The boy's name had been Tarin.
A name, soft and yielding, like damp wood. Fitting, Kael thought, for a life that had never known steel or fire, never held a blade nor shouted above the uproar of battle. Tarin had lived in shadow and silence, the kind of soul the world passed by without pausing to notice.
Kael sat by the hearth, its embers glowing like slivers of fire trapped in ash. His hands were folded, not in prayer—he would offer the gods no words, not now, not ever—but in stillness. The stillness of a predator learning a new body.
Memories leaked in, dripping from the blood and bone like rainwater through cracked stone. Tarin's memories—faint and fractured, stitched with fear. They came in uneven pulses: a bleating goat in the rain, a slap across the cheek from a drunken uncle, the smell of wet straw and rotting wool.
Tarin had been seventeen when he died.
A herder's son. Born during a late frost. Small for his age, sickly from birth, always behind the others. They called him "slow," "hollow-headed," "goatboy." He had no friends, only silence. Yet in that silence, he had listened. He heard the things others ignored: whispered prayers from fearful mothers, curses muttered under breath when food was short, gossip about soldiers and taxes, about gods that watched and gods that punished.
Tarin had never spoken back. Not because he couldn't. Because he knew it wouldn't matter.
Kael closed his eyes.
He could feel it now—the brittle shell that had once held this boy. The quiet grief. The deep ache of invisibility. Tarin had not been stupid. Just... soft. Gentle in a world that worshipped hardness.
And then came the choice.
Not Tarin's. He'd never been given one.
Two days ago, the High Seer of Velkhar had descended from the temple, riding a beast with silver-clad hooves that never touched the ground. The villagers called it the "Sky Treader," a sacred being said to be born of Aureon's breath. The High Seer wore robes that shimmered like frost under moonlight and a mask that gleamed with radiant runes. No eyes were visible behind it. No voice was needed.
He had pointed his staff at Tarin. That was all. No reason. No explanation. No blessing.
Just a gesture. A verdict. And then Tarin was taken that night.
They stripped him in front of the shrine, muttered a few rote prayers, and left him there—naked, bleeding from a split lip, and opened gut as snow fell like a funeral veil. A gift, they called it. A mercy.
Kael's jaw tightened. They burned the strong. They bled the weak. And called it devotion.
That was what the gods had taught them. That was what Kael had once fought to uphold.
And now, in a twist as cruel as divine irony, he wore the flesh of their discarded offering. The gods had taken everything from him. Now, he would repay the debt.
He stood, uncoiling from the chair with deliberate grace. His movements were surer now. The body was fragile, but his will had begun the work of reforging it. It no longer trembled under its own weight. The fire had settled in his marrow.
Kael crossed the small room. There was nothing of value—no weapons, no armor, only simple tools, rough-woven clothes, and a few cracked wooden icons of Aureon on the walls. He tore one down, letting it fall to the floor with a hollow clatter.
Near the door, hanging crooked on a nail, was a rusted mirror. He stepped in front of it.
A stranger met his gaze.
The boy's face was narrow, almost sharp, like it had been carved with a dull knife. His hair was black, too long, matted in places. His eyes were green-soft, downcast, dull. A forgettable face.
But Kael leaned in. And behind those eyes, his past self stared back.
"You're dead now, Tarin," he said softly. "But your body will live long enough to burn the gods from the sky."
A knock jolted him. Like a leaf brushing against a door in wind.
Then a voice—female, young.
"You're awake?"
Kael's eyes flicked to the door.
Too soon. He hadn't planned to be seen again yet—not before he had something to hide behind. A mask. A lie. But fate rarely waited for readiness.
He opened the door slowly.
The same girl from last night, clutching a wooden bowl with both hands. The rising steam curled around her face like breath. Her silver hair caught the light in pale strands, wind-blown but graceful, falling in loose waves to her shoulders. Her dress was patched, her feet bare. She looked to be fifteen, maybe sixteen, though her blue eyes were older. Mountain children aged fast.
"Mother sent this," she muttered, eyes not quite meeting his. "She thought you'd... need more nutrient. After the shrine."
Kael nodded, taking the bowl. The warmth bled into his hands like sunlight through stone. He inhaled deeply—boiled root vegetables, bone broth, a pinch of frostweed. Simple food. Poor food.
But real food. Just like the meal they brought previously—thin broth and black bread. This, though, was richer. Heartier. It clung to the air with the promise of warmth.
A peasant's offering, yes. But it anchored him more than any spell or oath ever had.
"What's your name?" he asked.
She hesitated with a flicker of caution.
"Lodia," she said. "You really don't remember me?"
Kael studied her. Tarin probably did. This body had walked these paths, shared bread with these people. Maybe even spoken to her once, in some quiet corner of a winter morning.
But Kael was no longer Tarin.
He offered a faint smile, more apologetic than warmth, and stepped back inside.
"You're not him," she said.
Kael didn't answer.
"I don't mean just the shrine," she went on. "You're... different. You're not the Tarin I know..." She hesitated, then added, "You don't blink the way he did. He always blinked too fast when he was nervous."
Kael studied her closely. Curious. The kind of curiosity that, if left unchained, could become dangerous.
"And what will you do with that thought?" he asked.
She shrugged. "Nothing. People change. Especially after... whatever that was."
She nodded toward the window, toward the distant gleam of the shrine's peak.
"I saw them drag you up," she said. "I thought you'd be dead by morning. But you came back. Nobody ever comes back."
Then she left.
He drank the soup slowly. Each sip brought heat to his throat. He ate with appreciation—not for the food, but for the moment. For the knowledge that life pulsed again within him. That this world had failed to bury him forever.
Outside, the sun dipped behind the peaks. Shadows lengthened, covering the village like mourning shrouds. Smoke trailed from crooked chimneys. Lights flickered in windows, soft and scarce. The mountain wind howled like a thing forgotten.
Kael returned to the hearth. The fire had nearly died.
He found a small book beneath the cot, wrapped in old cloth. A prayerbook. The symbol of Aureon marked its spine.
He fed it to the flames, one brittle page at a time.
As each page curled and blackened, Kael whispered the names of cities that once bent the knee to him. Cities razed. Banners flown. Vows sworn in his name.
Now he had no throne. No sword. No army. But he had time. And time, properly wielded, was sharper than any blade.
The last page flared, turned to cinder, and drifted upward like a dying moth. Kael watched the smoke swirl into the chimney, vanishing into the sky the gods claimed as theirs.
Let them choke on it.
Night clutched the village in its frozen grip. Snow had begun again—thin flakes, light as ash, drifting down in silence. Kael remained by the hearth, the book's burnt remains scattered at his feet, and for the first time since his return, he allowed himself stillness.
Not rest. Not peace. But stillness.
It was different now.
In his old life, stillness had been a calm before war—a sharpening of the soul. Now it was the forge. The boy's body was frail, but not broken. Not anymore. The pain had dulled to a manageable throb. Muscles remembered nothing, but his soul did.
He flexed his fingers, testing grip. His wrists still trembled, but less so. He stood again, slowly, steadily. Even that felt like victory.
He crossed to the window.
Outside, the world looked as it always had. The same crooked rooftops, the same breath-fog curling from lips, the same tired men stacking firewood like offerings. But now he saw it with different eyes. Not Tarin's eyes—Kael's. Eyes that had seen golden spires fall and divine blood soak the earth. Eyes that once looked down from thrones carved from dragonbone.
He turned away. The past would not help him now. Only what he built next.
That night, Kael did not sleep. He sat cross-legged on the floor, his body still, his mind racing. He reached inward, deeper than before.
There, buried beneath layers of memories and pain, he found it again, the spark.
Godbane.
A sliver of the art he had once mastered. It pulsed like a heart of coal in the furnace of his soul. Still weak. Still shackled by this new flesh. But alive.
He fed it with breath. With memory. With purpose. And slowly, it stirred.
By dawn, Kael had a plan.
He needed strength. That meant finding something this body could wield—staff, knife, even stone. Anything sharp.
He needed information. What had changed? Who ruled now? Were the gods still ascendant, or had fractures formed?
And he needed to hide.
The gods had long memories. And though they had erased his name from mortal tongues, they would not forget his soul forever. He already felt the weight of unseen eyes pressing on him. Somewhere, something divine would notice the flame rising again.
But not yet.
He wore the boy's clothes—patched wool, plain linen, too loose in some places, too tight in others. He found a walking stick outside, weathered and cracked. It would do.
As he stepped into the snow-dusted morning, the cold struck him like a lash.
Villagers stared. Whispers followed. But he didn't flinch.
Let them see. Let them wonder. Tarin had died. But something greater walked in his place now.
Kael walked down the path toward the temple.
Toward the god that had once crowned him. Toward the lie of Order. Toward the first step in a war long unfinished.
The gods would bleed. And the world would once more remember the name:
Kael—The Ash-Wrought.