When the Echo vanished, the sky didn't clear.
Instead, it shifted—as if the world exhaled, unsure whether to breathe again.
The violet flame in my hand dimmed to a soft glow. Not gone, just… resting.
"I didn't destroy it," I said quietly, eyes on the horizon. "I only made it remember."
Riven stepped beside me, her knuckles still bruised. "Good. Let it remember what happens when it messes with us."
But I wasn't so sure. The Echo of Ash hadn't screamed in pain. It had screamed in recognition.
It wasn't defeated. Just… disrupted.
"I think it saw something it didn't expect," I said.
Sabine joined us, her voice low. "You."
We spent the night in the fractured halls of Emberthorn. The headmistress was still missing. So were two professors. The sky refused to return to normal, and half the school's defenses lay in ruins.
But somehow, we slept.
And in our dreams, something called.
A place.
A name.
Hollowhearth.
We left at dawn.
No one tried to stop us. Maybe no one could.
The Circle traveled together, through winding glens and scorched woods, across lands the world had forgotten.
It felt like chasing a ghost.
But when we reached the valley where my village once stood, it was no longer just ash.
There were ruins. Scorched stones. Burned trees grown over with soft moss. Time hadn't erased everything.
Just... buried it.
Riven crouched by what looked like the remnants of a hearth. She ran her hand over blackened brick. "This was your house?"
I nodded, silent.
I didn't expect the tears, but they came anyway.
"I thought it was gone forever."
Asher stepped forward. "Maybe it was. But now you're here."
That night, we lit a fire in the center of Hollowhearth. Not for magic. Just for warmth. The flame danced low and violet, its color still altered by the Chronicle's final memory.
We sat around it, not as students or soldiers, but as survivors.
And then I did something I hadn't done since I was six years old.
I told them the whole story.
Not the polished version I gave professors.
Not the half-truth I whispered to myself.
But the real one.
The night the fire came.
How I survived.
How I ran.
How I felt the fire choose me—not as a blessing, but as a curse.
And how I never forgave myself for surviving when no one else had.
When I was done, there was silence.
Then Tara, quiet and clear: "You didn't survive by accident."
Felix: "You carried the flame so no one else had to."
Riven tossed a twig into the fire. "And now you're making it mean something."
Later, as everyone slept, I stood alone at the edge of what was once the village square.
The Chronicle was gone. The ring was still warm on my finger. And in the distance, the sky shimmered faintly with ash and stars.
I didn't feel empty anymore.
I felt like a spark waiting to catch.
Tomorrow, we'd return to Emberthorn.
Tomorrow, we'd prepare for the Echo's next move.
But tonight—
We rebuilt Hollowhearth.
With stories.
With memory.
With fire.