The crimson light returned.
It always began the same way—Kael's eyes fluttered open to the glow of morning sunlight filtering through stained-glass windows, casting dragons across the walls. The sheets beneath him were silk, warm and familiar. The scent of jasmine and smoked wood filled the air.
He was home.
The Aerwyn estate stood unmarred. Towering pillars of carved obsidian lined the halls, the floors polished until they gleamed. The family crest—a drake mid-flight—watched him from every surface. It felt real. It always did.
But Kael knew better.
"Mother?" he called out softly, standing.
Silence answered him.
"Ren? Lyra?" he tried again. "Father?"
No footsteps. No voices. Just the faint crackle of a fireplace he couldn't find. His heart sank.
It was a dream. The dream.
He moved through the house like a ghost retracing old paths—down the wide staircase, through the kitchen where his mother used to hum, past the training hall where his siblings used to spar. Every detail was perfect. Every smell, every texture, every memory etched into his mind and relived, over and over.
The dream was a punishment, and he was its only prisoner.
He stepped into the courtyard, bathed in early sunlight. The air shifted. Time bent. The warmth grew unnatural.
He knew what came next.
The world shimmered. The courtyard darkened as an orb of fire grew in the sky—small, trembling, golden. The first breath of Cruel Sun.
"No," Kael whispered, but his body moved on its own, hands raised, flame gathering.
The heat surged. The walls cracked. Screams tore through the estate—his siblings' cries, his mother's final gasp. And then…
The smoke parted.
His father stood at the center of the devastation, a twisted parody of the man he once was. His skin was blackened, crumbling like burned parchment. The fire had taken nearly everything from him—except his fury.
"You did this," the charred figure rasped.
Kael tried to look away, but the dream held him still.
"You brought ruin to our family," his father said, stepping closer. His eyes were hollow, but they burned hotter than any flame Kael had ever summoned. "You think you can outrun it? The past will catch you, Kael. It always does."
As the words echoed, the estate crumbled into ash around him. The sky split open in flame.
Kael gasped.
His eyes snapped open, and the ceiling of Poseidon greeted him—cold, damp stone laced with rust and faint traces of Arcane wards. The dream's heat still clung to his skin, though the cell was freezing.
He sat up slowly, pressing a hand to his chest.
Still breathing.
Still cursed.
The dragon birthmark on his back pulsed once beneath his skin. A reminder. A warning.
No matter how deep the prison, the past always followed.
Kael rose to his feet.
If the dream wouldn't let him forget, then perhaps it was time to stop running—and face what he'd become.