Darian's boots hit the cracked, ash-covered earth with force as he sprinted through the ancient forest. Behind him, the echo of howls—unnatural and thick with fury—pursued him like hounds of vengeance. Twisted trees with blackened bark clawed at the air, the wind screaming through their hollow limbs. His chest burned, not from exertion, but from the searing energy boiling beneath his ribs.
He didn't stop running until he burst through the final veil of shadows and into a clearing where the moon bathed the earth in a cold, silvery hue. There, at the center, stood a ruin older than memory itself—The Weeping Pillars.
"They said you'd return here," a low voice intoned.
Darian's sword was halfway drawn before he saw her.
A woman in blood-red robes leaned against one of the broken columns, her raven hair tangled with feathers and bone trinkets. Her eyes glowed with the pale violet hue of the Ancients. A Seer.
He narrowed his gaze. "Do I know you?"
