcome, Weaver.]

Elara stared, her mind utterly blank, unable to process the impossible sight. A video game menu had just opened up in her brain. Kaelen and Seraphina watched her, their expressions a mixture of concern and anticipation, but they seemed unable to see the screen only she could.

Before she could even ask what a ‘Weaver’ was, more text appeared, bold and demanding. The words made her heart stop, then restart with a single, powerful surge of adrenaline that banished all fear.

[Primary Quest Issued: Rescue the Anchor.] [Target: Leo Vance.] [Status: Alive.]