Ash and Oaths

Chapter 4

Part 1

No villages listed this side of the ridge, Erlin murmured, scanning the ruins.

Knowledge sleeps here, she replied. But memories—some persist.

They paused at the edge of the central plaza, where an old obelisk still stood—semi-intact, carved with her old sigil: a spiral crown within a bone circle. By its base, glowing faintly in spirit-misted air, were three figures hunched over scraps of cloth and relics.

Velrona breathed in, tasting the residue of incense and decay.

"Spirit-foragers," Erlin observed. "They make a living collecting echoes and selling them off."

They revere my shadow, Velrona replied quietly. But they've forgotten my shape.

She stepped forward. The figures snapped to attention—not startled, but obedient, like birds sensing a shift in wind.

One rose, a lean middle-aged man with spirit-threaded tattoos weaving around his arms. His voice crackled like dry reeds. "Who walks Serathe tonight?"

Velrona cleared her throat. "Someone asking questions."

His tattoos shimmered as he approached. "You seem familiar."

She tilted her head. "Familiar enough."

He hesitated, stepping back. "No one this side remembers. Just the name."

System note: Emotional resonance within crowd: low reverence detected.

Another forager—a woman with pale hair and soil-smudged robes—sighed. "The Saint's blood ran red as these stones. We speak her name in hushed echoes."

Velrona nodded. "And where is that name today?"

The man didn't answer. Instead, he raised a lantern and gestured them to follow.

They moved through broken archways and crumbling walls to an underground chamber a short walk from the plaza—a place beneath the elder shrine. Inside, bones lay arranged around a central cairn of smoldered candle stubs. The foragers circled it, reverent yet fearful.

The air was cooler here, damp, scented with mold and centuries-old incense.

"You wish to walk in her memory?" the woman asked.

Velrona nodded. "I wish to see what she left."

They glanced at each other.

He took a small brush and swept dust from a fragment of wood—the carved spiral burnt into splintered oak. He held it out to her.

Artifact retrieval prompt: spiritual resonance high flashed within Velrona's mind.

She reached out and touched it.

The contact jolted her—cold, echoing spark. Her vision shivered, and for a single heartbeat she saw herself, in robes of dark mourning, kneeling before her seven daughters, whispering oaths that later led to disaster.

She pulled back. Erlin gasped beside her, sensing the echo.

What did you see? he asked.

Velrona discreetly slipped the fragment into her cloak. "A betrayal," she said, voice low.

The woman frowned. "You took something back there."

Velrona kept her gaze lowered. "Something remains."

The three foragers backed away, uneasy.

The man spoke again. "If you claim her name, prove it."

Velrona raised her hand, deliberately.

System prompt: Use Voice of the Veil?

She closed her eyes.

Her voice carried through the chamber like skin sliding over bone: soft, resonant, ancient.

"By the bones of those whose names you fear to utter; by the silence left when power burns itself alive, I speak the truth."

A moment of thick silence.

Then, the candles atop the cairn flickered—bright, white. The incense vapors coalesced into faint images: seven pairs of hands, each placed upon her head in blessing—or exile.

The others stepped back, awe and dread mixing on their faces.

Velrona opened her eyes.

"Ask your bones," she said softly. "What I remembered."

The man turned pale. "We will speak to them."

They backed away, murmuring prayers as Velrona and Erlin exited the chamber.

Outside, the moon edged near full.

Erlin approached her. "Well…"

She smoothed Erlin's cloak. "They want signs. We'll give them answers soon enough."

He paused. "They sold my memories last week. My debts nearly bought me into a grave."

Velrona met his eyes. "That path ends now. Your name is yours."

Erlin simply nodded. Trust held in silence is the strongest kind.

Back at their campfire, Velrona reflected on the ruins.

System emotional update: Reverberations recorded. Artifact acquired.

Under the charred sky, she lit a fresh bundle of herbs and incense.

"Tomorrow," she said to Erlin, "we return. We claim my memory—and you reclaim yours."

He stirred the fire.

Memory is a living weapon, he remarked.

Only when you forget. She canceled the ember.