At dawn, the valley echoed with hooves.
No war cries. No horns.
Only rhythm.
Steady. Deliberate.
Eren stood at the crest of the hill, cloak stirring in the wind, watching as a line of mounted figures emerged from the morning mist. Their formation was tight, precise. Banners fluttered, not of fire or flame, but marked in crimson spiral and silver script.
The Red Circle had returned.
Syra stepped up beside him, hand on her sword.
"They've never ridden in formation like this before."
"They're not here to burn," Eren said. "They're here to negotiate."
Elira joined them, brow furrowed.
"That's even worse."
The Circle stopped a hundred paces from the edge of the camp. At their head was a man cloaked in deep crimson, his face hidden by a half-mask of ivory carved with runes.
He dismounted slowly.
And walked forward alone.
Eren met him halfway, with Syra and Elira a few steps behind.
They stopped within arm's reach.
The man removed his mask.
His face was older than Eren expected. Lined not by age, but by weight. He had eyes the color of dying embers.
"I am Varn," he said. "Once Pyre-Scribe of the Third Flame. Now... something else."
Eren inclined his head slightly.
"I know the name."
"Then you know why I'm here."
Eren's voice was calm.
"You want me to surrender Akreth."
Varn shook his head.
"No. I want to understand why it hasn't devoured you."
Elira tensed.
"You think we'll hand over knowledge?"
Varn looked past her, to the people gathering at the edges of camp. Quiet. Watching.
"No," he said. "I think you already have."
Eren studied him.
"You left the Circle."
"Not entirely," Varn replied. "But enough to know it cannot lead the next age. The fire they wield is chained to ritual. Yours... is not."
"So what do you want?" Eren asked.
Varn stepped closer.
"I want to witness. Not as an enemy. Not as a believer. As someone who once gave everything to the wrong truth."
Syra scowled.
"You expect us to let you just walk into the camp?"
Varn met her gaze.
"No. I expect you to let me earn it."
Eren turned to Syra and Elira.
They exchanged a glance.
Then he looked back at Varn.
"Then you'll walk with the scouts tonight."
Varn didn't hesitate.
"I will."
That evening, as the camp prepared for the march to the next valley, Varn helped set up tents. He hauled water. He said nothing about prophecy or flame. He listened. He watched.
And when the first child approached him and asked what the symbols on his mask meant, he knelt and explained.
"They were meant to bind truth. But truth doesn't stay still."
Eren watched from a distance, arms crossed.
Elira joined him.
"You trust him?"
"No," Eren said. "But I trust what he's lost. And I trust what he's trying to rebuild."
That night, Varn sat by the fire and told his own truth.
He spoke of the day he first lit a pyre in the name of cleansing. How the screams never left his dreams. How the silence afterward was worse than the fire.
"I served the Circle for thirty years," he said. "And it took one sentence to undo all of it."
He looked at Eren.
"Your words."
Eren didn't respond.
He didn't need to.
The fire between them flickered.
And the runes on Akreth glowed gently.