Page 11 of The Last Remaining Light

“Yes, but I like reading over talking. Books make me much better company,” she said casually.

Caelyn looked genuinely thoughtful for a moment before answering, “I think you would probably remain good company regardless.”

The compliment landed strangely inside her chest. Warm and unexpected. Elowynn suddenly became very interested in the titles along the shelf beside her. It had been a while since she had received a true and genuine compliment, and she knew he was genuine with his words.

She looked quickly toward the shelves before he could notice anything in her expression. “You are strange.”

“I know,” he said simply before going back to his task.

Silence settled comfortably between them once more.

Elowynn eventually moved toward the lower shelves on the eastern side of the library where older resonance texts were kept chained carefully behind narrow iron gates. Most of the books there had survived from before the Great Vigil. They were ancient. Dangerous. And they were utterly beautiful in their cages. Their weathered leather bindings were darkened with age, and their cracked spines were threaded with faded silver embossing. Some still carried tarnished astryllic sigils pressed into the covers while others shimmered softly beneath the lanterns, as though traces of old resonance still lingered within the brittle pages.

While she scanned faded titles beneath the lantern glow, Elowynn had weaseled her fingers between their locked bars, trailing them across their bindings, wanting to touch them. Needing to feel their history at her fingertips.

But… then she paused.

One particular book hummed a soft tone beneath her touch, and Elowynn blinked at it, her curiosity piqued. The sensation was not something she heard so much as felt—a faint resonance pulsing through the astrylite embedded within the cover.

Something about it felt wrong.

Behind her, Caelyn tensed. The lantern nearest the shelf that he stood by flickered once. Then dimmed.

Elowynn looked back, noting the change in lighting. She stared at the lantern, then to Caelyn, her fingers still on the resonating tome.

Caelyn frowned toward the light. “That keeps happening lately,” he admitted.

The lantern brightened again almost as soon as the words were spoken, yet unease prickled across Elowynn’s skin. She turned her attention back toward the shelf just as a soft metallic click echoed through the dimly lit shelves.

The chain around the old tome loosened on its own.

Both of them faltered.

Like a moth to a flame, unable to help herself, Elowynn very carefully reached through the bars with her fingers and eased the book free from its resting place.

Motes of dust scattered into the lantern light. She could see the title had nearly faded entirely from the spine, but she still managed to decipher part of it.

“…Resonance Degradation Beneath Southern Aethercurrents.”

Caelyn stepped closer beside her. “What does that mean?”

“I do not know,” she breathed out. Her eyes were wide, her fingers trailing over the title reverently. Something about the words unsettled her but also pulled at her to keep looking.

Elowynn carefully opened the brittle cover. Most of the pages had darkened badly with age, their edges warped by moisture and time. Strange diagrams filled the margins beside tightly written annotations in old Astrari script.

Then after a few pages, she found the sketches

Blackened veins. Darkness spreading through resonance lines beneath the skin. White, filmy eyes. Her breath caught in her chest, her fingers trembling.

The Starless.

Caelyn hovered over her shoulder. “These drawings…” he murmured, but said nothing else.

Elowynn turned another page. More diagrams. More corrupted resonance patterns.

Then she spotted beneath one of the sketches, a single line written hastily across the bottom margin in faded ink.

The song beneath the world is becoming distorted.