Chapter sixteen: Trial of Stone
Aryn's POV
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We didn't speak for a long time after the beasts... hollow beasts fled.
The forest had quieted in that unsettling way it always did after blood was spilled. No birds. No wind. Only the crunch of snow beneath our boots and the thudding of my heart as it slowly calmed down from the firestorm that had taken me.
Garrick walked ahead, his blade remained in his grip unsheathed, his posture alert but at the same time, unreadable.
I kept pace, cradling the arm where one of the beasts had sunk its teeth.
He had wrapped it well. My blood had already scabbed, but the mark's energy pulsed beneath the cloth - bandage. Warm. Rhythmic. Like it approved of the violence.
Like it wanted more.
---
We stopped by a ridge just past dusk, where frost coated the stones like a second skin.
Garrick crouched and examined the terrain. "We're close... I believe the Hollow Pass lies ahead."
I looked up, my breath caught. Massive stone pillars jutted from the earth in uneven rows, forming a jagged archway beyond the trees. They pulsed faintly with a glow only I seemed to notice — a shimmer like moonlight on obsidian.
"What is it?" I asked.
He stood slowly. "This is a trial site. One of the old ones. Not built by the Court. Older than them. It tests not the body. But the mind."
I turned to him. "Why would the Warden send me here?"
He paused briefly. Then;
"To see if you can bear the truth."
---
The stones loomed taller as we approached. Ancient runes covered their faces, etched so deeply into them it was. As if they had bled the rocks into shape. Between them, a shallow valley dipped low, forming a perfect circle in the center. Hollow.
Empty. Waiting.
"I can't go with you," Garrick said. "It only opens for the marked."
I swallowed... hard. The wind had returned, but not as a warning this time. It welcomed.
I stepped forward, slowly.
The stones shivered. Or so I felt...
And then the world fell away.
---
I found myself standing in a room that wasn't real.
A cabin.
It was familiar.
My grandmother's. Only... it was burning.
Flames curled up the wooden walls, licking the rafters, but they made no heat. No smoke.
And in the center stood a girl.
Me...
Younger. Maybe ten. Hair tangled from running wild through the trees, eyes wide with guilt.
In her arms: a wolf pup. Limp. Bleeding.
"You couldn't save him," the younger-me said. Her voice was flat. Accusing.
I stepped closer. "It wasn't my fault. The snare—"
"You set it. It was you!"
I froze. "I was only trying to catch a rabbit."
The fire brightened.
"And you caught him. Your first betrayal."
I stepped back.
The flames roared.
The scene shifted.
---
Now I stood in the training yard.
The one near the village where my mother used to spar.
I must have only been a few months old, perhaps nearing a year old when she used to spar in this yard.
Normally, I shouldn't remember this, because I was too young then. But somehow, I remember it. Vividly... All too vivid.
And this time, it was Garrick who stood in the yard. He stood across from me.
Bleeding. Barely standing. A sword through his gut.
I gasped.
"I didn't—"
He looked up, eyes glassy. "You let me fight alone."
"No! I tried to help, I tried—"
"You watched. You watched because you were afraid of what you might become."
I dropped to my knees. "I didn't mean to. I swear." I was already in tears.
The ground cracked.
And the trial shifted again.
---
Now the clearing was filled with bodies.
My family.
My grandmother. My mother. Villagers I had grown up beside. Even Kael.
All of them lying still. Pale. Eyes open, staring at nothingness.
A chorus of whispers filled the air:
I clutched my head.
"Stop."
< You will destroy everything you love. Just like the Court wants.>
"STOP!"
Flame burst from within me, wild and gold. It seared the illusions.
But they didn't burn.
They watched.
Waiting.
For me to break.
---
Then I heard it. A voice.
Not the whispers.
Hers.
My mother.
"You were never meant to be gentle."
I turned.
She stood at the edge of the dream. Whole. Alive. Radiant.
"You were born to rise. Even if you must rise alone."
Tears ran down my face. "I don't want to be alone."
"Then carry us with you."
She reached out, and where her hand touched mine, the fire settled. Soft. Steady.
The illusions shattered like glass.
And I fell.
---
I awoke on stone.
Snow falling gently onto my face.
Garrick knelt over me, his face tight with concern.
"You were gone longer than any I've seen."
I sat up slowly. My limbs felt heavier. Not from fatigue.
From understanding.
"I saw everything," I whispered. "Everything I feared becoming. And everything I could become."
Garrick helped me to my feet.
"And what did you choose?"
I looked toward the path ahead. The Hollow Pass loomed beyond the trees.
"To become it anyway."
---
That night, we didn't make camp.
We walked beneath stars and silence. The
Guilt would no longer chain me.
Fear would no longer guide me.
I wasn't just a girl marked by accident.
I was fire chosen by the Warden.
And the Court would learn what it meant to burn...!
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