The forest thinned as morning broke, revealing a ragged path carved into the hills. Aela's boots scraped over exposed roots and gravel, but she barely noticed. Her mind was full of shadows—memories that weren't hers, fragments of voices half-heard.
Ahead, Kael walked with quiet purpose, eyes scanning the horizon like he expected the past itself to reach out and drag them back.
"How far to the next vault?" she asked, breaking the silence.
Kael pointed toward a cleft in the hills where the ground sloped sharply downward. "The Archive is beneath us. Hidden in a place that forgot the sky."
Aela frowned. "You mean a cave?"
"No," Kael said. "I mean a place so old, even the sun stopped looking."
They descended into a canyon where light barely touched the walls. Moss glowed faintly along the stone, and a thin river trickled beside them, flowing uphill in silent defiance of nature.
At the canyon's base, Kael stopped before a crumbling archway. Carved into the rock above it were worn symbols—shifting as Aela tried to read them.
"What does it say?" she asked.
Kael hesitated. "Only silence may enter."
Aela stepped forward. "Then we whisper."
Kael shook his head. "No. I mean it literally."
He raised a hand and pressed two fingers to the center of the arch.
Instantly, the world hushed.
No wind.
No dripping water.
Even her heartbeat grew muffled in her ears.
The door opened.
They stepped inside.
---
The Archive Below wasn't like the vaults Aela had imagined. It was not grand or sacred. It was decayed. Broken. A library collapsed upon itself, with shelves twisted like dying trees and books that wept ink into the floor.
Memory hung in the air like dust.
Kael led her down narrow corridors, past shattered statues and hollow rooms filled with glass fragments—each reflecting scenes that changed when she blinked.
One room showed her mother's face.
Then her mother leaving.
Then… nothing.
"I never knew her," Aela whispered.
Kael paused. "That's the Archive. It shows what was forgotten… and what you were never allowed to remember."
"Allowed?"
He didn't answer.
Farther in, the Archive narrowed to a stairwell descending into blackness. At the bottom, a circular chamber waited—its center cracked open by time, revealing a chasm of flickering memory-light below.
Suspended above the chasm, floating midair, was a second shard.
But they weren't alone.
A figure stood in the shadows.
Tall. Pale. Eyes glowing faintly blue.
He wore robes marked with gold thread and carried a staff etched with clockwork gears. His presence distorted the room, like reality was bending to make space for him.
"Kael," the figure said. "Still running errands for the fallen ones?"
Kael stiffened. "Riven."
Aela stepped closer. "You know him?"
Kael didn't take his eyes off the man. "Riven was once a Guardian of the Dawn."
"And now?"
"Now," Riven said smoothly, "I correct its mistakes."
He stepped forward, gaze fixed on Aela. "You're the listener. The last fragment. I expected… someone older."
"Sorry to disappoint," she said coolly.
"Not at all," Riven replied. "You're precisely what I feared."
He lifted his staff, and the shard above the chasm shuddered.
Kael moved between them. "You can't take it."
"I don't intend to," Riven said. "I came to see if she would."
Aela stared at the shard. It pulsed, calling to her—but this time, there was resistance. A pressure. Like something wanted her to fail.
She stepped toward it.
"No," Kael warned. "It's a test."
"She has to try," Riven said.
Aela ignored them both. She reached out—
—and the floor dropped away.
The chasm swallowed her whole.
---
She fell through memories.
Her own.
She saw herself as a child, wandering into the standing stones.
A shadow watching from the trees.
A voice whispering her name long before she ever truly heard it.
Then other memories—not hers.
Kael, kneeling before a crumbling tower. A girl with silver eyes cradling a wounded boy. Riven, screaming as light burst from his chest and scattered across a burning sky.
Then—darkness.
When she opened her eyes, she was back in the chamber. The shard hovered before her.
She reached out again—and this time, it came willingly.
The moment her fingers closed around it, everything froze.
Riven stepped back.
Kael stared at her in awe.
"What did you see?" he asked.
"I saw the moment it broke," Aela said quietly. "The Dawn."
"And?" Riven pressed.
She met his gaze. "It wasn't shattered by war."
Riven's eyes narrowed. "No. It was shattered by fear."
Aela tucked the shard into her pouch beside the first. Her heartbeat was steady now. Clear.
"I'm not afraid anymore."
Riven smiled faintly. "Good. Then you'll live long enough to regret it."
In a blink, he was gone.
No flash. No sound.
Just silence.
Kael approached slowly. "You passed the Archive's test."
"I saw too much," Aela said. "But I needed to."
They turned toward the exit, the walls of the Archive shifting behind them like an old book closing.
Kael spoke softly. "Two shards found. Five remain."
Aela didn't answer right away.
She touched the pendant. The glow was steady now.
The echoes weren't just whispering anymore.
They were calling.