The fire crackled silently in the hearth in Mara’s apartment, its flickering light casting long shadows against the stone walls. Aerin sat at the round table, her fingers tracing the rim of a cup of peppermint tea, lost in deep thought. Across from her, Kael stood with his arms crossed, his presence an unchanging reminder of their past. He had come and gone the last few days, moving around the city like a shadow. Aerin had been clear about her feelings about him showing up after all these years. An uncomfortable and suffocating feeling, their memories hanging heavy over her. He had left her then.

“We don’t have time to wait,” Kael said; his voice low but insistent, Aerin startled as he spoke, bringing her back to the present. “King Hazrael is moving faster than we thought. He’s set his sights on more than just stopping you from claiming your throne. He means to break you, your magic, before you can even come close.”

Aerin’s eyes flicked up at him, narrowing. “And how is it that you know so much about his plans? You’ve been gone for over ten years, Kael.”

His eyes softened, he slowly closed them, dragging his fingers through his hair. “I didn’t have the luxury of staying away by choice. Every move I’ve made has been to keep him from finding you.” He took a step closer, lowering his voice. “I’ve spent those years building alliances, gathering information—because I knew this day would come. As my father did, the night they all came for you”

Talon leaned against the far wall, arms folded, eyes never leaving Kael. “Convenient,” he muttered, his tone cold. “That you show up now, with all this knowledge of the king’s plans. Feels a little... rehearsed.”

Kael’s jaw tightened, but he didn’t take the bait. “Believe what you want, but it’s the truth. I would never lie to you”

Mara, who had been standing by the window watching the sky, turned slightly, her eyes flickering between the two men. “What exactly has Hazrael planned?” she asked, her voice smooth but laced with tension. There was something unspoken in the way her gaze lingered on Talon before shifting it back to Kael.

“A trap,” Kael said simply, the word hanging heavy in the air. “He’s sent his best to track us, to corner Aerin before she can unlock the full extent of her power. If we don’t move now, he’ll have the upper hand against us.”

Aerin felt the weight of the room pressing in on her, her heart beating faster and faster, the tension in the air thick as smoke. She glanced at Elden, who stood by the door, silent but watchful. His eyes met hers, and for a moment, she saw something—regret, perhaps? Or desperation. It was hard to tell with him. Their fight had taken a toll on them both.

“We really can’t afford to wait,” Elden finally spoke, his voice steady. “Kael’s right. If King Hazrael is sending his hunters, we’re already behind.”

Talon scoffed, loud and clear. “Of course, you’d agree with him. Anything to prove yourself to her, right?”

Elden’s expression darkened. “This isn’t about me, Talon. Not now”

“No?” Talon pushed off the wall, stepping forward closing in on Elden, suffocating the space. “Are you sure about that? Because from where I’m standing, everything you’ve done since you got here has been about earning her favor. Or perhaps, tricking her?”

Aerin cut in before Elden could respond, her voice sharp. “Enough. Stop. This isn’t the time for your petty fights.”

Kael’s eyes lowered as they met Aerin’s. “I’m here to help, Aerin. I know you have no reason to trust me, not after all this time, but I won’t stand by while King Hazrael destroys everything.”

She held his gaze, torn between the memories of the boy she once knew and the man who now stood before her, she sighed, “You said you had information. What else do we need to know?”

Kael hesitated for a heartbeat, another, then leaned forward, his voice dropping. “He’s not just after your throne, Aerin. He knows about your magic, the depths of it. He’s preparing something—something to strip you of it entirely. Take it all from you. If he succeeds, there won’t be a throne to claim. You’ll be completely powerless.”

A sharp chill ran down her spine, but she kept her voice steady and calm. “Then we stop him. We need to move now.”

Mara glanced at Talon, who seemed to be biting back another remark. “Agreed,” she said softly. “We can’t afford to wait.”

Talon let out a slow and long breath, glancing again at Aerin. “Fine. But we’re not splitting up. Not again.”

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Elden’s eyes flicked to Aerin, a quiet plea in his eyes. “I’ll follow you wherever you go, Aerin. I swear it. You have my word”

For a moment, she felt the weight of everyone’s expectations on her—Kael’s knowledge, Talon’s sharp protectiveness and distrust, Elden’s unspoken desperation.

“Then we move at dawn,” she said firmly. “And we end this.”

As dawn closed in, none of them had slept. Aerin had gone back to her room above the tavern, Elden close behind her, to gather her fighting leathers and daggers. She braided her hair as she looked herself over in the mirror. These last few weeks had started to show on her face, the lack of sleep making her skin paler and her eyes darker. She tested her magic, letting it flow through her and simmer through her fingers. It spoke to her clearer day by day now. She had much more to learn, Mara had found some older scripts about her magic’s source. If they were lucky these coming days ahead, they would train her. Wielding her power, finding her true balance and depth.

They all met at the edge of Yaveria, the wind howled through the city, its mournful wail echoing through the barren, dawn-kissed landscape. Yaveria had once been the heart of a great and beautiful kingdom, a realm of towering spires and lush forests, where rivers shimmered like silver beneath the moonlight. But now, much of it was poor and unkept—its bones exposed to the unforgiving elements, the blood of the fallen still soaked into the earth. There was still life in Yaveria, children playing, the market full of vendors and people roaming around, but it was a sorrow coating the city.

Kael stood at the edge of a clearing, his eyes scanning the horizon, where the clear outline of Yaveria’s walls loomed in the distance. All the memories here clung to him like shadows—his past intertwined with Aerin’s in ways he hadn’t been able to untangle since the night it all fell apart.

“It was here,” Kael said quietly, his voice barely audible over the wind. “Where everything began to end. All those years ago”

Aerin turned her gaze to him, sensing the weight of his words. “You never told me why you left,” she murmured, her eyes searching his face. His hair disheveled from the lack of sleep.

Kael closed his eyes for a moment, letting the chill morning air bite into his skin, breathing slowly. When he opened them again, there was a deep darkness in his gaze, one that had been forged through years of loss and survival. “My father... he made a choice that night,” Kael began, his voice rough. “When the Shadow Seekers came for your family, he knew what they would do. He took me, I was only a child, and fled through the western pass. He thought... he thought he could stop them.”

Aerin’s breath caught, the cold morning air filling her and making her shiver. “Stop them?”

Kael nodded at her, his jaw tightening as the old wounds reopened. “He ambushed them—an entire battalion. My father was one of the best swordsmen in Enderris, but even he couldn’t hold them all back. He thought he could do it alone. He killed dozens, maybe more, but he was wounded. Badly.” His voice faltered for a moment, the memory still raw in his mind. “We found a healer days later, but it was too late. I watched him die.”

The silence that followed was heavy, the weight of Kael’s grief noticeable. Aerin could feel it, the depth of his loss mirroring her own. They had both been shaped by that night—by the bloodshed and horror, by the lives stolen around them, their loved ones. Eachother.

“I had no choice after that,” Kael continued, his voice low, almost haunted by his memories. “I was a young boy, alone in a world that had turned against me. I had lost everything. I didn’t know if you were alive. So I did the only thing I could, what my father had taught me—I built alliances. I sought out anyone who knew what had really happened that night, anyone who could help me understand why your family was destroyed, butchered by the Shadow Seekers, why King Hazrael was willing to burn Enderris to the ground.”

His dark eyes turned distant, his thoughts slipping deep into the past. “It took years and years to piece it all together. Every whisper, every scrap of information I could find... It led me to King Hazrael’s inner circle. But the deeper I dug, the more I realized how far his reach went. He didn’t just want your family dead, Aerin. He wanted their legacy erased. Erased from this world. Their magic, their bloodline—it threatened everything he had built. I still don’t know why.”

The words hung between them and the weight of history and untold truths. Aerin felt her heart constrict, her breathing quickened, the anger she had long buried simmering to the surface. They had both lost everything.

“And now,” Kael said, turning back to her, his voice hardening, “he knows you’re alive. He knows you’ve inherited the magic your mother passed down. He’s more dangerous than ever, Aerin. And if we don’t stop him, he’ll finish what he started.”

Aerin’s fingers clenched the edge of her cloak, the chill of the wind biting into her skin. She looked out over the sorrowful remains of her once-great kingdom, the vastness of it all sinking into her bones. The sky, bruised with dark clouds, seemed to reflect the depth of their shared grief.

“I never knew,” she whispered, her voice coated with regret. Her eyes met his. “All this time, Kael... I thought you’d left. I thought you abandoned me.”

Kael shook his head, his eyes lowered softly as he looked at her. “I never stopped fighting for you, Aerin. Even when I didn’t know where you were. If you were alive. I swore to myself that I’d find the truth, no matter the cost.”

The wind picked up again, swirling around them as though it, too, carried the weight of forgotten years. For a moment, neither spoke to each other. Aerin’s magic responded to the wind and danced together with it, shielding them from the cold.

“This place...” Kael said, his voice barely a whisper. “It’s just a graveyard now. But it’s where I learned to fight. It’s where I learned that you can’t outrun your past.”

Aerin nodded, her heart heavy with both sorrow and a flicker of resolve. “Then let’s make sure King Hazrael can’t outrun his.”