Page 1 of Stone Sentinels

CHAPTER ONE

BARON

The Veil

“You were right,” I say with only a hint of sarcasm, and I’m proud of myself for it. Pyre looks up from his desk and sniffs the air. Yeah, I smell bad, but I don’t care. That stinky sludge is doing what it’s supposed to—healing me, and I’m going to let it. Pyre quirks his signature brow as if to agree that he’s always right, so I flip him off and sit backwards in the chair beside him.

“What was I right about?”

“About me not belonging in the other world.”

“I know.”

“When all of this is over, I want to be here in The Veil. But I want to know what being the guardian means, and what exactly we’ll be protecting the spirit realm from.” Folding my arms over the back of the chair, I wait for Pyre’s answer. He scribbles a few more notes in his book, the ink disappearing into the paper. He turns to me and his eyes look... normal? Well, not normal, but more normal than usual. The white is gone, replaced by a rare shade of violet.

But, he still appears blind.

Pyre stares off into the distance for a few more seconds before the white fog returns to his gaze. “I was using a spirit to see. Sorry if I startled you.”

“I’m not going to go blind, am I?”

“No.”

“Then why areyoublind?”

“I was blind before I traded my soul. You’ll be fine. And to answer your question, the duties of Guardian of The Veil consist of monitoring all the ancient portals, using the Echoing Spire’s power to keep the territories in their neutral state, eliminating threats, closing rifts, and keeping the peace among the creatures here. When the equilibrium is balanced, you will need to help ease spirits into the afterlife. But for now, I simply make sure those spirits are as comfortable as possible.”

“And the ridiculous amount of knowledge you have?”

Chuckling, Pyre unbraids his long hair. The sides of his head are still shaved. “That came with surviving through the ages, keeping records, and studying the forbidden magics as well as the rest of the arcane arts. Some of my teachings came from the Sentinels.”

“Eilish told me about them.”

“They are very dangerous, but full of knowledge, if you are willing to listen.”

“It can’t be as easy as you make it sound,” I say as I study him with purpose. “What did you struggle with? What do I have to prepare for?”

“What you need to understand is that The Veil is a place where time is obscure, and that means you can walk through dreams, memories, fears, prophecies, and raw power. You can see beyond worlds, because it isthisworld that bridges them all together. Sorting through it all and channeling the information and energies in ways that are beneficial for The Veil is what is important. Knowledge means everything here; magic is simply the tool we use to acquire it.”

“You said I’ll have to repair rifts. What’s the difference between a rift and a portal?” I stand up to pace the length of the room as we talk.

“Rifts are tears in The Veil; they allow energy and magic to flow between this world and the others. Think of them as holes in your tunic—a few are manageable, but too many can cause it to fall to pieces. Too many rifts would be catastrophic to all. Portals are natural exit and entrance points created by a power rupture of magic.”

“They aren’t dangerous?”

“Only if the wrong sort discovers them. The biggest threat to the spirit world is the living, Baron. Chaos comes swiftly on the wings of the beasts who call The Veil their home,” Pyre says ominously. “So, no. It’s not as simple as I make it seem.”

“Fuck.”

“What?” he asks, appearing genuinely interested.

I sigh. “This is going to be a lot of work.”

“What did you think it would be?” he asked, appearing perplexed.

“I just figured I’d be fucking around with spirits all day.”

It takes him a few seconds to realize I’m joking. Then a smile grips his mouth. “Asshole,” he says.

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