The land behind him was dying.
Ironvale crouched on the horizon like an old wound that never healed, no matter how much time passed. Tall brass towers rose from its center, sharp and uneven, cutting into the sky like broken teeth. Pipes ran along their sides, thick as tree trunks, hissing and coughing steam into the air. Smoke drifted upward in heavy clouds, darkening the sky above the city until the sun looked weak and pale when it tried to shine through.
Even from far away, Ironvale felt loud. The ground there was black and worn down, pressed flat by metal tracks and endless footsteps. Nothing grew the way it should. The earth had been worked too hard, torn open again and again until it had nothing left to give. The air carried a bitter smell of oil and heat, and the wind that came from that direction always felt sharp, like it was scraping the skin instead of cooling it.
It was a place built to endure, not to live.
Kresor lay in a shallow ditch at the very edge of that world, where the dead ground began to give way to something softer. Mud pressed against the side of his face, cold and wet. Water pooled beneath him, seeping through his torn clothes, clinging to his skin like a second, heavier layer. Every part of him hurt, but the pain had dulled into something thick and constant, like he was sinking into it.
His body barely felt like his own anymore.
Burns covered his arms and shoulders, the skin raw and cracked. Some were fresh, still angry and red. Others were older, darker, layered on top of scars that never truly faded. Deep cuts ran across his chest and along his ribs, each breath pulling at them, reopening the hurt. When he inhaled, it felt like broken glass dragged through his lungs. When he exhaled, it came out shaky and thin, like he wasn't sure the next breath would follow.
Still, he was alive.
That thought felt wrong. Heavy. Like a mistake the world had not corrected yet. He stared at the dirt in front of his eyes, unfocused. Small stones pressed into his cheek. A dead leaf clung to his jaw, stuck there by mud and blood. He didn't have the strength to brush it away.
The world is a machine, he thought dully. It only knows how to crush. Every breath costs something. Every step. Every moment you keep going, it takes more than it gives back. Trust… is something only dead people can afford. A dark liquid leaked from his side, seeping through torn cloth and broken flesh. It was thick and black, darker than blood, with a faint shine to it, like oil catching light. It moved slowly, almost with purpose, spreading into the dirt beneath him.
Where it touched the grass, the green died. Blades of grass curled in on themselves, losing their color. The soil turned gray and brittle, cracking as if it had been burned from the inside. Even the small insects that crawled too close went still, their bodies stiffening before collapsing into the dirt.
Kresor clenched his teeth as another wave of pain rolled through him. His fingers twitched, digging weakly into the mud. He knew what that liquid was. He had seen its effects too many times to count. He knew what he was. A Vessel. A carrier. A curse wrapped in skin and bone.
Something that should not be lying in a quiet place like this. The pain pulled harder now, sharper, dragging his focus inward. His muscles tightened, shaking as his body fought to stay conscious. Inside him, something dark stirred. Not fast. Not loud. Just a slow, angry awareness, like a creature lifting its head after a long sleep.
Scolirius. It felt weak, drained from whatever had happened before he collapsed here, but it was still there. Watching. Waiting. The presence pressed against Kresor's thoughts, filling them with sharp edges. Fear. Suspicion. The urge to strike first before anything else could hurt him.
Kresor squeezed his eyes shut. Not now. He didn't have the strength for it. Not for the fight. Not for the anger. The darkness inside him seemed to sense that weakness, shifting restlessly, then settling back down, coiling into itself.
Then everything went quiet. Not the empty quiet of Ironvale, where silence was never real. There, even the still moments were filled with distant metal groans, humming engines, the low vibration of machines that never truly slept.
This silence was different. It was deep. Wide. It spread out in all directions, pressing down on him like a heavy blanket. Not suffocating, but steady. Holding. For a moment, Kresor thought he had lost his hearing.
Slowly, carefully, he lifted his head just enough to see past the edge of the ditch. Golden fields stretched out before him.
Wheat grew tall and thick, moving with the wind in slow, rolling waves. The stalks brushed against each other with a soft, constant sound, like the sea far away. Sunlight spilled over everything, warm and open, with no smoke to dull it, no filters to twist its color.
The sky above was blue. Not the pale, sick blue he was used to seeing through Ironvale's haze, but a clear, honest blue that seemed to go on forever. White clouds drifted lazily across it, unhurried, unbothered. There were no towers here. No pipes. No engines. No sharp smell of oil or heat. It felt wrong.
For someone like him, silence was usually a warning. Quiet places never stayed that way for long. They were traps. Or graves. A soft rustling sound came from the wheat. Kresor's heart stuttered. His hand shook as he dragged it through the mud, trying to reach for something, anything. His fingers tried to close, but there was no strength left in them. They fell open again, useless.
"Don't…" he whispered, his voice barely a sound. His throat burned with the effort. "Don't touch…"
The rustling grew closer. A figure stepped out from the wheat.
She was young, maybe his age. Her dress was plain and light-colored, made from simple cloth, stained at the hem with dust and bits of dried flour. The fabric moved softly in the breeze. Her arms were brown from the sun, strong not from magic or training, but from real work. From lifting. From carrying. From days spent under open sky. In her hands, she held a small wicker basket. Inside it, Kresor could see the tops of bread loaves wrapped in cloth, and a bundle of green herbs.
She froze when she saw him. For a long moment, neither of them moved. Kresor waited. He waited for the sharp intake of breath. For the fear. For the scream or the shout that always came when people saw him like this. Broken. Bleeding. Wrong. He waited for her to run.
It never came. Instead, she took a careful step closer. Then another. "Hush," she said softly. Her voice was calm, low, steady. It didn't shake. It didn't rise. It flowed like water over stone, smoothing instead of striking. "The earth has already heard enough of your hurting."
She knelt beside the ditch. Mud stained the knees of her dress as she settled there, but she didn't seem to notice. Her eyes moved over him, slow and thoughtful. She took in the burns, the cuts, the way his chest struggled with each breath.
The black liquid at his side did not make her pull back. Inside Kresor, the darkness flared. Scolirius stirred, irritated, offended by her closeness. A sharp heat flashed behind Kresor's eyes. His vision tinted darker at the edges. A pulse of anger rose in his chest, sudden and violent.
She should be afraid. She should know better. For a heartbeat, the urge to lash out burned hot and bright. Then it faded. The calm around her pressed down on it, smothering it like dirt thrown over fire. The anger shrank, retreating back into the depths where it came from, leaving Kresor shaken and confused.
Why isn't she afraid? he thought weakly. I ruin things. I end things. She reached out and placed a hand on his forehead. Her palm was warm. Not hot like power or magic. Not sharp like energy or force. Just warm. Steady. Real. The kind of warmth you felt from standing in the sun too long, or sitting near a hearth after coming in from the cold.
"You're just a boy who fell too far," she said quietly. The words landed harder than any blade. Kresor swallowed, his throat tight. His chest hurt in a different way now, deeper and more confusing than the wounds in his body.
"Ironvale…" he whispered. "They're coming…" She glanced past him, toward the distant smoke on the horizon. The towers were barely visible from here, but the dark smear they left on the sky was impossible to miss. "Let them," she said.
Her voice didn't carry anger. Or fear. Just certainty. "The wind doesn't remember their names." She looked back at him, really looked, as if trying to see past the blood and damage to whatever was left underneath. "And today," she continued, "neither will you." She stood and turned toward the field. "Father!" she called. "By the creek-bed! Hurry!"
The sound of her voice carried easily across the wheat. Kresor's vision blurred. The edges of the world softened, colors bleeding into one another. The wheat seemed taller now, leaning inward, closing around the ditch like a living wall. The distant towers of Ironvale slipped out of sight, hidden behind gold and green.
His chest felt strange. The tight pressure he had lived with for as long as he could remember began to crack. Not suddenly. Not violently. It broke slowly, like ice melting after a long winter. The weight fell away. Not with pain. With exhaustion. His eyes drifted shut.
Above him, a single stalk of wheat swayed gently in the sunlight. It brushed against another, then another, moving as part of something larger. For the first time in his life, the sun felt real. Not filtered. Not distant. Just there.
Maybe, he thought dimly, silence isn't a cage. The darkness inside him went still. Maybe it's peace. And then he knew no more.