"Some prayers do not ascend to the heavens.
Some sink into the earth and wait for the living to remember them."
The mist hung low, muffling the sound of their boots against the damp earth.
No birds called.
No wind stirred.
Only the soft, hesitant rhythm of footsteps weaving deeper into the forest's breath.
Francesca moved ahead, scouting the path.
Alberta walked a little behind, lost in thought.
Cornelius trailed closer, his brow furrowed.
The silence stretched
not peaceful,but brittle.
Then softly, as if testing the weight of it,
Cornelius spoke:
"That name you said, Alberta..."
She looked up, confused.
"Seraphina."
"You spoke it like you knew her."
Alberta hesitated.
"I... don't know."
"It just... came to me."
Cornelius nodded slowly, but unease clung to him like mist to skin.
The name lingered in the air
unanswered,
unsettled.
A few steps ahead,Dantes slowed.
Just slightly.
As if the name had brushed against him
like an old scar reopening beneath his ribs.
For a moment, he stood too still.
The mist curled hungrily around his boots.
The trees leaned closer.
Even the breath of the forest seemed to pause.
Then Dantes gave a short, cold laugh
too sharp to be real.Dry, almost mocking.
"Plenty of ghosts in these woods."
"Better not chase the ones that don't belong to us."
Alberta's hand tightened around her cloak.
Cornelius said nothing, his face unreadable.
And Dantes
Dantes kept walking.
Each step carved a deeper wound into the mist, as if the very air resisted letting him go.Leaving behind a silence that tasted faintly of regret.
Some memories rot.
Some memories wait.
And some
some bleed through no matter how deep you bury them.
The mist thickened.
The path narrowed.
It wasn't a road anymore
it was a breath,
a hush,
a memory the earth had tried to forget.
Every step sank heavier into the ground,
as if the roots themselves remembered,
aching to pull them back.
Francesca paused first, lifting a hand.
Cornelius stiffened beside Alberta.
Even Dantes slowed again, his gaze sharpening.
Ahead
the trees parted.
Not by human hands,
but by something older.
Older than kingdoms.
Older than crowns.
There, under an uprooted tree,half-devoured by moss and time,lay a hollowed stone. Sealed by forgotten symbols.
Guarding something the world had tried
and failed to bury.
The mist pressed tighter.
The earth seemed to hold its breath.
And faintly,
almost too faintly to be real,
Alberta heard it.
A whisper.
Soft, brittle, as if spoken by the trees themselves:
"Edmund..."
One name.
Nothing more.
A heartbeat.
A thread snapping in the dark.
Then her breath caught tight and sharp.She staggered a half-step back, breath stolen.
Not from fear.
From recognition.
Edmund.
The lost prince the one who died before the Wane began.
What does that name have to do with Dantes...?
She stared at Dantes' back
his shoulders stiff,
his head lowered against the mist.
Who are you really?
But she said nothing.
Only clutched her cloak tighter,
bearing the weight of a truth too heavy to name aloud.
Some names are not lost.
Some names carve their way back
through silence,
through ruin,
through the broken hearts left behind.
At its heart, waiting:
A blade.
The Lionheart Sword.
Untouched.
Unforgiving.
Undone.
— End of Chapter 38 THE CURSE OF LIONHEART