Elysia dreamed of fire.
Not the wild, roaring inferno that had swallowed Greyfen, but a quieter flame—steady, patient, relentless. It burned without smoke, without sound, curling through her veins instead of consuming her skin. Wherever it passed, memory followed.
She saw a city of white stone under a golden sky.
She saw towers etched with runes older than language, bridges of light spanning impossible distances. She heard laughter echoing through halls that no longer existed and felt a warmth that had nothing to do with heat.
Then the fire flared.
The city shattered.
Stone screamed as it tore itself apart. Light fractured into jagged shards, each piece screaming as it fell into darkness. The sky split, just as it had above Greyfen, but this time there was no village—only a world breaking itself open.
Elysia screamed.
She woke with a sharp gasp, her body jerking upright as pain lanced through her shoulder. Her vision swam, forest shadows blurring together until she realized she was no longer dreaming.
She was alive.
Her breath came fast and shallow as she took in her surroundings. She lay beneath a canopy of towering trees, their branches knitted so tightly together that only slivers of pale daylight pierced through. The ground beneath her was soft with moss and fallen leaves, the air cool and damp.
And she was not alone.
Alden Blackthorn sat a short distance away, crouched beside a small fire carefully hidden within a ring of stones. He looked up the moment she stirred, his hand drifting—instinctively—to the hilt of his sword.
"You're awake," he said.
Her throat burned. "Where…?"
"Northwood Forest," Alden replied. "About three leagues from what's left of Greyfen."
The words hit harder than the pain.
"What's left," she echoed faintly.
Alden did not soften it with lies. "Nothing worth going back to."
Elysia closed her eyes.
Images surged forward—burning rooftops, screaming neighbors, Ser Kael's cold smile, the sky tearing itself apart. Her hands clenched in the blanket draped over her shoulders, fingers digging into coarse wool.
"I killed them," she whispered.
Alden frowned. "No."
"The light," she said, voice cracking. "If I hadn't—if I wasn't—"
"You saved yourself," he cut in firmly. "And probably half the village by scattering them before they could finish the job."
She laughed weakly. "That's supposed to make me feel better?"
"No," Alden admitted. "But it's the truth."
She turned her head, studying him more closely now. In the clearer light of morning, he looked older than she had first thought—late thirties, perhaps. Lines etched his face not by age but by experience. His armor was battered, patched in places, bearing no sigil or banner. A man without allegiance.
"Why are you really here?" she asked.
Alden stirred the fire with a stick, sparks jumping briefly before dying. "Coin, originally."
Her eyes flicked to him.
"Someone hired you?"
"To pass through the Eastern Reach unseen," he clarified. "Ironically, avoiding Varlen's patrols. Didn't expect to walk into a prophecy instead."
Elysia swallowed. "They called me that too. A convergence. A fracture point."
Alden's jaw tightened. "They would."
"You believe them?"
He hesitated.
"That something happened to you?" he said slowly. "Yes. That you're dangerous? Only if you let them decide what that means."
She hugged her knees closer. "I don't even know who I am anymore."
Alden studied her for a long moment. Then he reached into his pack and withdrew a canteen, offering it to her.
"Drink," he said. "Then we'll talk about where this road leads."
She took the canteen with trembling hands and drank deeply. Cool water soothed her raw throat, grounding her in the present moment. When she handed it back, she noticed the faint shimmer still clinging to her skin—like embers refusing to die.
She stared at her hands. "It won't go away."
Alden followed her gaze. "Magic rarely does."
That word again.
Magic.
Before the Shattering, magic had been everything—so the old stories said. The Lumen had flowed through the land like breath through lungs, sustaining cities, crops, and people alike. After the Shattering, it had broken apart, twisted into something unstable, hoarded by kings and weaponized for war.
And now—
"Is that what this is?" she asked. "Lumen?"
Alden exhaled slowly. "If the Eastern Reach is hunting you personally, then yes. Or at least a fragment of it."
Her chest tightened. "Why me?"
"That," he said, "is the most dangerous question you can ask right now."
A branch snapped somewhere deeper in the forest.
Both of them froze.
Alden rose silently to his feet, drawing his sword just enough for the blade to catch light. His posture shifted—not aggressive, but ready.
"Stay here," he murmured.
Elysia nodded, heart hammering.
From between the trees emerged a figure cloaked in layered robes of deep indigo, walking without hurry. Her hood was thrown back, revealing wild silver-streaked hair and sharp, intelligent eyes that glittered with amusement.
"Well," the woman said, clapping once. "If this isn't delightfully dramatic."
Alden swore under his breath. "Lyra Quinn."
Elysia stared.
The woman grinned. "Guilty."
Her gaze slid to Elysia, lingering with unmistakable curiosity. "So this is her," Lyra said softly. "The girl the sky screamed for."
Elysia felt the fire in her veins stir again.
Lyra Quinn did not look like the kind of mage Elysia had imagined.
She wore no crown of light, no ceremonial robes stitched with glowing sigils. Instead, her clothing looked practical—layered fabric reinforced with leather panels, travel-worn boots splattered with mud, and a satchel slung over one shoulder so heavy it visibly pulled her stance crooked. Yet despite the unassuming appearance, the air around her felt… different. Charged. As though reality paid closer attention when she spoke.
Alden did not lower his sword.
"You shouldn't be here," he said flatly.
Lyra tilted her head, examining him like an interesting problem. "And yet, here I am. Curious how often that's true."
Her eyes flicked to the blade half-drawn from its sheath. "Relax, Blackthorn. If I wanted the girl, she'd already be glowing in a containment circle."
Elysia stiffened. "Containment?"
Lyra's smile softened—slightly. "Poor choice of words. Occupational habit."
Alden did not move aside. "You've been tracking us."
"Yes."
"You led the Eastern Reach straight to us."
"No," Lyra corrected calmly. "They felt her awakening. I followed the echo."
Elysia's stomach twisted. "My awakening?"
Lyra stepped closer, slow and deliberate, as if approaching a skittish animal. "What happened above Greyfen wasn't just magic," she said. "It was resonance. The Lumen doesn't simply respond—it recognizes."
Elysia shook her head. "I don't even know what that means."
"That," Lyra said gently, "is why you're in danger."
She reached into her satchel and withdrew a small object wrapped in dark cloth. As she pulled the fabric away, Elysia sucked in a sharp breath.
The compass.
The same dark metal. The same etched symbols. The same faint pulse of inner light.
"How do you have that?" Elysia demanded.
Lyra raised a brow. "Because there's more than one."
Alden cursed quietly.
Lyra glanced at him. "You didn't tell her?"
"There hasn't been time."
"There's always time for the truth," Lyra replied. "Especially before the lies find her first."
She knelt and set the compass on the forest floor. The moment it touched the earth, Elysia felt something pull at her—subtle but undeniable, like gravity shifting sideways.
"This is a Lumen Anchor," Lyra explained. "Forged before the Shattering. They were used to locate convergence points—places, people, moments where the Lumen gathers."
Elysia stared at it. "It appeared on my arm."
Lyra nodded. "Because you are one."
Silence settled heavily between them.
"No," Elysia said. "I can't be."
"You already are," Lyra replied.
Alden stepped in. "You said you followed the echo. That means others can too."
"Yes," Lyra said simply. "Kings. Orders. Things far worse than kings."
Elysia's pulse raced. "Then why are you here?"
Lyra looked at her intently. "Because the world is dying—and you might be the only thing that can stop it."
The words felt too large, too final.
"I don't want to save the world," Elysia whispered. "I just want to survive it."
Lyra smiled sadly. "Most heroes do."
Alden snorted. "She's not a hero."
"Not yet," Lyra agreed. "But she's becoming something."
The ground shuddered faintly beneath their feet.
Alden stiffened. "You felt that."
Lyra's expression darkened. "Yes."
"What was it?"
"Someone else touching the Lumen," she said. "Forcefully."
Elysia hugged herself as the warmth in her chest flared again—this time in warning.
Lyra stood. "We need to move. Now."
"Where?" Elysia asked.
Lyra met her gaze. "The City of Dawn."
Alden's eyes widened. "That place is a myth."
"So was she," Lyra said, nodding toward Elysia.
Another tremor rippled through the forest, stronger this time. Birds scattered from the treetops in a panicked storm.
Alden sheathed his sword fully and extended his hand to Elysia. "If we're doing this," he said, "we do it fast."
Elysia hesitated.
Behind her lay Greyfen's ashes. Ahead—uncertainty, danger, a destiny she did not understand.
The compass on the ground spun suddenly, its needle snapping east—then shifting, aligning itself toward the horizon.
Toward something calling her.
Elysia reached out and picked it up.
The moment her fingers closed around the metal, the forest seemed to hold its breath.
"I'll go," she said quietly. "But not because of prophecy."
Lyra smiled. "Good."
Alden nodded once. "Then we move."
Far away, unseen and unknowing, the Shade stirred.
And the girl who survived the fire took her first true step into legend.
They traveled hard for the rest of the day.
Lyra set the pace, moving through the forest with an ease that suggested long familiarity with wild places. She chose paths that were barely paths at all—slight depressions in the undergrowth, places where the trees grew just far enough apart to allow passage without snapping branches or leaving obvious tracks. Alden followed close behind her, constantly scanning their surroundings, while Elysia walked between them, clutching the compass beneath her cloak as though it might vanish if she loosened her grip.
The forest changed as they went.
The Northwood grew denser, older. The trees thickened, their bark scarred with symbols carved long before any living memory. Moss crept up their trunks like slow-moving tidewater, and the air grew heavier, rich with the scent of damp earth and something sharper—ozone, Lyra called it. Residual magic.
Elysia felt it too.
Every step seemed to resonate inside her, as though the ground itself recognized her presence. The warmth in her chest never faded; instead, it pulsed steadily, no longer painful but far from comfortable. When she brushed her fingers against the trunk of a tree at one point, she could have sworn she felt it respond—subtly, like a living thing waking from sleep.
She said nothing.
By dusk, they reached a narrow ravine where a thin stream cut through stone polished smooth by centuries of flow. Lyra motioned for them to stop.
"We'll rest here," she said. "Briefly."
Alden frowned. "We shouldn't stop."
"We should," Lyra countered. "Or she collapses."
Elysia opened her mouth to protest but nearly swayed on her feet. Alden caught her elbow before she could fall.
"That answers that," he muttered.
They made camp without fire this time. Lyra whispered a few words under her breath, tracing a sigil in the air that shimmered briefly before fading. The forest around them seemed to close in protectively, shadows deepening, sound dulling.
"A veil," Alden said.
"Crude, but effective," Lyra replied. "It'll blur us from long-range sensing. Not from a determined tracker—but it buys us time."
Elysia sank down onto a flat stone near the stream, exhaustion finally overwhelming adrenaline. As Alden handed her a strip of dried meat, her hands trembled badly enough that she nearly dropped it.
"I can't stop shaking," she said quietly.
Lyra crouched in front of her, studying her face with a clinical softness. "Your body is adjusting," she said. "You survived a Lumen surge that should have killed you. That alone is… unprecedented."
"That's not comforting," Elysia said.
Lyra smiled faintly. "It wasn't meant to be."
Night fell quickly beneath the forest canopy. The world dimmed to shades of shadow and starlight filtering faintly through the leaves. Elysia lay back against her pack, eyes burning with fatigue even as sleep refused to come.
When it finally did, it took her without warning.
She stood in a place that was not the forest.
The sky above her was fractured—split into vast, floating shards of light and darkness, slowly rotating like pieces of a broken mirror. Beneath her feet stretched a plain of ash and glass, reflecting the sky in warped patterns.
"You walk the edge," a voice said.
Elysia turned.
A figure stood a short distance away, tall and indistinct, its shape shifting constantly—at times humanoid, at times something far older. Faces emerged and faded across its surface: men, women, children, kings, soldiers. All watching her.
"Who are you?" Elysia asked, her voice echoing unnaturally.
"I am what remains," the figure replied. "I am the memory of unity. I am the grief of division."
"The Shade," she whispered, though she did not know how she knew the name.
The figure inclined its head. "You hear me clearly. That is… rare."
Elysia's chest tightened. "Everyone keeps telling me what I am. No one asks what I want."
The Shade stepped closer. With each movement, the ground beneath it shimmered. "Want is a luxury of intact worlds," it said gently. "Aeralis is broken. And so are you."
"That's not fair."
"No," the Shade agreed. "It is not."
Images flared around them—seven crowns suspended in darkness, each glowing with a different hue. Beneath them, the land cracked and withered, magic bleeding away like lifeblood.
"When the Lumen shattered," the Shade continued, "it fractured into fragments bound to thrones and bloodlines. The balance was lost. The world has been unraveling ever since."
Elysia shook her head. "Then fix it yourself."
A sound like distant laughter rippled through the air. "I cannot. I am consequence, not cause."
"Then why me?"
The Shade raised one shifting hand and placed it over where her heart would be. The touch was cold—and unbearably heavy.
"Because you were born between moments," it said. "Because the Lumen answered you when it should not have. Because you survived."
The sky above them darkened.
"But hear me, Ashborn," the Shade said, its voice lowering. "Unity will demand sacrifice. And destruction will promise peace."
The world began to collapse inward.
"Choose wisely," the Shade whispered. "For either path ends in fire."
Elysia woke with a gasp.
She bolted upright, heart racing, the echo of the Shade's words still ringing in her mind. The forest was quiet, the ravine bathed in pale moonlight. Alden sat awake nearby, sharpening his blade. Lyra watched the stars, her expression unreadable.
"You dreamed," Lyra said without turning.
Elysia swallowed. "It spoke to me."
Lyra's eyes flicked to her sharply. "The Shade?"
Elysia nodded.
Lyra exhaled slowly. "Then the hunt has truly begun."
Alden looked up. "We won't outrun them forever."
"No," Lyra agreed. "But we can reach the City of Dawn before they close the net."
Elysia tightened her grip on the compass as it pulsed faintly against her palm, pointing onward—always onward.
Somewhere far to the east, King Oris Varlen stood before a map of the Seven Kingdoms and smiled as fresh reports arrived.
The girl lived.
And the world would bleed for it.