The wind that moved across the desert that night carried something different.
It wasn't just dust and silence — it carried a sound. A trembling hum that stirred the bones of the earth.
Ezekiel froze mid-step. He was miles away from Maplewood, wandering beneath a bruised sky that had long forgotten to rain. His cloak was torn, his eyes hollow, his faith… a ruin of what it once was.
But then, that sound reached him — faint at first, like a song whispered from the horizon.
A heartbeat made of light.
He dropped to his knees.
Not in weakness — in recognition.
> "Seraphina…" he breathed.
He could feel her. Not her voice, not her touch — but her spirit, breaking through something unholy. It felt like fire refusing to obey. It felt like mercy fighting back.
And in that moment, something inside him that had long been dead — faith, maybe — shuddered awake.
Ezekiel rose slowly, his hand trembling as he lifted the silver cross that hung from his neck. The same one that had burned him the night he was cast out.
Now, it was cool.
Now, it pulsed with light.
He looked toward the distant mountains, where the Sanctum of Fire stood like a scar against the night sky.
And though the world called him fallen, though the church had branded him heretic, something divine whispered otherwise.
> "Go back," the wind seemed to say.
"Go back, for the truth is burning through the lies."
Ezekiel clenched his fists. Every scar on his back screamed as he began to walk — then to run.
He didn't know what awaited him. Whether redemption or ruin.
But he knew this — the fire that spared Seraphina was no ordinary miracle.
It was a message.
And if the heavens had broken their silence once… they could do it again.