The door creaked open like it remembered how.
Old wood sighed. Vines slithered back.
And the earth beneath the Ashroot split wide, revealing stairs that led into nothingness.
No cobwebs. No dust.
Only moist heat, rising like the breath of something buried too long and never meant to wake.
---
Theo was dead.
Clara held my arm.
Noah stood silently, his face strangely calm.
He wasn't crying.
He wasn't even blinking.
He whispered:
> "This is where she said I'd remember."
---
We stepped inside.
---
The staircase spiraled downward, swallowed by thick roots that pulsed with wet, unnatural rhythm. Some of them twitched when touched. Others curled back, as if recognizing us.
Clara's flashlight flickered but didn't die. Not yet.
Carvings lined the walls. Symbols I'd seen before—on ritual pages, in Clara's sketches, in Eleanor's handwriting. But deeper in, they changed.
The spiral began to open.
Split into two branches.
One ended in a circle.
The other… a flame.
---
I ran my fingers over the split.
The bark was warm.
Beating.
Like skin.
---
At the bottom of the stairway was a chamber.
The walls were made of packed dirt and twisting roots. The ceiling too low. The air smelled like burnt sugar and blood.
A circle had been carved into the floor. Twelve notches. Dried wax stains. Bone fragments arranged like clock hands.
This was not a basement.
This was a womb.
---
Clara stepped forward.
There were jars on the shelf.
All labeled.
Each with a name.
Jonas. Anna. Ruth. Clara. Noah.
The one marked "Clara" was half full of ash.
The one marked "Noah" was empty.
---
> "What is this?" Clara whispered.
> "An inheritance," I said, without meaning to.
Because I was beginning to understand.
This wasn't just a ritual site.
It was a family vault.
And someone had been preparing it for a very long time.
---
Noah stepped into the circle.
He looked up at the roots above and smiled.
> "She said I'm almost ready."
Clara grabbed his arm.
> "No. We're not doing this. You're not doing any of this."
He looked at her, confused.
> "But you already chose me."
---
I turned to her. "What is he talking about?"
She shook her head. "I didn't. I swear—"
But I remembered the drawing.
The one Clara said she didn't draw.
The one that showed Noah in the circle.
Arms raised.
Eyes hollow.
And Clara… watching.
---
The earth trembled.
The roots in the ceiling groaned.
From the wall behind the circle, the dirt peeled away—revealing a mural.
A family tree.
Painted in blood.
Starting at the top with Eleanor Ashcroft.
Then branching down through names I didn't recognize.
Then: Amelia.
Beneath me: Clara. Noah.
And beneath that…
A blank space.
---
> "It grows only through fire," Noah whispered.
> "Or it ends in ash."
---
I turned to him.
> "What does that mean, baby?"
But it wasn't my son who answered.
It was the voice through him.
Older. Male.
Jonas.
> "It means this root was cursed to keep growing.
And every few generations, a new branch must be burned away.
Or the whole tree goes mad."
Clara stepped into the circle beside Noah. "Then I'll do it."
> "Do what?"
> "Be the one who ends it."
---
Suddenly, the chamber went cold.
The roots flinched.
The jars rattled.
And behind us, the stairs collapsed.
Buried by falling dirt.
No going back.
---
The roots around the chamber moved to form a face in the wall.
A hollow visage—familiar and rotting.
Eleanor.
No eyes. No mouth.
But we heard her voice.
Not aloud. Not in the ears.
In the blood.
> "The fire bearer must kill the ash carrier.
One must die willingly.
Or the root lives again."
---
Noah looked up at me.
He didn't cry.
He just said:
> "It's okay, Mom."
> "I saw what's next."
> "It's warm."
---
Clara trembled.
> "Don't you dare."
But Noah reached into his pocket.
Pulled out something small.
The broken matchbox.
The one Eleanor used to keep under her bed.
He struck one.
Flame hissed to life.
---
I screamed.
I lunged for him.
But Clara stepped in front of me.
She didn't stop him.
She held his hand.
> "If it has to be one of us…" she said quietly.
> "…then let it be both."
---
She took the flame.
Dropped it into the circle.
The wax caught.
The bones ignited.
The mural began to burn.
And Noah whispered:
> "Ashes from the root."
---
The roots screamed.
The chamber collapsed inward.
But not with death.
With relief.
As if the tree itself had waited for someone to break its legacy.
---
And in that moment—before the darkness swallowed us—
I saw the mural again.
New names appeared.
But only one remained.
Clara.
---
Noah was gone.
But the fire…
Remained.