Chapter 17: Judged by Fire

Kael woke to the smoky aroma of his fire’s embers, a stark contrast to the restless dreams that had plagued him through the night. The dawn light filtered weakly through the forest canopy, painting everything in muted shades of gray and amber. He rubbed his face, trying to shake off the remnants of the visions: twisted, hollow voices and haunting golden eyes that stared through him like a predator sizing up its prey.

The codex lay open beside him, its pages scattered with frantic notes. He couldn’t remember falling asleep. Beside the fire, the roasted remains of the rabbit were cold, only half-eaten. His stomach churned at the thought of finishing it.

And then he saw it.

One of the dragon eggs, black as midnight and cradled in a bed of moss, was no longer whole. A fracture split its surface, glowing faintly with a molten light that pulsed like a dying heartbeat. Kael’s breath caught in his throat.

No. Not here. Not now.

Panic surged through him. His hands, calloused and trembling, hovered over the egg as if to shield it. The glow from the fissure reflected in his wide eyes, drawing him closer, entrancing him.

When his fingertips brushed the cracked shell, the world shattered.

Kael stumbled into a void of endless, blinding silver light. The air was suffocating, thick with a weight that pressed against his chest. He turned, searching for something solid, but found nothing but the featureless expanse. And then the light shifted, coalescing into a towering figure clad in radiant silver armor, its presence radiating an oppressive authority. It held a silver scale weighing a sword and crown.

Arthor.

The god of judgment. The Father of Order. The arbiter whose edicts bound the mortal and immortal alike.

“You stand before me unworthy,” Arthor’s voice thundered, a grim pronouncement that echoed in the marrow of Kael’s bones. The god loomed over him, faceless behind his gleaming mask, a massive sword in one hand and scales in the other. “You seek to bond with a creature of flame and fury, yet your soul is mired in chaos. Prove yourself.”

Kael swallowed hard. His throat was dry, his mind blank. What could he say? What could he possibly offer to a god who weighed the hearts of kings and crushed kingdoms with a single decree?

“I… I didn’t choose this,” he stammered. “I didn’t ask to lose everything. To carry this—this weight.” His voice cracked, anger bleeding into his words. “And now you want me to prove myself? Prove what? That I can carry another burden for your amusement?”

The scales tipped, the motion slow but deliberate. The blade sank lower, its edge glinting ominously.

“You confuse survival with strength,” Arthor said coldly. “You confuse defiance with justice. If you are to wield the fire of a dragon, you must understand the weight of your actions. Prepare yourself.”

The void twisted, the light bleeding away into darkness. Kael’s stomach lurched as the ground re-formed beneath his feet—hard, jagged, and soaked with blood.

Kael stood on a battlefield. Broken banners snapped in a bitter wind, and the ground was littered with corpses. Men and women, soldiers and civilians, their faces frozen in expressions of terror. A single figure emerged from the haze, shrouded in shadow, its form flickering like a flame caught in a storm. Its eyes glowed with the same golden light that had haunted Kael’s dreams.

The figure held a jagged blade slick with blood. At its feet lay the bodies of villagers—his villagers. Greenhaven. The dead faces of his family stared up at him, their mouths open in silent accusations.

“This is the trial of justice,” Arthor’s voice rumbled from above. “This enemy has wronged you. Wronged your people. Their crimes are undeniable. What will you do?”

“I don’t even know what it is!” Kael shouted into the void, his voice cracking. “How can I fight something I don’t understand?”

“You are not asked to understand,” Arthor replied. “Only to judge.”

Kael staggered backward, his pulse roaring in his ears. The figure advanced, its steps slow, deliberate. He reached for his dagger, but it wasn’t there. His hands were empty.

The creature lunged, and Kael barely dodged, stumbling into the wreckage of a cart. His hand closed around something cold and solid—a sword, rusted and pitted with age. He raised it, his arms shaking under its weight.

“You are not asked to fight, either,” Arthor’s voice cut through Kael’s racing thoughts. “Choose.”

The figure halted, its golden eyes narrowing. Arthor’s scales appeared in the air before him, shimmering faintly. The crown and the blade hung in delicate balance, waiting for Kael’s decision.

“You must choose,” Arthor commanded. “Justice demands action.”

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Kael gritted his teeth. The sword in his hand felt foreign, wrong. He wanted to lash out, to bury the blade in the creature’s chest, to end its mockery of his failure. But the faces of the dead stopped him. Their lifeless eyes pleaded for more than vengeance.

“No,” Kael said, his voice hoarse. He threw the sword to the ground. “I won’t fight. I won’t kill it.”

The battlefield dissolved into the void. Arthor’s towering form appeared once more, his expression unreadable behind the silver mask.

“Mercy is not weakness,” the god said. “But neither is it always justice. Remember this lesson, mortal. The scales of judgment do not favor absolutes.”

The silver light faded, replaced by the verdant glade where Aeloria, the Mother of Creation, awaited. Her radiant beauty was muted, her serene smile tempered with sorrow. She stood beside a sapling, its delicate branches trembling as though caught in a storm.

“You have faced judgment,” she said softly. “Now you must prove that you can create where others destroy.”

Kael eyed the sapling warily. Its leaves were already browning, the soil at its base dry and cracked. “What is this?” he asked, his voice laced with suspicion.

“It is your soul,” Aeloria replied. “Scarred. Fragile. On the brink of ruin. Save it.”

The sapling began to wither before his eyes, its leaves curling inward as its bark split and blackened. Kael dropped to his knees, his hands fumbling at the dry soil, trying to scoop water from the earth. It crumbled in his hands, useless.

“I don’t know how,” he whispered, desperation clawing at his throat.

Aeloria knelt beside him, her gaze piercing. “Your grief, your rage—they are not poison. They are fire. Will you let them consume, or will you wield them?”

Kael closed his eyes. Memories flooded his mind: the laughter of his sister, the warmth of his mother’s embrace, the promise of a future now reduced to ash. He felt the anger and sorrow rise within him, threatening to drown him. But instead of fighting it, he embraced it.

The earth beneath the sapling darkened, rich and fertile. The sapling straightened, its leaves unfurling, their edges glowing faintly with crimson light. A single flower bloomed at its apex, its petals blood-red and shimmering with embers.

Aeloria smiled faintly. “Even in ash, life takes root. Remember this.”

Kael found himself in Greenhaven again. The ruins were sharper now, the smell of charred wood and flesh so real it choked him. The air itself seemed heavy, saturated with despair, the distant cries of the dying echoing in his ears.

Amid the devastation stood Amoria, the Goddess of Love. She was unscathed by the ruin around her, a radiant figure of impossible beauty in a landscape of despair. Her golden robes shimmered like liquid sunlight, untouched by soot or ash, and yet her presence was not comforting. It was piercing. Her eyes, deep pools of molten gold, seemed to see straight into Kael’s soul, stripping away the walls he had built around his grief and anger.

In one delicate hand, she held a goblet of crystalline glass, overflowing with dark red wine that spilled continuously, staining the ground at her feet. Where it touched the earth, roses bloomed—dark, blood-red, and thorned—only to wither moments later, their petals curling into ash.

“This is the trial of the heart,” she said, her voice softer than the others, yet no less piercing. “You carry their loss. Their pain. Do you carry their love as well?”

Kael looked away, his hands clenching into fists. “Love doesn’t matter,” he said bitterly. “It didn’t save them.”

Amoria’s expression hardened, the warmth in her voice cooling like embers buried under ash. “Love does not guarantee salvation. It does not shield against cruelty. It is fragile, Kael—painfully so. Yet, for all its frailty, it endures. Tell me, what endured in you when your world fell apart?”

He turned to her, anger flashing in his eyes. “Pain. Hate. The drive to survive.” His voice cracked under the weight of his words. “Not love. Not anymore.”

Amoria stepped closer, the golden glow of her robes casting long shadows over the ruined ground. Her eyes bore into him, unyielding. “You believe that?” She gestured to the charred rosebush, its skeletal branches trembling in the cold wind. “Then take it. Crush it. Prove your love is gone.”

Kael hesitated, his gaze fixed on the twisted bush. Its blackened thorns jutted outward, sharp and unforgiving. He reached out, his fingers closing around the stem. Pain exploded through his hand as the thorns pierced his flesh, drawing rivulets of blood. He wanted to let go, to cast the thing aside, but his grip tightened instead.

The bush writhed in his hand, its thorns growing, twisting into his palm. Faces began to form within its petals—his sister, his mother, the villagers of Greenhaven. They stared at him, their expressions twisted with grief and accusation.

“You blame love for your pain,” Amoria said. “But love did not kill them. It is the weight you carry because you _loved them_ that keeps their memory alive. Pain is not the absence of love. It is its shadow.”

The faces in the rosebush began to scream silently, their mouths wide, their eyes endless pits of golden light. Kael gritted his teeth as the cries echoed in his mind. His blood dripped to the earth, pooling around the roots of the bush. The wind howled, carrying whispers of every name he had lost.

“Do you see?” Amoria pressed, stepping closer. “Love is agony. It is a blade that cuts deepest when it is lost. But it is also a seed, waiting for you to plant it in the ashes of what you once had. Will you let it grow?”

Kael’s knees buckled, and he fell to the ground, the rosebush still in his hand. He stared at it, his blood soaking into the scorched petals. His voice was barely a whisper. “I don’t know how.”

Amoria knelt beside him, her fingers brushing the ruined earth. “You do,” she said softly. “You just don’t believe you deserve to. Love cannot bring back the dead, but it can honor them. It can give their sacrifice meaning.”

Kael closed his eyes, his tears mixing with the blood on his hands. Slowly, the rosebush began to change. The blackened stems softened, their thorns retracting. The petals unfurled, their scorched edges glowing faintly with golden light. A single flower bloomed, brilliant and unbroken.

Amoria stood, her voice now as gentle as a lullaby. “Love does not erase scars, Kael. It does not heal wounds. But it gives you a reason to endure. Even in ruin, beauty can take root.”

Kael opened his eyes, the glowing rose in his hand trembling. For the first time, he allowed himself to feel the weight of his love for those he had lost—not as a burden, but as a testament.

Amoria smiled faintly. “You have learned. Let this be your guide, for the trials ahead will demand it.”

And then she was gone, leaving him alone with the rose and the memories it carried.

Kael’s eyes snapped open, the smell of smoke and ash flooding his senses. The cracked egg sat in his hands, its color had shifted to copperish hue. His fingers tingled where they touched its surface, a faint connection thrumming between him and the life within.

The egg hadn’t hatched, but something had changed. It was alive, a part of him in a way that defied explanation. For the first time since Greenhaven fell, Kael felt something else: hope.

He wasn’t just surviving anymore. He had a purpose. And he wasn’t alone.