Date: October 14, 542, from the Fall of Zandra the Dishonorable.
The water was cold. Not like the mountain streams of Krag-Mhor, where paws grew numb even in midsummer, but a different cold—deep and crushing. It seeped through his fur, reaching his skin, sapping his warmth slowly, methodically, like a hungry beast digesting its prey. Sobra swam on, his powerful paws working steadily, rhythmically. Every stroke brought him closer to the islet in the center of the lake, and every stroke took him farther from the shore, which had long since vanished behind a veil of silvery mist.
He didn't know how much time had passed. An hour, maybe two. In this world without dawn or dusk, time flowed differently—measured by fatigue. And now, fatigue was beginning to make itself known. His muscles burned, his breathing had grown heavy and ragged, and his soaked, heavy fur dragged him down like an anchor threatening to pull him under.
*I'll make it,* he told himself, his paws paddling faster.
He thought of Datuk. Of how Datuk had stood at the tower's threshold, fists clenched, trying not to show his worry. *"Sobra is a worthy fighter,"* he had said, and smiled—that crooked, almost angry smile that always meant he was worried but didn't want to show it.
*I'll come back,* Sobra thought. *I'll definitely come back. And we'll spar again, and you'll complain that I'm too fast.*
He swam on, and the islet drew nearer.
---
The islet was small—perhaps ten paces long and as many wide. It rose half a meter above the water, its gently sloping shores covered in fine white gravel that glowed faintly in the diffuse light. There was no grass, no bushes on the islet—only smooth, time-polished stone. And on that stone—nothing.
Sobra swam into the shallows, his paws touching bottom. The gravel was slippery and cold. Staggering, he hauled himself onto the shore. Water streamed from his fur, leaving dark, quickly drying patches on the stone. He shook himself—once, twice, thrice—and looked around.
Silence. Only his breathing. Only the soft lapping of waves. Only the pulse of blood in his ears.
Sobra circled the islet's perimeter. Slowly, carefully, scrutinizing every stone, every crack. He sniffed the ground—the gravel smelled of ozone and cold metal, like everything in this world. Nothing. No leaves, no guardians, not even a hint that anyone had been here before him. Only white stone—smooth and cold—and a silence that pressed on his ears harder than the water had pressed on his chest.
He stopped on the eastern side and squinted. The lake stretched before him—silvery, boundless. The shore had long since vanished beyond the horizon; only the white haze reminded him that solid ground existed somewhere far away.
*There's nothing here,* Sobra thought, and bitter disappointment spread through him.
He made another circuit. Slower, more carefully. He scratched at the stones with his claws—they didn't yield; they were smooth and slippery as ice. He tried digging in different spots—the gravel shifted, but beneath it lay the same smooth, polished stone. No fissures, no hollows, no hint of a cache.
*The compass couldn't have been wrong,* he thought, returning to the center of the islet. *It led me here. That means I'm missing something.*
---
He shook his head, trying to reach his nose to the back of his neck where the compass lay hidden under his thick fur. Awkward. Very awkward. He spent several minutes squirming like an eel, cursing—in his bearlike way, without words, but very expressively—his own clumsiness. Finally, the compass slipped from his fur and fell onto the stone.
Sobra looked at it.
The device lay on the white surface, and its needle—which had guided him across the wastelands, across the lake, to this islet—was trembling. A fine, rapid quiver, as if listening to something. Then it jerked and froze, pointing directly at the center of the islet. Where he was standing.
Sobra tilted his head. He nudged the compass with his paw—it didn't budge. He picked it up in his teeth, carefully, so as not to damage it, turned it over, and placed it back down. The needle jerked again and froze, pointing at him.
*Here,* he would have said if he could speak. *What I seek is here. Beneath me.*
He took a step back. The needle twitched and turned, pointing at the spot where he had stood a second ago. Sobra stepped aside—the needle followed him. He stepped back—the needle returned.
*The compass is pointing at me,* he realized. *Or at the spot where I'm standing.*
He placed the compass on the stone directly in front of him. The needle quivered and pointed at him. Sobra moved the device to the spot where he had just been standing—the needle pointed at the device.
*Maybe I need to put it in the center and wait?*
Carefully, so as not to disturb the needle, he carried the compass to the very middle of the islet—where the stone was particularly smooth, almost mirror-like. The device settled onto the surface. For a moment, nothing happened.
And then the compass flared.
---
Red. Bright, blinding. It flooded the islet, the lake, the very sky. Sobra squeezed his eyes shut, but the light pierced through his closed eyelids, through his fur, through his very flesh. He felt his heart, his pulse, his breathing—all begin to beat in time with this light, this fire.
Red shifted to orange. Warm, almost like a campfire. It spread across the stones, and the gravel under Sobra's paws grew warm, glowing from within. Orange shifted to yellow—bright, alive, reminiscent of a sun that had never existed here. Yellow shifted to green. The color of young leaves, the color of hope. For a moment, it soothed the bear, and he felt the fear that had been building inside him begin to melt.
Green shifted to blue. The color of the sky over Krag-Mhor on a clear day. The color of Datuk's eyes when he looked at Sobra with a smirk. Blue shifted to indigo—deep and dark, like the pool where Sobra had nearly drowned as a cub. Indigo shifted to violet. The color of twilight, the color of mystery, the color of things hidden from sight.
All the colors of the rainbow shimmered before his eyes, blending, separating, converging at a single point—where the compass had just lain.
And then the compass vanished.
---
Sobra opened his eyes. The light had dimmed, but not disappeared—it was concentrated at a single point where the device had been. Now, a portal pulsed there. It was not round, not oval like the ones Sobra had heard about in Datuk's stories. It was jagged and uneven, its shimmering, iridescent edges expanding and contracting as if the portal were breathing.
Sounds emanated from within. Not voices, not noise—something else for which Sobra had no name. It was like the rustle of leaves, the sound of rain, the crackle of a fire—and yet unlike any of those things. It was the voice of the Tree itself. Or of whatever lay beyond it.
Sobra didn't know what it was. He didn't know where this passage led. He didn't know what awaited him beyond that shimmering veil. Perhaps a trap. Perhaps death. Perhaps an exit from the Tree—or an entrance to its very heart.
But his instincts—ancient, animal, the ones that had never failed him in the forest—cried out: *There. That is what you swam for. What you walked for.*
He looked toward the shore. Beyond the silvery expanse of the lake lay the wastelands, the cliffs, the white sand. There, in the tower, Datuk, Ulvia, and Rosh were waiting. They didn't know where he was. They didn't know what he had found. They didn't know what he was about to do.
*I'll come back,* Sobra thought. *But first—there.*
He remembered how Datuk had hugged him before he left. How Ulvia had stroked his neck and smiled. How Rosh had nodded, and in his cold, mismatched eyes, something like respect had flickered.
*I'll come back,* he repeated. *I promise. And I'll tell them everything.*
The portal pulsed, its shimmering, iridescent edges beckoning. Sobra felt the warmth radiating from it touch his fur, soothing and calming him. He took a step forward. Then another. The shimmering edges brushed his muzzle, and he felt a vibration run through his body, making his silver stripes flare brighter.
*I'll come back,* he told himself a third time.
He lifted a front paw and stepped into the portal.
The light flared brighter, and the world around him vanished.
---
He felt neither falling nor flying. Only light—multicolored, iridescent—flowing around him from all sides, penetrating his fur, his muscles, his bones. Sobra closed his eyes, and in the darkness, images flickered: Datuk, hugging him and cursing through tears. Ulvia, stroking his neck and smiling. Rosh, nodding, something like respect in his eyes.
And then—silence. Deep, all-encompassing. It closed in around him, and Sobra felt his body, his mind, his spirit—all of it beginning to change. Not painful. Not frightening. Just… different.
One paw was already on the other side of the portal. The second was leaving the stone. Another moment, and he would disappear. Vanish from this white world, from this tower, from this lake. And arrive wherever the compass had been leading him.
*I'll come back,* he managed to think one last time.
And he plunged into the multicolored abyss.