We traveled west.
Not toward anything. Just away—from the hunters, the temple, the blade that remembered me too well.
Aeris flew above, circling in tight, watchful arcs. Lyra walked ahead of me, always just far enough not to meet my eyes. And Kael… Kael walked beside me like he belonged there.
He barely spoke.
But when he did, it was never small talk. Only truths too large for my throat.
"You used to laugh," he said once. "Not often. But when you did, it shook the constellations."
I said nothing.
What do you say to a man who claims to have died for you?
Twice.
We camped under fractured sky—stars like slashed glass across a wound of night. I couldn't sleep. I didn't try.
The fire burned low. Lyra had already turned in. Aeris curled at my side, his scaled form shimmering faintly. Dreaming, I think.
Kael remained by the edge of the clearing, staring into the woods.
"Still no sleep?" I asked.
He turned slowly, moonlight catching the twin scars across his cheek.
"I don't sleep easy. Not since Solmere fell."
I sat up straighter. "You mentioned that name before."
"It was where you died. The last time."
I swallowed.
"Tell me what happened."
He exhaled through his nose, eyes unfocused—as if gazing through time itself.
"You stood on the edge of the Rift. Alone. The sky was breaking apart, stars crashing like hail. I remember the sound of it—like gods screaming backwards. You held that blade of light. Solgrave. And you told us all to run."
My pulse slowed. Or maybe time did.
"You didn't listen."
"Of course I didn't," Kael whispered. "I was your Blade-Bearer."
He reached into his cloak and pulled something out—wrapped in dark velvet, tied with a frayed star-thread.
He unwrapped it carefully.
A medallion.
Old. Burned. Cracked.
A sigil of the fallen prince—two stars bound by a ring of flame.
"You gave me this," he said. "Said if I died holding it, I'd remember you next time. So I did."
He placed it in my hand.
It was warm.
Too warm.
I flinched—but didn't let go.
And in that moment, I saw it.
Not a memory. A sensation. A loop. A return.
Flashes—
– Me, standing atop Solmere's last tower.
– Kael below me, bleeding out, clutching this same medallion.
– My voice echoing down, hoarse and full of finality: "Forgive me."
– Then nothing but light. Endless, crushing light.
My hand trembled.
Kael's voice was softer now. "We all swore, back then. Before the fracture. Before the gods turned. You didn't force it. We wanted to follow you."
I stared into the flames. "Why?"
"Because you didn't fight for power," he said. "You fought to end it."
I laughed. Just once. Quiet, bitter.
"If I was so noble… why do I remember nothing?"
Kael didn't answer.
Instead, he pulled his sword from the sheath on his back, flipped it, and drove the tip into the ground before me.
Then he knelt.
One knee to earth. One hand on his heart.
His voice was a vow. Low. Unshakable.
"By fire remembered. By stars undone. By the first death and the last breath. I swear to you again, my Prince of the Starfall."
I looked down at him, hollowed by the weight of it.
"You don't even know who I am anymore."
He met my gaze, unflinching.
"You're still him."
I wanted to deny it. To laugh. To run.
But something in me stirred. Old. Cold. Sacred.
A whisper in the dark that didn't use words, only presence.
Aeris stirred beside me, eyes glowing faintly gold.
"He's telling the truth," the dragon said, voice drowsy but certain. "His soul carries your mark. That kind of loyalty doesn't fade across lifetimes."
I clenched my fists.
This wasn't what I asked for. I didn't ask to be hunted. To be remembered. To bear the weight of a crown carved from silence and starfire.
But the world was asking anyway.
Kael rose.
His sword shimmered faintly now—reacting to my presence.
Another echo.
Another proof.
Lyra stepped into the firelight, silent. Watching. She didn't speak, but her eyes told me she had heard enough.
Too much.
A new tension formed in the silence.
Three of us bound by different truths, all of them impossible.
And in the distance…
A sound.
Like metal screaming.
Like a horn from a throat that was never alive.
Kael turned first, eyes narrowing.
"They've found us."
Lyra cursed under her breath and grabbed her bow.
But I didn't move.
I stood still, feeling the weight of the medallion. The truth of the vow. The inevitability of this path.
"They won't stop," Kael said, drawing his blade. "They'll keep coming. As long as you live."
I nodded once.
"Then we make sure they remember why I died the first time."