As they went deeper into the fog, it peeled back slowly, not all at once, revealing the silhouette of something grand and forgotten. A small castle—at least what remained of it—stood sunken into the earth, swallowed by centuries of vine and tree. Towers crumbled into leaning stone pillars. Walls bore deep cracks where roots had forced their way through like veins. Ivy and moss covered everything, turning age into a kind of beauty.
Yet what caught Lira's breath wasn't the structure—it was what shimmered just in front of it.
Ghostly figures. Dozens of them.
Translucent and glowing faintly silver, they moved like echoes suspended in air. Elves—tall, graceful, robed in flowing garments that seemed to drift like water. Children danced between ruined archways. Two figures stood atop a balcony, heads bowed together, speaking in silence. Musicians played instruments whose notes were swallowed by time.
Thalanir stopped cold.
He shifted into his elven form with barely a shimmer, the stag's light collapsing into the tall, horn-crowned figure of a man. His antlers remained, now like polished wood rising from his temples, threaded with moss and soft green light.
"This can't be," he murmured, stepping forward slowly.
Lira turned to him. "What is it?"
Thalanir's eyes swept the scene before them, almost afraid to blink. "I know this place. From our oldest stories. This is Elarion. The cradle of the First Treesong. The place where the elvenkind were said to have awakened from starlight."
Renkai's growl broke the stillness. He did not step forward. His eyes moved, sharp and wary, toward the shapes in the fog.
"I've walked through endless places touched by old power," he said, voice low. "But this... this fog isn't just showing you visions. It's remembering. And something remembers us, too."
Lira looked back toward the figures. As she watched, one of the ghostly elves turned its head, looking in her direction. No eyes, no face—just light. But somehow, unmistakably, the gaze met hers.
She slid down from the drake.
The moment her feet touched the moss-covered stone, the fog shifted again. It curled up around her legs—not binding, not threatening, but guiding. The drake let out a slow breath behind her, and the silver figures rippled like reflections disturbed by wind.
"Lira," Renkai warned, his voice taut, "we don't know what this place will do."
"I know," she said softly, eyes locked on the ruins. "But I think I'm supposed to be here."
She stepped forward, past a broken archway, and into the heart of the ruined castle. The temperature didn't drop, but her skin prickled with sensation—like stepping into a memory not her own. The silver echoes didn't vanish. Instead, they drifted back, giving her space, as if they too were waiting.
Inside, crumbled halls spread like ribs around a long-forgotten heart. Trees had grown through some corridors, and patches of grass bloomed where sunlight fell in narrow beams. There was a stillness here—not lifeless, but sacred.
Thalanir followed her slowly, reverent, as though entering a temple he feared to disturb. His voice came quieter now. "In the myths, they said Elarion vanished after the Binding Wars. Some believed it was swallowed by time. Others said the forest hid it from sorrow. But none ever found it again."
Renkai remained near the entrance, back half-turned to them as he scanned the woods beyond the fog. His posture was stiff, tense.
Lira moved deeper. Her hand brushed an old carving—spiraling patterns of tree roots, stars, and what looked like a woman standing between them. The lines pulsed faintly under her fingers.
The drake remained at the threshold, unmoving but alert.
Then Lira saw it: a circular platform at the center of what had once been a great hall. Stones shaped like petals curled outward, and at its center lay a sunken pool, empty now but lined with shimmering silver dust. Around it, symbols etched in the floor began to glow faintly.
Lira stepped onto the platform.
At once, the fog rushed inward—not violently, but with a sudden urgency, curling around her like a robe. Her vision blurred. For a heartbeat, she stood in two worlds: the ruin beneath her feet, and a vision of the same space whole and alive. The pool filled with glowing water. Elves stood in a circle, chanting. At the center, a young woman—her.
No—not her.
But someone who looked like her. Eyes closed, hands raised, vines weaving up her arms.
The chanting deepened. The starlight above shimmered, and the woman lifted a seed of glowing green in her palm. As the others bowed, she lowered it into the water—and the fog exploded outward.
Lira gasped.
She was back.
The fog thinned slightly around the edges of the ruin now, curling back toward the forest. Renkai had turned sharply, looking for threats. Thalanir stood on the platform's edge, hand pressed to one of the carved stones.
"You saw it too," Lira said.
He nodded once. "She was you. Or… someone before you. A memory planted here, waiting to be claimed."
The drake let out a deep sound from the archway. Not a warning—more like an echo of the chant.
Lira knelt by the silver-lined pool, hand hovering just above it. The dust shimmered. "This place was never lost. It was protected."
Renkai finally stepped into the ruin, gaze lingering on her, then the glowing carvings. "Then we weren't just meant to find it," he said. "You were meant to wake it."
The drake moved into the hall now, vines whispering along the stone. It bowed its head again toward Lira—and the fog parted entirely behind it, revealing a long-forgotten path.
And at the end of that path, more ruins waited. A deeper mystery. A truth half-buried in vines and time.
Lira stood, hand still tingling with the memory. "We go forward."
No one argued.
They stepped into the breath of the forest, and it welcomed them in silence.
The path beyond curved inward, leading deeper into the heart of the ruins. Here the fog grew thinner but stranger—glowing softly in patches, and humming at the edges of hearing. They walked in silence until they reached a small chamber set within a ring of leaning stone pillars, their tops broken and their surfaces etched with runes.
At the center of the chamber stood a pedestal, entwined in delicate vines. Resting atop it was a bracelet—unlike anything Lira had ever seen. It looked like it had been woven from living vines, yet it shimmered like moonlight caught in silver thread. It pulsed faintly, as if breathing.
She stepped closer.
The moment she neared, the bracelet responded—its glow intensified, casting a soft light across her face. Her breath caught.
Then, from the shadows beyond the chamber, a figure emerged.
An old woman, hunched and wrapped in faded rags, her back bowed beneath age and time. Her feet were bare, and her long gray hair hung in loose, tangled ropes. Despite her appearance, her eyes were sharp—clear pools of ageless knowing.
Renkai immediately shifted, claws at the ready. Thalanir stepped forward, protective and tense.
But Lira raised a hand. "No. She means no harm."
The old woman's lips parted in a smile both sad and warm. "You are back, after all these years. I see you again. I am satisfied now. The bracelet awaited you. And I, guarding it."
She stepped slowly forward, bare feet whispering across stone. "The fog will never lift for outsiders, because it protects our center of life. Our species comes from here, but many have forgotten this."
Lira stood still, heart full, and listened.
The old woman reached out, fingers trembling slightly, and touched the bracelet. "You were once the seed. Now you return as the bloom."
She lifted the shimmering piece and gently placed it around Lira's wrist.
It clasped without a sound, vines curling perfectly to her skin.
The glow steadied.
And the chamber exhaled—fog curling inward like breath held for centuries, now finally released.