The Ember Circle

Kairo awakened in silence.

The storm was gone. Above, the sky was a deep, bottomless black—full of stars more fierce than he'd ever seen, as if the heavens had been scoured of time. He was on his back, laid out across the center of the ruin's glowing circle. The stone beneath him pulsed gently with warmth.

For a moment, he didn't move.

He felt. different.

Not in flesh, but in something deeper. The visions had faded, but echoes still lingered behind his eyes: columns of light, voices that spoke in a forgotten tongue, a city of gold engulfed in fire.

And always—the sigil on his breast, burning like a second heart.

He sat up slowly, wincing. His limbs ached, and his cloak was damp with dew. The cloaked figures had disappeared. The symbols that had burned beneath his feet had cooled to a soft, sleeping blue.

Had it all been a dream?

A hallucination?

No. The fire in his skin, the tightness in his mind—still there. Real.

He was about to stand when the snap of a twig froze him.

Someone was watching.

He whirled toward the sound, heart racing, and caught movement at the edge of the ruins. Someone emerged from the shadows—hooded, cloaked, but unmistakably human. A woman. Tall, poised, and moving with the guarded grace of one who had been trained to stealth. Her boots made barely a whisper on the stone as she stepped into the circle.

She stopped a few feet from him, pushing back her hood.

Kairo stared.

She was youthful—a year older than him, maybe—with deep bronze skin and sharp, amber eyes that shone with something less than ordinary. Her black curls were braided in a rope that fell past her shoulder, and a fine scar ran down her cheek, like the gash of a claw partially healed with time.

She looked at him as though she already knew him.

"You're late," she said in a matter-of-fact way.

Kairo blinked. "What?"

"You were supposed to Awaken last year. Maybe earlier than that." She folded her arms. "Took you long enough."

Kairo's mouth opened, then closed. "Who. are you?"

She tilted her head, studying him. "You have no clue, do you?"

"That's pending. Are you real? Or just the latest strange person my mind's decided to invent?"

She smirked. "Real. And slightly offended.".

Kairo stood, brushing dirt from his sleeves. "Okay, so let's try again. Who are you? What is this place? And what happened to me last night?"

She gave a slight bow. "My name is Sera Nym. I'm with the Ember Circle—and you, Kairo Vane, just had your first Awakening."

He stared at her. "That doesn't mean anything to me."

"It will."

She turned and started walking towards the edge of the ruins, halting when he didn't follow. "Well? Do you want answers or not?"

Kairo hesitated. There was a matter-of-factness to her voice, but not unkind. And despite the fact that he knew so little about her, something in her presence felt. steady. Grounded. Like a torch in the darkness.

He followed.

They walked in silence down a narrow trail that wound along the cliffside. The sun had not yet risen, but the stars and moon offered more light than they should have—soft silver bathing the world in an otherworldly calm.

After a few minutes, Kairo broke the silence. "You said I'm one of the Awakened. What does that mean?"

Sera didn't slow down. "It means your blood contains a spark—an ancient power once wielded by those who shaped the world. Long, long ago, before the First Empire collapsed, the Awakened were guardians, builders, seers. They kept the balance."

"What became of them?"

"They were hunted. Betrayed. Broken."

Kairo's throat moved in a swallow. "And now?"

"Now, only a few remain. Scattered. Hidden." She faced him again. "Until you."

They came to a small clearing edged by old stone arches half-swallowed by the forest. A small fire burned low in the center, with three others sitting around it—two men and a woman, all dressed in leathers and cloaks, with swords and strange devices at their belts. They glanced up as Kairo approached, eyes studying him in quiet intensity.

Sera raised a hand. "This is him."

One of the men stood up. Burly, bald-headed, with intricate tattoos crawling up his arms. His voice was a low snarl. "He looks like a twig."

"Thanks," Kairo said morosely.

The woman laughed. She was older than the others, her gray-streaked hair tied up in a tight bun, her eyes sharp as glass. "Don't mind Jorran. He's a blunt instrument."

"And you are?" Kairo asked, attempting not to sound defensive.

She nodded. "Name's Virella. That scowling one beneath the tree is Tenn. We're what's left of the Ember Circle around here."

"And what is the Ember Circle?"

Sera answered before anyone else could. "A resistance. A remnant. A flame that refuses to die. We protect those like you. The Awakened. And we fight those who would see us all extinguished.".

Kairo felt like the ground was shifting beneath him again. "So I'm not just some orphan with weird dreams."

"No," Tenn said, finally speaking. His voice was quiet, but firm. "You are something much more dangerous."

Kairo turned to him. "Dangerous to who?"

Tenn met his gaze. "To the ones who want to rule unchecked. To the Order of Null. To the Emperor."

There it was again—levels of meaning he didn't understand. "The Order of Null?"

"They're the ones who've made your kind nearly extinct," Virella said to him. "They murder Awakened. They're fearful of what you are. What you may become."

"Why?"

"Because your power's not theirs to control," Jorran growled. "And they cannot tolerate that.".

Sera stepped closer to the fire, her face shining in its light. "You've woken, Kairo. That cannot be undone. The Order will feel it. And they will come."

He felt the weight of their words dropping into his chest like stone.

"But I don't know how to use any of it," he whispered. "I don't know what I'm doing."

Virella's smile was small, wry. "None of us did, at first. That's why you're here. We'll train you. Help you remember what your blood already knows."

Kairo looked around the camp—these strangers who suddenly knew more about him than he did himself. And for the first time in years, he didn't feel entirely alone.

He felt the heat of the fire, the wind through the trees, and deep in his chest… that pulse.

That fire.

There was no going back to what he had been, whatever he had become.