Cassian's heart pounded, not with fear—but with the raw aftershock of something ancient stirring inside him.
The flames in the brazier no longer raged. They pulsed gently now, like the steady breath of something alive. The bloom remained—flickering petals of fire that seemed to whisper and twist into unfamiliar shapes. Script? Memory? Emotion?
And beside it, under the starless dome of the ruined observatory, stood the girl.
She was calm. Too calm. Cloaked in midnight black, her long hair brushing the small of her back like strands of ink. Her lavender eyes were sharp and bottomless, glinting like glass that had once known fire.
Cassian's hand twitched near his chest, where the ember had bloomed. Where the fire still lived.
"Start talking," he said, his voice raw. "What is this flame? What did I just see? Who were those people in the vision?"
She tilted her head slightly, as if assessing him. "You're not ready to understand all of it yet."
Cassian stepped forward. "I just poured part of my soul into that thing. I deserve answers."
A pause. Then a sigh, long and patient.
"You saw the Flame's memory. A scar that fire itself remembers. That vision was real—it happened long before the Church you know was ever built."
He swallowed hard, recalling the battlefield. The crowned Tribunal. The flaming flower held in outstretched hands.
"And the people I saw?"
"They were Flamebearers. The true ones. The First Thirteen."
Cassian blinked. "Then… what are Flamebearers? I've never heard that name in any Church doctrine."
Her eyes darkened, like storm clouds pulling over lavender. "You wouldn't. They erased us."
Cassian frowned. "Us?"
She stepped forward now, her voice low but steady. "The Flamebearers were the ones who kept the First Flame. Before the Church. Before the Tribunal. Before the Twelve wrote their sacred laws in ink and lies."
He stared at her. "And what was their purpose?"
"To remember," she said. "To pass on the flame—not as a weapon, but as a memory. A truth that could never die. They lit the flame in those who had lost their way. Healed the broken. Protected the balance between man, world, and will."
Cassian tried to wrap his head around it.
"But the Church calls anything outside their doctrine heresy."
She smiled—but it wasn't kind. "That's the point. The Church didn't rise beside the Flame—they rose by destroying it."
The words hung in the cold air.
Cassian felt his stomach twist. "Why did they burn the Flamebearers?"
"To bury the truth." She moved to the brazier, her fingers brushing its edge. The fire leaned toward her, like it knew her. "The First Flame doesn't follow orders. It doesn't belong to doctrine. And those who carried it couldn't be controlled."
Her gaze turned back to him.
"The Church called them heretics. Said their fire was stolen. Unclean. They dragged them from the towers, the valleys, the ruins of the old world. Burned them at the roots of their own trees."
Cassian looked away.
He had grown up within the Church's walls. He'd memorized their verses. Recited the Twelve Doctrines until his tongue ached. And yet, none of it had ever made him feel the way the flame had. This... truth.
"You said I'm not chosen," he said quietly. "That I was stolen."
She nodded once. "The flame inside you—it was never meant to be kept by them. They took it. Buried it inside children like secrets. You weren't born with it… but it remembered you."
"Then what am I?"
She stepped closer, voice now a whisper. "You're a key."
He froze. "To what?"
"To the oldest truth the Church tried to forget."
He couldn't look at her. Not yet. His eyes fell to the flames in the brazier, still blooming. Still alive. The vision clung to him like ash on skin. That kneeling figure. That battlefield. That moment of loss that rippled across time.
He let the silence stretch for a moment.
Then: "Who are you?"
She didn't answer right away. Instead, she knelt before the brazier, mimicking what he had done. The flames did not harm her. If anything, they embraced her.
When she looked back up, her expression was softened—but scarred by memory.
"My name was once Isolde. I was born three centuries ago. When the last Flamebearer died… I should have burned too."
Cassian stiffened. "Three centuries—?"
"I was sealed. Preserved by a flicker of the original flame. Hidden, until now."
"So you're one of them?"
"I was." Her voice faltered. "But I failed them. I was too young to stop what happened. I was the last flower before the garden was set alight."
Cassian's thoughts raced.
So much of his life—everything he thought sacred, everything he'd endured to serve the Tribunal—it felt brittle now. Hollow. Lies dressed in holy robes.
He took a shaky breath. "What was the flower? The bloom I created—what is it really?"
Isolde looked to it. "A Flamebloom. It's a soul-mark. A memory made fire. Only those who awaken their flame willingly can create one. It's not a weapon—it's a promise. A truth that can never be silenced."
"And the vision I saw… that was your memory too?"
She shook her head. "No. That was the flame's memory. It remembers all those it's touched. Every bearer. Every betrayal. It chose to show you that for a reason."
Cassian folded his arms across his chest. The wind howled through the shattered dome above, tugging at his cloak like unseen fingers.
He turned his gaze on her again, voice rough with the storm in his chest.
"What's your purpose now?"
"To finish what the Church tried to end," she said. "To wake the flame in those who still carry its spark. To bring back what was stolen. And when the Church comes for us—"
Her eyes hardened, like steel caught in firelight.
"—we won't burn quietly."
Cassian didn't answer. He couldn't. Not yet.
A war was rising in his heart.
The boy who had grown up in the Church—the orphan who found sanctuary in doctrine, order, prayer—was being torn open. And inside, something older was waking.
Not just the ember.
But memory.
He remembered the feeling during the Trial—when the Tribunal looked at him not with pity, but with fear.
They knew.
They knew what he carried.
"Why me?" he whispered.
Isolde rose to her feet, stepping close enough that he could see the fire reflected in her lavender eyes.
"Because you were never supposed to survive that Trial. Because the ember should've died… and it didn't."
She placed her hand just above his heart.
"Because it called out—and you didn't turn away."
Cassian shut his eyes. He remembered the scream of the bell. The silence in the Church. The fire blooming from his chest.
"You said others would come. That the game's begun again."
"They've already felt it," she said. "The moment you bloomed, every relic bound to the First Flame stirred. Those who still carry embers will feel the pull. Some will rise. Some will fall. And the Church... will tighten its grip."
Cassian opened his eyes slowly. "They'll come for me."
"They will." She didn't flinch. "But not just them. Others too. Not all Flamebearers were saints. Not all memories are kind. The fire remembers wrath… just as it remembers love."
He took a deep breath.
"So what do we do?"
Isolde tilted her head toward the stairwell. "You've lit the signal. Now we gather the kindling."
Cassian gave a bitter chuckle. "Poetic."
She smiled faintly. "It's what we were. Poets of fire. Keepers of truth."
He turned toward the broken dome, the night sky above as black and empty as a coffin.
Somewhere out there, the Tribunal was stirring. Somewhere, the Church would feel the ripple. The bells would ring again.
And when they did, he would no longer be just a shadow in their halls.
He would be the flame.
Isolde's voice broke his thoughts. "You asked if you were chosen."
He looked at her.
"You weren't," she said. "You chose. That's what matters."
Cassian looked to the brazier one last time, the bloom now steady, glowing like a heartbeat.
And in his chest, the ember answered.
To be continued..