Kaelen glanced at her.
"Listen," he said quietly, not slowing his pace, "I don't know why my father wanted you here. But you are on your own. Do what you can to not get in the way."
He did not look back to see how the words landed.
The forest swallowed them before she could respond.
The trees beyond the outer roads were not like those near the capital. Those were shaped, tended, coaxed into elegance. These were ancient. Their trunks were thick as towers, bark spiraled and ridged like petrified waves. Their roots did not burrow cleanly into the earth — they rose and folded over themselves, knotted like the backs of great beasts sleeping beneath the soil.
Light barely reached the ground.
What did filter through came fractured — green and gold and sometimes a pale silver shimmer that did not belong to sunlight at all.
The air changed.
It grew dense. Heavy with damp loam and crushed fern. Sweet rot and mineral dampness. The scent of sap thick enough to taste.
Kaelen did not hesitate. He stepped over exposed roots, boots finding natural intervals in the terrain as if he had memorized it before ever walking it.
Behind him, the child stumbled almost immediately.
The path — if it could be called that — was no path at all. It slanted without warning. The soil shifted from firm ground to sinking moss within steps. Vines brushed at ankles. Thorned creepers snagged fabric and did not let go easily.
She struggled to match his stride.
Her breathing grew audible within minutes.
Short. Sharp.
Too loud.
Kaelen did not slow.
The forest itself seemed to test balance. The ground rose into unnatural ridges, then dipped sharply into pockets of damp earth that swallowed small boots nearly to the ankle. Stones jutted from the soil at unpredictable angles, slick with moss. The humidity pressed against skin and lungs alike.
This was not wilderness shaped for survival.
It was wilderness that existed without concern.
A distant sound rolled through the trees — not wind, not quite. Something like breath passing through hollow stone. The canopy shifted slightly in response.
The girl looked up at the sound.
She tripped.
Hands caught bark too rough for skin. A quiet hiss escaped her teeth. She pushed herself upright again, eyes determined, jaw tight.
Ahead, Kaelen's silhouette moved with effortless economy. He did not brush against branches; he angled before they obstructed him. He stepped where the earth was firm without testing it. His pace never faltered.
The others escorting at a distance — silent palace wardens, tasked only with observation — moved similarly. Light-footed. Measured.
None turned around.
None checked.
The deeper they went, the more the forest changed.
The trees began to lean.
Not toward the sun — but inward, toward one another. Their branches braided high overhead, creating an interlocked ceiling that pulsed faintly with bioluminescent growth. Pale fungi clung to bark in spiraled patterns, glowing dim blue. Moss crept across stones in veined geometries that almost resembled script.
The air felt charged.
Not hostile.
But alert.
Every few steps, Kaelen adjusted his breathing — not consciously, but rhythmically, aligning himself with the subtle pulse beneath the earth. The forest had a cadence. Slow. Deep. Like the heartbeat of something vast.
The girl could not find that rhythm.
Her breaths grew uneven.
She stumbled again — this time harder — knee striking stone beneath moss. She bit back a cry, but pain flared hot in her eyes. When she stood, she limped for several steps before forcing her gait even.
The ground sloped downward into a ravine without warning.
Kaelen descended without pause, using roots as natural rails, boots barely disturbing loose soil. The child hesitated at the edge, peering down into shadowed depth. The incline was steep — nearly vertical in sections.
She swallowed.
Then climbed down.
Her fingers slipped twice. Soil broke loose beneath her weight. Pebbles scattered down the incline, clattering louder than they should have in the quiet.
No one reached back for her.
At the bottom, the air was colder.
Mist gathered low across the ravine floor. It curled around ankles, clinging damp and persistent. The scent of water was strong here — but no river was visible.
Instead, thin streams ran beneath the earth itself, visible only through faint ripples under the soil's surface. Water moving where water should not move.
Kaelen stepped across without hesitation.
The girl did not see the subtle shifts beneath her feet until one gave way slightly, soaking through her boot. She gasped at the cold.
The temperature dropped further as they continued.
Birdsong ceased.
Insects thinned.
The silence was not empty — it was layered. Thick. Watchful.
They emerged from the ravine into a clearing that was not truly open. Stone pillars jutted from the earth at uneven angles, half-consumed by roots. Their surfaces were carved — worn with age, but deliberate. Lines curved into one another in complex patterns that caught the light strangely.
Kaelen slowed for the first time.
Not for her.
For the stone.
The carvings shimmered faintly when his gaze lingered too long.
The girl reached the clearing seconds later, chest rising and falling rapidly now. Sweat dampened her hairline. Dirt streaked her palms and knees. Her tunic had torn slightly at the hem where thorns had claimed it.
She leaned forward, hands braced on her thighs.
No one acknowledged her exhaustion.
The clearing itself felt wrong.
Not dangerous — not immediately — but displaced. As though it had not been meant to exist in this forest and yet had endured regardless.
The ground here was unnaturally smooth.
No undergrowth.
No fallen branches.
Only bare soil and stone.
Kaelen stepped between two pillars.
The air shifted.
The girl hesitated at the threshold, sensing the change even through her fatigue.
Beyond the clearing, the forest thickened again — but the trees were different.
Their bark was pale.
Almost white.
Their leaves narrow and long, hanging like blades rather than foliage. They did not rustle in the faint breeze. They barely moved at all.
And the light here — whatever filtered through — carried a faint violet hue.
The terrain rose steadily upward now, but not evenly. Jagged rock formations pierced through the soil at erratic intervals, forcing constant adjustments in stride. Some stones were warm to the touch. Others pulsed faintly beneath thin layers of moss.
The child lagged further.
Her breathing was no longer quiet.
It was labored.
Every incline demanded more than she could give. Every uneven stretch forced her to compensate beyond her small frame's endurance. Twice she nearly collided with protruding stone because her focus blurred.
She wiped sweat from her brow with the back of her hand, leaving a streak of dirt across her temple.
Still, she did not call out.
The forest did not accommodate her.
Branches hung at adult shoulder height — striking her face instead. Roots rose in tangled masses impossible for shorter legs to clear cleanly. Even the spacing between natural footholds seemed designed for longer strides.
This was land meant for beings who had grown within it.
Not children raised behind stone walls.
The incline steepened further.
Loose shale replaced soil.
Each step slid half a measure back.
Kaelen ascended fluidly, weight distributed precisely. The wardens behind him followed without sound.
The girl slipped fully this time.
Her foot lost purchase. She fell to one knee, then both hands, scraping skin raw against sharp stone. The impact knocked breath from her lungs.
For a moment she did not move.
The others did not turn.
She forced herself upright slowly, shoulders shaking once before steadying.
Then she climbed.
By the time they reached the crest of the ridge, her breath rasped audibly in the quiet air. Her chest burned. Her legs trembled faintly beneath her.
At the top, the land opened abruptly.
The forest thinned into a vast expanse of rolling terrain that seemed almost oceanic in structure — waves of dark grass stretching toward a distant horizon. But the grass did not bend with the wind.
It moved independently.
Subtle ripples traveling across its surface without breeze.
Far beyond, a valley dipped sharply, and within it lay something older than the trees — stone ruins half-swallowed by earth. Circular formations. Broken archways. Geometric foundations too precise to be natural.
The sky above the valley appeared distorted.
Not visibly broken — but heavy. As though the air itself thickened above that space.
Kaelen stood still, surveying.
The observers remained behind him.
The girl emerged seconds later.
She did not have the breath to speak.
Her hands trembled slightly at her sides. Dirt crusted her palms. A thin line of blood marked one knee where the skin had split.
She followed his gaze toward the valley.
Whatever exhaustion pressed against her seemed momentarily replaced by something else.
A pull.
Faint.
But present.
The land stretched before them — beautiful, immense, indifferent.
And utterly unwelcoming.
Kaelen stepped forward without looking back.
The grass parted around him in quiet arcs.
Behind him, the girl swallowed hard and followed.
The environment did not soften.
It did not slow.
And it would not forgive weakness.