Kael awoke to the scent of burning incense and damp stone. The forge chamber was quiet, the coals now faintly glowing instead of roaring like before. He sat upright, rubbing his eyes. His dream had been strange—fragmented images of firebirds flying across a shattered sky, a city made of obsidian crumbling into ash.
The phoenix wasn't just showing him power.
It was showing him memory.
Someone knocked lightly at the chamber door before it creaked open. Elara peeked in, her hair still damp from morning training.
"You missed the council meeting," she said. "Nyra nearly sent Merek to drag you out."
"I was… somewhere else." Kael stood and reached for the leather harness that held his dagger. "The phoenix showed me something again. A city—burning. Falling. Like a memory."
Elara's brow furrowed. "A city?"
"I think it was in the past. But it felt too real."
She hesitated, then stepped closer. "There are old records—ruins buried in the firelands, north of Ember Hollow. Some say they were cities from the Age of Flame, when phoenix-bearers ruled openly."
Kael's heart pounded. "I need to go there."
"Kael, wait—Nyra will never allow you to leave without backup. The northern firelands are cursed. No one returns."
He turned to her, fire flickering in his eyes. "Then I have to be the first."
---
Convincing Nyra took hours. She paced like a caged wolf, snapping her fingers as flames danced in her wake.
"You're not ready," she said for the third time. "That city—if it even exists—is dead for a reason."
"And what if the answers I need are buried in it?" Kael shot back. "You've trained me to wield the fire, but I don't even know what it is. Why it burns in me."
Silence fell across the chamber.
Merek, arms folded, finally spoke. "He has a point. The flame is waking inside him faster than we've seen before. Maybe it's because it remembers something he doesn't."
Nyra stared at Kael, eyes narrowed. "If I let you go, you take Elara. And you take the whisper-stone. If I hear silence for more than a day, I'm sending everything we've got after you."
Kael nodded once. "Deal."
---
By dawn, he and Elara were riding toward the scorched horizon.
The firelands stretched for miles, barren and lifeless. Charred trees clawed at the sky like bones. The air shimmered with heat, though no sun touched the blackened soil. It was as if the earth itself had forgotten how to live.
They reached the edge of the first crater by midday. Steam hissed from a nearby fissure as they dismounted and continued on foot. Kael felt the pull again—deep in his chest, like a compass made of fire.
"There," he said, pointing to a jagged ridge.
They climbed in silence until they stood before it: a shattered gateway, half-buried in ash. Carvings lined the black stone—symbols that pulsed faintly as Kael approached.
He reached out.
The carvings lit up in response.
Elara drew a sharp breath. "It's reacting to you."
Kael's fingers grazed the stone, and the world around them shifted. The ash cleared. Heat surged. And suddenly, they weren't standing at a ruin.
They were standing inside the city.
Whole. Alive.
Flamebirds circled towers of obsidian and gold. People in crimson cloaks walked below, unaware of the strangers watching from the gate.
Kael staggered, his breath stolen. "This is… the past."
"No," Elara whispered, clutching his arm. "This is a memory."
And then came a sound—a horn, deep and thunderous.
The sky turned red.
Above them, an army descended from the clouds, cloaked in black fire.
And Kael heard a voice—not his own—echo in his mind.
"They came for the last flame."