As the last of Darvin's spells vanished in glittering fragments, Renn stood still, his blade lowered at his side.
The whispers from the crowd barely reached him.
For a moment, the arena faded from his senses.
Something tugged at the back of his mind—faint, like a memory rising through fog.
He blinked.
And he was five years old again.
The sun was softer back then.
It was his birthday.
His father, stoic but warm in his way, had handed him a gift: a wooden sword.
Not store-bought. Handmade.
The wood was dark, smooth, and oddly heavy. His father said nothing of where he got it, only that it was "a gift meant to stay close."
Renn, wide-eyed and giggling, had carried it everywhere since.
He even slept with it by his side.
He remembered swinging it clumsily through the air, chasing chickens and pretending to be a knight.
He remembered the warm pride in his chest every time it made a solid thwack.
But something else had followed.
A feeling.
