The fire didn’t die.
Even after the Hollow Spire had fallen, even after the ghosts had found their rest and the war cries faded into ash, the fire inside me still flickered—brighter now, not angry or wild, but steady. Purposeful. Like it knew the story wasn’t finished yet.
Because it wasn’t.
The realm was shifting, breathing again, but magic never simply ends. It curls, it coils, it waits for the unwary.
And something was stirring in the dark.
The Warning
It came at midnight.
Not a scream. Not a knock.
A pulse.
A ripple of raw power across the leyline seams, felt like a heartbeat behind my eyes. I shot up in the cot, gasping, drenched in sweat. Kael stirred beside me, instantly awake, his muscles tensing under the thin cotton blanket.
“You felt that too,” he said, voice tight.
I
