The circle was drawn in salt, ash, and broken names.
Lys watched nervously as Nyrelle finished etching the final rune in chalk—two crescents crossing, with a single line descending between them like a falling star.
Ashling knelt at the center.
The memory-core floated just above her hands, flickering like a stormcloud trying to remember light.
"You're sure about this?" Lys asked.
Ashling's voice came from far away.
"No."
"But he'll keep breaking unless we try to put him back together."
The Rite of Reconciliation hadn't been used since the end of Cycle Six. Back then, it had shattered the minds of three memory-bearers. Their souls had scattered into cursed rivers, never seen again.
To reconcile is to return what was not meant to return.
To summon is to suffer what even memory refused to keep.
Nyrelle had warned them.
And yet here they were.
"Seven fragments," she said. "Seven echoes of Sevrien. To reconcile them, Ashling must carry them for a breathless moment—must hold all their truths at once. And in doing so, invite them to choose."
"Choose what?" Lys asked.
"To become one again," Nyrelle whispered. "Or to die separately."
Ashling breathed in.
The core pulsed—
Ashbrand: The one who chose flame over surrender.
Vaelren: The gentle tactician who sang lullabies on the eve of war.
Sol-Keir: The liar who rewrote himself to protect others.
Eriswain: The cursed guardian who murdered a king to save a child.
The Unnamed: The child before memory—still unbranded.
The Hollowed: The version who let them erase too much.
The Last-Eyed: The one who watched the Severance and did nothing.
Each voice screamed, whispered, or wept inside her mind.
She held them.
She held him.
And for a moment, there was silence.
Then—
The circle flared white.
Ashling was gone.
Not physically.
Pulled inward.
She stood in a ruined hall of mirrors and voidlight.
Seven figures stood around her, forming a spiral.
Each one was Keiran.
And none of them were.
"We were once one," said Ashbrand, his voice like coal.
"We bled apart," whispered Vaelren, sorrowful.
"And now she comes to stitch us?" snarled The Hollowed.
"No," said the Unnamed, small and scared. "She comes to understand."
Ashling turned in a slow circle. Her voice echoed softly.
"You don't have to agree. But you do have to speak.
If I'm to carry the whole of him…
I must know what broke him."
The figures stirred.
And they began to speak.
Ashbrand: "I chose fire. I burned the false council. I didn't regret it.
Because some truths only rise in ash."
Vaelren: "I gave away my peace to end a war no one asked me to stop.
I smiled as I fell."
Sol-Keir: "I erased myself from her memory so she could survive.
And now she walks beside me, never knowing my name."
Eriswain: "I killed a friend. A king. I told myself it was mercy.
But the blade still weeps."
The Hollowed: "I let them take my name. I thought emptiness would save the world.
Instead, it starved me."
The Last-Eyed: "I watched them tear him apart.
And I watched because I agreed."
The Unnamed said nothing.
Only wept.
Ashling stepped toward him.
Kneeling.
"You're the beginning, aren't you?"
The child lifted tear-stained eyes.
"I just wanted to keep a promise."
"What promise?"
"To never forget who I loved."
The void cracked.
The spiral closed.
And a new shape began to form—
Until a voice, deep and furious, tore through the stillness.
"No."
"I will not return."
Ashbrand stepped forward.
But it wasn't him.
It was something else inside him.
A blade of thought and hatred, forged from the pain of a life he never forgave.
Ashling staggered back.
The figure burned red—not flame, but fury. Ancient.
"You think you can fix this?" it snarled. "We died because we dared to carry more than one name."
"You didn't die," Ashling said softly. "You were chosen to carry memory. And you made it a weapon."
The red-eyed Remnant screamed, and the hall began to fall apart.
Mirrors cracked. Spirals fractured.
The reconciliation was collapsing.
Outside the rite-circle, Nyrelle fell to her knees. "She's losing it."
Lys surged forward. "Then pull her out!"
"We can't. Not unless she chooses to leave."
Lys knelt at the edge of the sigils, eyes shining with tears.
She whispered toward the void:
"Ashling, if you can hear me—tell him who he is.
Remind him why you stayed."
Inside the broken spiral, Ashling rose to her feet.
The furious Remnant—the one with too much flame and not enough soul—prepared to strike.
But Ashling stepped closer.
"I remember you now."
"Do you?" it hissed.
"Yes. You're not just rage. You're the refusal.
The one who kept standing after they told you you were nothing.
The one who chose pain rather than obedience.
You're not what broke him.
You're what kept him from staying broken."
It snarled again.
But this time—
It hesitated.
Ashling held out her hand.
"Don't be a weapon anymore.
Be a name again."
The void roared.
And then—
Stillness.
Seven echoes folded inward.
Their silhouettes became one.
A single figure stood before her now.
Scarred. Glowing faintly.
Not whole.
But possible.
Keiran's voice returned.
Quiet. Full.
Ashling smiled through her tears.
The spiral shattered.
Ashling collapsed, coughing.
Lys caught her.
The memory-core fell to the earth—no longer pulsing.
It had settled.
Nyrelle touched her forehead.
Ashling's voice, barely above a whisper:
"He's quieter now."
Nyrelle smiled through her trembling.
"Then he's listening again."