The cold came with teeth.
Veyna moved like a whisper ahead of them, her cloak flaring behind her, a pale streak of movement against the ashen woodlands. Janis trailed close, her steps sure-footed, bow slung tight across her back. Azrael walked behind, still half-lost in memory but pressing forward into the bleak, widening wild.
They had left Morrin's ruins behind, but the smoke still bled into the skies above them, a dark omen staining the horizon. The trees here were leafless; blistered bark and crooked limbs, as though the forest had once been burned alive and had frozen in its death throes.
The trail was silent. No birds. No beasts. Only the howl of distant wind.
Azrael kept his eye ahead. His right eye—the one that still worked. The patch over the other felt tighter these days. He wasn't sure if it was the cold or something else. Something deeper.
"Anything?" Janis asked Veyna.
The priestess slowed, running a gloved hand along the ridged bark of a splintered tree. "The pull is stronger. The Echo never leaves a place untouched—it guides."
Janis frowned. "Yeah, well, the wind's guiding us into frostbite."
Azrael remained quiet. He glanced to his right, beyond the tree line where the land dipped into a narrow valley. Something about it tugged at him. The shadows. The way the wind bent low, curling between the rocks.
"Camp soon," Veyna said. "We'll need fire. This place sleeps with open eyes."
They pressed forward.
---
Back in the Vale of Danigrasse, light filtered dimly through the high council chambers. The circular hall, framed in thick wood and stone, flickered with cold torches. Twelve elders sat beneath the high beams, their faces drawn with worry, tension, and ambition.
Varros stood at the center.
"Whatever happened in Morrin wasn't a natural failure," he said.
"Are you suggesting sabotage?" Elder Tenik asked. His face was gaunt, as though permanently etched in suspicion.
"I'm suggesting interference. Not just by man."
A murmur passed through the circle.
Elder Mura tapped her staff. "We mustn't return to old myths. We buried the God Wars in the snow where they belong."
Varros stepped forward. "And yet something stirs. You sent Azrael with Veyna for that reason, didn't you? You believed the Echo had reawakened."
"Belief is dangerous," Mura replied.
"And silence is worse," Varros snapped.
Another elder coughed. "What of the relics? Have any survived?"
Varros shook his head. "None found. But the vault wasn't empty. I believe they were… activated."
That made them sit back.
Mura narrowed her eyes. "Activated?"
"By whom?" Tenik asked.
Varros hesitated. "We may already know."
A silence fell heavier than stone.
---
Night came quickly in the wild.
They set camp at the base of a moss-covered rock formation. The fire crackled weakly in the wind. Janis boiled rootwater while Azrael sat hunched nearby, running a finger across a jagged stone.
Veyna stood in prayer, arms outstretched toward the moon.
"I don't like this," Janis said softly.
Azrael glanced up. "The silence?"
"The feeling. It's too quiet. Like even the forest is waiting for something to happen."
He nodded. "I feel it too."
Veyna lowered her arms. "We are within the borders of an old shrine. A forgotten one. The spirits here don't sleep."
Janis sighed. "You always say that like it's comforting."
Veyna turned. "Would you rather be alone?"
"No," Janis muttered. "I just wish they had voices less like wind and more like people."
Azrael smiled faintly. For once, the tension between them wasn't as sharp. Maybe it was the firelight. Maybe the cold. Maybe it was the shared helplessness none of them wanted to admit.
He stared at the flames and remembered the way the relic glowed in the cavern. The voice.
He is not yet ready.
"What do you think it meant?" he asked suddenly.
Veyna looked at him.
"The voice. The orb. Why say I'm not ready?"
Veyna sat down across from him. Her face, though calm, bore the weight of truths too old for words.
"Because something once belonged to you," she said. "And something else has been waiting for its return."
"Something divine?"
"Something broken."
Azrael's heart beat faster.
Janis poked the fire. "Lovely. Let's just throw a party for our broken gods."
---
Meanwhile, in the council chamber, the debate had turned.
Elder Tenik rose. "If the Echo has truly returned, we are out of time. We must send emissaries to the other villages. The Sage Greens. Even the Iceborne."
Mura waved a hand. "We would be mocked. Or worse, provoke them. You know how the Yellow Faith responds to prophecy."
Varros stepped in. "We don't need belief. We need proof."
"Then find it," Mura said. "Before your student brings back war with him."
Varros didn't flinch.
"He's more than a student," he said. "He's the thread unraveling everything we've forgotten. And you all know it."
The room fell into still silence.
---
In the wild, dawn broke over frostbitten trees.
Azrael woke first. His breath formed clouds in the morning air. Janis snored beside him, curled under her cloak. Veyna was already standing, staring eastward.
He approached her.
"You don't sleep much."
"I dream while I'm awake."
"That sounds exhausting."
She turned, her expression unreadable. "We're close."
"To what?"
"The mouth of the Ash Scar."
Azrael blinked. "That's real?"
She nodded. "The point where the gods last wept."
Janis groaned from behind. "Please don't make me hike into divine heartbreak before breakfast."
But they packed up. And they moved.
And as the land opened before them—flat, barren, scorched—they saw it.
The Ash Scar.
A crater miles wide, layered in black soot and glassed earth. In its center, a spiral of stone columns stood like frozen ribs reaching skyward.
Azrael felt something stir behind his eye.
Veyna's voice was hushed. "This is where the First Rebellion began. Where the god of silence died."
Janis stared. "We're actually going in there?"
Azrael stepped forward. "We have to."
---
In the council chamber, Varros stood at the far window. Snow had begun to fall again.
A runner arrived, breathless. "Message from the outpost—west sentry spotted unnatural light over the old crater."
Varros turned slowly.
Mura stood beside him.
"It's begun," she said.
"No," he replied. "It's waking up."
---
They reached the edge by nightfall.
The spiral columns loomed above, half-buried in ash and moss.
Azrael stepped forward.
The wind howled.
And the ground beneath him whispered: Welcome back.