Emberfall rose from the mountainside like a wounded giant—weathered, half-buried, and too proud to die. Kael could see the remnants of its grandeur in the skeletal archways and broken murals along its entrance. Once, this citadel had been a fortress of power. Now it was a relic clinging to memory.
The stone gates creaked open with Sarai's touch, her fingers tracing a forgotten sequence into the glyph plate. It shimmered faintly, then dimmed again.
"Don't speak unless spoken to," she said as they stepped into the shadowed courtyard. "And don't touch anything glowing unless you want to lose a hand."
"Sounds inviting," Kael muttered, ducking under a fallen lintel.
The inner grounds were surprisingly intact. Overgrown with thornbloom vines and dotted with shattered sigils, yes—but not abandoned. Smoke curled from makeshift chimneys. Candles flickered in high balconies. People moved like whispers—watching them through arrow-slit windows, waiting.
They were being tested already.
Sarai led them through a maze of narrow halls and crumbled sanctums. The deeper they went, the more Kael felt it—that hum in the stone. A frequency just beneath hearing. The Core in his chest stirred again, as if something ancient was pulling at it.
They entered a long, dome-roofed chamber lined with cracked crystal sconces. At the far end stood three figures cloaked in grey and crimson, their faces obscured by masks shaped like broken sunbursts.
One stepped forward.
She was tall, lean, and carried a carved wooden staff etched with names—Kael could read them faintly in the low light. Dozens, maybe hundreds. The dead.
"You bring an echo," she said to Sarai, voice smooth but cold. "Another spark, untested. Why?"
"He touched the Hollowroot," Sarai replied.
A silence fell over the room like a blade. The masked woman tilted her head, eyes narrowing.
"Did he survive it?"
"Not untouched."
The woman turned her gaze to Kael. He felt like he was being dissected.
"What did it show you?" she asked.
Kael hesitated. "A version of me. Older. Worse. Something I don't want to become."
"Then you've seen the truth."
"Is it truth?" he asked. "Or a trap?"
She seemed to consider that. "The Hollowroot doesn't lie. It doesn't need to. All paths are real—just not all are chosen."
Another figure stepped forward now, a shorter man with a shock of white hair and a jagged scar down one cheek. His mask hung at his belt.
"Let me test him," he said. "See if he's worth our time."
Sarai tensed. "He's not ready for that."
"He's here," the man snapped. "Which means he's already in the current. Either he swims, or he drowns."
Before Kael could react, the man raised his hand. The air shifted.
A sudden pull—like gravity had flipped sideways. Kael stumbled as the floor twisted beneath his feet, the walls stretching, his senses warping. He barely registered the strike until it was inches from his face—a pulse of raw energy, fast and sharp.
He raised his hand, instinct screaming.
Boom.
A shockwave exploded outward. Dust flew. The man staggered back, blinking as the energy blast dissipated harmlessly against a pulse of translucent light surrounding Kael.
Kael stared at his own hand. He hadn't shaped the energy. It had shaped itself.
The masked woman stepped between them. "Enough."
"But—"
"He's bound to the Core. You felt it too." She turned back to Kael. "You're not trained. Not forged. But you're already channeling instinctively. That's enough—for now."
The man spat to the side, but backed off.
She lowered her hood. Her features were sharp, lined with age and fire. "I am Vaelra, Keeper of Emberfall. You may stay here—for a time. But don't mistake sanctuary for safety."
Kael exhaled slowly. "I don't."
Later, Sarai led him to a smaller room—a chamber with no windows and a single mattress of woven leaf-thread. It smelled faintly of smoke and copper.
"This is yours," she said. "Eat. Rest. Training starts at dawn."
Kael sat down heavily, his limbs aching. "They don't like me."
"They don't trust you," she corrected. "There's a difference."
"Will that change?"
She hesitated. "Maybe. If you live long enough."
Kael let out a weak laugh. "Comforting."
Sarai turned to leave, but paused at the door. "You did well today. That shield—it was a reflex, not luck."
"I didn't know I could do that."
"Then imagine what you'll do when you do know."
She left him with that thought.
Kael lay back, eyes on the stone ceiling, Core still humming faintly in his chest.
He was inside the walls now. But the real trial had only just begun.