Chapter 232: Embers in the Wind

The ruins of Kareth-Fen still smoldered behind them as Kael and his companions descended the Ember Range. The air smelled of burnt magic and ancient dust, and the silence that followed Thelen's fall was unnerving. No cheers. No triumph. Just the quiet reckoning of what they'd survived.

Kael walked at the front of the group, his blade sheathed but his hand still resting on the hilt. His thoughts were far from the mountains. Thelen's words echoed in his mind—"This place remembers truth."

But whose truth?

Behind him, Corven trudged along, a new scar on his cheek and a heavy bag of salvaged memory crystals slung across his back.

"I still say we should've crushed the whole vault," he grumbled. "What good are pieces of a madman's mind?"

Kael didn't answer.

Lysara, who walked beside Kael, replied instead. "Because pieces can become warnings. Or weapons. Depending on who wields them."

Corven muttered, "Let's hope we're still the right ones."

They reached the foothills by nightfall and set up camp near a stream veiled by silver-leaved trees. The fire crackled quietly. Stars blinked overhead, but none of them found peace in their flickering.

Kael sat apart from the others, sharpening his blade. Not for war—just for routine. For control.

Lysara approached, tossing him a flask.

"Drink. You look like you're trying to fight the stars."

He took it, sipped. The bitter herb wine burned down his throat, but steadied his pulse.

"We did it," she said after a while. "Thelen's gone. The Priory is broken."

Kael shook his head. "Thelen was one man. His ideology… it's harder to kill."

He handed back the flask.

"I saw the visions in that citadel. They weren't just memories. They were temptations. What if we rewrote the past to avoid pain? What if we sculpted history to serve peace?"

"And who decides what peace looks like?" Lysara asked, sitting beside him.

"That's the trap," Kael murmured. "That's what he fell into."

Lysara looked toward the fire. "So what now?"

Kael glanced at her.

"Now we go north. To the Free Shards. There's unrest brewing there—and someone's been moving memory artifacts on the black net."

She raised an eyebrow. "We're chasing ghosts again?"

He gave a faint smirk. "You love ghosts."

Across the sea, in a city built into the bones of a fallen colossus, two figures stood atop a tower.

One wore robes of midnight glass, eyes glowing with emberlight. The other—a slender woman wrapped in veils—watched the stars with a device shaped like a serpent.

"Thelen has fallen," she said softly.

"Yes," the other replied. "Too soon. He was supposed to buy us time."

"He bought us attention. Now the Warden's path is set."

She turned, and her veil rippled with unnatural movement.

"We proceed with the next phase?"

He nodded once.

"And what of Kareth-Fen?"

The woman chuckled. "Let them think it's dead. But the real heart of memory lies deeper than they know."

They turned back to the stars.

"And soon," she whispered, "we'll awaken the one who remembers the first fire."

Back at camp, dawn broke in amber waves.

Kael woke early and knelt by the stream, washing his face. In the water, for a moment, he saw a flicker—a memory not his own.

A child standing in a burning library.

A voice crying out in a language older than flame.

Then it vanished.

He stood, heart pounding.

The crystals.

Even with Thelen dead, fragments of Kareth-Fen's essence were bleeding into the world. The vault's collapse had not contained it—only cracked the vessel.

Lysara approached, sensing his tension. "You saw it too?"

He nodded. "They're not finished with us."

She looked toward the rising sun. "Then we finish them first."

Corven stumbled from his tent, yawning. "Someone better have coffee or conquest. I'm not doing both without boots."

Kael sheathed his blade.

"Pack up," he said. "We head for the port. We sail with the tide."

The journey north was swift. Kael's party booked passage on a darkwind sailship—the Whispering Raven—captained by an exile from the Elarian Isles. The crew spoke little, and the sky grew darker with each league.

On the second night, Lysara stood at the bow, watching the sea.

Kael joined her.

"There's something ahead," she murmured. "A storm that's not just weather."

Indeed, the air was thick. The water churned without wind. In the distance, pale lights danced across the waves.

Corven came up from below deck. "The crew says we're entering the Drift. A stretch of sea where magic and memory mix. Ships disappear. Voices call from the water."

Kael narrowed his eyes. "And what's at the end?"

"The city of Shardveil," Corven replied. "Where they say time itself once fractured."

Kael nodded.

"Then that's where we go."

The sea whispered around them, secrets rising from the depths.

And far ahead, beneath a moon carved with ancient runes, the next war waited in silence.