The company left the lake behind as the sun slipped behind a veil of pale clouds, its light dimming long before evening. The forest swallowed the clearing almost immediately, branches knitting overhead until the water's silver calm felt like a memory they had imagined rather than lived.
The path ahead was narrow, winding between roots that rose like the ribs of some buried creature. The air had changed again, heavier, thicker, carrying a faint hum beneath the silence, as though the forest was thinking.
Siegfried rode near the front, Ellina just behind him in the carriage. He could feel her presence even without looking, a quiet awareness, steady and unsettling in equal measure. Every so often, he caught himself glancing back, as if expecting her to meet his eyes.
She didn't.
But he knew she felt him watching.
It didn't take long for the riders to notice something was wrong.
The trees were too close.
The shadows too deep.
The path too unfamiliar.
Vinrah slowed her horse, scanning the terrain with a frown. "This isn't the route we took in," she muttered. "The ground's different."
One of the riders pointed to a cluster of stones half-buried in moss. "Those weren't here yesterday."
Siegfried dismounted, crouching to touch the earth. The soil was freshly disturbed... not by hooves, not by weather, but by something deeper. Something that shifted the land itself.
He rose slowly. "The forest moved again."
Vinrah cursed under her breath. "It's herding us."
Ellina's voice drifted from the carriage, calm but certain. "Not herding. Guiding."
Siegfried turned. "Toward what?"
Ellina met his gaze through the thin veil. "Toward whatever it wants us to see."
A chill ran through the company.
They pressed on, the path narrowing until the horses had to walk single file. The trees leaned inward, their branches arching overhead like a cathedral of bone and shadow. The air grew colder, carrying a faint whisper that none of them could quite understand.
Siegfried slowed his horse until he rode beside the carriage. "You said the forest is guiding us," he murmured. "Do you know where?"
Ellina's eyes flicked toward him, soft and unreadable. "Not yet."
"But you feel something."
"Yes."
A pause.
"And so do you."
He didn't deny it.
The whispering grew louder, not voices, not wind, but something in between. A sound that seemed to come from the roots beneath their feet.
Ellina leaned slightly toward him, her voice low enough that only he could hear. "Stay close to me."
"I always do."
Her breath caught... just barely... before she looked away.
The path opened suddenly into a clearing ringed by towering pines. At its center lay a circle of shattered stone pillars, half-buried in the earth, covered in moss and ancient carvings worn smooth by time.
The air here felt different... charged, expectant, as though the forest had been holding its breath for their arrival.
Vinrah raised a hand, signaling the company to halt. "What is this place?"
Ellina stepped down from the carriage, her movements slow, reverent. "An old boundary," she whispered. "Older than the Stone of Veylan. Older than the roads."
Siegfried joined her, scanning the broken pillars. "A boundary for what?"
Ellina touched one of the stones, her fingers tracing the faint grooves of forgotten symbols.
"For whatever lived here before men."
The forest fell silent.
Even the wind stopped.
And Siegfried felt, for the first time, that they were not alone.
The clearing felt older than the forest itself.
The broken pillars rose from the earth like the vertebrae of some ancient titan, each one carved with symbols that time had nearly devoured. Moss clung to their sides in thick, velvety sheets, and thin roots curled around their bases like skeletal fingers. The air inside the circle was colder, heavier as though the forest's breath didn't reach here.
Siegfried stepped carefully between the stones, boots crunching over brittle leaves and fragments of shattered rock. Every sound felt too loud, swallowed and echoed at the same time.
Ellina followed him, her movements slow, deliberate. She didn't touch the stones yet, but her eyes traced every line, every fracture, every shadow. Her expression was unreadable, not fear, not awe, but recognition.
"This place…" she murmured, "it was not meant to be found."
Vinrah snorted softly. "Then why lead us here?"
Ellina didn't answer.
Not immediately.
Siegfried crouched beside a fallen pillar, brushing away a layer of moss. Beneath it, faint grooves formed a pattern...not runes, not letters, but something older, more fluid. The lines curved and spiraled, intersecting in ways that made his eyes ache if he stared too long.
"What do you make of it?" he asked.
Ellina knelt beside him, her presence quiet but intense. She leaned in, her veil brushing lightly against his shoulder as she studied the markings.
"It's a boundary sigil," she whispered. "A warning. Or a promise."
"Which?"
"That depends on who broke it."
Siegfried's stomach tightened. "You think it was broken?"
Ellina pointed to the jagged edges of the stone. "This wasn't worn down by time. It was shattered."
Vinrah swore under her breath. "By what?"
Ellina's gaze drifted toward the center of the circle. "Not what. Who."
At the heart of the clearing lay a wide, flat stone half-buried in the earth. Unlike the pillars, it was smooth... too smooth, as though something heavy had rested upon it for centuries, shielding it from wind and rain.
Siegfried approached it slowly.
The air above the slab shimmered faintly, like heat rising from a forge, though the clearing was cold enough to mist their breath.
He knelt and brushed away the dirt.
Underneath, the stone bore a single symbol, a spiral of interlocking lines that seemed to twist inward endlessly, drawing the eye toward a center that wasn't there.
Ellina inhaled sharply. "It's a seal."
Siegfried looked up at her. "A seal for what?"
She didn't answer.
Her eyes were fixed on the symbol, wide and unguarded for the first time since he'd known her.
Vinrah stepped closer. "Ellina. Talk to us."
Ellina swallowed, her voice barely above a whisper. "This is older than the Stone of Veylan. Older than the kingdoms. Older than the forest."
Siegfried rose slowly. "What was sealed here?"
Ellina's gaze lifted to meet his, and for a moment, he saw fear.
"Something that should have stayed asleep."
A low vibration trembled through the ground subtle at first, then stronger, rattling loose stones and sending ripples through the moss. The horses reared, snorting and pulling at their reins. Several riders struggled to calm them.
Siegfried drew his sword. "Ellina..."
"I know," she said, stepping back from the slab. "It's waking."
The vibration deepened into a pulse; slow, rhythmic, like a heartbeat beneath the earth. The spiral on the stone seemed to darken, its grooves filling with a faint, shifting glow.
Vinrah shouted, "Everyone back!"
But the forest had already moved.
The trees around the clearing leaned inward, branches twisting together until the sky vanished behind a canopy of living wood. The air thickened, heavy with the scent of damp earth and something metallic.
Ellina's voice cut through the rising panic. "Do not run."
Siegfried turned to her. "Why not?"
"Because it's watching," she whispered. "And it wants to see what we do next."
The ground beneath the central slab cracked in a thin, jagged line splitting the stone with a sound like distant thunder. Light seeped through the fracture, pale and cold, illuminating the carvings on the surrounding pillars.
The symbols glowed faintly, one by one, as though waking from a long sleep.
Ellina stepped closer to Siegfried, her voice low and steady. "This place was a prison."
"For what?" he asked.
Her eyes didn't leave the glowing stone.
"For something that remembers its captors."
The light pulsed again, brighter this time.
And the forest held its breath.
The light beneath the cracked seal pulsed again, once, then twice, each throb sending a faint tremor through the earth. Moss shivered. Dust drifted from the broken pillars. The air thickened until every breath felt like drawing in cold smoke.
Siegfried stepped instinctively in front of Ellina.
She did not move behind him.
She moved beside him.
The glow seeped through the fracture in the stone, spreading like veins of pale fire. The spiral symbol darkened, its grooves filling with a shifting, liquid shadow that seemed to swallow the light around it.
Vinrah raised her sword. "Everyone back. Now."
But the forest had already closed the exits.
Branches twisted together.
Roots rose like barriers.
The clearing had become a chamber.
And the chamber had a heartbeat.
A low hum vibrated through the stones. It was not sound, not exactly, but something felt in the bones. The horses panicked, pulling at their reins, eyes rolling white. Riders struggled to hold them, but the animals wanted nothing to do with the circle.
Ellina's voice was barely a whisper. "It is coming through."
Siegfried tightened his grip on his sword. "What is?"
She did not answer.
Her eyes were fixed on the crack in the slab.
The light dimmed.
The shadow inside the spiral thickened.
And then the temperature dropped so sharply that Siegfried's breath misted in front of him.
Something was rising.
A tendril of darkness slipped through the crack, thin as smoke but moving with purpose. It curled upward, tasting the air, then split into two, then three, each strand drifting like ink in water.
Vinrah swore. "What in the gods' names is that?"
The tendrils recoiled at her voice, then snapped toward the nearest pillar, striking it with a sound like cracking ice. The stone flared with pale light, runes igniting along its surface.
Ellina inhaled sharply. "It is testing the boundary."
Siegfried stepped closer to her. "Can it break through?"
"It already has," she whispered.
The tendrils withdrew, sinking back into the crack.
For a moment, the clearing went still.
Then the slab split open.
A column of shadow surged upward. It was not a creature, not a form, but a presence. It rose like smoke caught in a windless room, twisting and folding until it towered above the stones. The air around it warped, bending the light, distorting the edges of the world.
The riders staggered back.
One dropped to his knees.
Another covered his ears, though there was no sound.
Siegfried felt pressure behind his eyes, a weight pressing into his skull.
Ellina stepped forward.
The shadow turned toward her, or seemed to. It had no face, no features, but the clearing darkened in its direction, as though acknowledging her.
A whisper slid through the air, soft as breath, cold as the grave.
Not words.
Not language.
But intent.
Ellina's eyes widened. "It knows me."
Siegfried grabbed her arm. "Ellina."
She did not pull away.
She did not move at all.
The shadow leaned closer, its form narrowing, focusing, condensing into something almost human shaped, a silhouette carved from night.
The whisper came again, clearer this time.
A single word.
A name.
Ellina's.
Her breath caught.
Siegfried's grip tightened.
The shadow reached toward Ellina.
Its form narrowed, condensing into a single tendril of darkness that stretched across the clearing like a hand made of night. The air around it warped, bending the light and pulling the warmth from the world.
Ellina did not move.
She stood perfectly still, breath shallow, eyes wide.
Siegfried moved before he even realized he had.
He stepped between them, sword raised, boots grinding against the stone. The shadow recoiled slightly, as if surprised by the interruption.
"Siegfried," Ellina whispered, "do not."
But he was already there.
The shadow hesitated, its form rippling. Then it lunged.
Siegfried lifted his free hand.
And the world ignited.
The shadow lunged for Ellina.
Siegfried stepped between them, sword raised, his other hand lifting with a certainty that came from long-buried instinct. He opened his palm.
Blue fire erupted from it in a sudden, blinding surge.
The riders cried out and stumbled back, shielding their eyes. The flame spiraled upward in a twisting column, bright enough to paint the broken stones in ghostly color.
Ellina stared at him, stunned. "Siegfried… what is this?"
He did not answer.
Because the moment the fire touched the air, something inside him cracked open.
Not a clear memory.
Not words.
Just the weight of a night he had spent years trying to bury.
Cold stone.
Silence.
Loss.
And the rage that had once answered it.
The fire wrapped around his arm like a living ribbon, humming with a deep, ancient resonance. It did not burn him. It never had. It only waited.
The shadow struck the flame and recoiled violently, its form shuddering as though burned by something it recognized.
Vinrah shouted, "What is that? What is he?"
Siegfried kept his eyes on the creature. "Stay back."
The flame climbed higher, coiling along the length of his sword. The blade glowed with fierce brilliance, casting long, wavering shadows across the clearing.
Ellina's voice trembled. "Siegfried… you never told us you could do this."
"I did not intend to."
The creature hissed, silent but furious.
Hidden among twisted roots and blackened stone, the necromancer watched through a pool of dark water.
His voice rose in a low, cold murmur.
But no one in the clearing heard him.
Only the reader knows his words.
"Child of the Flame."
He leaned closer to the scrying pool, eyes narrowing with recognition.
"You survived."
The shadow in the clearing shuddered, reacting to the distant command, but Siegfried heard nothing. He only felt the creature recoil from him, shrinking from the fire.
The necromancer's voice deepened, dripping with hunger.
"We remember you."
The blue fire surged brighter, swirling around Siegfried like a living storm. The shadow unraveled at the edges, collapsing inward.
Siegfried raised his sword, the flame spiraling along the blade.
"Stay away from her."
The shadow vanished into the earth.
Silence fell.
The blue fire dimmed, curling back into his palm before fading entirely.
Siegfried stared at his hand, breathing hard.
Ellina approached him slowly, uncertainty in her eyes. "Siegfried… what are you?"
He looked away. "Someone who should have stayed hidden."
She reached out, hesitating before touching his arm. "You do not have to be afraid of us."
He did not answer.
Because the only fear he felt was that the past he had buried was no longer buried at all.
The clearing held its breath.
The last traces of blue fire faded from Siegfried's skin, leaving only the faint scent of scorched air and the uneasy silence of a forest that had seen too much. The broken pillars no longer glowed. The cracked seal lay dormant once more, as if nothing had stirred beneath it at all.
But everyone knew something had.
Vinrah sheathed her sword with a sharp, unsettled motion. "We should move. Whatever that thing was, it will not stay gone."
The riders murmured in agreement, their voices low, shaken. No one looked directly at Siegfried. Not out of fear, but because they did not know what they had witnessed, or what questions they were allowed to ask.
Ellina stepped closer to him, her expression soft but uncertain. "Are you hurt?"
"No."
His voice was steady, but his hand trembled before he forced it still.
She hesitated, searching his face for something he did not offer. "Then we should leave this place."
He nodded.
The company gathered themselves quickly, eager to be anywhere but the circle of broken stone. Horses snorted and pawed at the ground, anxious to escape the lingering tension in the air.
Siegfried mounted last.
As the group turned away from the ruins, the forest parted for them once more, branches shifting aside as though relieved to let them go.
But Siegfried looked back.
The clearing was still. Empty. Silent.
Yet he felt eyes on him.
Not from the trees.
Not from the earth.
From somewhere far beyond the forest's edge.
A presence watching.
Waiting.
Remembering.
He tore his gaze away and followed the others into the narrowing path, the weight of his secret heavier than it had ever been.
The forest closed behind them.
And the ruins slept again.