The river was never supposed to speak.
Yet that night, beneath the bruised sky and the trembling ash trees, it sang—not a melody, not a whisper, but a scream rippling through water, echoing over stones smoothed by centuries. And Almond heard it. Loud. Clear. Intimate. As if the current had dipped its wet mouth to her ear and recited every secret she had ever buried.
She didn't flinch. She stood barefoot on the rocks by the bank, her blood still drying in the lines of her palm. The oath she made was still fresh—too fresh. Her skin hadn't adjusted to the weight of it. Her bones hadn't accepted the shift. The forest had gone silent behind her, like it, too, was listening.
Aren was nearby, kneeling before the river as if waiting for it to baptize him or swallow him whole. He wasn't crying, but his eyes carried the heaviness of someone who'd forgotten how.
Velda stood apart, arms crossed, the last flickers of flame dying at her fingertips. "The river's not singing for us," she said sharply. "It's mourning."
"No," Almond murmured, gaze locked on the rippling surface. "It's warning."
Because the fire wasn't in the sky anymore. It was beneath them. In the river. In the dirt. In the pact. Something ancient had been awakened—not with a bang, but with a vow.
And now the world would answer.
From the far end of the water, a figure emerged—not walking, not gliding, but rising. Cloaked in liquid shadow. Antlers spiraling from its head like twisted branches. Its face… wasn't a face. It was a void carved into flesh. A mouth with no voice. A god with no prayers.
Aren's breath caught. "Who is that?"
Velda answered slowly, with the stiffness of someone trying not to tremble. "The first one."
The river being took one step forward—and the ground around them steamed. Not just from heat. From memory. From time collapsing on itself.
It spoke in their heads. Not words. Not sentences. Impressions. Pain. Fury. Boundless hunger.
Almond took one step forward. "If you're here, then the pact wasn't enough."
It answered with silence that roared louder than thunder.
Then the sky broke.
The sky cracked in two—just cracked, like something divine had taken a hammer to it. Light didn't pour through. Instead, ash rained down in spirals, soft like snow but heavier than guilt. Almond didn't blink. She just watched the being rise higher from the river, dripping liquid time, crowned in antlers etched with galaxies.
Aren stumbled backward. "Velda—what do we do?"
Velda didn't answer. Her eyes were locked on the entity like it held every answer to every ritual she'd ever failed to complete. Her flames sparked again, weak and confused, like they knew they were no match for this creature.
"I think," Almond said, stepping closer, "we ask what it wants."
"You don't ask beings like that," Velda whispered harshly. "You survive them."
But Almond wasn't listening to fear anymore. The oath had anchored itself in her soul—deep, binding, ancient. Whatever this thing was, it had been pulled to her. And there was no retreat now. She knelt before it, blood-smeared hands open like an offering.
"I didn't wake you," she said quietly. "The pact did."
The being tilted its non-face, curious—or maybe insulted. Time warped around its body. Flowers bloomed and wilted in seconds at its feet. The air around them shimmered, disobeying gravity, turning the river into a mirror of broken stars.
Then, finally, a voice—not a scream, not a whisper, but a choir of the damned—rushed through her mind:
"You bear the sin. You lit the match. You called the dark and bound it to your spine."
Almond gasped, her back arching as if the words were branding her vertebrae. The river screamed again.
Behind her, Aren cried out. Not in fear. In recognition.
"She's the vessel," he whispered.
Velda turned to him sharply. "You knew?"
"No," Aren said, horrified. "I felt it. Just now."
And then the river-being turned to Velda.
"The witch who guards the flame. You were once mine."
Velda's knees buckled. "That's impossible."
But the being just watched. And waited.
Velda's hands trembled—not out of fear, but from the residual power still buzzing through her bones. The river had quieted now, but its memory lingered in the air, thick like incense. The trees whispered their secrets to each other again, slowly returning to their ancient rhythm.
Almond stood barefoot at the river's edge, her hair soaked, tangled with leaves and moonlight. A small cut bled down her cheek—more a mark of survival than injury. She didn't wipe it away. She let it stay. A crown of defiance.
Aren approached her slowly, water dripping from his boots. His eyes searched her, not with pity or awe, but recognition. As though he had seen her before time began. As though every version of him had known every version of her across lifetimes.
"I saw it," he said, voice hoarse. "When you called the fire. When you bent it. You didn't hesitate."
"I couldn't," Almond replied softly. "If I waited, he would've taken you."
He stepped closer. "So you saved me."
"No," she breathed, locking eyes with him. "I saved us."
In the silence that followed, the trees stilled. The stars leaned in. The river, no longer angry, seemed to hum in tune with something much older than magic—something ancient and infinite.
Velda watched them, a pang slicing through her chest—not of jealousy, but of remembrance. She had once loved like that too, dangerously and without limits. And it had almost destroyed her. Almost.
Behind them, the glowing remnants of the pact they'd forged shimmered like burning runes on the bark of the old oak. The pact had been sealed not just with blood, but with choice. And choice, among immortals, was rarer than time itself.
The river had sung of fire.
And they had answered its call.