Astraxian stirred in the ashes, breath shallow, limbs slow to obey. He had wrested back control of his body—but not his soul. That remained drowned in a grief so vast it had swallowed him whole. It had muted his long, endless existences.

  He knelt in the dirt, spine bowed, arms limp at his sides. Around him, the wind moved sluggishly, dragging soot across the blackened plain. His fingers trembled faintly, like broken instruments long out of tune. Black eyes stared into the soil, vacant. His skin, once unmarred, now bore the fine silver filigree of sorrow—etched grief, delicate and damning.

  He couldn’t lift his head.

  A tremor passed through him. Not from cold, but from the weight. The memory of her grief still clung to him, heavy as chains. Silent tears slipped down his cheeks, unbidden, catching faint light like dying stars.

  He had hurt her.

  Far more than he’d ever feared. He had known—of course he had known—she would never love him as she once had. But this?

  There had been no love in what she gave him.

  Only grief.

  Betrayal.

  Fury.

  And hate.

  He had shattered his only salvation.

  The only blessing in the long night of his existence.

  The only thing he had ever truly, irrevocably loved.

  Why go on now?

  What remained, if she loathed every fragment of who he was?

  A laugh slipped past his lips. Low. Bitter. Almost a sob dressed in mockery. It bloomed into a quiet chuckle.

  Then silence.

  He bowed forward until his brow pressed into the ash-blackened earth, his breath stirring the soot.

  A breath. Two. Three.

  And then his palm slammed downward, cracking the ground in a burst of soot and stone.

  He rose. Slowly. Each movement scraped against the edge of exhaustion. Akasha lingered nearby, her presence a vague silhouette. Ahrimanos was already vanishing into the distance, that strange, deliberate gait as measured as death itself.

  Astraxian lifted his gaze to the sky.

  He closed his eyes. Drew in a single breath.

  And with the exhale, he let everything go.

  Emotion burned away in the furnace of resolve. His shoulders loosened. His face flattened into something unreadable.

  When he opened his eyes, the darkness was fading, replaced by a cold, gleaming gold—metallic and sharp, like the edge of a blade held too long in fire.

  The shadow-web that had marred his skin ebbed, pulling inward like a receding tide.

  But something had changed.

  There was an edge now.

  Sharp enough to cut through the bones of reality.

  He felt more dangerous. More distant.

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  As if he had just shed the final part of himself that might have stayed his hand.

  He walked toward Akasha.

  Step. Step. Step.

  She leaned back, barely noticeable—but enough. Instinct. Fear. Though she mastered herself, it still showed in the tension at her jaw, the way her hand twitched near her blade.

  He stopped beside her.

  His tone was almost light, deceptively casual.

  “Didn’t you say you had resources?”

  She didn’t speak.

  “I need you to do something.” His voice carried no urgency, no warmth. Only certainty. “Keep an eye on Elena. If anyone starts looking into her, let me know immediately.”

  A beat.

  “Do not engage. No matter what.”

  His gaze drifted past her, toward the path Death had taken.

  “Do this, and I’ll refine your power. Hone it until none in the Six Realms dare stand against you.”

  He walked on.

  Akasha remained where she was, still as sculpture. His words lingered, curling through her like smoke.

  But it was his voice that haunted her most.

  It hadn’t sounded like one man.

  It had sounded like many.

  The bowl trembled in Elena’s hands as she wove between crowded tables, careful not to spill the stew’s steam or scent. The wooden floor groaned beneath her steps, grounding her in the smallest of ways.

  Lanternlight flickered across the low-beamed ceiling, casting warped shadows over the walls.

  She set the bowl in front of a hunched traveler, his cloak patched and stained, the hilt of a dull dagger protruding from his belt. He grunted thanks, already reaching for the bread, and she turned away without a word.

  Back and forth she went. Endless tables. Endless bowls. But she welcomed the monotony.

  The work was simple. Predictable. Comforting—if only because nothing else was.

  Behind the counter, Garron nodded toward her. “Two more for the back table,” he said, sliding the bowls forward across a counter chipped and darkened by age.

  She nodded. She always nodded.

  Even her name felt strange now, when spoken aloud.

  .

  It was all she had.

  She’d woken up in a spare bed upstairs. No memory. No marks. No trail.

  Just her name. Elena.

  Garron said they found her sleeping on the steps. No wounds. No blood. Just there.

  The first thing she remembered was the scent of stew and the weight of a blanket over her shoulders.

  A healer had come. Old. Cloud-eyed. Hands like gnarled branches. She examined Elena for a long time before shaking her head.

  “Nothing wrong that I can see,” she had said.

  Garron had offered her the room, the job, and something that almost resembled safety.

  And she’d taken it.

  Because what else could she do?

  “Here you go,” she murmured, placing a bowl at the last table. She didn’t meet their eyes.

  She never did.

  From behind the bar, Garron watched her. Concern? Caution?

  She didn’t ask.

  She didn’t want to know what he saw when he looked at her.

  Instead, she kept moving.

  The weight of plates, of bowls—these she understood. They made more sense than the gaps in her mind.

  Later, she stepped out into the city.

  Twilight clung to the air like cobwebs.

  Buildings of gray stone loomed around her, their facades stained with soot and rain. Narrow chimneys exhaled faint smoke. Many windows were fogged or shuttered, but a few flickered with hearth light. Shops lined the crooked street: a butcher’s stall where strings of meat hung like wet rope, a tailor’s cramped storefront with faded robes sagging in the display, their colors dulled to wilted violets. A fruit vendor sat beneath a moth-eaten awning, their produce bulbous and dark, as though grown under moonlight.

  The street was hushed but not empty.

  Two women walked arm in arm, murmuring in a tongue she didn’t know. A hunched man swept dust from his doorstep—again and again, though the wind undid his work. A cloaked figure leaned against the wall, smoke glowing blue in the fading light.

  Elena stood among them. Watching. Waiting.

  Hoping.

  One face. One voice. One flicker of recognition.

  But none came.

  They passed her like wind through leaves. No one paused. No one looked twice.

  So she walked.

  Street after street. Sign after sign. Stone after stone.

  Searching.

  For memory. For meaning. For herself.

  But the city offered nothing.

  Only silence.

  Eventually, she found herself in a small square. A fountain stood at its center, long dry. She sat on its edge. Waiting again.

  The stillness gave her no answer.

  She sighed.

  She hadn’t known what she expected.

  A single bell rang far off, slow and mournful.

  Elena didn’t look up.

  The world was full of sounds she no longer answered.

  In time, she rose and walked back toward the inn. Her footsteps echoed behind her—soft, steady.

  And alone