THE LAST KING OF EMBERWYLD : THE AWAKENING DARK
Chapter 6: The New Guardian
The nothing did not fade.
It changed—slowly, subtly, like ice melting in spring. The darkness grew thinner, lighter, softer. The cold grew warmer. The silence grew filled with whispers—not the hungry whispers of the nightmare, but something else. Something almost like hope.
Kaelen stood at the center of it all, the Duskblade in his hand, the key in his pocket, Elena beside him.
“The heart of the nightmare is still here,” he said.
“Yes.”
“But the first king is gone.”
“Yes.”
“So what remains?”
Elena looked at the shifting darkness.
“The dreams,” she said. “The hopes. The fears. The hungers. Everything that the first king dreamed into existence. They are still here. They are still real.”
“Can they hurt the world?”
“They can. If they are not watched. If they are not guarded. If they are not kept in check.”
Kaelen looked at the Duskblade.
“That’s why you need a guardian.”
“That’s why the world needs a guardian. Someone to watch the dreams. Someone to keep them from spilling into reality. Someone to protect the living from the dead.”
“And you want that someone to be me.”
Elena smiled.
It was a sad smile, small and tired and full of years.
“I want you to choose. To stay here, in the heart of the nightmare, and guard the dreams. Or to go home, to your village, to your sister, to your life.”
“What happens if I go home?”
“Then someone else will have to take your place. Someone who may not be as strong. As brave. As ready.”
“And if I stay?”
Elena looked at the darkness.
“Then you will never leave. You will watch the dreams for a hundred years. A thousand years. As long as the heart beats.”
Kaelen was silent.
He thought of Lyra. Of the village. Of the children with hollow eyes who now had full bellies and bright smiles. He thought of the fields, green and gold. The sea, blue and bright. The sky, full of stars.
He thought of his mother, standing in the garden of lilies.
His father, wearing the crown of thorns.
Elena, waiting for a thousand years for someone to finish what she started.
“I’ll stay,” he said.
Elena’s eyes widened.
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“This is not a decision to make lightly.”
“I’m not making it lightly. I’m making it because it’s right. Because it’s necessary. Because someone has to.”
Elena reached out and touched his face.
Her hand was warm.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“Don’t thank me. Thank the people who taught me what it means to sacrifice.”
“And who were they?”
Kaelen smiled.
“Everyone I’ve ever loved.”
The nothing shifted.
The darkness parted.
And a new door appeared.
Not the door of stone and shadow—the door of the nightmare. A different door. Smaller. Simpler. Made of wood and brass, like the door to a cottage or a shop or a home.
“The guardian’s door,” Elena said. “Beyond it is your new home. Your new life. Your new purpose.”
Kaelen walked to the door.
He placed his hand on the handle.
It was warm.
“What’s on the other side?”
Elena smiled.
“Whatever you want it to be.”
Kaelen opened the door.
Beyond it was a room.
Small and simple, with a bed and a desk and a window that looked out onto the stars. The walls were wood, warm and brown. The floor was carpeted in deep red. The air smelled of woodsmoke and old books and something else. Something sweet.
The smell of lilies.
His mother’s garden.
He walked inside.
The door closed behind him.
Elena was gone.
Kaelen sat on the bed.
The Duskblade was on his hip. The key was in his pocket. The heart of the nightmare was somewhere beyond the walls, beating softly, dreaming quietly.
He was alone.
But he was not lonely.
He could feel them—the dreams. The hopes. The fears. The hungers. They were all around him, pressing against the walls, waiting for a moment of weakness, a moment of doubt, a moment of fear.
He would not give them that moment.
He was the guardian.
He would watch.
He would wait.
He would protect.
Days passed. Or weeks. Or months. Time was different here, in the heart of the nightmare. It flowed like water, sometimes fast, sometimes slow, sometimes not at all.
Kaelen explored his new home.
The room was larger than he had thought. There were other doors—doors that led to other rooms, other spaces, other worlds. He opened some of them. He left others closed.
He found a library, filled with books that had never been written. He found a garden, filled with flowers that had never bloomed. He found a kitchen, filled with food that had never been eaten.
He found a mirror.
And in the mirror, he saw himself.
Not the man he had been. The man he was becoming. Older. Wiser. Stronger. His eyes were the color of the door—the color of the wound—but they were not hungry. They were peaceful.
He smiled at his reflection.
His reflection smiled back.
One day—or one night—he felt a shift.
The heart of the nightmare was beating faster. The dreams were stirring. Something was wrong.
He walked to the window.
The stars were flickering.
Not fading—flickering. As if something was passing in front of them. Something dark. Something hungry.
He had seen this before.
Five years ago, standing on the cliffs of Dusk Hollow.
The same flickering.
The same darkness.
The same hunger.
“The door is opening again,” he whispered.
But that was impossible.
The door was gone. The first king was dead. The nightmares were dying.
Unless—
Unless something new had been born.
Something worse.
Kaelen grabbed the Duskblade.
He walked to the door of his room.
He opened it.
Beyond was the nothing.
But the nothing was not empty.
There was something in it.
Something waiting.
Something that had been waiting for a very long time.
“Hello, Kaelen,” the something said. “I’ve been watching you.”
Kaelen raised the blade.
“Who are you?”
The something stepped forward.
It was a woman.
Young and beautiful, with dark hair and dark eyes and a smile that was almost kind.
She was wearing a white dress.
She looked like Elena.
But she was not Elena.
“I am the new nightmare,” she said. “I am the dream that the first king dreamed before he died. I am his last thought. His last fear. His last hunger.”
“What do you want?”
She smiled.
It was not a kind smile.
“I want to finish what he started. I want to open the door. I want to end the world.”
Kaelen gripped the blade.
“You’ll have to go through me first.”
The woman laughed.
It was a beautiful sound—warm and bright and full of joy.
“That’s the plan,” she said.