They called him Ashen—not because of what he was, but because of what he'd become.
Born of silence and raised by the Choir's echo-hymns, Ashen had never truly spoken. His words, when needed, came in fractured chords and resonant hums, pulled from the bones of forgotten languages.
His body bore the Choir's scars. Sigils—imperfect and ever-shifting—ran up his arms like cracked calligraphy. One eye was solid white, reflecting nothing. The other bled colors that didn't exist in nature. A living vessel. A broken instrument.
Yet, in the moment Mother Anex summoned him, he stood straight and still.
"Go to the unbound flame," she said, her voice trailing in echoes behind her. "Carry the song to him before the others fill his silence with lies."
Ashen bowed low, fingers tracing the shape of a spiral across his heart.
And then, without fanfare, he walked into a mirror.
Elsewhere – Kael's Landing Site
Kael stirred amidst jagged ruins, buried beneath broken stone and scorched soil. The world welcomed him not with reverence, but with ruin. Whatever power had cradled him during his descent had done so violently.
His mantle flickered like a dying comet behind him.
His Sigils pulsed slow and deep—still adapting, still evolving.
But it wasn't pain that woke him. It was a sound.
Faint. Alien. Beautiful.
A melody.
It coiled in his thoughts like mist. Not words—intent. Not commands—invitation.
He rose slowly, half-staggering. And as he did, the horizon shimmered, and from it came a shape—thin, twitching, ash-colored, moving as if gravity itself bent to accommodate its presence.
Kael blinked, reaching instinctively for his Sigils.
The figure stopped a few paces away.
And then, without a single word, Ashen sang.
The sound wasn't loud. It was barely audible. But it resonated in Kael's bones.
Visions flickered behind his eyes:
• A mirror filled with fire.
• Threads unspooling from the Loom.
• Himself—walking across a world made of broken notes.
Kael clenched his fists. "Who… what are you?"
Ashen opened his mouth—but only a fragmented harmony emerged, layered and discordant. And then, his hand extended—not in threat, but in offering.
Behind him, the wind shifted. The world itself seemed to wait.