The moon hung low over the Black Hollow forest, pale and distant like a watching eye.
They stood at the edge of the treeline—Elena, Dorian, and Miles. Behind them, the world was still. Before them, the ruins of the Temple of the First Pillar rose from the earth like broken teeth, swallowed by ivy and forgotten time.
"This is where it began," Dorian said quietly, his voice weighted with memory. "Where you first called the flame."
Elena's heart beat harder. "The flame?"
"Your power," Miles answered, though his tone was colder now. "The divine fire born from the First Soul. It's what the Devourer wants. What makes you different."
Elena stepped forward. The temple stones pulsed faintly beneath her feet. A part of her stirred—old and vast, like a sleeping god woken by the scent of blood.
"Why now?" she asked. "Why is the Devourer waking now?"
"Because you remembered," Dorian said, watching her. "And because your power is growing stronger again. It's calling to him."
A gust of wind blew past them, and with it came whispers. Not voices exactly—but impressions. Fear. Hunger. Despair. Something dark was shifting in the distance.
The Devourer had opened its eyes.
Elena reached out instinctively, pressing her palm to a stone slab covered in old runes. Heat flared up her arm—hot, but not painful. Familiar. The runes glowed gold.
"Elena—" Miles reached for her.
But it was too late.
The ground beneath them shook, and the wind howled like a scream. A pillar of golden fire erupted from the earth around Elena, swirling up into the sky, laced with tendrils of shadow.
Dorian stepped back, awe and something like reverence in his eyes. "She's awakening."
Elena's body lifted slightly off the ground, suspended in the spiral of light and shadow. Her eyes opened—but they were no longer her usual color. They burned bright white, flecked with gold and deepest black.
She saw everything at once.
The temple's past—the blood spilled in her name.
The first war—the Devourer sealed beneath layers of time.
And herself—splintered across a thousand lifetimes, always finding Dorian. Always losing him. And always dying to stop the Devourer.
But not this time.
With a scream, the light around her collapsed inward—and then exploded outward in a pulse of power that sent Miles and Dorian stumbling back.
Elena landed on her feet, glowing faintly, her voice steady but fierce.
"I remember now."
Dorian stepped forward, his chest rising and falling with shaky breath. "And?"
"I'm done being hunted. This time… I'll be the one who decides how the story ends."
Miles looked at her, jaw tight. "Then tell us—what's the next move?"
She turned toward the darkness in the distance. Her eyes narrowed.
"We find the others," Elena said. "The old bloodlines. The ones who still carry fragments of the First Soul. We're not strong enough alone."
"And the Devourer?" Dorian asked.
Elena smiled coldly. "Let it come. I'll be waiting."
Above them, clouds began to churn.
Far away, in the ruins of a forgotten city, a creature of endless mouths and hollow eyes rose from its slumber, sensing her power for the first time in centuries.
The hunt had begun.