Dawn was a slow, reluctant thing.
The sun crawled above the trees with the weariness of an old man rising from his bed. The forest was hushed, not with peace, but with the echo of what had passed in the night. The only sound was the crackling of the small fire and the occasional rustle of leaves overhead.
Kael sat with his back against the same stone where he'd kept watch, arms wrapped around his knees. He hadn't slept. Neither had Mira.
Aven stirred beneath his blanket, wincing as he shifted the bandaged gash on his ribs. Berrin snored faintly, sprawled like a fallen log. The big baker's son had held up better than Kael expected. He'd even cracked a nervous joke after Mira had finished treating Aven, but no one had laughed.
Kael's hands still trembled.
The cloth now lay in his satchel, wrapped and bound, but its memory still burned behind his eyes. That impossible heat. That blinding light. That feeling—not of control, but of something ancient moving through him.
Mira approached quietly, crouching beside him. She handed him a tin cup filled with warm tea steeped from forest herbs.
"It'll help," she said gently.
"Will it?" Kael muttered, staring into the dark surface of the drink.
She didn't answer. Just sat beside him, letting the silence settle between them.
Eventually, Aven joined them, gingerly lowering himself onto a flat rock with a grunt.
"I'd trade a finger for another hour of sleep," he muttered. "But I keep seeing that… thing when I close my eyes."
Kael finally looked up. "You shouldn't have charged in."
Aven shrugged, then winced. "Didn't have time to think. You were about to die."
Kael opened his mouth, then closed it. He didn't know what to say to that.
Berrin shuffled over, arms crossed against the early chill. He looked like he wanted to say something, but his usual bluntness was muffled by the tension still hanging in the air.
"We're not ready for this," Berrin finally muttered. "We don't know what we're doing. If one of those things can almost kill us… what else is out there?"
"More," Mira said quietly. "That was just a scout. The Blightborn never travel alone for long."
The words settled like frost over their shoulders.
Kael took a long breath. "We can't turn back."
"Who said anything about turning back?" Aven raised an eyebrow. "I just want to know what's waiting for us when we get to Elarion. If we even make it that far."
Kael nodded slowly. "My mother once told me that the road only asks two things: that you take the next step, and the one after."
Berrin grunted. "Wise woman."
"She is." Kael managed the ghost of a smile. "Though she'd also be the first to tan my hide if she knew I was walking into something like this."
Mira smirked faintly, her eyes distant. "My teacher would probably lecture me about the importance of caution… while handing me another scroll about forgotten magic."
Kael's smile faded. "Do you really think that cloth… the flame… was magic? Old magic?"
"I'm sure of it," Mira said. "Whatever's in you—it's not common. That light burned the corruption straight out of that Blightborn. Nothing I've read suggests that kind of cleansing exists anymore. Not since the Sundering."
"Then why me?" Kael whispered.
Aven snorted. "Maybe because you're a magnet for trouble."
Kael gave him a look.
"Hey," Aven raised his hands, "I didn't say it was a bad thing. Just… fitting."
Berrin dropped a thick branch on the fire, sending up sparks. "I say we figure it out on the way. Sitting here won't change what happened. And I'd rather not wait around for more of those rot-brained monsters to show up."
The others agreed.
They broke camp in silence, stamping out the fire and burying the embers. Kael paused before leaving, glancing back once at the clearing where it all happened. The grass was still scorched in a rough arc. Ash clung to the bark of nearby trees. A faint scent of burned flesh still lingered.
He turned away, hoisting his pack.
The road resumed like an old tale, winding forward beneath rising sunlight. But everything felt different now.
They kept closer together than before. Mira began pointing out herbs as they walked, explaining their uses. Berrin told a story about his younger sister trying to bake using salt instead of sugar, which earned a real laugh. Aven, for all his sarcasm, stopped to check their path regularly, scanning the woods for any signs of movement.
And Kael listened. Watched. Learned.
It wasn't just survival anymore. It was something else growing between them—trust. Fragile, but real.
By late afternoon, they came upon an abandoned waypost—an old stone hut overgrown with ivy, its roof sagging, but its walls still standing. A rusted lantern hung from a crooked beam.
Inside, they found dry straw, a broken bench, and a cracked map etched into the back wall. It showed the central kingdoms before the Fall, faded with time but still legible.
Kael stepped closer, running his fingers across the markings.
There—at the center—was Elarion, marked with a golden sunburst.
Mira leaned in. "The capital."
"Looks farther than I thought," Berrin muttered.
Aven pointed to a mark between them and Elarion. "That's the Ashen Pass. We'll need to cross it in two days' time."
Kael's brow furrowed. "Isn't that where—"
"Where the Old Ward broke," Mira finished for him. "It's said that's where the magic first fractured."
Kael shivered.
They decided to stay the night at the waypost. As twilight fell, they shared a thin stew from dried meat and roots Mira had gathered. Berrin, ever resourceful, made flatbread from flour he'd packed—"in case of emergencies," he claimed.
They ate in silence, the fire flickering between them. Kael noticed the way Mira kept glancing toward him, thoughtful, hesitant.
"What is it?" he asked.
She shifted. "Your fire… I've read stories. Ancient ones. There's a name for it."
Kael blinked. "What name?"
She hesitated, then said softly, "The Everflame."
Aven coughed. "That's a myth. A bedtime story."
Mira didn't smile. "Most truths begin that way."
Kael looked down at his hands again.
The warmth he felt wasn't fear. It was something steadier. Like a spark deep inside his bones, waiting to be fanned.
Maybe the road hadn't chosen him by accident.
As night settled around the old waypost, and the wind whispered through the cracks in the stone, Kael whispered something to himself.
"I won't run."
And the flame inside him flickered—still small, but steady.
The others didn't hear him.
But in the silence that followed, something ancient stirred.