We had barely escaped the Whisper-Forest when the mist returned.
This wasn't fog.
It was intent—gray with memory, thick as prophecy. It moved with a hunter's patience, curling between the trees like breath held too long.
Lyra's hand went to her sigil again, but it was Aeris who first sensed it.
"Someone's coming," he growled, wings flaring from his back like ink spilled in the wind.
Then I felt it.
Not footfalls. Not a voice.
A pressure.
Like the sky bracing itself.
I turned—too slow.
Steel flashed.
A white-haired figure dropped from the canopy above, blade-first.
I dodged—barely. His strike carved through the ground like the soil itself tried to get out of the way. Dirt and light shattered. I rolled, kicked up, landed in a crouch.
The swordsman stood motionless.
Cloaked in pale ash-colored robes, layered in worn leather, and fastened with a brooch that shimmered—Solmere's Crest. A blade of legend. And it was pointed straight at my chest.
"You're him," he said.
His voice was sharp. Controlled. Cold as crystalized lightning.
"I don't know who you think I—"
"You burned the Sky-Father's eye," he interrupted. "You tore open the Ash Rift. You danced with entropy, then called it 'grace.'"
"I—what?"
"Your name," he asked, "before this body. Say it."
I hesitated.
I didn't know whether it was memory, instinct, or something deeper, but part of me wanted to say it.
Instead, I asked, "Who sent you?"
He vanished.
No—he moved. Too fast to track.
His sword came down in an arc. I raised my arm—
Pain tore through me. Sparks flew. But not blood.
The dragonlight reacted.
It surged from beneath my skin, coiling around my arm in blazing gold. The sword struck it—and rebounded.
The shockwave cracked trees in a circle around us.
He skidded back, eyes narrowing.
"Interesting," he muttered. "So the Bond isn't broken."
Aeris leapt from my shoulder mid-flare, landing in a burst of light beside me. "He's not trying to kill you," the little dragon hissed. "He's testing."
"Could've fooled me."
Lyra shouted from behind a ridge, but I couldn't hear what she said. The mist was thickening again, dulling all sound.
The swordsman raised his weapon again.
"Draw," he said.
"I don't have a weapon."
He tilted his head. "Then awaken it."
"What are you—"
He moved again. I was faster this time. Barely.
I ducked, twisted, and his blade passed over my shoulder. I slammed my hand forward—dragonlight spiraling from my palm—and hit his side.
He slid back again but didn't fall.
He smiled.
"You're remembering."
I wasn't.
Not fully.
But something inside me was waking up.
Flashes:
– A burning sky over a city made of glass.
– A blade with no hilt, made of memory.
– A vow sealed in blood across twin moons.
– A war.
And me—at the center. A conductor of ruin.
I raised my hand again. This time, I called to it.
Not power. But form.
A hum filled the air.
The dragonlight coiled upward, crackling, shaping itself along my forearm. No hilt. No steel. Just will made sharp.
A weapon forged from memory and denial.
Aeris whispered, "You named it once. You broke a god with it."
"What's it called?"
The swordsman answered instead:
"Solgrave."
His eyes flashed. Then he attacked with real intent.
Our blades met. Not with the ringing of metal—but the screaming of ideas.
Each strike pulled something from me. A feeling. A truth. A fragment of who I was before. He fought like he'd trained against me a thousand times.
Maybe he had.
But I wasn't the same as then.
I was more—and less.
The fight blurred. My senses stretched. Somewhere, I felt Lyra's panic. Aeris screaming my name. Trees bending. The Rift pulsing faintly beneath the earth.
I saw through layers.
The swordsman's form shimmered with echoes—two, three versions of him overlapping, as if this moment had happened before and would happen again.
And always ended the same.
But this time—
I pivoted.
I stepped through his next strike, let it graze past, and spun the blade of light across his shoulder.
It hit.
He dropped to one knee.
Breathing hard. Not from pain—but from realization.
He sheathed his blade.
And bowed.
Deep.
Slow.
Intentional.
"…Sire," he said.
My mind blanked.
"Come again?"
"You are he. The one whose name was banished by the Celestial Accord. The Starforged. The Betrayed Flame. You don't remember, but your body does."
He looked up.
And there were tears in his eyes.
"I was your sword-bearer once. I failed you. I thought you died with the last cycle."
Lyra finally reached us. Her eyes were wild. Her blade was out. "What the hell is going on?"
The swordsman spoke her name.
Her real one.
She went still.
I felt the tremor pass through her.
"You both served the First Star," he said. "You both watched it fall."
He turned back to me.
"Many will hunt you now. But not all are enemies. Some still kneel. Some still remember the vow."
I took a step back.
"What vow?"
But he was already rising.
The mist parted.
In the distance—horns. Lights. Rift-hunters.
"Go," he said. "The Blade of Solmere cannot fight beside you. Not yet. But know this…"
He looked at me as if trying to remind me of something forbidden.
"…The stars did not abandon you. They only hid you. And soon… you will burn again."
Then he vanished into the trees.