Free Web NovelChapter 347: Chapter 347
When Circe fell asleep that night, she did so wrapped securely in Ragnar’s strong arms, his steady breathing warm against her hair. She did not know how long she slept, nor when the world around her began to shift, but when she opened her eyes, it was not the familiar silk-draped walls of her bedchamber that greeted her. Instead, she found herself surrounded by the rough, timeworn stone of the cave that she often dreamt of.
The air was cool and damp, heavy with the smell of wet rock. Pale blue light shimmered faintly against the walls, cast by the cerulean pool that lay at the cavern’s heart. She was lying in the same place she always did, upon the large jutting rock that faced the water.
Circe pushed herself upright and brushed the dust from her clothes, small grains of sand falling away at her touch. Her gaze swept the cave in search of Dena, but there was no sign of her.
Perhaps she would have to go looking.
It would not be the first time Dena had summoned her here only to remain unseen, waiting for Circe to seek her out. Maybe there was something Dena wished to show her, something she could only discover by venturing deeper into the cave.
And yet, even in the stillness, Circe felt an unshakable sensation. The feeling crawled along her spine like cold fingers, prickling at the nape of her neck. It was as though unseen eyes lingered in the darkness, studying her.
Circe slowly turned in a circle, her gaze combing through the jagged rock formations and shadowed alcoves. Just as before, she saw nothing. There was no movement. No figure emerging from the gloom.
Still, the sensation refused to fade.
It was not the first time she had felt watched in this place. But lately, the awareness has heightened. It pressed closer now, as though whatever observed her had drawn nearer. The more attuned she became to her abilities, the more she felt it, like an itch beneath her skin that could not be scratched.
"Why do you always bring me to this cave?" she murmured, stepping away from the water’s edge. Her voice barely rose above a whisper, the question spoken more to herself than to anyone else and she did not expect an answer.
"Because this cave is the most magically charged site in your realm."
The voice came from directly behind her.
Circe froze. Her pulse ratcheted upward as she whirled around to come face to face with Dena.
"Hello there," Dena said smoothly, entirely unbothered by the fright she had caused.
It took every ounce of restraint Circe possessed not to press a hand to her chest to calm her racing heart.
Dena continued as though nothing had happened. "Everything about this place is tinged with magic. The walls, the water, even the air hums with it." Her grey eyes flicked upwards. "The cave draws its power straight from the veil that separates this plane from the faelands. And that magic only grows more potent as the winter solstice nears."
Her words stirred an old memory, an earlier conversation Circe had once shared with Caliso about the solstice and the veil.
"The winter solstice," Circe repeated slowly. "When the magic of the veil allows wild beasts from the faelands to cross over into this realm."
The shift in Dena’s expression was immediate. Her lips curved downward, and a visible agitation tightened her features.
"I would say beasts roam your realm all year round," Dena replied coolly. "You are even married to one." The pointed remark struck like a thrown dagger.
Circe bristled, her hackles rising before she could stop herself. This was not the first time Dena had spoken disparagingly of vampires, nor the first time she had made her distaste for Ragnar’s kind painfully clear. Yet each time, it still threw Circe off guard.
Dena either did not notice Circe’s reaction or deliberately chose to ignore it.
"And it is all the fault of Marzen and his horde of blood-sucking leeches," she went on, her tone laced with contempt.
Then, just as swiftly, she looked away and returned her attention to the cave, as if she had never strayed from the original subject at all. "People have speculated about this place for many millennia. They believed it to be holy ground, sacred soil touched by their gods. Religious leaders, witches, shamans, many have ventured here, particularly as the winter solstice approached. Those who did found that their minds and bodies could not withstand the magic that assaulted them from all sides. It invaded their senses, clawed through their thoughts. They went mad."
"Their skin peeled away in layers as though burned from within. Their veins ruptured beneath the strain. Blood seeped from their eyes like tears. Not long after, they died of slow, gruesome deaths."
Circe swallowed hard, forcing down the lump forming in her throat. The images rose vividly in her mind despite her efforts to suppress them. This was more than Dena had ever revealed about the cave, the very place that had occupied so much of Circe’s curiosity. freēwēbnovel.com
"It’s nearly the winter solstice," Circe said quietly. "And I’m here. Why hasn’t anything happened to me? Or to you?"
Dena regarded her with something unreadable flickering behind her eyes.
"You are not truly here, are you?" she replied. "The cave’s magic is considerably dulled within your dream-state. Even if you were to stand here awake and in the flesh, the power you carry is stronger than that of this place. It would not affect you as it did the others. As for me, my true form cannot walk freely within your realm. So I bound my soul to the magic of this cave. It anchors me here, tethered to this existence. Through that binding, I feel whenever someone or something crosses the wards."
Circe studied her carefully. Dena had never been this forthcoming before. Extracting answers from her had once felt like pulling teeth. Yet tonight, the words flowed freely.
Circe couldn’t bring herself to fully trust this sudden shift. She had never completely trusted anything Dena had told her in the past, especially when she still couldn’t sense whether the woman was lying or speaking the truth.
All her life, she had possessed the uncanny ability to detect deception, to feel it like a tremor beneath her skin, a discordant note in the air. It had always been there, steady and reliable. Now, standing before Dena, that sense was eerily absent. She couldn’t feel anything at all.
And yet, something in Dena’s statement gave her pause.
"Your true form?" Circe echoed, her brows knitting together. She didn’t know whether to be frightened or intrigued by the implication that the woman before her might not truly look as she appeared, that this face, this body, might simply be a borrowed skin worn for convenience.
She recalled reading about such things in one of the tomes housed in Ragnar’s vast library. The word had stood out to her then.
Glamour. It was the art of altering one’s appearance through magic, reshaping flesh and features into whatever form one desired.
