Rain hissed over broken stone as Ryven walked beside Kaelith, the two of them cloaked in silence and steam. The Abythrot was gone, but its echo still lingered in Ryven's skin—a buzz, a weight, like some part of him had been touched and not entirely returned.
He glanced at Kaelith, who moved like they belonged to this world—shoulders square, steps light, cloak whispering glyphs with every motion.
"Okay," Ryven said finally. "What's a Sigil?"
Kaelith didn't break stride.
"A soul mark," they said. "The start of a bond. A connection to this place."
Ryven frowned. "Cool. And a Tether?"
"That's what keeps you from unraveling." Kaelith gave him a sidelong look. "You have neither."
"Yeah, I figured." Ryven flexed his fingers. That shimmer again—soul resonance, they'd called it. Leaking. Dangerous. "So… I'm just gonna disintegrate or something?"
"No," Kaelith said. "You'll attract something worse."
Ryven stopped walking. "You keep saying stuff like that. What exactly is out there?"
Kaelith stopped too.
The rain fell in heavy drips from shattered columns around them. The ruins had grown quieter—too quiet. The kind that made sound feel like a sin.
"I don't know everything," Kaelith said, voice lower now. "I know the Warder Corps might. They track soul phenomena. Collect unanchored things like you."
"'Collect.' Wow. Comforting." Ryven squinted. "And what's an Eidolon?"
Kaelith looked at him, expression unreadable beneath the mask. "Your echo. A weapon. A will. A part of yourself that manifests when your soul stabilizes."
"Sounds cool." Ryven paused. "So where's yours?"
Kaelith's cloak shifted. "Not all of us are complete."
They turned and started walking again, faster.
Ryven followed. "Right. Mysterious answer. Got it."
They moved through the fractured courtyard, under arches that shimmered with broken memories—half-visible events flickering in and out like reflections on water.
For a second, Ryven saw himself—split in three. Different versions. Each walking a different direction.
He blinked.
Gone.
He shivered.
"You felt that too?" he asked.
Kaelith didn't answer. But their hand hovered near the hilt of their glaive.
Eventually, Kaelith slowed. They crouched beside a ruined marker—carved with sigils that pulsed like dying embers. A soul-path, scorched.
"Someone passed through here," they muttered.
"Another Warder?"
"No." Kaelith stood slowly. "Something following you."
Ryven swallowed. The resonance haze around his hands thickened—drifting like smoke now.
"So what happens if Erethein finds me before we get to your Corps?"
Kaelith looked over their shoulder.
"If that happens," they said, "don't expect a rescue."
Ryven opened his mouth—then shut it. Something in Kaelith's voice had shifted. Not threat. Not pity. Just a fact.
And yet, Kaelith hadn't left.
He walked beside Ryven again.
"You didn't have to help me back there," Ryven said after a while.
"I didn't," Kaelith replied.
"Yeah. But you did. Why?"
Kaelith didn't answer right away. Their cloak snapped in the wind as they walked, tall and steady against the storm.
At last, they said: "Maybe I wanted to see what would happen."
Ryven looked at them—half-smiling. "You sound like me."
Kaelith's eye narrowed. "Don't insult me."
Ahead, the mist parted. A broken structure loomed at the end of the path—twisted like it had been frozen mid-collapse.
Kaelith nodded at it. "Temporary ward. Safe enough. We rest there."
Ryven nodded. His legs ached. His side still smoked faintly from the Abythrot's strike.
But beneath the exhaustion, something stirred.
Not fear.
Still not fear.
Curiosity.
Always curiosity.
He followed.