The fish crackled in the fire.
Not much, just two—gutted with a sharpened stick and grilled over a pit Cassian had carved from riverstone. It was rough, half-assed, and somehow the best-smelling thing Noah had experienced in weeks. He was crouched on a flat rock near the fire, arms around his knees, watching the smoke curl into the soft blue sky.
Cassian sat with a satisfied huff, handing over a stick skewered with blistered, golden meat.
"Bet the gods never grilled trout over open flame," he said.
Noah took it, sniffed. "Bet the gods never fished with a glorified twig either."
He bit into it. Burnt at the edges. Perfect.
Abel was leaned against a chunk of sun-warmed stone behind them, his bandaged side carefully propped, eyes half-closed. He didn't speak much—just ate slowly, like every bite had to be considered. His color had returned, a little. His hair was still damp from the lake, pulled back in a half-tie Cassian had made from a strip of his ruined shirt. The white cloth looked oddly clean against all the dried blood.
For a moment, it felt like a scene out of someone else's life.
Just three people, alive. Together. Breathing air that wasn't spoiled. Eating food that wasn't fear.
Noah didn't trust it. But he liked it.
Cassian chewed in silence, staring into the flames.
"This is weirdly good," he admitted. "Didn't think I had it in me."
"Your talent is wasted on stabbing," Noah said around a mouthful. "Open a restaurant. 'Goblin and Trout.'"
"I was thinking 'Fishy Business.'"
"Too obvious."
"'Cassian's Cod-pocalypse.'"
Abel let out a quiet wheeze of breath. It took Noah a second to realize he was laughing.
They ate in peace. It didn't last long.
The last bite of fish vanished into Abel's mouth. He wiped his fingers on the edge of his pants and let his head fall back against the rock. The warmth of the stone. The stillness of the trees. The sound of Cassian stabbing a stick into the embers, flicking char.
It was quiet again. But not peaceful.
Noah turned the stick in his hands, stripping the last of the charred skin from the wood. His stomach was full. His limbs didn't shake. The sun was warm.
He still felt hollow.
"Hey," he said softly. "Can I ask you both something?"
Cassian stopped poking the fire. Abel opened one eye.
Noah didn't look at either of them. Just at the flames.
"I know I'm the only one who… came from somewhere else," he said, carefully. "The only one with that divine candidate bullshit attached to him."
His voice didn't waver, but something under it tightened. "But I don't want it. Not the trials, not the ascension, not the cards. I don't want to become a god. I don't want to win anything. I just—" He paused, searching for the words. "I just want to live. Just be someone. Maybe an idiot with a sword and a few jokes. Someone who fishes and complains about taxes. Someone who figures out how to smile without guilt."
The fire crackled.
"I know it won't be easy," Noah went on. "It might take years to feel normal again. Maybe it never will. But if there's a chance to build something quiet and stupid and real… I want to try."
He looked up then, gaze moving between them.
"But you don't have to come with me," he added. "Either of you. I mean it."
His voice lowered. "Abel… I don't want you to feel like you owe me anything. You saved my life more than once before I ever touched your curse. You're free. If you want to go your own way, you should."
Then he turned to Cassian, and this time it was harder to hold the eye contact. "And you… I can't imagine what it's like. Looking at me, knowing I'm the reason the people you grew up with are gone. You shouldn't have to keep pretending it's fine. You deserve peace too, and if that means walking away—"
"No," Cassian cut in, sharp and sure.
Noah blinked.
"I'm not walking away," Cassian said again, quieter now. "I knew what was happening. I knew we were being used. And I knew you didn't choose any of it. If anything, you're the one who broke it. So don't you dare think I'd blame you for surviving."
Abel pushed himself forward a little, wincing from the movement. "He's right," he said. "You don't owe us this life, but we don't owe you distance either. You said you want to try living? Then let's try it. Together."
Noah swallowed hard. He didn't speak, but his hand found a flat stone near the fire and tossed it in.
It bounced once, then sank.
The fire had burned low. Just enough left to cast a flickering gold across the rocks and half-lit faces.
Cassian lay curled on his side a few steps away, back to them. Still. Quiet. Arms tucked around himself like armor.
Abel leaned against a boulder, shoulders slumped but breathing easy, his healing wound hidden beneath a fresh bandage. Noah was beside him, eyes half-closed, but sleep never came when called. Not anymore.
He turned his head slightly, watching Cassian's outline in the dark.
Too small. Too far. Too alone.
He shifted, and Abel stirred.
Their eyes met. A silent question. A soft answer. Abel's lips quirked into a tired smile, and he gave the smallest nod—go on.
Noah turned toward the other boy.
"Hey," he called gently. "Cass."
A pause. Then, movement.
Cassian pushed up and crawled over. His expression was unreadable in the firelight, but his silence spoke of hesitation worn thin.
"You sure?" he mumbled, voice scratchy.
"Yeah," Noah said, scooting over. "Warmth is warmth."
Abel chuckled, shifting slightly to make room.
Cassian settled in behind Noah, limbs awkward for a moment, then still. His arm came around, half-hug, half-grip. His face pressed into Noah's shoulder like it was the last safe place on earth.
"This is weird," Cassian muttered.
"I'm in the middle," Noah said. "Of course it's weird."
Abel snorted. "Don't kick me."
"Don't spoon me too hard."
"Don't start talking about feelings again," Abel warned.
But none of them moved.
The three of them—scorched, scarred, stitched back together by blood and choice—lay tangled beneath the stars, breath easing in the quiet.
They didn't speak again.
But for the first time in too long, they slept.
The morning was pale gold and full of birdsong.
Mist still curled between the trees, clinging to the underbrush like something shy. Sunlight cut through in narrow shafts, catching on dew-slick leaves and turning spiderwebs into constellations.
They broke camp without words. Just motion, habit, a rhythm building between the three of them that didn't need directions anymore.
Noah rolled his shoulder. No ache. No limp. For the first time in days, his body felt like his own again.
Abel moved slower but steadier, the wound on his side bound tight with clean cloth. He refused help now, walking with a quiet pride that no one mocked.
Cassian was humming.
Just once. Just a little.
It wasn't a tune Noah knew—something half-formed and probably accidental—but it was a sound. A real one. A living one.
They followed the river upstream, winding through thick woods and alpine meadows that unfurled like green carpets across the land. Wildflowers nodded in the breeze—white, blue, violet. Bees moved lazily between them.
Every so often, Cassian would flick a pebble into the stream and grin when it skipped. Abel rolled his eyes, but there was no edge to it.
Noah walked in the middle again. Not just physically, but… balanced.
It was strange, this peace. A stillness between storms.
He wasn't used to it.
"Think we'll find something up there?" he asked, gesturing toward the distant slope.
Abel shrugged. "Only one way to know."
Cassian bent to pick up a crooked stick and inspected it like a sword. "If there's food, shelter, and no cults, I'll take it."
Noah laughed. It surprised even him.
They kept walking. The air was cool, the sun warm, and the path ahead steepened gradually toward the mountain that loomed in the distance.
Whatever came next—whatever waited over that ridge—it could wait one more hour.
Right now, they were alive.
Together.
They reached the halfway point just before noon.
The slope had grown steeper, the trees thinner. The ground was drier here, dustier, littered with sharp stones and tangled roots. The river still ran nearby—narrower now, faster—but the soothing murmur had given way to a rush, like breath caught in a throat.
Noah stopped to drink. Abel knelt beside him, filling their shared flask.
Cassian had gone ahead, poking into bushes with a long stick he'd sharpened. "Should've made more of these," he muttered. "Feels like goblin weather."
Noah raised a brow. "What the hell is goblin weather?"
"You know. Warm. Too quiet. Smells like feet."
Before Noah could reply, something snapped in the undergrowth.
Hard.
All three froze.
Another snap. A growl.
Cassian barely turned before the first one lunged.
It came from the left—green-gray skin, gangly limbs, long teeth, crude knife in hand. Noah barely registered the creature before instinct took over. His hand shot forward and flicked.
A glowing card-shaped construct zipped through the air, humming with kinetic light.
It struck the goblin in the chest and exploded on impact—light, force, and blood.
The body hit the dirt in a heap.
But more followed.
Four, maybe five—snarling, frothing, eyes wide with wild hunger. Not intelligent. Just rabid.
Abel surged forward, snatching a fallen branch and swinging it like a club. Cassian roared and tackled one sideways, pinning it and stabbing with his makeshift spear.
Noah moved.
Another card shimmered into being between his fingers. He slashed it forward—this one sharp-edged, hard as steel. It sliced through the air and buried itself in a goblin's neck. The creature choked and fell.
Breath sharp. Limbs tighter. He was faster now. Sharper.
He hated how good it felt.
One goblin came from behind. Noah pivoted, summoned two more kinetic cards—one exploding midair to knock it back, the other striking like a thrown dagger.
The forest rang with screams and splintering wood.
And then… silence.
Leaves fell. Blood steamed on the rocks. Abel stood panting, a scratch across his cheek, while Cassian cradled a bruised arm.
Noah exhaled. His heart thundered. His fingers still hummed with energy.
Cassian broke the silence first. "Goblin weather. Told you."
Noah barked a laugh, half adrenaline, half relief.
"Everyone okay?" Abel asked, wiping his forehead.
"Mostly," Cassian said, stretching. "One of them bit my stick. Bastard."
Noah looked down at the bodies.
Not cultists. Not ghosts. Not cursed nobles or haunted kings.
Just monsters. Wild. Physical. Alive.
Above them, silver Zorya had begun to rise—trailing like smoke from the cooling corpses, curling gently in the air, radiant and soft.
It drifted toward Noah, shimmered against his skin… and stopped. No entry. No fusion. Just a flicker of light trying and failing to sink in.
He swallowed.
He stepped back and let it go, watching it rise into the sky like glowing ash.
By the time they reached the ridge, the light had begun to change.
It wasn't golden—not the harsh, blinding kind of the desert sun—but soft, lavender-tinted, like the sky itself was holding its breath. The forest behind them thinned, and the air felt cooler up here, like it belonged to something older, cleaner.
No one spoke as they climbed the final stretch. There wasn't much left to say. Breath came harder. Boots scuffed over dry stone. The sound of the river had faded somewhere below.
And then they reached it.
The world opened.
Noah froze first. His hand went up slowly—not to signal danger, but as if to steady himself against the sight.
Before them stretched a vast expanse of forest—unreal in its beauty. Trees glowed in hues no earth-born woodland had any right to hold: violets like bruised twilight, deep cyans that shimmered as the wind stirred them, soft blues that seemed lit from within.
A sky stretched overhead, full of gentle haze and distant clouds. To the far west, faint waves glittered—a wide, open coastline, edged by sun-splashed cliffs and mist. Where the sea met land, they could just barely make out lights—tiny sparks of civilization.
"Gods," Cassian murmured. "Is that… real?"
"Don't jinx it," Noah said quietly, squinting into the distance.
Abel stepped forward beside him, one hand shading his eyes. "There—look. A river. Same one we followed."
The ribbon of water curved through the foreign forest, wider now, almost ceremonial in how it carved the land. Near its banks, further off, they could see faint lines of movement—maybe old roads, maybe trails, or magical infrastructure long forgotten.
Light shimmered at odd intervals. Not firelight. Something else. Pulses. Beacons. Signs of life.
Or something like it.
Noah's voice was soft. "We follow the river."
He didn't look at either of them. Just the water, and what lay beyond it.
"Fresh water," he said. "Maybe fish. And maybe…"
A pause.
"…a town."