Flames roared. Moonlight shimmered. And at the heart of it all, Aryan and the girl stood—no longer strangers, yet not quite allies.
The circle of runes that caged them pulsed with ancient power. Each symbol carved a memory into the stone, glowing in alternating shades of deep crimson and silver-white.
Aryan's flame surged from his palm, dancing along his skin. But as it neared her, it did not burn. It bent.
It bowed.
And the girl's moonfire responded in kind, not with hostility—but with harmony.
The Watcher's voice rang through the chamber once more.
"You must not fight each other. You must remember."
Then silence. The light dimmed. And in that stillness, visions came.
A tree, vast and eternal, bloomed in the sky.
Its branches cradled stars. Its roots drank from rivers of fire. And beneath it, two shadows sat—one cloaked in sunfire, the other wrapped in soft lunar glow.
Aryan clutched his head. "What is this…?"
The girl had fallen to her knees. Tears fell down her cheeks. "This is where it began."
A memory not entirely his… and yet, unmistakably familiar.
In the vision, the girl took Aryan's hand. "If we fall in this life," she said, "let the moon remember your flame… and guide it back to me."
Aryan's chest tightened.
He didn't just love Lirael in his past life. He made a pact—binding his flame to the cycle of rebirth itself. And she… she became its beacon.
His anchor.
His promise.
The chamber shook. Cracks opened in the stone beneath their feet, revealing rivers of molten energy and pools of cold silver light.
The Watcher spoke again, its voice echoing from the depths of time.
"Choose now. Rekindle the bond—or lose it forever."
Aryan turned to the girl. Not Lirael—but her echo. Her remnant. Her vow made flesh.
He reached out.
And she placed her hand in his.
Flame and moonlight swirled into one, rising in a spiral that touched the ceiling. The runes on the ground broke apart—and in their place, a mark burned into the air above them: a sigil split between sun and moon.
A pact reforged.
A path rewritten.
The Watcher vanished.
But the girl remained, her hand still in Aryan's.
She looked up. "Do you remember me now?"
He didn't answer.
He simply whispered her name.
"…Lirael."
---
Author's Note (by R.E. Solcrest):
The bond that defies death, time, and even memory—what was lost is starting to return. But can it survive the truth of what broke it in the first place? The flame has remembered. The moon has answered. What comes next… will burn everything.