Chapter Sixteen: Ashes of the Servant

The woman led Kieran to a ravine hidden beneath the roots of the mountains—a place neither marked nor mapped.

There, the stars disappeared.

The silence wrapped around them like gauze.

She did not speak until the fire between them was lit, dancing in the dark like a dying heartbeat.

"You want to know who I am," she said finally. "You should ask why I left."

Kieran didn't respond. He simply waited.

And that was enough.

The Red Whisper

"My name is Seréne."

Her voice was calm—but somewhere in it, a storm still lived.

"I was chosen by Auren Soldran when I was fifteen. He taught me to kill without mercy. To plan without hesitation. To erase anyone who questioned his will."

Her hand drifted to the hilt of her curved blade.

"I believed in him. Until I saw what he truly wanted."

Kieran narrowed his eyes.

"What did he want?"

"A god's death… and a god's place."

The Betrayer of Sylas

Seréne cast something into the fire—a piece of cloth bearing the sigil of the old Voidborne order, now charred beyond recognition.

"He hated Sylas not because of power. But because Sylas refused to reshape the world when he could have."

"Auren believed that was cowardice."

"He wanted the Voidborne legacy to dominate the world. To rewrite fate with his name etched into the bones of every continent."

She looked at Kieran then—eyes sharp as frost.

"He would have killed Sylas, if he could. But he couldn't. So he shattered what Sylas loved instead."

The Day the Fire Went Out

Kieran's voice was a whisper.

"My family…"

Seréne nodded slowly.

"Your family were descendants of Sylas's bloodline. You didn't just inherit the Voidborne traits—you inherited his silence."

"That made you dangerous to Auren."

She reached into her coat and pulled out a small, black stone—its surface marked with spiraling runes.

"This is what I took when I ran. Auren's plan for the fragments. And the weapon they'll form if reunited."

"I'm giving it to you… because you need to know what's coming."

Warning in the Flame

The stone pulsed in Kieran's hand.

A vision struck him—a blade longer than any mountain, forged from shadow, carved with runes from a forgotten age.

Its name came unbidden:

The Oathender.

The weapon that can kill fate itself.

And with it… a single warning burned into Kieran's soul:

"If Auren gathers all six fragments… not even Sylas could stop what comes next."