Chapter 34 – Flameborn Rising

The wind in the mountains was different.

Not cruel or cold—but old. It didn't howl like it did near the courts or scream across battlefields. Here, it whispered. It remembered.

Lyra walked alone through paths carved by time and frost, past sleeping trees that bent with memory. Her cloak dragged through moss and melted snow, boots soaked, but she didn't feel the cold.

She was following something older than instinct.

Older than blood.

Her mother had told her stories—half-wrapped in lullabies, half-lost to time. About a village where women danced in circles of fire and wolves were born from moonlight. Where the mountains answered to those who could listen with their hearts.

Lyra had always thought they were fairy tales.

Now she knew better.

She crested the ridge just as the sun broke through the mist—its rays slicing across the valley like a blade of light. And there, cradled between the cliffs and shadows, was the village.