After stepping out of the shower, Kael looked at himself in the mirror.
He let the water run.
He meant to take a sip, but instead his hands went under the stream. Rubbing against each other. Harder. Harder.
The skin reddened. The water splashed against porcelain. He didn't stop.
The blood wouldn't disappear.
Even though there was nothing there.
It won't go away... it won't go away.
The water kept running.
And he remembered.
---
It had been an ordinary day. Back when he still understood nothing.
Kael lay in front of his house in the village of Bath. The sun was warm. The dust clung to his sleeves.
In front of him stood a little girl—no older than seven.
She held a sharp stone.
She brought it down against her own hand.
Once.
Twice.
Again.
Skin split. Blood welled up slowly, thick and dark.
Her face did not change.
No tears. No fear.
Only calm.
As if she were playing.
---
The sound of the door opening snapped him back.
A servant girl entered without knocking. Her eyes stayed fixed on the floor.
"Your room is ready."
Through the mirror, Kael watched her for a moment.
Then he nodded.
---
He lay on the bed but sleep would not come.
So he wandered the palace halls instead.
James found him before long.
"Can't sleep?" he asked lightly. "You'll get used to it."
They walked toward the garden. Sunlight rested over the flowers, bright and indifferent.
"So," James said as they reached a metal bench, "how did it feel?"
"I felt sad," Kael replied. "But that's not what you mean."
James gave a small laugh. "You always were sharp." He leaned back, stretching his arms along the bench. "Something changed, didn't it?"
Kael's gaze dropped to his hands.
"I felt... like I was burning."
James studied him more carefully now. "Yeah," he said quietly. "That sounds about right."
A pause.
"People have been changing since the plague began," James continued. "You're changing too."
Kael looked at him. "Is there something special about you?"
"That's not what I want," Kael said.
James' voice softened slightly. "Still feeling guilty?"
Silence.
"Most people aren't," James added. "Not anymore."
Kael stared at his hands.
"Is that really better?" he murmured. "Maybe it is."
A week passed.
Seven days in which Kael tried to gather the scattered pieces of himself, to convince his body that he was still alive, and to teach his heart how to beat again. He did not fully succeed. Perhaps he never would. But at least he managed to stand on his own feet.
Now, he stood before the leader's door. He took a deep breath. Then he pushed it open.
The room was spacious, a round table of dark oak at its center. Spread across it was a large parchment scroll—a map. He recognized it at first glance: the Province of Jan. The rivers were drawn like blue veins, and the clan symbols were scattered across it like old scars.
The leader stood beside the table. James sat opposite him. When Kael entered, James lifted his head and smiled.
"Kael! You made it." James rose and patted his shoulder. "How have your days been?"
"Fine." Kael's lips curved into a brief smile, but his eyes remained wary. James knew he was not fine. And Kael knew that James knew. But this was their ritual now: empty question and empty answer, a temporary bridge over an abyss.
"Let's begin." The leader gestured for them to sit. He placed his finger on the map, over one of the X marks.
"We've received information about something happening in one of the villages here." He paused. "We don't yet know whether it's a new outbreak or not. You are to head there immediately. Observe the situation, assess the level of danger, then report back."
James studied the map. "Why us specifically?"
"Because you're the closest." The leader traced a line from the X mark to a small circle nearby. "The other teams are here and here. It would take them at least a week. You can reach it in three days."
Kael listened, but his eyes wandered across the map. He saw the symbol of the Golden Feather scattered across several regions—a stretched shadow touching everything. The Feather Clan. The clan his family once served. The clan that ordered their deaths? He still did not know.
"Kael." The leader's voice pulled him back. "Are you ready?"
Kael looked at the leader's finger, still resting on that small circle. There, in that distant village, something was waiting for him. A new mission. Perhaps an escape from his memories. Perhaps a confrontation with them.
"Ready." He said it in a voice he no longer fully trusted.
James stood. "Then we'll prepare our gear and depart."
At the door, Kael paused. He looked at the map once more. At the many X marks scattered across it. How many of them would become new graves? How many would add more blood to his hands?
Then he turned and walked out.
---
Kael slowly donned his gear. He felt its weight on his shoulders—not the weight of leather and metal, but the weight of what it would make him do again.
The cart was waiting. Nearby, James spoke with a servant. As Kael approached, James glanced at him and gave a brief smile before returning his attention.
"One last point." The servant raised his voice slightly, his eyes fixed on James. "Do nothing until the village's situation is confirmed."
James let out a muffled laugh. "Do you take us for children?"
The servant did not laugh. He looked at Kael for a moment—as if the weight of mystery pressed against the air around him—then turned away.
They mounted. The cart set off.
---
After minutes of silence, Kael opened his hand. He stared at it intently, as if trying to summon something.
"What are you doing?" James asked.
"I'm trying..." Kael's palm faced the empty air, fingers slightly curled, as if waiting for something to land in them.
James watched in silence.
Seconds passed. Kael's brow furrowed. A tremor ran through his fingers—not from the cold. For a moment, something flickered in his palm. A spark. No larger than a seed. It died instantly.
Kael stared at his hand. The spark was gone, but the memory of its heat remained.
James exhaled slowly. "It'll come back," he said quietly. "When you need it."
Kael didn't answer. He kept staring at his palm, as if accusing it of betrayal.
The cart rolled on, carrying them toward the unknown. Kael closed his eyes, the memory of that failed spark still burning in his palm.
---
Hours away, deeper in the forest, a different kind of fire was about to be born.
a village rested in the heart of a forest. Trees surrounded it on all sides, as if to trap it—or perhaps protect it.
A faint breeze whispered through the branches, but it did not stir a single leaf.
Maia! Wait!" Karl's voice cracked as he ran. He was thirteen, old enough to know fear but too young to hide it.
Maia stopped at the edge of the forest. She was seven. Everything was still a game.
"Don't go there," he panted. "Father said—"
"Father says many things." She smiled. It wasn't cruel. Just curious.
Karl opened his mouth to argue, but something on the ground caught his eye. A glimmer near the old tree. Wrong. The light was wrong.
Maia was already walking toward it.
"Maia, don't touch—"
She already had.
"Maia! Don't touch dangerous things!"
The girl lifted the jewel in her small hand. A black light seeped between her fingers, brushing against her skin like a faint pulse—not painful, not burning, but heavy in the air around her.
Her brother was still calling her name, but his voice seemed to come from far away, as if a wall of thick glass had grown between them.
For a moment, Maia felt something enter her. Not like a visitor—like something that had always been there, waiting to wake up.
She smiled.
Karl did not see her eyes change.
And when she turned to him, the smile was still on her face, and everything looked the same. Almost.