The chapel was supposed to be forgotten.
Long since erased from records, prayers, and pilgrimages. Nothing more than a ruin clinging to the bones of the old forest, where moss overtook memory and the wind no longer carried hymns.
But Kael knew better.
The crows told him.
They circled above the crumbling spire like sentinels, dozens of them, black feathers flickering with hints of iridescence, their wings slicing through a pale, iron-colored sky. He'd seen them for miles — always ahead of him, always drifting toward one place.
The second Remnant was near.
He stepped through the treeline and stopped at the chapel's edge. Once a place of worship, now a carcass of rotted beams and shattered stained glass. The stone was cracked but not collapsed. Someone had kept it standing — or something.
Ash swirled faintly around the entrance, even though there had been no fire.
"This place remembers. Be careful."
The Echo's voice curled like smoke in Kael's mind — feminine, serpentine, and ancient. Solvane. She was more present now, since he'd fed the flame. Since he'd made Hiram scream.
"Veyrith's scent lingers. Masked god. Liar. Traitor. Beautiful."
Kael didn't answer.
He stepped through the doorway.
Inside, the air shifted — not colder, not warmer, just heavier. Like the silence had teeth.
The chapel was empty of pews, but the bones of the place remained. Stone archways, broken murals, and the lingering scent of long-extinguished candles. The stained-glass windows were shattered, leaving only jagged shards of forgotten saints.
But what stood at the altar was not glass.
It was a man.
Tall, thin, cloaked in deep green and gray. His robe was stitched with symbols Kael half-recognized — sacred to the old gods, banned under royal decree. A porcelain mask hid his face, cracked down the left side. One hand rested on a ruined lectern. The other held a small chain of bone-carved beads.
The man didn't move as Kael entered.
"You followed the flame," he said softly.
"No," Kael replied. "I followed the crows."
A pause. Then a smile in the voice.
"They followed you."
Kael moved closer, slow, his hand near the hilt of his ashsteel blade.
"You know who I am?"
"I know what you carry."
"Then you know not to stand in my way."
The masked man turned toward him, tilting his head in that slow, birdlike fashion.
"I am not here to stop you. I am here to witness you."
"…Witness?"
"One who remembers the forgotten. One who tends the last places of the gods. We are few. Fading. But when one like you appears, we watch."
The figure gestured to the floor at the foot of the altar.
A symbol was burned into the stone.
Six points forming a ring around a hollow center — the mark of Veyrith, the God of Masks and Betrayal.
It pulsed faintly as Kael approached, but not with light. With feeling. A pressure that stirred something deep in his chest — something not his own.
"What do you want from me?" Kael asked.
"Nothing," the Witness replied. "It is you who wants. That is why you came."
Kael stared down at the symbol. The longer he looked, the more it shifted. Not visually — but emotionally. It reflected back his doubts. His anger. His guilt.
His fear.
What if you are what they said you were?
What if exile was justice?
What if they were right?
He dropped to one knee.
The symbol flared, brighter than before.
"You're close," Solvane whispered. "Take it. Let him in. We need the second."
"I don't need anyone."
"Then burn him. But first... listen."
Kael reached down and pressed his palm to the stone.
The world blinked.
Suddenly, he was not in the chapel. Not in the forest. Not in his body.
He stood in blackness — no light, no sound, only pressure.
And then…
Voices. Hundreds. Thousands. Whispering behind masks. Laughing. Crying. Screaming.
A figure emerged. Cloaked. Human-shaped, but too still. A mirrored mask hid its face, but the reflection within it showed Kael — not as he was, but as he feared he might become.
"You seek truth," the figure said. "You chase names. Faces. Blame."
Kael tried to speak. No voice came.
"You are a weapon looking for a reason."
The mask cracked. Beneath it: Kael's own face, smiling cruelly, eyes hollow.
"You think vengeance will bring peace?"
The figure stepped forward and placed its hand on Kael's chest.
"You don't want justice. You want permission."
Then it vanished.
The world split.
Kael gasped, falling backward onto the chapel floor.
The mark was gone. His heart pounded like a war drum.
The porcelain-masked man knelt beside him.
"You've claimed the second."
Kael looked at his hands.
The flame within his veins had changed — now streaked with shadows, curling in unnatural arcs. His heartbeat echoed with something deeper. More subtle. A new presence, cool and calculating.
"Veyrith watches now."
He stood slowly, jaw tight.
The Witness stepped back.
"You are two now. Solvane and Veyrith. Wrath and Deceit."
Kael walked past him.
"You're not the only one watching, are you?"
"No," the Witness said. "Others carry pieces. Not all will bow."
"I'm not asking them to."
Kael stopped at the threshold, the cold wind pushing into the chapel once more.
"But if they get in my way…"
He raised his hand. A flame danced in his palm, then twisted — reshaping into a hollow crown of flickering fire.
"…they'll burn."
The crows outside screamed as one.