---
The knight rode through ash that had been a village.
He didn't look back. He never looked back. Looking back was for men with consciences, men who could afford to carry the weight of what they'd done. He had learned, long ago, to let it slide off him like water.
But the boy on his horse—the boy hanging limp across the saddle, barely breathing, his face streaked with soot and blood—that boy would not slide off.
Why did I take him?
The knight didn't have an answer. He'd seen the child charge at him—seen the fire in his hands, the rage in his eyes, the foolishness of a creature that should have run. He'd knocked him aside, easy as breathing.
And then, instead of finishing it, he'd picked him up.
Sentiment, he told himself. Weakness. The commander will—
He stopped the thought. The commander could do whatever he wanted. The knight had served for twenty years. He'd earned the right to one unexplainable impulse.
The boy's name was Ruk. He'd learned that from the other children, the ones who'd screamed it as he fell. Ruk, who had charged a knight to save his friends. Ruk, who had burned with a fire that should have been impossible for a crawler.
Brave little fool, the knight thought. Brave and stupid and probably dead by morning.
He rode on.
Behind him, Ash Valley lived up to its name.
---
The palace of Baroda rose from the plains like a wound in the earth.
Black stone. Obsidian towers. Walls that seemed to drink the light and give back nothing but shadow. For three hundred years, it had stood as a monument to power—to the kind of power that crushed kingdoms and burned cities and left nothing behind but ash.
Kaelen didn't know any of this. He was miles away, deep in a mountain, gliding through wonders he couldn't name.
But Ruk saw it.
Barely.
Through half-closed eyes, through the fog of pain and blood loss, he saw the towers rise against a sky that had never looked so far away. He felt the horse stop. Heard voices—sharp, commanding, fearful.
Then hands grabbed him, and the world went dark.
---
"Explain."
King Mathias Sanderson did not raise his voice. He never raised his voice. Raising his voice was for men who needed volume to compensate for presence, and Mathias had presence enough to crush armies without speaking at all.
He stood at the center of the throne room, surrounded by the relics of conquest. Swords that had drunk the blood of a thousand enemies. Shields that had turned aside assassins' blades. Flags from fallen kingdoms, hung like trophies, their colors faded to memory.
The air around him shimmered.
Not with heat—not exactly. It was something deeper, something that made the knights on their knees feel their enchanted armor grow warm against their skin, feel their lungs labor with every breath, feel their bones ache as if they'd stood too close to a fire for too long.
Ascended, they thought. He's Ascended. He's—
"Explain." The word again. Still quiet. Still terrifying.
The knight-commander—the same man who had smiled as villagers burned—pressed his forehead to the stone floor.
"Your Majesty. The mission was reconnaissance only. We were to observe the mountain, assess its defenses, report back on the—"
"I know what the mission was." Mathias took a step forward. The stone beneath his foot cracked. "I gave it to you myself. Observe. Assess. Report. Not—" His voice tightened, just slightly. "Not burn a village to the ground and wake a mountain that has slept for three hundred years."
The knight-commander's hands shook. He couldn't stop them.
"Your Majesty, the villagers—they were hiding something. We found evidence of—of worship. Rituals. They believed the mountain was alive, that a goddess lived within it, that—"
"That they were primitive fools?" Mathias's voice was cold. "That they posed no threat? That you could slaughter them for sport and claim it was strategy?"
"No, Your Majesty, I—"
"You were ordered to be subtle." The word dripped with contempt. "The mountain contains relics older than this kingdom. Older than any kingdom. The First Fire—" He stopped. Controlled himself. When he spoke again, his voice was ice. "Do you have any idea what you've done?"
The knight-commander didn't answer. Couldn't answer.
Mathias looked at him for a long moment. The air in the throne room grew hotter. Sweat dripped down the knights' faces. Their enchanted armor began to glow faintly, the wards struggling against power they weren't designed to contain.
"Get up," Mathias said.
The knight-commander rose. His legs shook.
"You will return to that mountain. You will wait—however long it takes—for the lava to subside. And then you will go inside, and you will find what is hidden there, and you will bring it to me."
"And if—if the mountain is still active, Your Majesty?"
Mathias smiled. It was not a pleasant expression.
"Then you will die. And I will send someone else. And someone else after that. Until the relic is mine or the mountain kills everyone I send." He turned away, dismissing them. "Either outcome serves me."
The knights backed out of the throne room, bowing, trembling, terrified.
Behind them, Mathias Sanderson stood among his trophies and thought of fire.
---
The glide ended.
Kaelen felt it coming—a slowing, a settling, a shift in whatever force carried them. Then his feet touched solid ground, and he stumbled, and Mina crashed into him, and Mira crashed into both of them, and they fell in a heap of limbs and laughter.
"Oof—Mina, your elbow—"
"S-sorry, I couldn't—I didn't mean to—"
"Get off my hair, both of you—"
They untangled themselves slowly, still laughing, still breathless from the ride. The chamber they'd landed in was different from the last—larger, brighter, filled with light that seemed to come from everywhere at once. Crystals grew from the walls, each one pulsing with soft colors. The air smelled warm and clean, like stone after rain.
"It's beautiful," Mina breathed.
Mira nodded, her eyes wide. "I've never—I didn't know places like this existed."
Kaelen said nothing. He was too busy looking.
The walls weren't just walls. They were alive—not literally, but close. Patterns moved across their surfaces, slow and hypnotic. Shapes formed and dissolved. Colors shifted from gold to red to deep, dreaming blue.
This is where she lives, he thought. The goddess. This is her—her heart.
"Kael." Mina tugged his sleeve. "Kael, look—"
She pointed.
Above them, so high he couldn't see the top, crystals hung like stars. Thousands of them. Millions. Each one catching the light and throwing it back in patterns that made his eyes water.
"It's like—" Mina struggled for words. "It's like the sky, but inside."
Mira laughed. Soft and real. "You're right. It is."
They stood together, three small figures in an impossible place, and for a moment—just a moment—they forgot.
Forgot the village. Forgot the knights. Forgot Dorn and Ruk and everyone they'd lost.
There was only this. Only beauty. Only wonder.
Then Mina's stomach growled.
Loud.
Really loud.
Mira's did the same a second later, and they both turned to look at Kaelen with expressions of pure embarrassment.
"What?" he said.
"Nothing." Mira's face was red. "Just—you heard that, right?"
"I heard it." He paused. "M-my stomach's been doing that f-for hours. You're just c-catching up."
Mina buried her face in her hands. "This is so embarrassing. We're in a goddess's home and we're—we're—"
"Hungry?" Mira offered. "Alive? Human?"
"Loud."
Kaelen felt his lips twitch. "You are loud. I c-could hear you from the other side of the—"
"Don't." Mina pointed at him. "Don't you dare make jokes. You're not funny."
"I'm a l-little funny."
"You're not."
"I'm at l-least a tiny bit—"
Mira snorted. It was an undignified sound, completely at odds with her usual composure, and it made Mina laugh, and Mina's laugh made Kaelen laugh, and soon they were all laughing again, helpless and hungry and alive.
This is strange, Kaelen thought. Laughing. After everything. It feels—
Wrong? No. Not wrong.
Strange. Just strange.
His stomach growled.
Mina pointed at him. "See? You're just as loud!"
"I n-never said I wasn't."
"You implied it."
"I d-did not."
"Did too."
"Did n-not."
"Children."
The voice stopped them cold.
Not loud. Not sharp. Just... present. Warm, like embers after a long night. Distant, like memory. Wise, like something that had watched the world turn for longer than the world had existed.
They turned.
The goddess stood at the edge of the chamber.
---
She wasn't what Kaelen expected.
No flames. No glowing eyes. No terrible beauty that hurt to look at. She looked—she looked like a woman. Tall, yes. Pale, yes. Her hair the color of cooling lava, her eyes the deep orange of embers.
But also tired. So tired. The kind of tired that came from centuries of carrying weight no one should carry.
"I did not mean to startle you," she said. Her voice was the same as before—warm and far and wise—but hearing it come from an actual person made it feel different. More real. More here.
"You're—" Mina's voice failed. "You're the—"
"Yes." The goddess smiled. It was a small thing, barely there, but it softened her face in ways that made her look almost human. "I am what your people called a goddess. Though I have never been certain the name fits."
Mira stepped forward. Her face was careful, controlled—but Kaelen could see the fear beneath.
"You saved us. From the lava."
"I tried." The goddess's eyes flickered. "I succeeded. Barely."
"Why?"
A long pause.
"Because you asked," the goddess said finally. "Because one of you—" Her eyes found Kaelen. "—prayed to me once. Not for power. Not for victory. Just to be normal. Just to be loved."
Kaelen felt his face heat. "I—I was just—I didn't—"
"You were the first in decades to pray for something real." The goddess's voice was gentle. "I could not answer then. The fire—" She stopped. Shook her head. "It does not matter. What matters is that you are here now. All of you."
Mina's stomach growled again.
The goddess's lips twitched.
"You are hungry."
It wasn't a question.
Mina nodded, mortified.
The goddess raised her hand. The crystals on the walls pulsed brighter, and suddenly—impossibly—there was food. Not summoned from nowhere, but grown from the stone itself: fruits that glowed faintly, bread that steamed with warmth, water that tasted like morning.
"Eat," she said. "We have much to discuss. But first—eat."
They didn't need to be told twice.
---
They ate like they hadn't eaten in days—because they hadn't. The food was strange, unfamiliar, but it filled the hollow places in their stomachs and, slowly, the hollow places in their hearts.
The goddess watched them. Her expression was unreadable, but her eyes—her eyes held something that might have been hope.
When they finished, when the last fruit was eaten and the last water drunk, she spoke again.
"You have seen much," she said. "Lost much. I cannot give back what was taken. But I can offer you something else."
Mira leaned forward. "What?"
"A path." The goddess's voice grew deeper. "A way to become more than you are. More than your village could have made you. I will teach you the seven stages. I will guide you through the fire. And when you are ready—when you are strong enough—you will return to the mountain, and you will free me from the chains that bind me."
"Chains?" Mina's voice was small. "You're a goddess. How can you be chained?"
The goddess's face flickered. Pain, quickly hidden.
"Even goddesses can be imprisoned," she said. "Especially by those who claim to love them."
Before anyone could ask more, the ground shook.
Not gently. Not warningly. A jolt that knocked them off their feet, sent crystals crashing from the walls, made the very air scream.
Then the creatures came.
---
They rose from the floor—from the stone—shapes of lava and darkness, eyes of fire, claws of cooled obsidian. A dozen of them. Two dozen. More.
Mina screamed.
Mira grabbed her, pulled her back, her face white with terror.
Kaelen stood frozen.
Not again, he thought. Not again. I can't—I can't watch—
The creatures advanced. Their heat pressed against his skin. Their eyes burned with hunger.
I will not lose another one.
The thought came from nowhere—or from somewhere deeper than thought. His legs moved. His body placed itself between the creatures and the girls.
His hands raised.
He had no fire. No power. No anything.
But he stood there anyway.
I will not lose another one.
The creatures paused. Just for an instant. Just long enough for him to see confusion in their burning eyes.
Then the goddess's voice filled the chamber.
ENOUGH.
The word wasn't loud. It was everything. It pressed against the walls, against the creatures, against Kaelen's very soul—and the creatures stopped. Frozen. Immobile. Trapped in the act of killing.
When the goddess spoke again, her voice was tired.
"You are safe. They will not harm you. They are—" She paused, searching for words. "They are part of me. Fragments. Echoes. When my control slips, they rise."
Kaelen didn't lower his hands. "Will—will it slip again?"
"Perhaps." Honest. Brutally honest. "I am not what I once was. The fire grows harder to contain with every passing year. But—" She looked at him, really looked. "You stood in front of them. You, who has no power. You, who has no training. You stood."
Kaelen's face burned. "I—I just—I couldn't—"
"You could. You did." The goddess smiled again—wider this time, warmer. "There is more in you than you know, child of Ash Valley. More than any of you know."
She raised her hand, and the creatures sank back into the stone, dissolving like nightmares at dawn.
"Rest now," she said. "Tomorrow, we begin."
The chamber dimmed. The crystals softened. And three children, exhausted beyond measure, curled together on the warm stone and slept.
---