The sun did not rise; it crept, smeared orange behind a veil of ash and low cloud.
Morrin's ruins were quiet, save for the gentle moan of wind filtering through skeletal beams.
Azrael sat cross-legged by the dying fire, his cloak drawn tightly over his frame. He hadn't slept.
His eyes were sunken, his left hand twitching every few seconds. The strange whisper from the night echoed through him like a splinter in his bones.
Janis stirred from her bedroll, groaning. "Tell me that's stew and not just burnt water."
"You're awake," Azrael said, his voice hoarse.
"Barely. You look worse than the ruins."
He forced a half-smile. "Didn't sleep."
Janis narrowed her eyes. "Something happen?"
He shook his head. "Just dreams."
Veyna stepped from the woods, as if summoned. She looked pristine, untouched by the ash and the cold. Her gaze fixed on Azrael.
"You saw it, didn't you?"
Azrael didn't answer.
Janis looked between them. "Saw what?"
Veyna knelt beside the fire. "The Echo doesn't just sing, Azrael. It listens. And sometimes, it speaks."
"I didn't hear anything," he lied.
"Good," she said softly. "Hold onto that."
They returned to the vault one last time. Veyna insisted.
Janis protested. "We already searched it. It's empty."
"You searched it with your eyes," Veyna replied. "We need to feel what's beneath."
They entered again through the side crawlspace. The air inside was colder, heavier than before.
Azrael's fingers brushed the pedestal again; this time gently. No flash. No hum.
But the wall.
A crack had formed since yesterday, running vertically from floor to ceiling behind the altar.
"That wasn't there," Janis said.
"No," Azrael murmured. "It wasn't."
Veyna approached, her hand outstretched. She whispered in a tongue older than any Azrael had heard.
The crack shivered.
Then opened.
A narrow passage, barely lit by bioluminescent moss, appeared behind it.
"We go together," Veyna said.
"We go?" Janis echoed. "You're joking."
Azrael was already stepping inside.
The tunnel spiraled downward, walls of smooth stone laced with glowing veins of pale blue. As they walked, the temperature shifted—it was no longer cold, but humid. The air smelled of wet leaves, firewood, and something sweeter… like honey and rot.
"This shouldn't be here," Janis muttered. "The ground here's not deep enough for a cavern."
"It was carved," Veyna replied, fingers brushing the wall carvings.
Images lined the walls—symbols of a hand pierced by lightning, a tree weeping blood, a single eye surrounded by flame.
Azrael stopped. "These match the mural above."
Janis leaned in. "That's your eye. Isn't it? The one you cover."
He didn't reply.
At the end of the tunnel, a wide chamber opened before them. Roots hung from the ceiling, and at the center stood a dais with a relic atop it; an orb, cracked but pulsing with pale light.
Veyna stepped forward. "Don't touch it."
Azrael didn't.
The orb flickered. A voice filled the chamber—not sound, but thought.
He is not yet ready.
Azrael froze. Janis clutched her blade. "Who said that?"
He is early. And yet late.
The light in the orb dimmed. The temperature dropped.
The Ash returns.
Then silence.
They made camp by a broken tree beyond the cavern. No one spoke for hours.
Azrael finally broke the silence. "It knew me."
Veyna stirred the fire. "It knew what was inside you."
"What does that mean?"
She met his eyes. "You carry a shard of something ancient. A spark of divine memory. A root left uncut."
"You mean a god."
"I mean something older."
Janis stood. "This is madness. We're playing with forces that broke the world once."
Azrael shook his head. "I didn't ask for this."
"You never do," Veyna whispered. "But that doesn't matter."
He stood. "So what now? We go back and tell the council I'm cursed?"
"We tell them nothing," Veyna said. "Not yet."
Azrael glared. "So we lie."
"We survive."
They returned to the Vale by dusk the next day. The sky bled red behind the mountains.
News had traveled fast. Elders stood waiting. Warriors flanked the gates.
Varros stepped forward. "You live."
"Barely," Janis muttered.
Azrael said nothing.
Veyna approached the council and spoke in hushed tones. Her words were measured, careful. She mentioned the relic but not the orb. She mentioned the roots but not the voice.
Azrael stood apart, watching his mother from afar. Kelea's eyes met his, and in them he saw the flicker of fear.
That night, he didn't sleep again. He sat on the high terrace of his family's hall, watching the stars.
And he whispered to the dark:
"Who am I really?"
Only the wind answered.
But deep in the forest below, something blinked.
And it remembered his name.