The forest did not return to quiet.
Tavian barely had time to breathe before the Pulse around him twisted again. His wrist still ached from summoning Raijara. The bondmark felt like it had been branded. He wasn't ready for another surge.
Kaelenna stepped in front of him, staff gripped in both hands. Her beasts, Tross and Yema, stood bristling at her sides.
Tross was all sinew and muscle, an Ash Pulse hound with fur like scorched stone and eyes that glowed orange. Yema moved like a smoldering rockslide, thick-limbed and flame-backed, snorting heat with every breath. They didn't speak, but they didn't need to. The way they moved showed intent. Protection. Rage.
Kaelenna's eyes flicked sideways. "You good?"
Tavian shook his head. "Not really."
"Fair," she muttered.
Then the first Juza warrior stepped from the trees.
They didn't wear bright armor. Just sleeveless cloaks stitched with Pulse-suppression threads, dull ash-grey against their skin. Their faces were painted in vertical red lines, sign of the Emberborn caste.
More followed. Six. Then eight.
Behind them walked a seventh figure. Not armored. Not young.
A priest.
The Juza priest's robes were charred at the hems, but clean. His bronze mask hung from his side now, revealing a face carved from angles and ritual scars. His eyes glinted like coal.
"Found it," he said aloud. "The false thunder."
Kaelenna raised her staff. "Tavian. They're here for you."
"I figured."
The priest stepped forward, unfazed by the beasts. "Storm-Veil. That Pulse pairing does not happen naturally. You're a corruption. A mistake waiting to be corrected."
Raijara stirred inside Tavian. "He smells like cinders and shame. Keep breathing. Do not try to draw me again."
Kaelenna took one step forward, defiant. "You don't belong here."
"We belong where the fire leads," the priest said. "And it led us to him."
One of the Juza warriors raised a hand. His beast responded.
A lean Embercat burst forward from the underbrush, fur streaked with glowing orange patterns, claws sparking with every step. It hissed and lunged at Yema.
The Emberdrake roared, meeting it midair in a collision of smoke and heat.
Tavian staggered back as Tross barked and leapt into the fray. The Ash hound tore into a second beast, some kind of scaled lizard cloaked in silk.
A second warrior flanked them. Then a third.
Kaelenna spun her staff. Ember flared from her tattoos and burned in her grip.
"I don't need Sariah to deal with you," she snapped.
"You never did," Raijara muttered with amusement.
Kaelenna struck, sending a shockwave of heat through the grass. Two Juza beasts flinched, but the priest raised a hand and snapped a phrase in Ithic.
It froze the air.
Tavian felt it. Hollow and wrong.
Then a voice answered in the same tongue.
Sariah stepped into the clearing like she had always been part of the scene. Her arms were bare, glyphs gleaming with Hollow and Verdant light. Her beasts, Maerith and Seyla, stalked behind her in absolute silence.
Maerith's shadow fur rippled with hunger. Seyla's antlers gleamed with leaflight.
The Juza priest paused.
"You speak the old tongue."
"I speak for those who were never meant to be silenced," Sariah said.
Then she raised both hands.
Her pulse was felt around them as she called upon her power. It wasn't loud. It wasn't violent.
It was final.
Words wrapped the clearing like a net. Old words. Words that had weight. The Juza warriors faltered. One dropped his blade.
Maerith moved like smoke and shadow, pinning a beast to the dirt before it could react. Seyla stepped forward and vines answered her hooves.
Tavian watched, unable to stand, barely breathing.
"What is she doing?" he asked.
"Speaking truth," Raijara said. "And unmaking lies. That is what Speakers do. And why are they still feared these days. It is good to see the Old Language has not been completely butchered by you humans."
The priest tried to counter, but his voice stumbled. Sariah's words cut through his like glass through silk.
He reached for his mask.
Then fire split the sky.
Not Pulse. Not spell.
A beast.
A scream cut through the air, sharp and golden.
Then came the wings.
The clearing was torn open by flame and air. A single shape dove overhead, wings outstretched like a banner of war. A great beast landed between the Juza and the siblings. Ember scorched the ground.
It was part lion, part phoenix.
A Lord-class Ember creature.
Its fur was ash-gold. Its mane burned like sunrise. Its claws sank into the dirt, and its roar turned trees to smoke.
The Juza priest stared.
Then he spoke, not in command.
In awe.
"…Ashara."
A woman stood behind the beast, hand on its shoulder.
Tall. Broad-shouldered. Tattoos laced down her back, Ember-inked and old. She did not raise her voice.
She did not need to.
"Step away from my siblings," she said.
The priest took a single step back.
And Tavian, for the first time since the storm, let himself exhale.