The Plain Lands were never truly flat; they were a sea of rolling gold and emerald, an endless expanse of swaying tallgrass and wheat that rippled like waves under the slightest breeze. Tucked into one of these gentle undulations lay Kael's village—a modest cluster of timber and stone known as Oakhaven. Here, the world felt small and safe, bordered by the silver ribbon of the Windrush Stream to the north and the dark, impenetrable eaves of the Whispering Woods to the east. Dawn crept over the horizon, coaxing the village awake beneath a blanket of thick, stubborn fog. This was no ordinary mist; it was a heavy, translucent veil that clung to the eaves of the cottages, turning the familiar silhouettes of haystacks and barns into hulking, unrecognisable beasts. The dew was so thick it didn't just dampen the grass; it hung in heavy globes from the spiderwebs stretched across the fences, looking like strings of lost pearls.
Birds tried to pierce the gloom with frantic, staccato calls, as if the morning air resisted every note. Under the eaves, the earthy smoke of peat tangled with the salty breath of the stream, weaving a scent that promised peace. It was the smell of home—of baking bread, damp earth, and woodfire. Yet while the villagers slipped into their routines—the distant clatter of a shutter being thrown open, the lowing of a cow waiting for the milkmaid—Kael sensed a hush that pressed against his chest, a silence waiting to be broken.
Kael, all wiry limbs and restless energy, slipped through the winding paths with a bucket swinging at his side. He was a creature of the village, as much a part of the landscape as the ancient oak in the square. His clothes were worn but well-kept—a linen tunic stained by the red clay of the riverbank and trousers that had seen a hundred mended tears. He scattered sly grins like breadcrumbs, each one a silent dare. His feet danced over the mud, never faltering, as if the earth itself bent to his luck. He knew every loose stone, every hidden root, and every patch of slippery moss; to Kael, the village was a map he could navigate blindfolded.
"Good morning, Mara," he called, tipping his free hand toward the young woman tending the chickens. She was windblown and bright-eyed, struggling with a feeding sack that threatened to spill. Mara was the daughter of the local miller, and she was the only person in Oakhaven who could match Kael's wit without blinking. "Careful! You're about to start a duel with your own rooster. And I'd hate to see you lose on the first day."
Mara rolled her eyes, but the corners of her mouth twitched. She adjusted her grip on the burlap, her cheeks flushing a deeper pink. "You'd cheer for it if I lost, wouldn't you?"
"Only if you gave me a front-row seat," Kael said with a wink. "And only if I got to be the one to rescue you afterwards." He paused for a second, the flirtation hanging in the damp air like a challenge, before he spun away. He pivoted mid-laugh, his heels finding the only dry patch of mud just as an angry hen's claw whistled through the space his calf had occupied a heartbeat before. Luck didn't just follow Kael; it seemed to anticipate his every move. He didn't even break his stride as he moved past her, leaving the smell of fresh rain and mischief in his wake.
As he walked, he passed the communal well, where the village gossip was usually traded like currency. Today, however, the women gathered there spoke in hushed tones, their eyes darting toward the forest. They spoke of the "Grey Hunger," an old wives' tale about a season where the sun would forget to rise. Kael pushed the thought aside. In the Plain Lands, the biggest threats were usually a bad harvest or a fox in the henhouse. Or so they liked to believe.
Passing through the village square, he nodded to the blacksmith's apprentice, who was already sweating over a cold forge, trying to coax a spark into life. Kael offered a brief, teasing bow to an older woman fetching firewood. "Careful, Mother Gable, if you carry any more than that, the woods will think you're trying to steal the whole forest," he joked, reaching out to deftly snag a falling log from her pile and tucking it back into her arms before she could stumble. He lingered just long enough to see her smile—a toothless, genuine thing. He liked these people. He liked the predictable rhythm of their lives, the way they looked out for one another in the vastness of the plains.
Every interaction left him liked—even admired—though Kael barely tried. Charm, he thought, was easier than strength, and far more useful. In a place where everyone knew your name and your father's name before that, reputation was the only armour a poor boy had.
Yet beneath the banter, Kael's instincts whispered unease. The forest at the village's edge was suffocatingly silent. The Whispering Woods were aptly named; usually, the wind would whistle through the ancient pines, sounding like a thousand voices in chorus. Today, the trees were statues. The usual chatter of the woodcutters was absent, their axes silent for reasons he couldn't name. Even the wind seemed reluctant to move. He paused, squinting at the tree line, and felt a cold prickle along his neck—an intuition that the world was shifting on its axis.
He shook it off with a laugh and approached the stream to fill the second bucket. The Windrush lived up to its name, the water churning over smooth river stones with a frantic energy that felt at odds with the stagnant air. The water was ice-cold, numbing his fingers as he plunged the wood into the current. The cold didn't just bite; it seeped into his bones.
That's when it happened: a violent, jagged vision, like a shard of someone else's memory piercing his mind. His knees hit the gravel, the empty bucket clattering away, but he didn't hear the splash of the water or the ring of the wood. The world of the Plain Lands dissolved entirely.
The bone-chilling cold of the Windrush was replaced instantly by a searing, dry heat that scorched his lungs. He was no longer standing in the mud; he was kneeling on a vast expanse of The Glimmering Wastes, a desert where the sands were not yellow, but a deep, bruised crimson, fine as powdered glass.
The horizon didn't just curve; it rippled under a sun that hung like a dying ember in a sky the colour of oxidised copper. In the distance, the ruined skeleton of a city rose from the dunes—not of stone, but of a black, obsidian-like glass that had melted and refrozen into jagged, claw-like spires.
One tower stood taller than the rest, a needle of dark crystal piercing the heat haze. At its summit, a circular chamber sat open to the winds, and though he could not see what lay inside, he felt a rhythmic, subterranean thrumming beneath his palms—a heartbeat that pulsed through the sand, synchronised with the heavy thudding in his own chest. The air here didn't carry the scent of peat or pine; it smelled of ozone, burnt metal, and ancient, baked dust. It was a place where the wind didn't whistle—it screamed through the glass ruins like a wounded beast.
Then, as quickly as the heat had taken him, the vision fractured. The red sands were swept away by a sudden, violent gale of dust, and the silence of Oakhaven rushed back in, leaving Kael gasping on the riverbank, the metallic taste of parched air still lingering on his tongue and a dull, sun-blinded ache behind his eyes.
He stayed on his knees for a long moment, gasping, watching the river water swirl around his fingers. It was just a daydream, he tried to tell himself. The heat, the lack of sleep. But the vision had felt more real than the gravel beneath his shins.
"Kael! Hurry up, or your breakfast will turn to ash," called his mother from the small cottage near the village centre. She stood in the doorway, wiping her hands on her apron, her eyes narrowing as she took in his pale face. His mother was a woman of few words and sharp perception; she could read a mood as easily as a merchant read a ledger. He laughed, his salute a reflex, but his heart thudded a frantic rhythm against his ribs. "Coming, Mother! Just making sure the fish weren't planning a coup," he yelled back, forcing his voice to remain light as he scrambled to gather his spilled water.
The morning passed in a blur of mundane tasks that felt increasingly surreal. He helped mend a leaking thatch on the tanner's roof, looking out across the plains. From that height, he could see for miles—the sea of grass punctuated only by the occasional lonely willow or the dark smudge of a distant farmstead. To the south, the road led toward the Great City, a place Kael had only heard of in stories told by travelling merchants. They spoke of stone spires and gold-paved streets, but lately, they had spoken of nothing but closed gates and missing messengers.
By midday, Kael had managed to charm, tease, and outwit nearly every villager he passed. A playful joke here, a saved basket of eggs there. He spent the morning mending a fence for a neighbour, his hands moving with an uncanny precision that made the work go twice as fast as it should. It was as if his body knew where the wood was weakest before the hammer even struck. And yet, as he walked the worn path toward the forest edge to hunt, the world seemed to snag like a torn tapestry. The sunlight felt thin, as if the sky were a piece of worn parchment being pulled too tight. The birds had stopped singing altogether. The only sound was the dry, rhythmic clicking of cicadas, a sound that usually meant heat but now felt like a warning.
A tall, narrow fracture of darkness cut through the dappled green of the glade. It was there for only a heartbeat—a vertical sliver of void that mimicked the height and stature of a man, standing perfectly still against the trunk of a dying elm. It had no depth, no texture; it was a hole in the reality of the forest. Kael rubbed his eyes, certain his mind was finally fracturing. But when he looked back, the space was empty, yet the air there was shimmering with a strange, oily distortion. But as Kael's gaze locked onto it, the shape didn't just move; it snapped out of existence, a whip-crack of shadow that retreated into the deeper thickets faster than a bird's wing-beat.
"Just me, right?" he murmured, a smile tugging at his lips despite the sudden, hollow ache in his chest. He reached for the small, rusted hunting knife at his belt, the metal feeling woefully inadequate against the memory of that void. The knife had been his father's—a simple tool for skinning rabbits, never meant for monsters. He stepped closer, every sense screaming caution. The temperature dropped ten degrees as he reached the elm tree; the bark where the shadow had leaned was scorched, not by fire, but by a frost so deep it had turned the wood to brittle glass. He reached out to touch it, and the bark crumbled into fine, grey powder under his fingertip.
A distant rustle made him freeze. A low, whispering sigh passed through the trees—not the sound of wind, but the dry friction of many voices speaking at once. It was a sound of ancient contracts and heavy chains, a sound that spoke of debts long forgotten and now due. Kael gritted his teeth, brushing a lock of dark hair from his eyes.
"Well," he muttered, squaring his shoulders, his knuckles white as he gripped the hilt of his blade, "if something wants to play hide-and-seek… I've never been very good at losing."
He stood at the very edge of the wild, the last outpost of the life he knew. To his left, the vast, open freedom of the Plain Lands; to his right, the suffocating mystery of the woods. He took one last look back at the village—at the smoke rising from chimneys and the distant sound of Mara's laughter as she chased a stray hen. He stepped across the threshold where the golden sunlight died against the moss. Behind him, the village remained bathed in morning warmth, oblivious; before him, the woods waited with a cold, hungry silence. He was unaware that the first shadows of the coming darkness were already moving toward his home—and that the world he knew was already gone.