The morning broke soft and pale, a veil of silver mist draped across the valley. Noah stirred awake to muffled sounds outside—the thrum of voices, the clatter of tools, the faint laughter of children. The moon people, were already at work.
He sat up slowly. Abel was awake but still reclining, his hand resting near the fresh bandages at his side. The wound had closed but not without pain—each shift of his body came measured, deliberate. Cassian sprawled half across the furs with his arm flung over his face, muttering something unintelligible before rolling onto his stomach.
For a long moment Noah just listened. No screaming. No clash of blades. No guttural howls echoing through stone. Just… life. It was unnerving in its own way.
When they finally stepped outside, the village stirred in earnest. Paths cut through the settlement wound between great trees strung with silver-threaded banners and charms carved into crescent moons. Women bent over clay ovens built into the earth, smoke curling upward, the smell of flatbread drifting through the mist. Miners with soot-darkened hands hauled tools over their shoulders, heading toward the cave mouths gaping at the valley's edge.
Children ran barefoot over moss and roots, their braids swinging, shells and tokens clicking together. A boy no older than eight darted past, hands cupped around a captured glow-beetle that shimmered violet in the morning haze.
They weren't soldiers. That much was obvious. They were farmers, artisans, singers. A people who lived quietly under the shadow of their dead god.
And yet… eyes followed them wherever they went. Stares. Whispers that stuck to them like burrs.
"The moon's touch," a woman murmured, balancing a basket of herbs.
"Blessed by the boy," another hushed.
Noah tugged at his collar, ducking his head. It did nothing to shake the prickle crawling up his skin. Beside him, Cassian smirked like he was enjoying a private joke.
"Popular," Cassian muttered.
"Shut up."
Abel walked just behind, his steps steady but slower than before. His silence was heavy, not disapproving—just watchful, as if he too weighed the meaning of all this sudden reverence.
At the path's bend, the priestess appeared. Her staff tapped softly against the ground, her tattoos catching silver light where the mist thinned. She didn't greet them, didn't waste words. She simply turned and gestured for them to follow.
They did, winding deeper into the valley.
The further they went, the more the land revealed itself. The trees weren't like those in the forest beyond the mountains. Their trunks shimmered faintly blue, veins of silver-white pulsing through the bark like living rivers of moonlight. Moss underfoot glowed faintly with every step, footprints shimmering a few seconds before fading. Even the animals seemed touched by it—white stags grazing at the meadow's edge with antlers veined in blue fire, doves with pale plumage wheeling in lazy arcs overhead.
Noah slowed as one of the stags lifted its head. Its eyes—deep, luminous, oddly human—locked with his. For a heartbeat, he thought it might bow. Then it bounded away into the mist, leaving only silence behind.
"You see that?" Noah muttered.
"Yeah," Cassian said, lips twitching. "Probably thinks you're the second coming of their moon brat."
Noah jabbed him with an elbow. "Don't call him that here unless you want a spear through your chest."
Cassian grinned wider. Abel's gaze lingered on the trail the stag left, his voice low. "It looked at you. Not me. Not him. Just you."
"Coincidence," Noah snapped, shoving his hands into his pockets. But the certainty in Abel's tone made his skin crawl.
They reached the valley's heart at last—a circular glade ringed by the luminous trees. No walls, no roofs. Just open earth humming faintly with some deeper pulse. The air here felt different, charged but calm, as though the valley itself was listening.
The priestess stopped at the edge and turned. For the first time her voice cut through the mist. It wasn't ceremonial, but steady, weighted.
"This is the Sacred Glade. Here we gather—to speak, to heal, to mourn. And when the time comes, to fight."
Her eyes lingered on Noah with that last word.
He shifted uncomfortably.
Then she raised her staff and struck it once against the earth. The dull thud echoed through the circle, and only then did Noah notice how many villagers had gathered—farmers, miners, children clutching mothers' skirts. Dozens of eyes. All fixed on them.
"Now," the priestess said, her voice sharp with command. "The Lorekeeper will hear you. Among the Menari, he holds the memory of our people. What he says of the world, we trust as truth."
Noah blinked, caught. "The who among the what now?"
For the first time, the priestess's gaze sharpened, the faintest spark of irritation breaking her mask. "The Menari. Our people. Not 'moon folk.' Not 'moon people.' Menari. Remember it."
Noah swallowed, awkward heat crawling up his neck. Cassian smirked. Abel stood steady, unreadable as ever.
The circle remained silent, waiting for the Lorekeeper to step forward.
The Sacred Glade emptied of its hum of whispers when the priestess raised her hand. From among the crowd, an older man stepped forward. His hair was a silver-white braid that reached to his chest, his skin pale with the faint sheen of age, though his frame was still sturdy. Tattoos spiraled across his arms, the ink faded but no less clear: constellations, crescents, and flowing lines that mimicked the paths of rivers and stars.
He leaned on a staff carved from bone and tipped with a shard of polished obsidian. When he spoke, his voice was steady and low, carrying the weight of memory.
"This is our Lorekeeper," the priestess said simply. "He remembers what the rest of us cannot. He will show you the world as it is."
The Lorekeeper inclined his head, then motioned for attendants to bring forward rolls of hide and bark. They laid them out carefully on the flat stone at the center of the glade. The surfaces were rough, uneven, but etched with lines, rivers, mountains, and crude but unmistakable coastlines. Each mark had been cut by hand, ink rubbed into the grooves.
Cassian crouched first, peering at the marks. "Maps," he muttered. "Sort of."
The Lorekeeper lowered himself with care, kneeling beside the maps. "These are what we hold. Not perfect, not new. But they are our truth." His fingers, gnarled but steady, traced a western sweep of coastline. "Here lies the Devouring Sun—the empire you call Helios."
Noah's breath stilled. The map wasn't beautiful, but it was vast. Half the continent was shaded with carved lines and sunburst sigils, a sprawl that dwarfed the rest.
"The Lady of the Zenith proclaimed her new empire ten winters and summers ago," the Lorekeeper continued. "In ten years, she has spread her banners across half this land. Legions march under her sun, fleets carry her priests across seas. Where she walks, shadows cannot live. She will not stop."
The way he said it—like an eclipse already in motion—made Noah's stomach twist.
The Lorekeeper's hand moved northward, tracing a jagged outline of mountains and peaks. "Above us lies Norvain. Snow-walkers. Their silence is their law. They eat no flesh, though the land offers little else. They bow to no god, but to stillness itself. The Everwhite Silence. A philosophy older than any throne."
Cassian raised a brow. "Vegetarians. In the snow."
The Lorekeeper's mouth twitched, almost a smile. "They endure. And in endurance, they believe they are closer to the truth."
His hand moved downward, south of the Menari lands. The map there showed twisting coastlines, long rivers cutting into another continent. "And here, the Republic of Zu. The people of warm seas and long tongues. Skin dark as river-stone, smiles quick as waves. They are traders. Wealth flows in their harbors, and their goddess, Namira, balances their scales."
"Goddess of tides and scales," the priestess added quietly. "Of commerce, of fairness. Though her people test her patience with every bargain."
Noah leaned closer, studying the carving of Zu. Merchant ships were etched into its harbors, waves curling around them. Something about it felt alive even on rough hide.
"And east?" Abel asked, his voice breaking the quiet.
The Lorekeeper's hand paused at the jagged line of mountains that hemmed the Menari valley from the other side. The etchings stopped abruptly there. No rivers, no roads, no symbols. Only blank space.
"The mountains guard their secrets," the Lorekeeper said. "No Menari who walked there has returned. We hear whispers—beasts larger than ships, golden cities, storms that never die. But they are whispers only. We do not know."
Silence settled. The maps were crude, but the weight of them pressed on Noah's chest. This wasn't just geography. It was a world—vast, sprawling, already divided and fought over. And he knew none of it.
Then the Lorekeeper's gaze fixed on him. For the first time, his voice shifted—less steady, more solemn.
"All this," he said, "is what grew in the last hundred years. Since the sky broke open. Since the gods fell."
Noah blinked. "Hundred… what?"
The Lorekeeper did not hesitate. "A century ago. The sky tore with fire and storm. Strangers fell from it—divine candidates, they called themselves. Some rose as kings. Some vanished. Some died. The Lady of the Zenith was among them. Others still walk, though less is known. It has been one hundred years since the sky broke."
The words hit like a blade.
Noah's ears rang. He stared at the map but saw nothing. A hundred years.
His body went cold, then hot, then cold again. His thoughts clawed at themselves.
"No," he muttered. "No, that's… that's wrong. It's been months. A year at most. Not…" His voice broke.
Cassian's head snapped toward him, brow furrowed. "Noah—"
But Noah barely heard. The Lorekeeper's voice pressed on, steady and merciless.
"Young one, you are touched by power. We all saw it in the glade. But know this: the others like you have had a century to build. A century to learn. To conquer. To ascend."
The air constricted around him. A century. A hundred years while he stumbled in darkness, while he fought in blood and filth. Months for him—an eternity for them.
He staggered back from the map, hands curling into fists. "That's impossible."
But even as he said it, he knew. The Womb, the way time twisted there. The voices of the dead, the endless corridors. It hadn't just trapped his body. It had stolen years—decades.
The others were already gods. And he was nothing.
The whispers of the Menari around the glade blurred together—blessed, moon-touched, chosen. All lies. He was behind. So far behind he might as well already be dead.
His breath came fast, shallow. Abel's hand touched his shoulder, grounding, but Noah flinched away. He couldn't. Not now.
He turned, stumbling from the glade, the world tilting sideways.
The door slammed behind him harder than he meant. Their quarters were dim, silver light spilling in through the slit window. The quiet was unbearable.
Noah pressed his back to the wall, fists pressed against his temples. "A hundred years," he whispered. Then louder: "A hundred fucking years."
Cassian and Abel followed, slower. Cassian closed the door softly, his usual grin absent. Abel's face was unreadable, calm in a way that only made Noah's panic worse.
Noah's words tumbled out, jagged, sharp. "They've had a century! Do you get it? A century to grow, to learn, to— to become gods. And me? I've been crawling in filth, bleeding, barely keeping up. I'm nothing. I'm already lost."
Cassian tried first, his voice lighter than his eyes. "You're not nothing. You're dramatic, sure, but not nothing."
"Don't joke." Noah's voice cracked. "Don't you get it? They've already won. They're gods. I'm just… I'm just a kid with a deck of cursed cards and too much blood on my hands."
'Well, at least I was a kid with a deck before I buried it under a tree,' Noah taunted himself.
He laughed then, a sound too sharp, too close to breaking. "I should just quit now. Save them the trouble of killing me later."
Abel stepped forward at last, steady as stone. His hand landed on Noah's arm, firm but not forceful. "You saved me," he said simply.
Noah blinked, thrown. "What?"
"You saved me," Abel repeated. "From the curse. From myself. No god did that. You did. If that is nothing, then I'll take nothing."
The words lodged in Noah's chest, heavy and immovable.
Cassian came closer too, crouching until his eyes met Noah's. "You're not behind. You're just… you. And you're not alone. We're here. We'll figure it out. Even if the rest of them are already shining suns and storm gods or whatever. You've got us. That's worth something."
Noah's breath shook. His chest hurt. He wanted to scream and laugh and collapse all at once.
Slowly, the storm ebbed. His hands lowered from his temples. The room steadied around him—the moss beds, the glow through the window, the quiet presence of Abel and Cassian.
He slumped onto the nearest bed, burying his face in his hands. "I can't do this," he whispered. "Not alone."
"Good thing you're not," Cassian said softly.
Abel sat beside him, silent, solid.
Minutes passed before Noah lifted his head. His eyes burned, but his voice was steadier. "We'll stay. A week, maybe. See what we can learn. Then… then we'll decide."
Cassian grinned faintly, relief flickering in his eyes. Abel gave a single nod.
Noah turned toward the window. The moonlight spilled pale and unyielding across the floor, painting the wood in silver. He watched it, chest still tight, but not breaking anymore.
Despair lingered, sharp and heavy. But beneath it, a spark. Small. Fragile. Hope, maybe. Or defiance.
Whatever it was, it was his.
And for now, it was enough.