The Pontifex of the chruch of Storm stood alone at the edge of the Basilica's highest spire, the night wind tugging at his robes. From here, the Storm city below was no more than a sea of shadows, and beyond it, the horizon gleamed faintly with distant lightning.
But the sight gave him no comfort. Not anymore.
His thoughts drifted back, inevitably, painfully, to the night that had scarred them all.
The raid on Ironwill Academy.
They had planned it for years. Prophecy had spoken of a girl, one of power and promise, her existence fated to change the course of the world. The Church had dwindled since the silence of the Storm Goddess; they had grown desperate, clawing at whispers of destiny to restore their fading influence. If they could claim the girl, they would be relevant again.
And they had succeeded.
The girl had been bound, carried away under cover of the night. He had believed then, with all his heart, that it was proof the goddess had not abandoned them.
But Scarlet Eveningstar had followed.
The Vice Principal of Ironwill. A name that now lived in the nightmares of every storm priest who had survived that night. She had not come with soldiers, nor demanded parley. She had walked alone into the Basilica, her very presence splitting the air like a blade.
The Pontifex remembered how the ground had trembled when she spoke. "Return her."
When they refused, the world broke.
Scarlet's hand rose, and time itself bent. Arrows froze midair, caught like flies in amber. Swords swung at her but never landed, trapped in distorted time that stretched into eternities. Her enemies screamed as they were slowed to a crawl, helpless as her other hand gestured and gravity crushed them flat against the Basilica floor.
He remembered priests clawing at the stone, bones breaking under impossible weight, their hymns cut short as their lungs collapsed. She did not kill with mercy; she killed with inevitability.
Every relic they raised against her, every invocation of storm magic was unraveled. She would snap her fingers, and their spells disappeared mid-chant, time reversed to strip the power from their voices. She would wave her arm, and entire sections of the Basilica buckled, pillars crumbling under the sheer force of her gravity.
The Pontifex had prayed then, desperately, for the Stormmother's intervention. But no storm came. No lightning struck. No divine hand shielded them.
Scarlet strode through their holiest hall, scared and merciless, tearing the very heart from their faith. She ripped open the sanctum, shattered the goddess's statue, and cast the holy relics into dust. The Basilica burned, half of it collapsing in a hail of stone and broken prayers.
By the end, the girl was gone, carried back under Scarlet's protection. The Church was left in ruin, its holy seat crippled, its priests scattered. More than half of their number perished that night.
And the goddess… remained silent.
The Pontifex gripped the railing now, the present pressing in on him, but the memories lingered like smoke. His hands shook, his lips pressed into a bitter line, and at last he sighed.
He lifted his gaze to the stormless sky, voice hoarse but steady.
"Stormmother… have you abandoned us?"
The night wind carried no reply.
Only silence.
The Pontifex's prayer hung in the air, devoured by silence.
Stormmother… have you abandoned us?
For decades, he had asked. For decades, there had been nothing.
But tonight, the silence broke.
At first, it was only a pressure. A weight on the wind, a hush that rolled across the Basilica like the moment before lightning strikes. Torches guttered. Clouds pulled apart. The air tasted of rain.
Then the sky split.
Not in storm or thunder, but in revelation. The heavens peeled back, and She stepped through.
The Storm Goddess.
The Pontifex dropped to his knees before he realized he had moved. All across the Basilica, priests fell prostrate, their foreheads pressed to the stone. Guards forgot their weapons. Servants forgot their breath. And it was not only here, it was everywhere.
In distant kingdoms, kings and emperors froze mid-sentence, their crowns suddenly meaningless. In the wild, hunters dropped their prey, eyes wide with terror and awe. On ships, sailors wept openly as the sea itself bowed to Her presence. Even the smallest child felt it, clutching their mother's skirts as tears streamed down their cheeks without knowing why.
For every mortal, in every corner of the world, now gazed at the same sky. And in that sky, the Storm Goddess revealed herself.
She was too vast to see, too radiant to name. She was the curve of the horizon and the depth of the ocean, the thunder in the bones of the earth. To gaze upon her was to feel your thoughts collapse, your soul stretched thin by perfection. She was not beauty as mortals knew it, she was beauty as creation remembered it.
And yet, when she spoke, her voice was softer than rain.
"My children," she whispered, and the world shuddered. Her voice brushed every mind at once not heard, but felt, sliding into the marrow of their bones. "I have not abandoned you."
The Pontifex's chest convulsed. He sobbed, lips trembling as he pressed his forehead to the railing. He had prayed for this moment, begged for it, cursed her absence and here she was.
The Goddess's words fell like balm on a wounded world.
"For too long, I have been silent. For too long, I have watched as despair took root. But no longer. Tonight, I name my heir."
The declaration rolled across the world like thunder. Oceans swelled. Trees bent. Mountains quaked, not in destruction but in recognition, as though creation itself bore witness.
And then her gaze shifted.
It pierced through the clouds, through distance, through walls of stone, until it found him.
Adrian Stormwell.
The boy who even now stood in his family's ruined estate, stunned beneath the night sky.
Her voice was infinite and yet unbearably tender.
"Adrian Stormwell. My heir. My successor. My beloved son."
Every mortal felt the truth of it settle into their soul like law. His name seared across the sky itself, carved in lightning and cloud, glowing above every city and every wasteland.
In the Stormwell estate, a crown of stormlight formed above Adrian's head. Lightning kissed his skin, winds bent toward him, the ice hummed at his feet. His body shone with her mark, the undeniable sign of divinity's chosen.
The world broke into chaos. Priests screamed with joy and pressed their faces into the floor. Kings raged, throwing goblets and shouting at empty thrones. Soldiers knelt where they stood, swords clattering to the ground. Mothers clutched their children. Thieves abandoned their spoils. Across the earth, the only name that mattered was whispered, cried, or cursed:
Adrian Stormwell.
And the Pontifex wept. Not from joy. Not from despair. From the weight of knowing.
The Stormmother had not abandoned them.
She had only been waiting.
Waiting for her son.