The gate closed behind them with a low, grinding shudder.
Torian flinched at the sound. It wasn't violent—it was final. As though the stone itself had drawn
breath, held it, and then exhaled the last vestige of the surface world. The air changed instantly. No
wind. No birdsong. Only silence.
He stood at the mouth of a descending tunnel carved straight into the rock. The stone was smooth
but old—worn down not just by time, but by passage. This was not a natural cave. It had been made.
By hands. For a purpose.
A pulse echoed beneath his boots. Faint. Rhythmic. Like a heartbeat trapped under stone.
Behind him, Skarn sniffed the air. His nostrils flared, and a low growl rumbled from his chest—not
one of anger, but of recognition.
"You feel it too," Torian said quietly.
Skarn's eyes glinted in the low light, and the beast stepped forward, his massive body filling the
width of the tunnel.
Torian adjusted the sword on his back, swallowed dry air, and followed.
The descent began.
The stairs wound downward at a steady angle, cut from the same black stone as the gate. Along the
walls, faint grooves spiraled downward like veins, barely visible, but unmistakably artificial. Some
bore broken carvings—old runes chipped and worn, others melted by heat.After the first hundred steps, the temperature began to rise.
Torian loosened his cloak and wiped sweat from his brow. The air thickened with every level, like the
stone itself exhaled heat. It wasn't stifling, but it clung to him, wrapping his skin in a sheen of
warmth that made it hard to breathe deeply.
"How far down does this go?" he muttered.
Skarn didn't respond, but the way he moved—tense, measured, tail low—told Torian the beast was
listening for something.
They passed more carvings.
Now, they weren't runes.
They were images.
The first depicted a flame inside a hand.
The next showed that same hand raised against a creature—an indistinct beast wreathed in
darkness.
Then a third: a spiral of fire wrapped around a tall, armored figure with no face.
Each image was blackened at the edges, as if partially burned into the stone.
Torian slowed to examine one. The spiral was sharper here, more deliberate.
"What is this place?" he whispered.
A whisper answered.
Not from Skarn.
Not from the stone.
From within."The place before purpose. The place before power."
Torian froze.
"Did you—?"
But Skarn had stopped, too. His head was raised, ears twitching, gaze fixed ahead.
The stairs ended.
The tunnel opened into a vast, circular chamber.
Torian stepped inside and gasped.
It was beautiful—and terrible.
The walls glowed with faint orange light, not from torches or lamps, but from veins of
emberstone coursing through the rock. They branched like lightning across every
surface, pulsing softly with light, as though the mountain itself had a soul.
In the center of the chamber stood a pedestal of black stone, ringed by four thick
columns. Around it were ruins—broken benches, collapsed altars, shattered slabs.
Everything bore the same spiral symbol in various stages of erosion.
Torian approached slowly, heart pounding.
With every step closer to the pedestal, the ember in his chest stirred.
It didn't burn.
It pulled.
As though the flame inside recognized the flame around it.
The pedestal bore no inscription. No markings. Just a bowl-shaped depression filled
with emberlight—liquid flame, neither hot nor cold, hovering above the surface like
smoke frozen mid-movement.He reached toward it.
Skarn growled—a short, warning sound.
Torian paused.
"I have to know."
He touched the edge of the bowl.
Light surged.
Not from the bowl.
From him.
The ember in his chest ignited.
He screamed.
The world vanished.
⸻
He stood in fire.
But it didn't burn.
It surrounded him—rolling waves of flame stretching into a horizonless sky. Embers
rose like stars in reverse. Beneath his feet, the ground was not stone but memory—
flickering images of people he'd never seen, lives he'd never lived.
A woman wielding a sword of white fire, facing a creature of smoke.
A child with gold eyes raising his hands as a city burned.
A beast like Skarn, chained to a pillar, roaring defiance as figures in robes looked on.Each image lasted a heartbeat.
Then another.
And another.
Faster now.
Dozens. Hundreds. Thousands.
All of them flame-bearers.
All of them ember-chosen.
Some triumphed.
Some died screaming.
One stared straight at him—an old man with burned skin and hollow eyes—and said,
"The ember is not your weapon. You are its voice."
Torian stumbled backward.
The fire collapsed inward.
A final whisper echoed through him.
"Fire remembers. So do we."
⸻
He fell hard, gasping, back in the chamber.
Skarn loomed over him, one paw on his shoulder, claws gently pressed against his
collarbone.Torian blinked, heart racing.
The ember in his chest had calmed—but it pulsed now, warm and steady, like a second
heartbeat.
He looked up at Skarn.
"I saw them. All of them. The ones before me."
Skarn's eyes narrowed.
"I think… I think the ember chooses. But it doesn't save."
He sat up, slowly, knees weak.
"It tests."
He looked around the chamber again—at the walls, the pulsing veins of emberstone.
"How many came here?" he whispered.
There was no answer.
But something told him the answer was not enough.
⸻
They found the forge on the far side of the chamber.
It was built into the wall itself—an alcove framed by twin statues now broken and
crumbling. Within, a smith's tools lay scattered: a hammer with a spiral grip, a
blackened anvil, long tongs warped from heat. Metal fragments were embedded into
the stone, melted like wax into the wall.
The forge had been destroyed.
But not by age.By flame.
Torian stepped inside and knelt beside the anvil. Beneath it, half-buried in ash, he
found a torn piece of leather-bound parchment.
He brushed it off carefully.
Words were burned into it—scrawled in rough, urgent strokes:
It listens. It waits in the heart of the ember. We are not the first. We will not be the last.
The flame is not our gift. It is our judge.
Torian read it twice.
Then a third time.
"Judge…" he echoed.
He folded the scrap and tucked it into his belt.
He stood slowly and turned to Skarn.
"I think this place was meant to prepare them. Like me."
Skarn tilted his head.
"But they failed. Or left. Or burned."
He looked at the forge again.
"I won't be the next."
⸻
That night, they camped near the chamber's entrance, where the air was slightly
cooler. Torian built a small fire—not out of need, but out of ritual. It was the only light in
the dark. The ember veins pulsed faintly around them, like distant stars.Skarn curled beside him, massive tail draped across the stone like a sleeping dragon.
Torian sat cross-legged, the sword across his knees.
He didn't meditate.
He didn't pray.
He simply asked.
Not aloud.
Inward.
"Who are you?" he thought. "Why me? Why now?"
There was no answer.
Only warmth.
And a feeling.
The feeling of being seen.
He breathed out.
"I don't want to be a weapon. I want to survive. To fight. But I won't be hollow."
The ember pulsed once.
Almost… gently.
He looked at Skarn.
The beast's eyes opened—calm, steady.
"I'm glad you're with me," Torian said.Skarn blinked.
A pause.
Then a low, soft huff.
Affirmation.
Torian smiled faintly and lay back on the stone.
Above him, the ember veins hummed.
And from somewhere deep within, just before sleep took him, a single word echoed
across his mind:
"Soon."