Silence pressed heavy over the square.
Kael's hand slid from the shard, leaving no mark on its surface, though his palm still tingled as if burned. His breaths came shallow and fast, his chest aching with every inhale. The hum inside him had quieted to a low thrum, like a caged animal waiting to stir again.
Around him, no one moved. Dozens of eyes bore into him—frightened, awed, suspicious. Then the whispers began.
"He touched it…"
"…shouldn't be alive…"
"…a curse, that's what it is…"
Kael staggered to his feet. The square felt colder, though sunlight still poured across it. His uncle broke through the crowd, face red and twisted with fear.
"What in all the broken heavens were you thinking?" His uncle's hand clamped Kael's shoulder, hard enough to hurt. "You don't go near the shard! You don't touch it!"
"I didn't—" Kael's voice cracked. He didn't know how to explain. The shard hadn't just called to him—it had demanded him.
The older man shook his head violently. "Enough. No more of your madness. Get back to the house before they decide you've brought ruin on all of us."
The crowd parted reluctantly as Kael's uncle dragged him away. Some villagers spat into the dirt as he passed. Others made warding gestures, muttering prayers under their breath. Children stared wide-eyed, clutching their mothers' skirts.
Kael kept his head low, shame burning in his chest hotter than the hum.
When they reached the narrow lane behind their stall, his uncle released him with a shove. "Do you understand what you've done? People will talk. The Guild merchants saw it. Word will spread."
Kael clenched his fists. "It wasn't my choice. The shard—it pulled me—"
"Don't speak of it!" His uncle's voice dropped to a hoarse whisper, as if the very air might be listening. "Resonance is dangerous. Only fools and the damned chase it. You'll keep your mouth shut, or you'll bring the Guilds down on us all."
Kael swallowed hard. He wanted to argue, to say the hum inside him was real, that ignoring it felt impossible. But his uncle's eyes—wide, fearful, desperate—killed the words in his throat.
That night, Kael couldn't sleep. The village lay quiet, but he heard every creak, every rustle of wind, every drip of water as though the world itself had grown sharper. The hum inside him was faint but constant, threading through his veins like a second heartbeat.
He sat by the window, staring at the shard's silhouette in the moonlight.
Climb.
The memory of that voice still rang in his bones. It hadn't been a command in words, but it had felt heavier than any order he'd ever known.
And yet—climb what? To where? Toward what?
His hands trembled. The images he had seen—warriors burning with echoes, artifacts glowing like stars, ladders piercing the heavens—they felt too vivid to be illusions. They were truths, buried in the marrow of the world. Truths he wasn't ready for.
In the forest beyond the village, a pair of eyes watched the shard's faint glow.
The figure crouched among the branches, cloaked in shadows. They had arrived with the caravan, but unlike the merchants, they had little interest in copper or spice. Their gaze lingered instead on the boy who had touched the shard and lived.
"Interesting," the figure murmured, voice muffled behind a mask etched with faint, shifting patterns. "So the echoes stir again."
With a soft click, a small device in their hand—a crystal lens bound in brass—captured the faint residue of light still clinging to the shard. Symbols glimmered across its surface before fading.
The figure slipped it away and vanished into the treeline, leaving no trace behind.
At dawn, Kael's uncle acted as if nothing had happened. He barked orders, counted coins, haggled with what few merchants hadn't fled after yesterday's spectacle. The villagers whispered behind Kael's back, but none dared speak to him directly.
Kael kept silent, though the hum inside him made silence feel unbearable. Every face in the crowd looked different now—some hostile, some wary, a few curious—but all marked him as something other.
When he glanced again at the shard, its surface was dull, lifeless stone. Yet he knew better.
It was waiting.