The apparition of Elara's future self still stood before them—real, corporeal, and brimming with a sadness too heavy to fake. Her eyes, though identical to Elara's, held an emptiness as though something vital had long been extinguished.
"You've seen what comes," Older Elara said. "The Heartforge awakens for no one lightly. But it has begun to stir because it knows the Harrower is close."
Kael moved to Elara's side, his hand near the hilt of his blade. "Why show yourself now?"
"Because if you continue down this path without understanding the cost," said the future Elara, "you will lose more than your life. You'll lose everyone."
Ryssa stepped forward, jaw set. "We already knew the risks."
"You think you do," Future Elara said softly. "But you haven't *lived* them yet. I have."
A silence followed—thick, uneasy.
"Then tell us," Elara said. "Tell us everything."
Future Elara stepped away from the dais and gestured for them to sit. Her movements were slow, as if the weight of memory was a mantle she couldn't set down.
"When I stood where you stand now, we were just as united. The Circle felt whole again. And then we breached the Heartforge, unlocked its power—and paid for it in blood."
Elara's mouth was dry. "Who died?"
"You did," said Future Elara. "Just not in the way you expected."
The room darkened slightly. Aelis frowned. "The Harrower got to you?"
"No," Future Elara said. "I became him."
The words struck like stones.
Kael unsheathed his blade with a rasp of steel. "You're lying."
"I wish I were." Her gaze turned back to Elara. "We unlocked a fragment of the Heartforge—one that binds to memory, to pain. It feeds off sacrifice, and when it didn't have enough... it took from me. I became the Harrower's vessel. Not because he possessed me—but because I *invited* him in, trying to control the Forge."
Tovan let out a shaky breath. "You're saying we fail because we *win*?"
"No," she said. "You fail because you *believe* winning means surviving."
Maeron's eyes darkened. "Then how do we win differently?"
Future Elara turned to him. "You destroy the Forge."
Gasps echoed around the chamber.
"You're insane," Ryssa hissed. "The Forge is the last sanctuary of the leylines."
"And if corrupted, it becomes the Harrower's weapon," Future Elara replied.
Kael clenched his fists. "So that's the real choice. Power—or survival."
"No," Elara said quietly. "Purpose."
Everyone turned to her.
She stepped forward to her older self. "You said I became him because I tried to wield the Forge. What if we don't use it? What if we shield it? Protect it without drawing from it?"
Future Elara's face softened. "You always were the hopeful one. That's what made you dangerous."
"Then let me be dangerous again," Elara said.
The older woman reached into her cloak and pulled out a shard of crystal—pulsing with golden fire and dark veins like ink drifting in water.
"This is memory made flesh," she said. "A piece of what I became. Take it. And don't let it become you."
She pressed it into Elara's hand.
The future shimmered—and disappeared.
***
The silence after her departure was nearly sacred. No one spoke for a long time, each person weighed down by visions of what could be.
Kael finally broke the stillness. "She was telling the truth."
Elara nodded. "And she gave us something useful."
She opened her hand. The crystal shard floated an inch above her palm, pulsing softly.
Aelis tilted her head. "It sings."
Maeron stepped closer, staring into the heart of the shard. "It's an echo crystal. Made from residual magic after a leyline collapses. They're not supposed to exist anymore."
"Maybe they don't," Tovan said. "In *our* time."
Lysandra looked pale. "This... this can guide us through the Forge. It contains pieces of someone who survived it—someone who *wielded* it."
"You mean abused it," Ryssa snapped.
"Survived it," Lysandra corrected. "And gave us a map of what *not* to do."
Elara wrapped the crystal in cloth and slid it into her satchel. "We head into the Forge tomorrow."
Tovan raised an eyebrow. "No scout ahead?"
"No," Elara said. "We go together."
***
That night, they made camp just inside the mirrored hall. The air remained still, but charged—like waiting for a storm to land.
Elara took first watch. Kael joined her, his steps quiet.
"I saw something else," she confessed as they looked toward the darkened Forge entrance.
He glanced at her. "What did you see?"
"When I touched the shard... I saw her memories. Mine. A moment—sitting on the throne of the Heartforge. Alone. And the world was quiet. Not in peace—but in ruin."
Kael didn't speak.
"I don't want to end up like her," she whispered. "But she didn't seem evil. Just... broken."
"Which means you don't have to be either," Kael said.
Elara gave a soft laugh. "And what if I'm already halfway there?"
Kael met her eyes. "Then I'll walk the other half with you."
Their silence after that felt gentler.
***
At dawn, the Keepers stood before the threshold of the Heartforge.
The entrance was a great arch of obsidian veined with luminous gold. Runes crawled across its face like living script. As Elara raised her hand, the runes flared and receded.
The door opened.
Inside was not fire or steel, but a cathedral of light and shadow.
The Forge was alive.
Leylines twisted through the space like rivers in air. Floating platforms hovered above a bottomless void, connected by bridges that looked too delicate to hold weight.
At the far end was a heart-shaped structure—a cocoon of pulsing stone and memory.
"The core," Maeron said. "That's where it begins."
And then they heard the scream.
A sound from behind.
Dozens of voices—inhuman and cruel—rising like a tidal wave.
"The Woken," Lysandra said grimly. "He's sent them."
Tovan cursed. "We have minutes."
Kael turned to Elara. "We hold them here. You go to the core."
"No," Elara said. "We go together."
Ryssa grinned. "Now you're talking."
They moved fast—across shifting bridges, through halls lined with sentient metal, as the Woken poured in from the rear. Feral creatures born from corrupted leyline energy, they moved like smoke and claws, hissing with magic.
Kael and Ryssa formed the rear guard. Tovan vanished into shadow, picking enemies off from hidden angles. Aelis summoned gusts that hurled entire mobs into the void. Maeron fought without hesitation, the shadows dancing with him like allies.
Elara and Lysandra reached the cocoon first.
It pulsed like a heartbeat.
"Now," Lysandra said. "Place the sigils."
Each sigil hovered from its Keeper's hand—Fire, Stone, Wind, Light, and Shadow.
They floated in a circle, embedding into the cocoon's surface.
The chamber shook.
A voice echoed—deep, ancient, and angry.
**"You cannot protect what you do not understand."**
The Harrower had arrived.
Not in body—but in voice, in presence.
The cocoon opened.
Inside was a core of pure leyline light—liquid gold wrapped in black tendrils.
Elara stepped forward, the echo crystal in her palm.
It rose from her hand, hovering before the core.
And then the tendrils surged forward, trying to consume her.
She screamed—but stood her ground.
The crystal flared, pushing back the dark.
And in that moment, she saw everything—
—herself at the beginning of time, lighting the first sigil;
—herself weeping over Kael's lifeless body;
—herself standing over a broken world, and choosing to *heal*, not *rule*.
And then—
Light.
The cocoon absorbed the echo crystal.
The tendrils retracted.
The core stabilized.
The Harrower's voice screamed in rage.
Outside, the Woken froze.
And then began to dissolve.
Kael stumbled in, bloodied but standing. "What happened?"
Elara turned to him, eyes glowing faintly gold. "We made a different choice."
Lysandra smiled, eyes wet. "You changed the future."
Elara exhaled. "We're not done yet. But we're no longer losing."
***
Outside the Forge, the land stirred. The skies cleared. The leylines pulsed with steadier light.
The world had felt the shift.
But Elara knew the Harrower still waited—somewhere beyond the veil.
She looked at her friends—wounded, tired, alive.
And whispered, "Let's finish this."