They left the village in silence.
Torian didn't look back. He didn't need to. The weight of that place—the stillness, the shadows, the
echoes of grief carved into stone—followed without footsteps. It clung to his breath, his thoughts,
and most of all, to the ember within his chest. It hadn't flared. Not once. But it remembered.
The morning light broke pale and quiet, veiled behind thin layers of drifting mist. Skarn padded
beside him, quiet and steady, though his ears twitched often, flicking toward sounds Torian couldn't
hear. They climbed the ravine's edge in a winding series of switchbacks, their boots scuffing
through dew-laced dust and rotting pine needles.
The higher they went, the more the world felt… ordinary.
Birdsong returned in scattered notes. The wind moved through the trees again, gentle and calm.
They passed between groves of evergreen and stone, unburned and unbroken. No flames danced
here. No bones waited beneath ash. Just trees. Dirt. Leaves.
Torian stopped at the top of a ridge and looked out.
Ahead lay miles of forest sloping gently east, with the faint shimmer of a river winding between the
hills. Far on the horizon, the land began to rise again—craggy mountains touched with snow even in
the warm months. He exhaled and let the sight settle into his bones.
It was the first time in weeks that the world didn't feel like it was dying."We move until night," he said.
Skarn made a soft sound in his throat—acknowledgment—and they continued down the eastern
path.
⸻
Torian didn't speak much that day, but something had shifted in him. For the first time, he wasn't
waiting for a whisper from the ember. He wasn't listening for fire or flinching at silence. He chose.
When to walk. When to rest. Where to camp.
And Skarn followed him not as a guide, but as a companion.
They covered more distance than usual. The terrain helped. The path was clear, worn by time but
unburdened by destruction. Torian wondered how many flame-bearers had walked this way. How
many had passed this exact hill, touched these trees, breathed this air before falling to ruin.
He would not be one of them.
By midday, the forest grew stranger.
Not hostile. Not unnatural. But… off.
He noticed it in small things.
The bark on the trees near the trail turned glassy at the tips. It caught the light strangely, as if the
sun was reflecting off something beneath the surface. The leaves on some branches curled inward
and trembled when he walked past—not from wind, but from something more like breath.
A fox darted across the trail ahead of them.
It stopped just before the treeline.
Then turned.
And stared at Torian.Its eyes shimmered—not animal eyes. Something brighter. Intelligent.
Then it vanished.
Skarn stood still beside him, unmoving.
Torian's hand went to his chest.
The ember was quiet.
Not asleep.
Observing.
Later, they crossed a small pond that reflected the trees perfectly—but not the sky. The clouds
overhead moved freely. But the pond's surface showed no movement above, no sun, no stars. Only
the forest. As if the sky had been cut away.
Torian knelt beside it, dipped his hand in.
The water rippled—but when he pulled back, his hand was dry.
He didn't speak of it.
They moved on.
⸻
They came to a clearing in the late afternoon.
It was circular, unnaturally so. The trees formed a perfect ring, and at the center stood a single
stone. Waist-high. Covered in lichen and vines. Torian approached it slowly, sword still on his back.
The stone bore a carving.
A spiral flame—deep, clean, precise.
But above it, scratched into the stone in uneven hand-carved lines, were four words:THE FIRE WALKS AGAIN
He ran his fingers across the inscription.
It was recent. Maybe days old.
He turned to Skarn. "They know."
The beast rumbled low in his throat.
Not just a warning.
Agreement.
Someone else was out there. Watching. Remembering. Marking.
And the world was beginning to respond.
⸻
They reached the edge of a hill at dusk.
Below, nestled in the fold of the land, was a hamlet. No walls. No towers. Just a handful
of stone huts with thatched roofs, smoke curling from chimneys, and one winding path
that led to a worn stable and a shared well.
Torian stared down at the houses, debating.
They hadn't seen other people in weeks.
"I won't ask questions," he said quietly. "I just want a fire. A place to sleep."
Skarn made no protest.
They descended slowly, boots crunching softly on gravel and grass.
As they entered the outskirts of the hamlet, people noticed.A boy stopped hauling wood and stared.
A man chopping logs lowered his axe, eyes narrowed.
No one shouted.
No one ran.
But the air shifted.
As if the village itself were bracing.
A woman stepped out from one of the central homes, wrapped in a shawl of faded
green, her white hair braided in cords. Her eyes were sharp, deep brown, and
unblinking.
She looked at Skarn first.
Then at Torian.
And she whispered, loud enough to carry:
"The flame wears a face again."
Every villager stopped.
Torian stopped walking.
The old woman's voice was soft. "It's too soon."
He didn't respond.
Didn't ask how she knew.
Didn't ask who had come before.
He simply walked past.Skarn followed, silent as stone.
No one stopped them.
No one spoke again.
They made camp just beyond the village, by a stream that shimmered gold in the last
light of dusk.
Torian lit a fire.
This time, it didn't retreat from him.
It didn't welcome him either.
It simply burned.
He sat beside it, arms on his knees, watching the flames twist upward into the
darkening sky.
"I'm not hiding anymore," he whispered. "I don't know what I'm supposed to be. But I'm
going to walk the path anyway."
The fire crackled softly.
No reply.
But a pulse of warmth settled into his chest.
Skarn curled beside him, tail wrapping over his back.
And the night moved on.
⸻
He dreamed.Not in images at first, but in sensation.
Weight.
Fire.
Cold wind on scorched earth.
Then sound.
The clang of metal on stone. The distant call of a horn.
Then he saw it.
A throne—made of ash and jagged iron, cracked down the center. It sat atop a hill of melted glass.
Around it, the battlefield shimmered—frozen mid-blast, soldiers locked in postures of pain, all of
them statues now, burned into position.
Torian stood alone.
No Skarn.
No allies.
Only the ember in his chest, glowing white-hot.
In one hand, he held fire—pure, raw, alive.
In the other hand?
Nothing.
Only blood.
He dropped the flame.
It burned the ground.Then the throne cracked open.
A voice spoke—not from the throne, but from inside Torian's own mind.
"All thrones burn eventually. Even the ones you never wanted."
He woke gasping.
The fire had gone out.
Skarn was awake, watching him.
Torian sat up slowly, heart racing.
The ember pulsed once.
Slow.
Steady.
He exhaled and looked at the stars.
They were sharp tonight.
Unusually clear.
Something was coming.
Something distant—but approaching.
And the fire within him would no longer stay silent much longer.