The wind howled as Kael descended the ash-strewn cliffs of the Cradle. Each step away from Draeven's grave felt heavier than the last—but Ashreign guided him forward, its flame now a steady glow at his back.
Serana, Ysera, and Veylan followed in silence.
Below them, stretched across the black plains of Ardra's Reach, lay a cracked road of obsidian stone—once used by pilgrims of the Flame, now buried beneath centuries of ruin and sand.
At its far end loomed their next destination:
The Vaults of Silence—a labyrinthine fortress built inside the husk of a fallen star.
"What are we looking for?" Serana asked, adjusting her pack.
"The Flame remembers," Kael answered. "But I don't."
Ysera frowned.
"You think the Vaults hold your past?"
"No. I think they hold what Draeven feared."
By dusk, they reached the Vault's threshold.
Twin statues—faceless titans in prayer—marked the entrance. The doors were sealed, their surface covered in inscriptions that shimmered when Kael approached.
Ashreign pulsed.
And the doors opened.
Inside was silence. Not quiet. Not stillness.
But true silence.
The kind that pressed against your thoughts and squeezed until your voice disappeared inside you.
"This place feels wrong," Veylan whispered.
"It feels old," Serana corrected.
They stepped inside.
The halls were wide and cold, lined with mirrors of darkened glass. Each mirror whispered not in sound, but in memory—faint impressions of the people who had walked these halls before.
And then they reached it.
A chamber of black flame.
Suspended in the center: a mask—carved from obsidian, etched with runes Kael did not recognize but somehow understood.
Ashreign trembled.
"What is that?" Ysera asked, eyes narrowed.
Kael stepped forward.
And the Flame spoke within him:
"The First Warden. He sealed the Watcher. He became silence."
Kael reached for the mask.
And the Vault screamed.
A wave of force blasted them back. Serana slammed against a pillar, Veylan struck the ground hard.
Kael staggered but remained upright—his hand now holding the mask.
In the moment he touched it, a memory not his own surged into him:
Fire raining from the stars.
A giant of light battling a serpent made of words.
A name burned into the sky: Azramon.
The silence shattered.
And in its place came whispers.
Not from within the Vault.
But from beneath it.
Kael turned to the others, eyes wide.
"Something's waking up."
Serana unsheathed her blade.
"What did you take?"
Kael stared at the mask.
"A warning."
The floor trembled beneath their feet.
Dust fell from the ceiling of the Vault of Silence like the first drops of a coming storm. The mirrors lining the walls began to ripple—no longer reflecting the room, but showing eyes. Dozens. Hundreds. Blinking open in absolute synchronization.
"That's not possible," Veylan whispered, drawing his twin daggers.
Serana pressed her back to Kael.
"You said this place was sealed."
Kael held the obsidian mask tightly.
"It was."
And then the floor cracked.
A web of red light shot through the ground. The chamber split open with a deep, groaning sigh, as though the world itself regretted what was coming.
From the fissure rose a hand—skeletal, yet immense. Its bones were carved from script, shifting runes that bled black fire. The arm followed, pulling a massive form upward.
The Watcher of Silence had awakened.
It had no mouth.
No voice.
Only a presence.
And a message etched into the air, burning into their thoughts:
"The bearer has touched what was buried."
"The Seal is broken."
"Balance must be restored."
The Watcher stepped from the pit, its body towering over the group. Not a beast—a concept given form. Its head bore a crown of shattered stars.
Kael lifted Ashreign, its flame resisting the creature's oppressive aura.
"We don't want a fight."
The Watcher tilted its head. And the walls shattered.
Out poured dozens of lesser forms—thin, grey silhouettes with runes for faces. Servants of Silence. Their bodies moved like parchment caught in a storm, flowing without bone or mercy.
"Too late," Serana muttered.
The battle ignited.
Kael surged forward, Ashreign cleaving one of the silent forms in two—only for its pieces to reform behind him. Ysera cast a ward, but the runes began eating her magic, unraveling her spells mid-cast.
Veylan vanished into shadows, blades flashing, cutting through the lesser Watchers with speed—but even he was pushed back by their sheer numbers.
The Watcher of Silence raised one hand.
The mask Kael had taken flew from his grip.
The creature reached to reclaim it—
But Ashreign intercepted, glowing brighter than it ever had. A pillar of fire erupted upward, engulfing the mask.
"No more chains," Kael said. "No more silence."
The fire from Ashreign surged into the Vault, turning mirrors to slag and runes to smoke. The Watcher shrieked—a soundless quake that shook their minds.
Then, with a final step forward, Kael struck the mask with Ashreign—
And broke it.
The Vault went still.
The Watcher froze.
Its runes flickered…
…and then it knelt.
Ashreign dimmed.
The silent forms dispersed, evaporating into ash.
Kael fell to one knee, exhausted, as the broken mask crumbled into dust in his hand.
Serana rushed to his side.
"What did you do?"
"I unbound it," Kael whispered. "I freed the First Warden's curse. The Watcher wasn't our enemy. It was a prisoner."
The Watcher raised its head one last time and uttered a single word into Kael's mind:
"Azramon… stirs."
And then it vanished into light.
Far away, in the city of black mirrors, the woman in silver silk smiled.
She had felt it all.
"The mask is broken. The Watcher is free. Good."
She turned to a creature chained behind her throne—its body made of obsidian wings and eyes stitched shut.
"Send the others. Kael's path has been lit. Let's see how far he'll walk before he burns."
The Vault was silent again.
But it wasn't the oppressive silence from before. This quiet was earned—a breath held after a storm, when the world takes a moment to remember it's still alive.
Kael stood among the ruin, hand resting on Ashreign's hilt, its flame dimmed to a soft ember. Around him, the shattered remains of the obsidian mask sparkled faintly—residual threads of ancient power unraveling into the ether.
The Watcher was gone.
But its warning was not.
"Azramon stirs."
Serana leaned against a broken column, wrapping a fresh cloth around her shoulder wound.
"You going to tell us who—or what—that is?" she asked, voice low.
Kael's jaw tightened.
"Not who. What."
He turned to face them, his shadow stretched long by the flickering flame still burning along the vault walls.
"I didn't just see the past when I touched the mask. I remembered."
Ysera, brushing soot from her robes, looked up.
"You've said that before."
"This was different," Kael said. "I remembered another life. Or maybe the first. I was there, when the sky broke. When the stars fell."
Veylan narrowed his eyes.
"And this Azramon?"
Kael nodded.
"He's not a man. Not a god. He's... a sentence. A truth that should never be spoken. He eats what makes us real. He whispers, and things unravel. And Draeven—he was trying to hold that unraveling back."
Silence fell again.
This time, it was fearful.
"So Draeven wasn't the true enemy," Serana muttered.
"He was... a barrier," Kael said, "twisted by time, but still standing. And now he's gone."
Ashreign pulsed once, as if in agreement.
They left the Vault before nightfall. The sky above Ardra's Reach was unusually clear, stars blinking through velvet blackness. But one of those stars pulsed—once, then again.
And then began to move.
"That's no star," Ysera whispered.
Kael looked up.
In the distance, wings spread across the horizon—black, vast, like curtains drawn across the heavens. A creature had taken flight from the east, one winged shadow moving against the night like a living eclipse.
Something had been sent.
And it was hunting.
That night, they made camp near the ruins of a forgotten pyre-temple. Kael sat alone with Ashreign, gazing into the flame. The ember burned in rhythm with his breath.
"What are you?" he whispered.
Ashreign did not answer.
But in the flame, an image flickered:
A throne of chains. A serpent with no skin. A voice that speaks only endings.
Kael's hands tightened around the sword.
"Then I'll be the one who speaks beginnings."
In the dream that came later, Kael stood before a sea of glass. A voice rose behind him, soft and endless:
"You have inherited more than fire. You carry the memory of the world. You are the Flamebearer, Kael—but not its master. Not yet."
He turned to see a figure cloaked in starlight.
"When you reach the Hall of Echoes, ask the question that burns. The answer will find you."
Then everything shattered—
And Kael awoke.
At dawn, they walked westward. Toward the Hall of Echoes. Toward the truth.
Above them, wings still circled.
The hunt had begun.
Far above the earth, where no bird dared soar and no wind dared speak, the creature flew.
Its wings were stitched from silence itself—feathers woven of ink and shadow. Where it passed, clouds dissolved, and the stars blinked out. It bore no name, but in the ancient tomes of the forbidden Sanctum, it had once been called:
Threnuul.
The Hollow Wing.
It had no eyes, but it saw. It had no mouth, but it hungered.
From the obsidian spires of the Mirrored Citadel, the Lady in Silver silk watched through a pane of living glass. Her fingers danced through the reflections, shaping them, bending them to her will.
She smiled.
"He heads to the Hall. Brave. Predictable."
The reflection showed Kael's silhouette trudging across the arid bones of the Dryspire Wastes, Ashreign at his side, companions flanking him in silence.
She turned to the chained beast beside her throne—a roiling thing made of whispers and bone fragments.
"Send word to the Kynbinders. Let them prepare the gate at Echo's Edge."
She paused.
"And let Threnuul feast first. If he survives… bring me Ashreign."
Far to the west, the wind died.
Serana was the first to feel it.
She stopped walking, hand resting on her dagger, scanning the jagged hills of glassy obsidian around them. A strange pressure settled in the air, like a deep breath held too long.
Kael noticed it next.
"No birds. No wind. Even the sun feels wrong."
Ysera's voice shook slightly.
"Something's above us."
They looked up.
The sky fractured.
From a ripple in the blue, Threnuul descended.
It did not fall—it unfolded, wings spreading wider than a battlefield, each beat releasing silent shockwaves that tore through the stone and sand. The light bent around it. Sound fled from it.
Kael instinctively drew Ashreign.
The blade ignited. Not fire—but light like dawn compressed into a blade's edge.
"Run?" Serana asked.
"Too late," Veylan muttered, blades drawn.
The Hollow Wing dove.
Its scream was silent but hit like a mountain. The ground cracked under the weight of it. Shadows peeled from rocks like flesh. Ysera raised her hands, but her magic turned to ink and dripped from her fingers.
Kael stepped forward, Ashreign flaring—
And Threnuul stopped.
It hovered, hovering low, wings motionless—studying him.
Ashreign howled. A sound only Kael heard. A call from blade to beast.
And Threnuul answered.
It lunged.
Kael met it mid-air, blade clashing against emptiness.
The impact exploded into a shockwave that shattered a nearby ridge. Veylan and Serana were thrown back. Ysera hit the dirt, clutching her staff.
Kael spun in the air, brought Ashreign down—
And carved through a wing.
Threnuul shrieked. A soundless scream that made Kael's vision blur. Black ichor sprayed across the ground, sizzling like acid.
But the creature did not retreat.
It split.
From its core burst three smaller wraiths—thin, winged, clawed, eyes glowing with mirrored hatred.
Kael hit the ground hard. Dust rose.
"New plan," he said, staggering to his feet. "We don't kill it."
"We bind it," Ysera gasped.
She began drawing ancient symbols in the air, ones she had sworn never to use.
"I'll need ten heartbeats. Hold them!"
Kael gritted his teeth.
"Serana. Veylan."
They flanked him.
"Let's give her time."
The dance of death resumed.
Kael moved like a storm. Ashreign screamed through the air. Serana danced between wraiths with blades flashing silver. Veylan blurred from shadow to strike and vanish.
Each moment was razor-thin. Each breath nearly their last.
Finally, Ysera shouted:
"Now!"
She slammed her staff into the ground.
The sigil erupted—a towering sphere of white flame, ancient glyphs circling like comets. Threnuul shrieked and twisted, its wings caught in the spell.
It tried to flee—
And the glyphs closed.
The Hollow Wing vanished.
Imprisoned in a prison made of names it once consumed.
Silence returned.
Kael dropped to one knee.
Serana helped him up, blood running down her cheek.
"You alright?"
"I will be."
Ysera knelt, breathing hard.
"That wasn't even Azramon. Just a servant."
Kael looked westward, where the horizon shimmered with heat and distance.
"Then we need to move faster."
Behind them, the sigil pulsed once more—then burned out.
And in the skies, other stars began to move.
The canyons opened like the throat of a waiting god.
Jagged and unnaturally symmetrical, the stone walls of Echo's Edge towered above Kael and his companions. The wind that funneled through these deep crimson passages did not whistle—it whispered. Sometimes in languages none of them recognized. Sometimes in their own voices.
"This place is wrong," Serana muttered, tracing a rune onto her blade. "Stone shouldn't hold memory like this."
"It's not memory," Ysera said. "It's resonance. This canyon was carved by the fall of a Sealed Star. Every sound since then has been etched into the bones of this place."
Kael said nothing.
But Ashreign trembled faintly in his grip.
They pressed on, boots scraping over uneven stone, careful not to disturb the strange sigils carved intermittently into the canyon floor. They glowed faintly—symbols of Kynbinder origin. Traps, warnings, or both.
Hours passed. The sun never reached them down here.
Instead, the glow came from fissures in the walls, oozing faint lavender light. Once, Serana caught a glimpse of something moving behind a slit in the stone—a face, maybe. Or a reflection of a face.
"We're being watched."
"We're being measured," Veylan corrected.
Kael halted as they reached a fork—one path led into a blackened tunnel choked with crystalline vines, the other a slope of jagged stone descending toward what looked like an ancient amphitheater carved into the canyon's heart.
He looked back at Ysera.
"Which way?"
She touched the canyon wall, closed her eyes, and listened.
"The Hall lies beneath the amphitheater," she said. "But the Kynbinders will not let us pass easily."
As if summoned, the air rippled—and a man stepped forward from thin air.
He wore robes woven from mist and chain, his eyes burning violet, his skin etched with glyphs that moved like ink in water.
"You seek the Hall," the Kynbinder said, voice calm. "But you carry fire where it must not burn."
Kael raised Ashreign. The blade ignited, casting harsh gold light across the stone.
"I'll burn through if I must."
The Kynbinder smiled, almost kindly.
"Then let us test the fire."
He raised his hand—and the amphitheater cracked.
From its depths, stone peeled back like unfurling scrolls. Chains burst from beneath, each tipped with jagged runes. And from within the pit, something rose.
A colossus of bindings—a golem formed from chained earth, sealed souls, and the skeletal remnants of past challengers.
"Prove yourself, Kael of Ashreign," the Kynbinder whispered. "Or be forgotten like the rest."
The golem struck first—its fist shattered the outer wall of the canyon in a single blow.
Kael dodged, the wind from the swing nearly hurling him off his feet. Serana leapt in, carving her daggers across its leg—but they sparked uselessly. Veylan vanished, reappearing behind its head and striking the exposed glyph—but it pulsed, throwing him back.
Ysera began a binding chant—threads of starlight swirling around her hands.
Kael ran straight toward the center.
Ashreign ignited—not just with fire, but memory. As he neared, visions exploded behind his eyes:
Chains around a world-heart.
Kynbinders chanting in a dead language.
A sword, not meant to exist, forged from rebellion.
"Your flame is unfinished," a voice whispered inside Kael.
"Then I'll finish it now."
He leapt.
The golem swung.
Kael spun mid-air, carving a spiral glyph with Ashreign as he fell—and drove the blade into the golem's heart rune.
For a second, the world paused.
Then—
The golem imploded.
Chains screamed. Souls howled. A ripple of heat exploded outward, flinging Kael across the stone—but Ashreign pulsed, shielding him in golden light.
When the dust settled, the amphitheater was silent.
The Kynbinder stood alone.
He bowed his head once.
"The Hall awaits."
And vanished.
Kael staggered to his feet.
"Everyone alive?" he called.
"Barely," Serana groaned. "But I'm counting it."
"Ysera?" he asked.
The mage nodded, her eyes fixed on a door now revealed at the amphitheater's base—a stone archway covered in symbols none of them recognized. It pulsed with ancient power, humming like the heart of a god.
"That's it," she whispered. "The Hall of Echoes."
Kael stepped forward, hand tight on Ashreign.
"Then it's time we heard what the world has forgotten."
And together, they descended into the Hall.