The ring cinched tighter, its cold metal biting raw through the meat of my finger until the skin throbbed, hot and raw, threatening to fuse with the metal. Gold light threaded through my veins—a searing, molten wire that dragged my arm forward with sickening force toward the splintered wooden door.
At my throat, the black lotus pulsed.
Thump. A heavy, suffocating pressure against my windpipe.
Thump.
Then, the entire corridor buckled. Stone ground against stone, sending a tremor vibrating through the soles of our feet, filling the air with the sharp, chalky stench of pulverized granite and age-old dust.
“Formation!” Grandma’s sharp command sliced through the rumble.
Movement erupted around me.
Neak Mean surged forward, a heavy shield of momentum. He planted himself firmly between the family and the shadowed corridor behind us, the leather of his boots scraping loudly against the stone as he squared his shoulders, lowering his center of gravity into the exact stance Grandma had drilled into us on the sun-baked court.
Nimol slipped behind him, her hand snagging Vannak’s arm and wrenching him into the center.
“Stay with me.”
“I am.”
“Don't wander.”
“I wasn't going to.”
“You were thinking about it.”
Vannak’s jaw tightened, his breathing shallow and rapid. “I was thinking about running.”
“That's wandering with enthusiasm.”
Vichea ignored their tense banter, his fingers trailing inches above the masonry. Ancient Boran symbols carved into the stone were awakening, sputtering to life with a faint, hummed resonance.
“Grandma.”
She glanced at him, her eyes razor-sharp. “They're responding to us.”
“Which ones?”
Vichea jabbed a finger toward the floor. “Those.”
Three glyphs flared bright gold, casting sharp shadows across the floor. Then, another ignited right behind Neak with a sudden crack.
“Don't step outside the markings,” Vichea warned, his voice tight.
Neak glanced down at the blinding gold lines framing his boots. “What happens if we do?”
Vichea turned toward the swallowing blackness of the corridor, where the air grew thick and metallic. “I don't think we want to find out.”
A dry, agonizing scrape echoed down the passage—like rusted iron dragged across gravel. The corridor fell dead quiet.
The Hollowkin was coming.
Neak raised his hands, muscles taut, knuckles white. “Everyone stays behind me.”
It detached itself from the gloom. Long, jointed limbs slithered and scraped against the walls, kicking up flecks of soot. Its head tilted at an unnatural, sickening angle. It didn't rush. It glided with a chilling patience, yellow eyes fixating on our posture.
Watching our formation.
Watching the golden wire burning under my skin.
Grandma caught the shift in its gaze. “It knows the lotus is with her.”
Neak stepped side-to-side, his wide frame cutting off the creature's line of sight. The Hollowkin's head snapped toward him, a low, wet hiss vibrating in its chest.
Good. Neak had its attention.
“Vichea,” Grandma murmured, her voice steady despite the chaos.
“Already watching.”
“Tell me what you see.”
“It avoids the gold markings.”
“Good.”
Nimol’s fingernails dug into Vannak’s sleeve. “Where do we move?”
“Not yet,” Vichea strained, eyes darting over the glowing geometry on the floor.
The Hollowkin lunged—a blur of elongated limbs and shadow.
Neak met it head-on. The crushing impact drove him backward, his shoes screeching and smoking against the stone floor.
“Neak!” Nimol screamed.
“I've got it!” he bellowed, straining until the tendons in his neck stood out. He heaved, shoving the beast off him.
The Hollowkin twisted midair with unnatural grace, its claws tearing into the vertical wall as it landed.
Vichea immediately pointed. “Left!”
Neak dove left just as the creature launched off the wall. It struck where he had stood a millisecond prior; the floor exploded in a spray of rock splinters, blinding grey dust billowing into the air, stinging our eyes and choking our throats.
Nimol tackled Vannak down into the grit. “Stay low!”
Vannak squirmed beneath her arm, coughing. “I can't see!”
“Then trust me!” She hauled him by his collar, dragging him through the haze toward the next glowing glyph.
Vichea scrambled after them, tracking the luminous lines through the dust. “Three steps!”
Nimol lunged forward. “Two more!”
She dragged Vannak another pace.
“Stop!”
A deafening crack echoed as a massive section of stone floor sheared away, collapsing into a pitch-black abyss directly in front of them. The bitter smell of stagnant air rushed up from the drop.
Vannak stared into the void, his voice cracking. “Okay. I officially hate this place.”
Nimol yeeled over the noise, hauling him back from the crumbling edge. “Keep moving when I tell you!”
Vichea whirled toward Grandma. “The markings are creating a path.”
Grandma’s eyes blazed through the gloom. “Then guide us.”
Vichea slashed his hand toward the far end of the corridor. “There!”
A heavy wooden door waited in the darkness, its ancient surface carved with the deep relief of a golden lotus.
Grandma’s face drained of color. “No.”
Neak caught the shift in her tone over the clashing fight. “What?”
“We don't go through that door.”
The Hollowkin let out an ear-splitting shriek that rattled the teeth in my skull. It launched itself forward again, claws outstretched.
Neak stepped into its path. “Move!”
He struck out with both palms, slamming into the monster's chest with a boom. The creature crashed sideways, plowing into the wall. Neak staggered back, a thick ribbon of crimson welling from a tear above his eyebrow, running warm down his cheek.
Nimol darted in, pulling at his shoulder. “Neak, fall back!”
“Not yet!”
“That's not a suggestion!” She dug her fingers into his vest and hauled him backward with all her weight. For once, his boots moved with her.
Vichea pointed to a burning line on the ground. “Bring it here!”
Nimol’s eyes flared with understanding. She maneuvered behind Neak, shouting into the dust. “Keep it moving!”
Neak feinted, baiting the Hollowkin toward the glowing golden boundary. The creature took the lure. One frantic step. Two.
Its pale, withered foot crossed the threshold.
Golden light erupted like an arc of electricity. The Hollowkin shrieked as its flesh scorched, leaping backward in a frenzy.
Vichea exhaled heavily. “It can't cross the boundary.”
Grandma stared at the creature, her jaw set grimly. “No. It can.”
We all looked at her.
“It just doesn't want to.”
The Hollowkin slowly raised its head, a sickening, wet smile splitting its face. The golden line beneath its feet began to spiderweb with dark cracks, the light sputtering out.
Vichea’s face went pale. “That's bad.”
“How bad?” Nimol asked, her grip tightening on her weapons.
“Very.”
Grandma spun toward me, reaching out. “Come here.”
I tried. I desperately leaned toward her, but the ring surged with a violent magnetic pull, dragging my body toward the lotus-marked door. My boots skidded powerlessly over the smooth stone.
Grandma snatched my wrist, her fingers locking on like iron bands. “No.”
The ring constricted with brutal force. A wave of liquid heat raced up my arm, scorching through my flesh.
“Grandma!” I gasped.
She refused to let go. Neak flanked her instantly, digging his heels into the floor. “I've got her.”
Nimol moved to Grandma's other side, anchoring them both. “Then I've got you.”
Vichea remained at the rear, tracking the dying glow of the floor symbols. Vannak stood trapped in the center, his chest heaving, eyes wild as he looked between all of us. “What do I do?”
Grandma locked eyes with him. “Stay exactly where you are.”
He nodded, locking his legs in place.
The Hollowkin struck again. Neak threw his weight into an interception, and the impact sent a shockwave that threw Grandma sideways into Nimol’s catch.
Vichea barked commands like lightning: “Right!”
Neak shifted his guard.
“Left!”
Nimol leaned into the dodge.
“Down!”
Everyone dropped into a low crouch. The Hollowkin's razor-like arm whistled through the empty air where their necks had been, slicing clean through the shadow.
Vannak ducked, covering his head. “It's behind us!”
Vichea spun. The creature's silhouette was warping—its shadow had detaching from its body, slithering across the floor like spilled ink toward the wooden door.
“Grandma!”
She whirled around. The shadow struck the wooden door, and the carved lotus instantly ignited with a sickly, golden glare.
Three heavy knocks vibrated through the wood.
Knock.
Knock.
Knock.
The corridor fell dead silent. Then, a small, hollow child's voice trickled through the cracks of the heavy timber.
“Grandma?”
Grandma froze, every muscle in her body turning to stone.
Vannak swallowed hard, looking at her pale face. “Who is that?”
She didn't answer.
Nimol took a cautious step toward her. “Do you know that voice?”
Grandma’s eyes welled, filled with a suffocating mix of grief, recognition, and absolute terror. “Yes.”
The Hollowkin ceased its frenzy. Neak slowly lowered his guard, panting. “Why did it stop?”
Vichea stared at the wall. “It isn't watching us anymore.”
The beast was frozen, its milky eyes fixed on the door. For the first time, it looked petrified—a primal dread radiating off its form that unnerved me more than its attack ever had.
The ring gave a violent, agonizing cinch.
The corridor vanished in a flash of blinding white.
For one impossible, suspended heartbeat, the smell of dust and iron was replaced by damp wood and rain. I was standing in the old house. A young boy stood beside a sunlit doorway, clutching a dented red tin truck to his chest. Specks of dust floated lazily through the humid air.
He looked up. He had Grandma's eyes.
My breath hitched in my chest. “Who are you?”
The boy smiled softly. “You remember.”
The ring snapped open—not outward, but tearing inward. Something sharp hooked deep beneath my ribs and yanked.
My memories ripped loose like pages torn from a book.
The smell of my first home... Grandma’s warm arms wrapping around me... Her soft voice singing in the dark... The quiet afternoon she gave me a new name... The heavy realization of accepting it because I had no one else left.
Each memory bled out from me, streaming into the ring like hot blood from an open wound.
“No!” I screamed, reaching into the void. “Give them back!”
From somewhere beyond the vision, muffled and distant, voices roared through the dark.
Neak. Nimol. Vichea. Vannak. Grandma.
They were still fighting for me. I could hear the desperate cadence of their breath, but I was slipping away.
Neak shouted, “Hold the formation!”
Nimol’s voice answered, raw and strained, “I'm holding!”
Vichea yelled, “The symbols are going dark!”
Vannak panicked, “Grandma, she's disappearing!”
Then Grandma's voice pierced through the static, loud and clear as a bell ringing in my head.
“Look at me!”
I forced my gaze upward. Somehow, through the tearing void, her face materialized.
“You are not the name they gave you.”
The ring pulsed violently.
“You are not the name you lost.”
Another pulse shook my soul.
“You are the choice you make.”
The boy's smile melted away. Behind him, something colossal shifted in the deep darkness of the vision. The wooden door groaned on its hinges.
Grandma extended her hand into the light. “Come back to us.”
I reached out and slammed my hand onto the boy's wrist. His skin felt like plunging my hand into ice water. “Who are you?”
He didn't answer me. He looked past my shoulder, straight at Grandma, then back into my eyes.
“The one you were before they found you.”
The door creaked open another inch. A blast of freezing, dead air poured through, carrying the sound of something immense breathing in the dark.
The boy smiled once more, cold and distant. “Let me out.”
The ring yanked another memory from my chest. I screamed as the pain flared blindingly bright—
Snap.
I crashed back into the cold corridor. Neak caught me under my arms before my knees hit the stone. Nimol grabbed my other side, bracing me up. Vichea slammed down onto one knee, pressing his palm flat against a sputtering Boran symbol on the floor, forcing his energy into it.
“Grandma!”
“I know!”
She placed both palms against the stone wall, her voice ringing out like steel. “Everyone, positions!”
In a heartbeat, the circle snapped shut around me. Neak took the front, a wall of muscle. Nimol guarded the rear, ears straining. Vichea held the left, tracking the shifting lines of light on the floor. Vannak stepped between Nimol and me, trembling violently but locking his feet in place. Grandma commanded the center.
And in that fraction of a second, the truth of everything she had drilled into us settled into my bones.
Boran wasn't about defeating the enemy standing in front of you. It was about standing so firmly that no one standing behind you was ever left alone.
The Hollowkin lunged with a guttural roar.
Neak stepped in to intercept. Nimol shoved Vannak clear of a sweeping claw. Vichea redirected their movement toward the glowing symbols, and Grandma kept the anchor of our formation held tight.
And I—
I stopped fighting the lotus. I stopped trying to run from the dark.
I reached inside my chest and grabbed it.
The black flower at my throat bloomed.
A wave of blinding gold light exploded outward, driving back the shadows with a deafening crack. The Hollowkin screeched, shielding its eyes as it was blasted back. The massive wooden door shuddered on its hinges.
Then, from the dark beyond the door, the child's voice called out again, quiet and clear.
“Grandma?”
Grandma stared at the wood, her face unreadable. The Hollowkin scrambled backward, whimpering as it retreated from the threshold.
Without warning, the golden lotus at my throat went completely, pitch dark.
The wooden door swung open another inch into the blackness. And from the void behind it, a raspy breath whispered my erased name.