As though the sky itself was hesitant to cast a shadow over the charred town, night gradually descended upon Greyrest. Where hours before there had been a resound of laughter and the dancing of fiddles, there was now a thick, uncomfortable silence that was tinged with questions that no one dared to ask out loud. Attracted by the quiet that demanded solitude,
Ethan left the square by himself. Crooked and half-collapsed atop the hill, his boots murmured across the path toward the old bell tower. Like a memory that would not go away, Ivy strangled its stone, and the moonlight softly touched it.
He made it to the crest, but he continued on past the tower.
He was drawn farther by something.
Beyond the ruins, past the last tents and torches, the land opened wide and quiet. He walked the edge of the fields, the air rich with wildflowers and something else, something beneath. A whisper in the scent of soil. A hum behind the wind.
At the twisted boughs of an old willow, he sat.
The stars above scattered unfamiliar constellations across the bruised sky, and yet they stirred something in him: a question sharpened by silence.
Why now? Why here? Why me?
He pressed his hand to his side. The scar still ran like a pale thread across his skin, a ghost of the crash, the moment when his life had shattered and reformed in a place with twin moons and foreign stars.
He had braced for death.
"I should've died," he whispered aloud.
"Perhaps you did."
The voice came from behind. Ethan didn't startle, he'd already sensed someone approaching. He turned slowly.
A woman stood there, half-hidden in the shadows of the tree. She was old, at least, that's what the world wanted him to believe. But her eyes were too clear, too knowing. Her robes shimmered like moonlight caught in silk, and her hands held no tremble.
"Do I know you?" he asked cautiously.
"You've seen me before," she said, "but not with those eyes."
He stood, the hairs on his neck prickling. "What does that mean?"
The woman stepped forward. The wind didn't touch her. The grass didn't bend at her feet.
"You've begun to feel it, haven't you?" she said. "The pull. The pieces moving behind the veil. Threads tightening."
"Who are you?"
"A guide. For now."
Ethan clenched his fists. "If you're here to speak in riddles, I've had enough of those."
She studied him, then smiled softly. "Very well. You wonder why you didn't die in that crash. Why, instead of darkness, you woke in a world at war."
He nodded.
"It was not a mistake," she said. "You were brought. Called, even."
"By who?"
"By the ones who remember what this world was... and fear what it's becoming."
Ethan took a step back. "You're saying I was summoned? That all of this, me being here, it's not some cosmic accident?"
"Not accident. Purpose."
He stared at her, heart pounding. "Then why not just tell me what I'm meant to do?"
She looked to the horizon. "Because the moment we tell a man his fate, we risk stealing his will. And it is your will, Ethan, that may yet change everything."
Ethan swallowed hard. "You said I've seen you before... what did you mean?"
The woman didn't answer immediately. She raised her hand instead and gently touched the side of his face. His skin burned where her fingers rested, not with pain, but with sudden clarity.
Images of times he had never experienced, conflicts he had never engaged in, and towers he had never ascended suddenly flashed through his mind. A crown. A blade. A shadow that fell across mountains.
And in the middle of it all... was him.
Then it vanished.
He stumbled back, gasping. "What was that?"
"A glimpse," she said. "Of what was, what might be." Ethan, not every path is set in stone. However, some people are destined to cross. One of them is yours.
His breath was shallow as he shook his head. "I am merely a man. I didn't request for this.
"No. However, the seed did not request to grow into a tree. The world needed shade, so it grew.
The wind picked up suddenly. The willow branches hissed like whispers. Surprised he looked around, but when he looked back, the woman was already stepping away, dissolving into the shadows.
"Wait!" he called.
She paused, her voice drifting back to him.
"When the time comes, remember this: the door you came through may not be the only one. And not all who cross it come to heal."
From behind, a soft tread broke the silence.
Ethan turned to see Maeve approaching, arms folded. "Couldn't sleep?" she asked, her voice low.
He blinked. The willow branches hissed. When he looked back, the woman was gone.
"Someone was just here," he murmured.
Maeve raised an eyebrow. "I didn't see anyone." She replied.
Maeve frowned. "Wondering, what he was talking about"
He didn't answer immediately.
"Couldn't sleep either?" he asked, voice quieter now.
"Not with all that ink and guessing on the table," she said. "Elyra wants answers. So do I. But you're not the only one being asked questions."
He nodded slowly. "Do you ever feel like you're in the middle of something bigger? That you were never supposed to be here, but now that you are, nothing will ever go back to what it was?"
Maeve's brow furrowed. She glanced at the stars. "Every day."
They stood in silence for a time.
Then she asked, "What do you think brought you here?"
Ethan didn't answer immediately. He let the silence stretch, let the weight of the sky settle on his shoulders.
"I don't know," he said at last. "But I think... I think it's still watching."
The stars above didn't blink.
But something, somewhere, listened.