We Don’t Wake What Sleeps

The scent of roasted rabbit drifted through the crumbling cottage, mixing with the crackle of fire and the low murmur of voices.

Herold stood triumphantly over the cookpot like he'd just slain a dragon, while Elara sat beside him, wiping her hands with a cloth and looking half-amused, half-exhausted.

"Honestly," I muttered, watching Seraph gnaw on a particularly large chunk of meat, "who would've thought nobles were this resourceful without their silver-spooned entourage?"

"I heard that," Seraph said with a full mouth, grinning at me. "Just because I know which end of a rabbit to gut doesn't mean I'm not royalty."

I rolled my eyes, but truthfully, I was impressed.

All of them—every single one—had endured every grueling mile without a single attendant in sight. That hadn't been the original plan.

We'd had knights, healers, and attendants when we left the Crownlands. But Valtor, in that ever-commanding tone of his, had ordered them to return to the capital before we arrived in Erin.

At first, I wasn't sure I agreed. I thought he was being reckless. Arrogant. What if we were overwhelmed? What if something happened? But after the attack in Erin, after the ambush in the Wastelands, after the cursed creatures that haunted us in the dead of night, I understood.

He'd been right.

Too many people would've drawn attention. More eyes, more noise, more targets. Worse—those people wouldn't have stood a chance in the crossfire.

Because what we were facing wasn't some band of rogue mages or a petty rebellion flaring up from the cracks. These were shadows made of something ancient and monstrous, moving like liquid malice. And facing them didn't just take power. It took control, precision, instinct.

And that's when it hit me—hard.

While my magic might be stronger, rarer, and more unpredictable than any of theirs, I was leagues behind them in pure combat skill.

Elara moved with terrifying calm. Her arrows—infused with freezing winds—pierced through armor like paper. She could shoot blind through fog, and I'd still bet she'd hit her mark. Her silence wasn't just poise—it was focus, the kind that came from years of drilling, years of proving she was more than her magic.

Herold? The guy made illusions and misdirection look like second nature. But even without his tricks, he fought like someone who didn't fear death. He ducked, weaved, struck with a knife he always kept hidden somewhere on him. I still hadn't figured out where.

Seraph, of course, was chaos personified. His storm magic surged through him with wild energy—lightning cracking through his laughter as he hurled bolts that could light up the night sky. But beneath all that mischief and banter was control. Every blast landed where it needed to. Every move was purposeful. Even when he looked like he was improvising, I realized it wasn't luck—it was instinct built from years of wielding power like a second limb.

And then... Valtor.

Valtor didn't just fight. He dominated.

He moved like a force of nature—fast, clean, devastating. His wind magic didn't follow him; it responded to him, curling around his body like it belonged there. And his sword? I'd seen him disarm, wound, and incapacitate faster than I could blink. There was no hesitation in him. Just the quiet certainty of someone who had been taught to win long before he learned to walk.

They'd all grown up in the palace, named heirs before they probably even left the womb. They'd had tutors, masters of combat, personal war strategists. They were polished, sharp, and terrifying.

And me?

I was a scholar from the ruins of a temple. An orphan with a library and a staff. Agile, yes. Fast, sure. But my magic? It came in bursts. Unpredictable. Dangerous. My instincts weren't honed—they were reactive. Defensive. The difference was clear in every battle.

I was surviving.

They were winning.

So as they sat around the fire, laughing, joking, chewing roasted rabbit like this was just another evening out—I watched them.

Not with envy.

With intent.

Because if I was going to stand beside them, fight beside them, lead beside them—I needed to catch up.

Fast.

***

After we had eaten, Valtor summoned us to the lopsided table with the map laid across its surface like some ancient relic that had barely survived the journey—much like us. The parchment was frayed at the edges, stained in places with dirt and—judging by the dark, rusty splotches—blood. His blood, probably.

He didn't mention it to anyone, of course. Knowing him, Valtor would probably rather choke on his own ego.

"We've traveled from the southern base of Mount Eriyan," he began, pointing to the bottom of the mountain where the village of Erin sat in uneasy silence, "up to the eastern ridge, then cut through the Wastelands."

He was pointing on the map, but my attention was elsewhere.

I don't know what came over me. Maybe it was muscle memory—or the fact that I'd spent too much time hovering over him like some awkward battlefield nurse—but my hand moved before my brain caught up.

I reached out and gently brushed my fingers over his forehead. Right where I'd tended the wound earlier.

Valtor went still mid-gesture, finger hovering over the map.

His gaze slowly, slowly shifted to me.

Realizing what I had done, I yanked my hand back so fast I nearly slapped myself in the face.

The others just stared. Elara blinked. Herold froze mid-chew on dried fruit. Seraph had both hands clapped over his mouth like he was physically trying to keep his soul from escaping through laughter.

"Oh goodness—sorry! I wasn't—I didn't mean to touch you. I mean, I did earlier, medically, which is different from—touching you now! This wasn't a follow-up appointment, I swear—"

Seraph lost it, and he collapsed onto the bench, wheezing.

"This wasn't a follow-up appointment," he repeated, wiping tears from his eyes. "I'm putting that on your gravestone."

Valtor blinked once, very slowly. "Are you done?" he asked, voice so dry it could've turned the Wastelands to ash.

"I am so done," I muttered, face burning as I backed away from him like he was a wild animal and I'd just poked his snout.

Elara was now actively looking away, her shoulders shaking. Herold let out a strangled noise and took a few steps back, hands on his knees, laughing silently like he was dying.

Valtor, somehow, kept his composure. Barely. There was a twitch at the corner of his mouth—an almost-smile. Or maybe that was just his last shred of patience slipping.

Then he gave me a long, unreadable look. "I'm fine," he said flatly, brushing his hair back like I hadn't just publicly caressed his face in front of our entire group.

I nodded, trying to pretend I didn't want the earth to swallow me whole.

"Right. Of course. Carry on, Your Princeliness."

I kept my hands far, far away from royal foreheads after that.

I followed his finger as it traced our path.

"So you were saying that now we're circling behind the mountain's body, correct?" I asked.

I swear I am trying my best to steer us away from what just happened.

Valtor nodded. "The goal is a full sweep. If anything's nesting here—any source of these shadow attacks—we'll catch a sign of it."

"And then what?" Seraph asked, pulling himself back into the conversation like he hadn't been completely derailed by laughter a moment ago.

"We wave politely and keep riding?"

"No. We do what we came to do—observe," Valtor said sharply. "No heroics. No attacks. If they don't see us, they can't follow us back to the capital."

The fire popped. Silence followed.

We all knew the stakes now. One misstep, and we'd be the ones drawing the next wave of darkness toward innocent cities.

As I scanned the map, my eyes caught something—at the base of the mountain's western side. A small, almost-forgotten mark inked in gold.

I leaned closer and pointed. "That's... a temple."

They all looked. Elara nodded slowly. "One of the old temples of worship. It hasn't been in use since what happened to your island."

I could sense the hesitation in her voice, like she was carefully avoiding an old wound.

I gulped. She was right.

Herold tilted his head. "I thought they all crumbled."

"They did," I murmured. "Most of them. But not all, I think."

Valtor's gaze flicked toward me. "You recognize it?"

"I think I do," I said, quietly. "That emblem—it's from the Order of Varethiel; we call them Vellorien temple, a place of worship. One of the branches of the Priesthood of Knowledge."

They stared at me.

Of course, they did.

Even now, after all these days we journeyed together, they still weren't used to the idea that the thirteenth prince had once lived a life so different from theirs.

"I was raised in one of the Vellorien temples in the main island of Varethiel, the City of Scholars," I said, my voice lower now.

"Not that one... but it was part of the same network. When I was young, we studied the temple glyphs, the altar inscriptions. This mark..." I tapped the edge of the map.

"It's from the era before the Great Schism. If something's hiding in this mountain, this temple could hold the key. Or answers. Or—"

"Or something that wants you dead," Herold interrupted dryly.

"That too," I muttered, then added, "but I want to go. I need to go."

Elara was the first to nod. "If Aric thinks the temple might offer answers, I say we make it a point to check it."

"We’ll pass close to it anyway,” Valtor said, but I noticed the subtle shift in his jaw. He was thinking. Calculating. And not just about the path.

He was probably thinking about me… or was I assuming too much? Never mind. This is all just exhaustion talking.

Again.

"We go at first light," he finally said, folding the map. "But we stay sharp. If something's been sleeping in that temple, we don't wake it without a damn good reason."

As the fire died into glowing embers and the night curled tighter around the broken cottage, I leaned against the cold wall, staring out into the dark.

That temple might've once been a sanctuary.

Now? It might be a graveyard.

And I couldn't help but wonder: When I stepped through its doors, would it recognize me, too?

Would I remember more than I wanted?

Or worse—would I discover something I wasn't ready to know?