“This heartbeat…” he said in a deep voice. “It is neither a sign of war nor of ruin. It is an ancient return.”

  That blue pulse had carved itself into  him. It awakened a memory he believed buried beneath centuries of silence. It was the same call no dragon had heard for generations. The last time he had felt it, the sky had collapsed upon itself and dragons had learned what it meant to lose. They saw water rise like walls, cities swallowed in a single breath. The legend of Oztar spoke of primordial heartbeats, of a rhythm that preceded the rebirth of the world. The sages told that whoever heard that vibration was destined to walk between water and sky, able to bend currents and wind. No one remembered the last time the Blue Current had chosen a human. Korvath felt that the choice had come. Below him, among the city’s rooftops, a light flickered for an instant. It was not cast magic. It was not a spell. It was a breath. Korvath tilted his head.

  “So small…” he murmured.

  In the canals, the water answered with a faint shiver, almost imperceptible. It was not yet a voice, but it was already a name being born. A gift that had awakened after many centuries.

  “Balance will finally return,” the dragon declared.

  And yet failure still spoke to him, whispering in the heartbeat of the sky and in the water that had never stopped remembering. Far from Oztar, someone had feared that moment for years. The signal awaited with terror for a lifetime had finally found its way back. Underground, the walls of ancient stone trembled slightly. From the cracks filtered a pulsing light, cold as icy water. At the heart of that tension-laden silence, a hooded figure stood motionless. The black cloak hung heavily from her shoulders as her hands, slow and deliberate, rose. The Superior floated among voids of light and silences that belonged to no place. She had never felt what she was feeling now. A subtle vibration, almost imperceptible, crossed her being. Something small. Fragile. Terribly powerful.

  “What was that?!” she exclaimed.

  And then she saw it. Not the newborn—not yet—but what that life would become: April. Her future took shape before her brown eyes like a shattered mosaic. Her existence would corrupt, challenge, and relentlessly destroy what she had built—what she believed eternal.

  “If she grows up learning to control water…” the word slipped from her spirit like a hiss “…I will lose what I have sealed.”

  A thought crossed her mind, swift and cruel. With a measured gesture, her fingers traced symbols in the air, and before her a globe of black smoke began to form, then took shape, trembling as if struggling to remain whole. The hooded figure slowly lowered her hands, and for a moment the sphere of smoke quivered, unstable. Then it opened, and a shadow moved across the stone, silent and unsettling. It had no eyes, yet its gaze seemed to fill the room, hungry and threatening.

  “Listen carefully…” the woman said, addressing the shadow. “…there is a child… April—” She broke off abruptly.

  For an instant, everything trembled with her: the stone, the air, even her own will seemed suspended in a fragile balance between life and destruction. That name was a wound that had never closed. To speak it, even in thought, hurt more than any spell.

  “If she finds Korvath, everything will end. Everything I have tried to stop,” she said at last.

  The shadow contracted, menacing, and left the chamber, heading toward Oztar. The woman’s hands trembled, every word weighing tons. The silence that followed was heavier than any scream.

 “It wasn’t meant to go this way…” she whispered, her voice breaking.

  Energy reacted to her faltering, pulsing like open wounds. Dark magic allowed no hesitation. You either obeyed, or it devoured you.

  “You should never have been born… you… and your bloodline,” she said in a threatening voice.

  The words were not meant only for April, but for the entire line of blood she carried with her—for a responsibility and a destiny that seemed to weigh upon her shoulders. Time passed as it always does after near catastrophes: in silence. Oztar healed without noticing. The waters grew calm again, the canals resumed their course, and the city forgot the night when the sky had beaten like a heart. But the heartbeat never truly ceased. With it, April grew. As a child she ran along the riverbanks, laughing as the water brushed her ankles. At times the waves seemed to follow her, slowing when she stopped, rippling when her laughter grew louder. No one noticed. No one, except the river. Korvath watched her from afar, hidden among the clouds. He never drew near. It was not protection. It was not surveillance. It was waiting. Each time the girl fell and rose again, the call grew clearer. More stable. As if the water itself were learning her name. Elsewhere, the Superior never ceased to watch. Through the Dark Form, she followed every step, every growth, every ripple that should not have existed. The fear remained the same: that one day April would find the dragon. The years slipped by as a river does when no one watches it. And when April turned eighteen, the heartbeat returned.This time, it wasn't calling. It was clamoring.