Chapter Eight: Shadows of Dalkar

Some fires are born to warm.

Some are born to destroy.

But others

Others are born to remember.

The flame within me did not sleep.

It watched. It whispered. It waited.

And now… it called me south.

🔹 The Call of the Compass

After the battle in Vhal Arak and my encounter with Selira, the weight of destiny pressed heavier against my shoulders.

I wasn't just carrying Kael's flame anymore.

I was carrying hope.

For the forgotten.

For the hunted.

For those who still had fire left in their veins.

Arkon gave me three days to recover.

I spent each one in silence, replaying every detail of the battle with the Flame Wraith and the truths Selira had spoken. The Pyra Compass no longer just a relic glowed faintly every night, its light shifting, seeking.

On the fourth dawn, it pulsed violently and cast a beam of energy that stretched south toward the Dalkar Wastes, a place beyond maps and beyond mercy.

I stood at the top of Zareth's highest tower and watched the beam dance through the horizon like a ribbon of burning fate.

The name carved into the light:

Rion Khael.

"He was once the brightest," Selira had said. "Then he vanished. Some say he broke. Others say he bent the flame to his will. If he's still alive… he's more dangerous than any of us."

Dangerous or not he was flameborn.

And I needed him.

🔹 The Dying Desert

The Dalkar Wastes were like no place I'd ever known.

Not barren. Not silent. Not dead.

They were cursed.

The moment my skiff crossed into the Crescent region, I felt it a suffocating weight, like a hand pressing against my soul. The skies above were the color of blood smoke. Winds didn't whisper here. They screamed.

This desert was once a thriving empire. According to Pyra scrolls, Dalkar had been home to one of the greatest flame temples in existence until the Empire turned it to ash during the Ember Suppression.

Now, only ghosts remained.

Ghosts… and hunters.

I passed three burned-out trade caravans in the first day. Bodies charred beyond recognition. Their mana cores shattered. Something or someone was hunting within this land. Something with power.

On the second day, my skiff lost its wind drive during a storm. I had to walk. For hours.

Alone. Sweating. Listening.

And then, just before sundown, I saw it:

A pillar of fire in the distance burning steady, unnaturally bright.

It wasn't natural.

It wasn't welcoming.

It was calling.

🔹 The Canyon of Blades

The fire led me into a narrow canyon of broken obsidian cliffs. A place known in desert legend as the Jaw of Dalkar because nothing escaped its teeth.

I kept low, moving between jagged rocks.

That's when I heard the clash of metal and the unmistakable roar of spellfire.

I reached a vantage point and looked down.

There he was.

Rion Khael.

Tall, powerful, muscles taut beneath ragged desert robes, his back marked with runes that pulsed with raw flame. His long black hair was tied in a warrior's braid, and his skin glistened with sweat and firelight.

He wasn't meditating.

He was fighting.

And he was winning.

Ten mercenaries surrounded him equipped with suppressor armor and enchanted weapons specifically designed to contain mages.

But Rion was something else.

He fought like a storm trapped in human skin.

With one swipe, a wall of fire erupted behind him.

With a snap of his fingers, molten spikes burst from the ground, impaling two attackers.

One mercenary screamed as his shield shattered. Another begged for mercy.

Rion showed none.

He raised his hand and the man was consumed in an inferno of blue flame.

The others fled in terror.

He let them.

And then…

He turned toward me.

As if he had known I was watching all along.

His voice echoed through the canyon.

"I smell it on you... the old flame. Arkon's leash still holds tight."

I stood slowly, stepping into the open.

"I'm not here to fight."

"Then you're in the wrong place, flameborn. Because everything here burns."

A flash of fire ignited in his palm.

"Let's see if you do too."

🔹 Duel in the Ashlight

I barely blocked his first strike.

The canyon exploded in flame as Rion leapt from the cliff and landed before me with a blast of heat.

His attacks weren't elegant they were brutal, wild, chaotic. He fought like a man who had nothing left to protect.

I countered with Pyra spirals, trying to form a controlled shield, but his flame shattered it.

"You fight like Zareth teaches," he snarled. "Precise. Predictable. Weak."

"I fight to protect the fire!" I shouted. "You're just trying to bury it."

He growled and launched a chain of flame straight toward my chest.

I rolled to the side, gasping as it scorched my shoulder.

"You think you can unite us?" Rion spat. "Kael's legacy is ash. The Pyra'Nahl are dead."

I looked him in the eyes and summoned the white flame.

It exploded from my core, wrapping around my arms, lifting the dust around us in a whirlwind of light.

"No," I said. "We're still here."

For a second just one he hesitated.

In that silence, I struck.

I didn't aim to kill.

I aimed to remind.

A wave of white fire met his corrupted blue. The ground beneath us cracked. The canyon echoed with the scream of clashing mana.

When the dust settled, we both stood—breathing hard.

His sword of flame flickered… then vanished.

He looked at me not with rage but with something else.

Recognition.

"White flame," he said hoarsely. "Only Kael ever mastered it."

"I carry his memory," I said. "And his mission. To reunite the Pyra'Nahl. To finish what we started."

He dropped to his knees, fists clenched.

"We lost everything. I watched our temples fall. Our children turned to kindling. And now… you ask me to believe again?"

"Not believe," I whispered. "Burn."

🔹 The Second Flame

That night, we made camp beneath the shattered sky.

Rion told me his story.

How he fled during the purge. How he tried to protect a flameborn village and failed. How he wandered the desert for years burning, surviving, killing.

"Hope is a fragile thing, Jace," he said. "And flameborn carry too much pain to hold anything fragile."

"Then we turn our pain into power," I replied. "We light the way for the next one. And we make the Empire remember what it tried to forget."

He looked at me for a long time.

Then, without a word, he placed his palm on the Pyra Compass.

The second flame lit.

Its glow merged with mine red and white, swirling like old stars reborn.

"Where to next?" he asked.

I looked east.

Toward a name etched in frost.

"We find the girl in the snow."