Ash fell like snow in the aftermath.
The village was quiet again, too quiet. Even the wind seemed hesitant to return, as though the presence of the Silent Pyre had scorched more than just the land. Kaen stood at the center of it all—fists clenched, breath uneven, the scroll still faintly glowing in his hand.
Selyra watched him with narrowed eyes. "You didn't just repel their fire. You commanded it."
Kaen looked down at his hands. They were trembling—not with fear, but with something deeper. "I didn't mean to," he murmured. "I didn't even know I could."
"That scroll isn't just a map," Selyra said, stepping closer. "It's a key. And every time you open it, something ancient inside you answers."
Kaen looked up. "Then I need to learn how to control it. Before it controls me."
She nodded. "And there's only one place left where that knowledge still exists."
He raised an eyebrow. "Where?"
"The Ember Vault."
The name stirred something in him. Not a memory—something older. A pull.
"But to get there," Selyra continued, "you'll need to cross the Ashmere."
Kaen blinked. "Isn't that just desert?"
Selyra's voice darkened. "No. It's the graveyard of Aetherkind. A place where their memories still burn."
---
The next morning, Kaen left the village behind with Selyra and two other companions—Tane, a sharp-tongued relic hunter with a prosthetic arm made of molten glass, and Mira, a quiet girl whose eyes glowed faintly in moonlight.
Together, they approached the edge of the Ashmere.
At first, it looked like any other wasteland. Dry, cracked earth. Scattered bones of long-forgotten beasts. But as they stepped further in, the heat began to speak.
Faint whispers drifted through the air.
Kaen paused.
A voice—no, his own voice, from a time he didn't remember, echoed softly in his ears.
> "Run. Don't turn back. They will find you."
He staggered.
Mira placed a hand on his shoulder. "The Ashmere doesn't lie. It shows fragments of who you were… or might become."
The ground ahead shimmered.
Kaen saw them—dozens of burning silhouettes, flickering in and out of sight. Aetherkind, locked in eternal battle. Some screamed. Some knelt in prayer. Others simply faded.
He stepped forward anyway.
Each step sent another memory crashing through him. Not just his. Others. Generations. Pain, power, betrayal.
His knees gave out.
But then… a hand caught him. Tane.
"You want answers?" he growled. "Then don't fall now. You're walking through the fire for all of us."
Kaen stood again.
The fire in the distance brightened, shaping itself into the outline of a vault—deep beneath the earth.
The Ember Vault was close.
And so were the truths it held.