Hi everyone! Below the break is an excerpt from Sun Rising's first chapter, now officially posted on AO3! Enjoy! If this catches your attention, feel free to read the rest here
Chapter One
Sole Eigher
▪──── ༻𖤓༺ ────▪
The night Sole’s world changed started with the sharp point of a knife digging into her back.
She had been standing in her backyard when the attack happened, staring absentmindedly at the small, half-wild garden neither she nor her father could ever manage to tame. The night air was cool, heavy with the scent of damp soil from the earlier rain, and her thoughts had long since drifted off to meaningless things. There was nothing in particular that floated through her head, just fleeting reflections of the day.
That was why, by the time she realized a faint golden shimmer had appeared in the corner of her vision, she was already too late.
Before she could even draw a breath, she was forced face-first into the grass. Cold dew soaked into her sleep shirt and chilled the skin of her face. A weight pinned her legs to the ground, sending a spike of pain down her body. Then she felt it. The unmistakable threat of a sharp blade against her spine.
“Don’t scream.”
Instinct gripped her immediately.
“Hrmngh-!”
A rough hand slammed against the back of her head, grinding her face deeper into the ground. In her panic, she inhaled a chunk of dirt.
“I-I said don’t scream!”
The voice was deep and raw, scraped thin like it had gone unused for a very long time. Sole did not need to guess. She knew who it was.
Earlier that evening, when the sun still blessed the sky with golden light, a warning circulated throughout Aohrea. The paper had been nailed to doors, pressed into hands, murmured about in hushed tones among the people she had passed in the streets. When she arrived home, she pulled down her own warning from the door. At the top in thick red lettering read ON THE RUN.
Beneath it was a photo of a man around her age. Stringy auburn hair framing a gaunt, haunted face. His eyes were dull brown; his skin scattered with freckles like splotches of dirt. A deep frown carved his mouth downward. Nothing like a normal, put-together Aohrean.
And beneath the image, a name.
Lyx.
It was plain, like she had always been warned. Curses looked normal, blending in with the crowd. They could be anyone, could come from anywhere. She should have known better than to be outside at night while he was still on the loose.
“’m sorry-!” Sole whimpered through the grass in her mouth, heart slamming dangerously against her ribs. There was no telling what someone like this would want from her, and there was no telling what he would do to get it. “Food,” he grit out, blade pressing just slightly deeper against her back, “Get me food.”
Hi everyone! Thank you so much for the recent support! I've decided on an official upload schedule for Sun Rising-- once a week on Mondays-- and as such, here is the intro for Chapter Two!
Read the entire chapter here.
Chapter Two
Lyx
▪──── ༻✩༺ ────▪
Lyx’s life truly began twenty-one years after he was born, at the precise moment his bare feet pressed into living grass and his lungs filled with fresh air for the very first time.
It was unlike anything he had ever imagined before.
The outside world was too large, too loud, too alive. It rushed at him all at once, an overwhelming spiral of sensation that left him dizzy and unsteady on his feet. Each inhale he took carried a thousand unknown scents along with it. The richness of damp earth, the sweetness of flowers, the salt of the ocean.
Lyx stood at the edge of a thin tree-line, frozen, afraid that if he moved too quickly the world might disappear underneath him. He could have stayed there forever, soaking this new freedom in.
But the Lab followed him, even here.
Screams still rang in his ears, shrill and merciless. When he closed his eyes, he saw shadows dancing across narrow corridors thick with dust and fear, heard boots pounding against metal floors. Distance meant nothing to a place like that.
He wasn’t sure if it would ever go away.
There was only one certainty left in him: he would never go back.
And that meant running. Finding Heidyn. Finding a new home.
