Chapter 19: Hollowrest

The battle chamber behind the waterfall was quiet now—ruined and scorched, still echoing with the memory of fire.

Lumen opened his eyes slowly. The threads clung to his fingers like cooled lightning, twitching once before fading to dormancy. The pain came next. Blunt, aching, embedded in the joints of his ribs and knees. He sat up with a groan, brushing ash from his face. The silver-red hue of his awakened ability had vanished, but its memory burned hotter than his wounds.

Nearby, Rin lay half-buried under rubble, her arm twisted unnaturally. Her face was pale, lips cracked. She stirred when he crawled over and touched her shoulder.

"Still alive?" she whispered, blinking.

"Barely," Lumen said. "Your arm—"

"I know. Don't touch it."

Gilger groaned from behind a shattered column.

"I'm not dead, but I might be hallucinating. Is anyone else hearing purring?"

Lumen turned.

There, curled beside Bram's body, was the grey-furred cat.

It had survived.

Bram hadn't.

The armored man's body lay unmoving, slumped against his blade. A cracked helm revealed part of his brow and one quiet, closed eye. The faint smile that had ghosted his face in those final moments still lingered.

Lumen exhaled shakily. He took off his own cloak, tattered though it was, and laid it gently over Bram's chest.

They stayed like that for an hour.

Then two.

No words. Just silence. And pain.

When Lumen finally stood, it felt like his spine was glass. He helped Rin to her feet. Gilger leaned on the wall for support.

A soft sound echoed in the cave—hooves.

From the mist beyond the waterfall, Mount Kein emerged. It stepped carefully into the chamber, nose lifted, ears flicking.

It stopped in front of Bram. No growl. No hesitation. It bent one knee.

Lumen approached, brushing its neck gently. The System pulsed quietly:

[Bond Detected: Mount Kein – Former Rider: Bram]

Response: Passive Reverence / Obedient State.

"You also knew him," Lumen whispered.

He turned to the others.

"Help me. We take him back. Not to the city."

"Where?" Rin asked softly.

"To her."

Before leaving, Gilger told them to wait—

"Couple hours, tops. Don't move."

He disappeared into the city's misted outskirts.

When he returned, dusk was bleeding into the stone. In his hands: a preservation charm, glowing faint with frost-thread, and a pouch of clinking glass vials.

He fixed the charm to Bram's cloak with care.

"It'll keep the body cold. Long enough to make the trip."

Then he passed a vial to Rin, then Lumen.

"Forest-grade tonic. Bitter as sin, but it'll help you walk. I stocked a few. Figured one day we'd need 'em."

No lies. No boasting. Just the truth.

And bruises darkening under his eyes.

Three days of broken silence.

Through forest.

Through low hills choked with fog and memory.

Through rain that never quite fell—only clung to the air like unspoken words.

They didn't speak.

Not once.

Not about the fight. Not about the grave they carried, draped across Mount Kein's broad back.

Bram's body, wrapped in his cloak and bound with the frost-thread charm, rode in silence—every swaying step a quiet funeral drum.

Lumen walked ahead most of the time, shoulders stiff, coat still torn where the ember blade had grazed him. His hand would sometimes hover near his threads… then drop.

Rin limped beside him for part of the way. Other times she drifted back. Her arm in a crude sling made from bandage cloth and stubbornness. Once or twice she looked at Lumen, like she wanted to speak. But her eyes lowered before a word escaped.

Gilger brought up the rear. His grin, gone. The illusionist walked slower now, clutching his ribs when the pain caught him off guard. At night, he just stared at the sky like he was waiting for a punchline that never came.

And between them all—silence.

Not cruel.

Not cold.

Just too heavy to break.

They exchanged glances across firelight.

Not blame. Not even guilt.

Only… understanding.

They had been changed. And none of them yet knew what to do with the pieces left behind.

By the third night, the trees began to thin. A breeze carried the scent of something familiar—wet soil, pine smoke, mint.

They were close.

And not a single word had passed between them since the city had vanished.

They crested the final hill just as the mist lifted.

Below, the fields stretched out like a memory half-remembered—

Wheat gone pale, scarecrows leaning with time, red threads fluttering like forgotten promises.

It felt like walking into a dream you once forgot.

Home, somehow.

Lumen stopped at the ridge's edge.

His chest rose slowly.

His scars burned.

Beside him, Rin said quietly,

"Hollowrest."

He looked at her. Then back toward the fields. The village beyond.

The name settled on him like an old coat, worn but fitting.

"…Hollowrest."

For the first time, it meant something.

The place where the scarecrow once stood.

Where it all began.

On the morning of the third day, they reached the village outskirts.

The sun had not yet risen.

The old house sat quiet under the fading stars, threads of smoke curling faintly from the chimney.

Elira stepped outside.

She hadn't aged much—perhaps only in the eyes. Her features remained sharp but soft, the strength of a woman in her thirties who had seen too much, but survived. A shawl draped her shoulders, her braid loose from sleep.

But when she saw them—

Bruised. Blood-dried. Leading a beast that carried a shrouded form…

Something cracked.

Her eyes found the shape across Kein's back.

The grey-blue scarf fluttered faintly in the wind, caught on a buckle.

She stepped forward—

Then stopped.

Her hand rose—not to scream.

Just a breath. A whisper, soft as memory:

"It found its way home…"

Her voice cracked.

"Back to him."

Rin stepped forward, voice hoarse.

"He saved us. In the end... he remembered."

Elira's fingers lingered on the scarf. She looked at Lumen—and something in her finally settled.

"Then we do this right."

Her voice trembled—not from fear, but from memory.

"Not as a soldier. Not as a weapon.

As a man.

As… the boy who used to fix fences just to have an excuse to stay longer."

She swallowed hard.

"He never came back. Not really.

But now…"

(She placed a hand over his chest.)

"Now, we make sure he rests where someone still remembers his name."

Lumen dug the grave himself.

He refused help.

By the time dawn broke over the fencepost, the earth was carved.

The same post Bram once stood beside.

The same field Elira once braided her hair in.

They lowered the body in with care.

The sword across his chest.

The scarf beneath his folded hands.

The cat curled beside the mound.

One paw pressed gently to the soil.

When it was done, Elira placed a small bowl beside the grave—

Mint leaves. River stones.

 Bram.

Then she cried.

Not loudly.

Just a long, soft weep that bent her shoulders.

No one spoke.

The wind moved slowly across the wheat.

That night, Lumen sat alone outside the cottage, the field quiet beneath a violet sky. The faint rustle of thread on the scarecrow post was the only sound—gentle, like something whispering just out of reach.

He didn't move. He barely blinked.

The grave behind him was still fresh. The sword buried with Bram had already begun to catch the morning dew.

Elira stepped outside and joined him, sitting on the old wooden step without a word. She didn't force conversation. She just sat—close, but not pressing.

Finally, her voice broke the stillness.

"I used to hate the silence, you know."

Lumen glanced at her.

"After he vanished," she continued, "the world never really got loud again. The birds still sang. The wind still blew. But I never heard it the same."

Her hands were clasped in her lap, thumbs fidgeting quietly.

"But tonight... I think he'd have liked it. This silence. It's not empty. Just full of things we don't know how to say."

Lumen stared out across the dark fields.

"I should've done more."

"You did what he couldn't," she said gently. "You came back."

He shook his head. "But not whole."

A long pause.

Then she said, softly:

"None of us come back whole. But we still return—for the ones who can't."

The fireflies had begun to flicker in the tall grass. The wind turned cool.

Elira stood.

She placed a hand on Lumen's shoulder—warm, steady, real.

"You gave him peace, Lumen. That matters more than any war he fought."

 "Get some sleep. Tomorrow… we remember him. Not the fighter. Not the guard. Just the man."

She left him there with the stars.

The threads on the scarecrow post whispered in the wind—soft, swaying, like they had always known the way home.

And in that silence, for the first time since the cavern, Lumen let himself breathe.

A new story was beginning.

But something old… had just ended.