Dain's sword wouldn't stop humming.
They had made camp in a clearing where the air was just thin enough to breathe, and the ground didn't whisper back when they stepped on it. A miracle in the Mourningwood. But Dain didn't care about the trees anymore.
He cared about the sword.
It lay across his lap, silent to the others. But to him, it vibrated with heat—not fire, not magic. Memory.
Every time Kael came near, the sword sang.Not in notes.In warning.
Lira sharpened a blade under her cloak. Quiet. Watching. She'd stopped asking questions—for now.
Torin was leaning against a root as wide as a wagon, plucking gentle chords on his lute. The song had no melody, no form. It was more like listening to wind trying to remember a hymn.
Kael sat at the edge of the firelight. Not in shadow. Not in light.
Just there.
Elyra broke the silence.
"You knew that thing in the shrine would be there, didn't you?"
Kael looked at her, slow and measured. "No."
"But you recognized it."
He didn't deny it.
Dain's fingers tightened on the hilt of his weapon.
"It was reacting to you again," he muttered.
"That blade was forged from divine bone," Kael said, too softly. "It reacts to many things."
"It doesn't hum at many things," Dain snapped.
Kael didn't look at him.
But the fire bent toward him. Just slightly.
"You saved my life," Dain continued. "But I don't think you did it for me."
He stood. The sword followed.
Lira shifted, ready.
Elyra rose, too. "Stop."
"Why?" Dain asked, stepping forward. "Why is it reacting to him? Why does it feel like it wants to be used?"
Kael's voice, when it came, was calm and cold.
"Because that sword was made to kill me."
The fire stilled. Even the trees leaned in.
Dain froze mid-step.
Kael stood.
The blade trembled—whether in fear or purpose, even Dain didn't know.
"You forged that blade?" Dain asked, incredulous.
"No."
"Then why would it—"
"Because," Kael said, and for a moment his voice was older, not louder, just heavier, like it carried the weight of an age lost to ash, "I broke the world. Once. And men who feared gods made weapons from the pieces."
No one spoke.
Even the Mourningwood didn't whisper.
Kael turned away from the fire, cloak rustling behind him like smoke.
"Sleep. We reach the glade tomorrow. And there are worse things than truth waiting for us there."
That Night
Kael didn't dream.
He remembered.
Silver.
The sky was silver, and the stars pulsed like heartbeat runes.
He stood on a shore made of broken mirrors, and before him: Myr.
She had no wings in this vision. Just long silver hair and a voice like warm wind. Her eyes were wide, sad, furious.
"You left me," she said.
"I buried everything," he replied.
"Not me."
"I had to."
She stepped forward. A feather fell from her hand. It burned white. "You were not made for silence, Kael."
"I was not made to lose you."
She reached for him—and her hand passed through his chest.
"You will have to choose," she whispered. "When the world speaks your name again, will you answer as a god…"
Her eyes closed.
"…or as a man?"
He woke to silence.
Not normal silence.
The kind that happens when a forest decides to hold its breath.
Everyone else was still asleep.
But something was watching.
Kael stood, eyes scanning the treeline.
Behind the veil of branches, just for a heartbeat—he saw them:
Feathers. Silver. Burning white.
Gone.
He sat again.
The sword across the camp hummed once, then fell still.