[Present]
I'm alone, again.
The forest press-hugs the narrow trail, moonlight slashing through branches. My cloak is damp with dew; my blade, dry with intent. Footsteps carry me forward, silent and certain, until laughter reaches my ears.
That laughter isn't mine.
I pause.
"Doesn't this feel familiar?"
The voice isn't the wind. It isn't the trees. It's inside, an echo of someone I used to be.
"Can't you feel the fear? The fear that isn't yours?"
My pulse hammers. I grip my sword.
Ahead, torches flicker in a rough circle of bandits. They trade crude jokes as they corner her, the girl, kneeling in the dirt. Her hands clutch her dress; her eyes are huge and blank. Each time one leers, she flinches but says nothing.
I creep closer.
"Doesn't this remind you of something?"
—Flash—
A ten-year-old boy in a cottage bright with laughter, then red with blood.
My father on the floor, shirt blooming scarlet.
My mother, face pale, breathing ragged, reaching out.
Her lips formed a single word: Run…
—Flash—
My own small hands wrapped around a knife, shaking.
The first taste of power.
The world went silent.
They don't see me. They can't. Their laughter dies as the clearing falls still. One by one, they clutch their chests, eyes wide with a terror not their own.
Their limbs lock mid-breath.
Same as hers.
I step forward.
The circle breaks. They fall like marionettes whose strings snapped.
I raise my sword.
"Strike it down."
That sudden whisper is my own, harsh and hollow. It rises from the part of me I buried long ago.
But then I see her.
Her eyes glimmer with raw confusion, and something gentler, fragile. Like hope.
I hesitate.
"Is that so?"
I lower my blade and sheath it with a soft click.
She remains on her knees, trembling. I crouch and pull my cloak around her shoulders.
Her gaze flicks to mine, searching.
I want to tell her it's okay. But instead, I catch my reflection in the blade's dark steel: hollow eyes that mirror her terror.
[Memory]
Smoke. Screams.
My home, small walls of wood, burn as men in dark masks storm in.
My father shouts, but he is cut down in a heartbeat.
My mother stumbles, hand clutching her side. She sees me, her child, frozen.
Her voice, a whisper above the flames:"Run, Kael…"
I didn't move. Questions pounded in my head:
Why are they doing this?
What did we do wrong?
I should have fled.
But instead, another voice rose from the wreckage of my mind, cold, certain:
"Feel what I feel."
It was me, but not me. The part I refused to admit.
Heat exploded in my chest. Rage, grief, and something deeper, an urgency. I seized a fallen knife, hands steady now.
I struck the first man. He fell, ragged breath in his throat. The next two didn't even have a chance to scream.
Then, I whirled, blade poised…
My mother.
The world slowed as her hand reached for mine. Blood blossomed on her dress, my blade's gift.
I dropped the knife.
She sank to the floor.
Her final breath caught in my memory, a silent plea.
[Present]
I shake off the past. The girl looks up, her tears glinting in the torchlight.
She's not running. She's waiting.
My chest aches with echoing guilt and something new, responsibility.
I offer my hand.
She takes it.
Together, we leave the clearing.
Every step, the forest seems to watch, silent sentinels guarding my secret. It won't be the last time I hear that inner whisper, but it was the first time I answered.
[End of Prologue]