For Me,There Is Only You |18+|

73. The Key

Then light returned.

I blinked rapidly, my eyes struggling to adjust as the world unfolded around us, and stole the breath from my lungs.

Magic thrummed through the air. Not like a spell, but like something ancient and alive.

I felt it in the soil beneath my bare feet, in the wind that stirred my hair, in the way the light shimmered without a source.

Everything here pulsed with life.

Trees towered overhead, their trunks impossibly wide, bark laced with glowing veins of silver and green that shimmered like starlight.

Flowers lined the winding paths in spirals of blue and gold, blooming and turning slowly as if listening to some quiet rhythm the earth was humming.

It was beautiful.

Too beautiful.

And completely alien.

None of this was built, not in the way cities or villages were. The structures looked like they had grown, shaped from living wood and stone. Domes and halls formed by vines, branches, and roots woven with impossible intention.

It felt like we had stepped into another realm entirely.

"We are at the Sanctuary, my child," Grandma said softly, still holding my hand.

I gripped her fingers tightly. "Why?" My voice came out small, hollow. "Why are we here?"

What truth was she talking about?

Why had she asked me about Zev? How did she know?

Why did the Elders come for me?

What was really going on?

"You'll understand soon," she said, but her voice held no answers.

Just a quiet patience I didn't want right now. I didn't want patience. I wanted answers.

I wanted someone to tell me what the hell was happening.

But the Elder ahead didn't slow. He moved like mist, silent and steady, and we followed.

The deeper we walked into the Sanctuary, the more I felt it...... eyes.

Elementals stood among the trees and beside the glowing paths, dressed in flowing robes of every color. They watched us. Me.

Their stares weren't unkind, but they weren't warm either. Curious, measured, unreadable.

No one smiled.

No one spoke.

My heart thudded louder in my ears.

I tried to meet no one's gaze, shrinking beneath their silence, suddenly all too aware of my uncertainty, my trembling fingers.

I didn't want to be here.

We stopped in front of a towering structure woven into the trunk of a tree so massive it didn't seem real.

Its bark had hardened over time into something smooth and dark, like polished stone. The tree pulsed faintly with light.

The Elder raised his fist and knocked once.

"The Key is here," he said.

That word again. Key.

The unease inside me coiled tighter, sinking its teeth in deeper. My thoughts tangled in each other. What Key? What did they mean?