Sela pursed her lips. "Alright. This is where we split." She reiterated the plan in terse whispers: She, Zara, Nima, Farrah would circle eastward and make a bold entrance near the most obvious slope path, drawing the cultists' focus. Brynna would station herself on a western promontory with her bow, ready to snipe or charge as needed. And Connor with Thea would sneak down a secondary path on the north side, slipping into the crater while the enemy's eyes were elsewhere.
Each nodded in understanding. There were no lengthy goodbyes or speeches. But as they parted ways with final clasped forearms and brief embraces, much was conveyed in silence—gratitude, love, and the unspoken hope that they would all reunite when it was done.
Thea stayed glued to Connor's side as they crept along a cleft in the northern rocks. Brynna gave him one last encouraging salute before she ghosted away into the shadows of an outcrop, her armor wrapped in cloth to mute its shine.
Connor and Thea descended carefully, sometimes crawling to avoid silhouetting themselves. The crater's edge loomed nearer, and the peculiar energies intensified. Pebbles on the ground trembled occasionally and lifted an inch or two before plunking back down. Thea watched one with wide eyes. "This place is alive," she whispered.
Connor just nodded. He felt it too. A pressure in his skull that wasn't pain but a sensation of being probed, like fingers drumming on the edges of his mind. Steady… he told himself, inhaling and exhaling slowly as they hugged the rocks.
Then, echoing faintly across the vast bowl, they heard it: a horn blast, and distant shouts. Sela's diversion had engaged the cultists on the far side. Connor prayed his friends were holding their own. Every instinct told him to hurry, to finish this so he could aid them. But he forced a patient pace. A reckless sprint now could spell disaster if he blundered into a trap or the entity unprepared.
Thea tapped his shoulder and pointed. Ahead, through a gauzy bank of violet mist, they could make out structures—tents? No, ruins. As they crept closer, the mist parted to reveal the remnants of what looked like an encampment and an ancient site combined.
Torn canvas tarps fluttered from poles—evidence that the cultists had established a base here recently. Bedrolls, supply crates, and ritual paraphernalia lay strewn about as if abandoned in haste. Perhaps when Sela's team attacked, the occupants of this camp rushed off to join the fray.
But dominating the scene was something older and more ominous: a circle of standing stones carved with seven-pointed star symbols, much larger and more weathered than any cult handiwork. It seemed the cult had set up around this prehistoric stone circle at the crater's center—maybe built by some long-dead civilization that had witnessed a similar event ages past.
At the very center of the stone ring was a depression—a small secondary crater within the crater. And within that depression, Connor saw what at first looked like a still pond of mercury, perfectly reflective. A pool of liquid light.
No, not liquid. A shimmer, a presence—flat yet three-dimensional, a disc of swirling radiance about ten feet across, hovering inches above the ground. It cast no shadow. As Connor and Thea edged nearer, they noticed it gently undulating, surface rippling as if stirred by an invisible breeze or something from beneath.
Connor's breath caught. Every sense in him screamed that this was the source. That pulsing he'd felt—it emanated from here. The Echo…
He motioned Thea to stay low behind a toppled crate at the circle's edge. They peered over it, scanning for any remaining cultists guarding this holy of holies. None immediately visible. The battle must have drawn them all away for now.
And yet, Connor did not feel alone. Far from it. An overwhelming sensation of presence saturated the air, centered on that shining pool. It was as if a million eyes were suddenly upon him, though physically nothing stirred.
He swallowed, mouth dry. Thea looked to him, awaiting a cue, face taut with awe and apprehension. Connor gave a slight nod and stepped forward into the stone circle, one careful foot after another, until he was at the rim of the strange shimmering pool.
From up close, he could see shifting images in the mercurial surface. His own reflection was there, bent and wavering. But as he gazed, it wasn't just him—other shapes flickered across the silver sheen, impossible to pin down: landscapes, starfields, faces… He sucked in a sharp breath. For the briefest moment he thought he saw his mother's face, then Marisela's, then Sela's, all in the span of a heartbeat. Echoes of memory? Or bait, designed to lure him closer?
Behind him, Thea rose slowly from cover, unable to resist the sight. She drew nearer but kept a respectful distance, not entering the stone circle. "Connor," she whispered, "do you feel that? It's like it's looking at us."
Before he could respond, a voice sounded—a low, resonant murmur that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. It wasn't heard with the ears so much as felt inside the skull, like an idea spoken directly into their minds.
"At last… you have come."
Connor's heart seized. Thea clamped her hands over her mouth to stifle a gasp. Both of them turned instinctively, expecting to see someone behind. But the crater was empty save for them.
It was the pool—the voice came from the pool.
Connor stepped closer to it, boots crunching on crystalline sand. He tried to keep his voice steady. "Who are you?" he called softly.
The reflective surface of the pool began to churn, swirls coalescing into vague shapes of light. Connor's reflection disappeared into a haze of brightness. The standing stones around them hummed, each rune carving lighting up with pale fire in response.
The voice came again, stronger this time, like a chorus layered over itself, male and female, young and old, all at once. "I have had many names. None in this tongue. You may call me Echo, if you must use a word."
Thea had crept to Connor's side now, her eyes huge. Connor felt her hand find his and squeeze, but he barely registered it, transfixed by the spectacle in front of him.
Within the pool, the light swirled faster, rising. An amorphous column took shape, extending upward from the liquid glow—humanoid in outline but shifting, as if made of mist and starlight.
Connor could see what looked like arms, a suggestion of a head and shoulders. But instead of a face, the front of the head was a vortex of luminescence, a constantly changing visage. One moment it hinted at angular, alien features; the next it flickered to mirror something disturbingly familiar: for a split second, Connor was staring at a ghostly version of his own face.
He recoiled slightly, and the figure's face became featureless once more, an empty light.
A gentle sound emanated—like the echo of distant whale-song mixed with a sigh. The being took a step (or what passed for a step) forward, hovering just above the ground within the stone circle. It regarded the two humans before it.
"So long… since I had form," it said, "so long since I touched a mind like yours, Connor."
The sound of his name spoken by this entity froze Connor's blood. It knew him. Not just as the cult's target, but truly knew him. The way it said his name… with an almost intimate familiarity.
Thea was trembling; she whispered, "How does it know—?"
"Why do you know my name?" Connor said hoarsely, fighting to keep his voice from shaking.
Within the pool, the light swirled faster, rising higher up the column of the Echo's form. Connor felt a pressure in his skull, like fingers rifling through pages of his memories. Images flashed in his mind unbidden: the bushfire on Earth, the roaring flames… the pain and clarity in those final moments as he shoved the girl out of harm's way… his own death.
Tears sprang to his eyes at the sudden vivid recollection. The Echo made a soft sound almost like compassion.
"I saw you then," it said, "in the between-place, when fire took you. A brave soul, untethered and shining. Through the rift I came and clung to you, little ember, carried along your wake. You brought me here."
Connor's mind reeled. The roaring in his ears could have been the memory of the fire, or the blood rushing with shock. This… thing… hitchhiked on his death? Followed him through whatever cosmic door delivered him to this world?
He remembered those early days in Aurelia, Marisela's theory that the starfall and his arrival were intertwined. Now here was the proof, from the star's own echoing ghost.
Thea looked at Connor, confusion and dawning understanding in her expression as she pieced together what she could from the Echo's words. She knew he was from "elsewhere" but not the details. Now was hardly the time to explain, and it seemed the Echo was doing it anyway.
"I… carried you here?" Connor said hoarsely, barely believing his own words.
"In a fashion," the Echo replied. "I was but an impression, scattered and weak. When the star that brought me shattered, I became stuck—diffused in this crater, half-aware. I needed a focus… an anchor. It has taken time, but your presence nearby—your resonance—stirs me to coherence once more."
The swirling form drifted nearer until it was only an arm's length from Connor. Thea instinctively raised her dagger in her free hand, teeth gritted.
The Echo's head tilted, as if noticing Thea for the first time. The chorus of its voice gentled. "Peace, child. I mean no harm to you. My interest is in the one who bridges worlds."
It extended a nebulous hand toward Connor. There were flickers inside its semi-transparent limb—glints of starry sky, as though its form contained a window to the cosmos.
Connor's legs felt rooted, equal parts terror and enthrallment. The being radiated a curious warmth that wasn't physical; it plucked at his emotions directly, alternating waves of comfort and dread.
"What… what do you want with me?" he managed.
Before the Echo answered, a burst of sound crackled from behind them—a flare of gunfire from the battle. A streak of red alchemical flame arced into the crater sky on the far side. The Echo's form snapped its head in that direction, the light in its face flaring brighter for an instant.
"They disrupt the aether with their petty skirmish," it said, almost petulantly. "The Daughters, those zealots… they served to hasten your coming, but now they are noise." There was an unmistakable disdain in its tone.
The cultists—noise to it. Tools, nothing more.
Thea took the moment of distraction to whisper urgently to Connor, "We should destroy that thing—now, while it's focused elsewhere." She had her dagger, but clearly that wouldn't hurt this entity. Her other hand hovered near her pouch of throwing knives nervously.
Connor understood her fear, and part of him was inclined to lash out too. But he wasn't sure brute force would work—this wasn't a foe like any they'd faced. And… a quiet part of him didn't want to destroy it, not yet. It was the key to so many questions—about him, about the universe. Perhaps even a way home, if such a thing existed.
He gently squeezed Thea's hand in a gesture of patience. "Not yet," he breathed.
The Echo turned back to them, its attention refocused. "They wanted me to be their god," it said, almost amused. "All their rituals and blood spilled, thinking it would earn them my favor. Primitive minds." Its glowing head swiveled between Connor and Thea. "But I have no need for acolytes. I need only a conduit—a way to fully exist in this world. And you, Connor, opened that path once. You can open it again."
At that, Thea stepped in front of Connor, as if to shield him from the cosmic being. "He's a person, not some tool for you," she snapped, voice trembling but defiant.
The Echo's form flickered, and for a moment the face of Councilor René appeared within its glow—perhaps a memory of the last person who attempted to speak to it thus. "All people are tools for something, child," it answered dispassionately, then looked to Connor. "In your world, I was a mere phantom. Here, I can be real. Don't you see? We are two exiles, you and I."
Connor felt a pang at those words. Exile—yes, he'd felt that loneliness keenly since arriving. To hear it from this entity was almost empathic. But he couldn't forget what it had done—manipulating events, costing lives, all in pursuit of becoming "real."
He summoned strength into his voice. "And if I refuse to help you manifest? What then? Will you kill me? Force me?"
The Echo emitted a sound like wind chimes in a sigh. "Kill you? I would rather not. Without you, I remain diffuse. If you refuse… I suppose I continue as I have, half-aware for eons, or seek another bridge—perhaps that spirited friend of yours? She too has a glimmer, but not like yours…" It regarded Thea briefly; Thea snarled silently in response, blade at the ready.
"But truly, Connor," the Echo pressed, "why would you refuse? I offer knowledge. Power beyond what these petty sorceresses and guilds could dream. I have touched the stars, roamed the void between worlds. With me, your magic—our magic—would be limitless. You could reshape reality as you see fit. Right the wrongs of this world… perhaps even return to the one you lost."
Connor's heart thudded. The temptation slid into him like a velvet dagger. Return to the world he lost—Earth. Was that possible? This being might know the way, might have the power to tear open the path. He could see his family again, the life he left behind…
He realized his hand had drifted toward the Echo's outstretched luminous hand, as if of its own accord. He snatched it back, clenching his fist. Focus. The Echo's words resonated too well with his private yearnings—no doubt intentionally.
He steadied himself, recalling the faces of those who relied on him here: Marisela's kind smile, Sela's steady eyes, Thea's unwavering trust right at his side. This world had given him purpose, bonds he never imagined. He couldn't betray that for a honeyed promise.
Connor straightened, meeting the swirling gaze of the Echo. "I am not your pawn," he said, voice firm. "And I've no interest in godhood or whatever you seek. I just want to protect the people I care about—from you, if need be."
The Echo's form drew back slightly, the light intensifying. Something like disappointment rippled across the mental link. Then anger. The standing stones around the circle vibrated, humming discordantly.
"Foolish," the voice reverberated, deeper now, resonant enough that Thea winced in pain, covering her ears. "You would reject the cosmos for these gnats? You truly take after the primitive apes of this sphere."
Its form began to loft higher, expanding. The liquid light pool beneath bubbled violently, sending up tendrils of brightness that licked at the air. The ground shook—Connor had to widen his stance to keep balance.
The Echo was losing its gentle façade. "If you will not join willingly, you will still serve, Connor. When you die—here and now—your unraveling spirit will feed me fully into this realm. Perhaps not as elegant as bonding with you alive, but sufficient."
With that chilling pronouncement, the Echo raised a nebulous arm. The seven standing stones flared in response, and beams of crackling energy arced between them, forming a cage of light around the circle—around Connor and Thea. The trap sprung, too fast to avoid.
Thea cried out as one beam passed near her; even being grazed by its radiance made her arm numb and cold. Connor lunged to catch her as she stumbled.
He looked up, adrenaline surging. The Echo loomed above them like a glowing specter of doom, drawing power from the ritual stones that the cult no doubt prepared for this exact moment. The air within the cage crackled with multi-colored lightning.
Out of the corner of his eye, Connor saw a figure sprinting toward the circle from the mist—Brynna, drawn by the commotion, no doubt. Her face was a mix of horror and determination. She loosed an arrow from her bow; it sizzled through the energy barrier and evaporated into nothing before reaching the Echo.
The knight didn't falter—she kept running, tossing aside her bow and drawing sword. "Connor!" she yelled, desperation in her voice.
Inside the trap, Connor grimaced. He quickly pushed Thea behind him, sheltering her with his body as arcs of energy danced perilously close. One misstep into those beams and they'd be fried to ash, he suspected.
Options whirled through his mind. Attack with his power? He had to try, though he feared how his aether might react with the Echo's. But if he did nothing, they were done.
He met Thea's terrified gaze. Still, she managed a nod to him, trust implicit even now.
Steeling himself, Connor planted his feet. He summoned the deepest well of his magic, ignoring the throbbing protest in his skull from yesterday's overexertion. Fine tendrils of telekinetic force snaked out from his hands, probing the cage for any weakness.
The beams danced wildly under his attempt—he felt them pushing back, threatening to overload his senses with raw aether. The Echo poured more of its power through, almost contemptuous.
"Your tricks are useless here," it thundered. "Be still and die with some grace."
With a sweeping motion of its arm, the cage of light began contracting, the standing stones inching inward as if pulled by invisible chains. The space for Connor and Thea shrank step by step.
Outside the ring, Brynna reached the perimeter. She hacked at one of the megaliths with her sword, grunting with effort. The blade bit stone, chipping it, but a backlash of energy knocked her on her back with a pained cry, her sword flying from her grip. She lay dazed for a moment, the front of her armor scorched.
Seeing Brynna fall stirred something in Connor—a burning refusal to let any more friends be hurt by this creature. He felt anger rising to meet fear, crystallizing into resolve. The Echo wanted to feed on his spirit? It would find it not so easily devoured.
He thrust both arms out, palms facing the nearest energy beam. He thought of Sela's training, the steady breath, the metronome. He would shape this chaotic magic, or break against it trying.
Teeth gritted, Connor poured his telekinetic force into a focused wedge, aiming to pry open a gap in the cage. At first, nothing—just blinding pain as raw aether fought back, stinging his nerves. He roared in defiance, digging deeper, finding that quiet center amid the storm of power. The beam in front of him quivered, then split—just a tiny opening, flickering unstable.
"Thea, now!" he shouted.
Without hesitation, Thea sprang for the gap. Connor dove after, feeling the searing burn as stray tendrils of energy licked his arm and shoulder. Agony flared, but then they were out—sprawled on the ground outside the ring as the energy cage sparked violently behind them, trying to recombine.
The Echo gave a discordant screech, its featureless face snapping down toward the escaped prey. Brynna was already on her feet again despite a limp. She grabbed Thea by the arm, helping pull her further clear. Connor scrambled up, half his sleeve charred and skin beneath blistered, but adrenaline masked the pain.
The standing stones began to move, realigning under the Echo's will for another strike. Connor realized this might be their only slim chance while it reconfigured.
Brynna passed in front of him, interposing herself between Connor and the Echo with shield raised. "Go!" she barked over her shoulder. "I'll hold it off—"
Before she could finish, a sudden explosive crack rang out. One of the megaliths shuddered, a chunk blown off its side. Another crack—rifle fire! Across the crater, on a ridge, Connor spotted tiny figures: Zara and Sela's group. Sela stood braced, smoke rising from the barrel of a captured longrifle. They must have fought through the cultists and seen the entity. Now they were firing on the standing stones, rightly guessing those were channeling its power.
The Echo let out a howl that resonated in the very stones. The ground around the ring ruptured as it directed energy outward in a shockwave. Brynna planted her shield, but the concussive force flung all three humans—Brynna, Connor, Thea—back like leaves in a gale. Connor hit the dirt hard, winding him. Brynna was thrown onto her back again, and Thea tumbled to the side with a yelp.
Dazed, Connor rolled onto his side. His vision blurred; the world was ringing. He saw the Echo, no longer a vaguely human size, but towering now, a pillar of wrathful light in the center of the circle. The standing stones around it were cracking under strain, their ancient surfaces unable to fully contain the surging power.
It was going to unleash something catastrophic—Connor could sense the build-up like the mother of all thunderstorms about to break. Perhaps it meant to obliterate friend and foe alike in one blow.
Summoning the last reserves of his strength, Connor dragged himself to his knees. Brynna and Thea were stirring, alive but stunned. Sela and Zara were rushing closer from the ridge, but they'd never make it in time.
The Echo coalesced a brilliant orb of energy between its "hands," a crackling sun of lethal force. It pulsed once—Connor felt the hair on his arms rise, knowing the next pulse would be release.
He locked eyes with Thea, who watched him with fear and unshakeable faith even now. And then he looked beyond, to the Echo entity that hungered for freedom at any cost.
In that fractional moment, Connor made his choice. Agency and responsibility merged—his will honed to a single point. He might not stop this being permanently, but he could sure as hell derail it.
With a strangled cry, he flung himself forward, right back into the stone circle, straight toward the Echo. He extended one hand and, with every ounce of magic and life left in him, formed a counter-surge—a crude, unrefined blast aimed not to kill (he doubted he could) but to disrupt.
His outstretched palm slammed against the forming orb of energy in the Echo's grasp. For an instant, time froze. Connor's mind filled with blinding light and a cacophony of voices not his own—a sensation of standing at the edge of an infinite echo chamber.
Then came the detonation.
A soundless explosion of pure light engulfed the crater's center. Those watching saw only a white flash and fell back, covering their eyes. The standing stones finally gave up, each monolith bursting into fragments that rained down like meteor shards. The Echo's towering figure was swallowed in the glare alongside Connor's small form.
When the brilliance faded, a strange calm settled. The heart of the crater was a smoking ruin of shattered stone and glassed earth. The Echo entity was nowhere to be seen—dispersed? Destroyed? There was no way to tell yet. Only a faint shimmering haze remained, drifting like fading fireworks.
And at the very center lay Connor, motionless on his back, half-buried in fine glowing dust.
"Connor!" Thea screamed, stumbling to her feet and racing into the debris field towards him. Brynna limped after, face stricken. From the other side, Sela, Zara, and the guards sprinted as well, having witnessed the cataclysm in horror.
Thea reached him first. She fell to her knees beside Connor, frantically brushing dust and grit off his face and neck. He wasn't moving. "No no no… Connor, please," she sobbed, fingers trembling as she felt for a pulse at his throat.
A beat… then another. Faint, but present.
"He's alive!" she cried out, a giddy mix of relief and panic. His pulse was thready and he remained unconscious, eyes closed as if merely in deep sleep.
Sela's head snapped up. "Connor? Can you hear us?" She leaned over him.
His eyes fluttered, not fully opening yet. His breathing quickened into a shallow pant as consciousness tried to claw back. Thea continued murmuring to him softly, encouraging.
Finally, those grey-blue eyes she knew so well blinked open, unfocused but alive. Connor gazed up at Thea's tear-streaked face, then at Sela and Brynna leaning over, with Zara and the others forming a concerned ring.
He managed a weak, lopsided smile. "We… we did it?" he croaked, voice raw.
A collective laugh—half joy, half release of tension—rippled through the group.
"You did it, you unbelievable man," Sela said, laughing through a sob she no longer bothered to hide. She grasped his uninjured hand and squeezed firmly, like a proud parent might.
Connor winced (her gauntleted grip still strong), but he squeezed back lightly. "The Echo… gone?" he rasped.
They looked around. The unnatural glow had faded; gravity felt normal again; silence reigned aside from their voices and the distant caw of returning crows. It seemed, at least for now, the entity was indeed dispersed.
"Likely banished or weakened severely," Brynna said. "If it ever shows its face again, it will find us ready."
A shadow of uncertainty passed over Connor's face, as if he alone felt some lingering presence. But it melted into weary contentment as Thea brushed his forehead soothingly. He let his eyes close again, exhausted beyond measure, but now in the gentle company of allies.
Thea looked up at the others. "He'll be alright, but he needs rest. We should get him out of this crater."
"Agreed," Sela said. She stood and began marshaling tasks, back in Captain mode: secure the area, salvage any useful supplies, prepare a stretcher for Connor.
Nima and Farrah nodded and hurried to fetch poles and canvas from the abandoned cult camp. Zara offered Brynna a shoulder; the Dame finally allowed herself to lean, clearly nursing a twisted knee.
As they all set about these tasks, Thea stayed with Connor. She dabbed at a smudge on his face with a corner of her sleeve. He opened his eyes a crack to peer at her. "You're fussing," he mumbled, a ghost of his cheeky grin appearing.
"Hush," she chided gently, relief and affection flooding her tone. "I'm tending. Big difference."
He might have chuckled if it didn't hurt so much. Instead, he shifted painfully and managed to lift his good arm towards her. She understood, carefully lowering herself to hug him against her, mindful of his burns. His head rested on her shoulder; she could feel his heartbeat gradually steadying against her chest.
In that embrace, amid the ruins of the Echo's altar, all the strain and fear of the previous days finally eased from Connor's mind. They had done it—together. The cost had been great, but the worst outcome averted.
"We'll get you patched up," Thea whispered into his hair. "Then it's back to Asterholt, and maybe a year of sleep for you."
Connor mustered a faint "Sounds lovely," against her collar.
Within the hour, the companions were ready to depart the crater. They bore new scars—burns, bruises, a stitched cut above Brynna's brow, a sling for Sela's re-strained arm, and the invisible marks of trauma in their eyes—but they also carried something else: triumph tempered with hard-won wisdom.
At the crater's rim, Connor insisted on being helped to his feet to take one last look back. Propped between Sela and Zara, he gazed at the silent bowl beneath. The stone circle lay broken, the evil it channeled dissipated to the winds. Sunlight poured down innocently now, as if the land were just land again.
Yet Connor couldn't shake the sense that this wasn't truly an ending. Something of the Echo lingered—a whisper at the farthest edge of hearing, an imprint on his soul. Perhaps it always would, for it had twined with him in ways even he did not fully grasp. Echoes can fade, but do they ever truly die? he wondered.
He thought of the Echo's last look at him—was it rage or sorrow?—and what it had said about being two exiles. In slaying it (if that's what he'd done), had he also cut off his own road home for good? The possibility gave him a pang of melancholy and relief all at once. Home… perhaps that idea had evolved for him.
Thea appeared at his side, slipping an arm around his waist to support his weight, drawing him out of his reverie. "Ready?" she asked softly.
Connor turned from the crater, letting his gaze fall on Thea's freckled, determined face, then Sela's proud smile, Brynna's respectful nod, Zara's playful salute, and the others waiting to escort him. His family in this world.
He nodded, a smile touching his lips despite his fatigue. "Ready."
With that, they began the trek back up out of the crater, leaving behind the echo of the fallen star and stepping forward, together, into whatever dawn awaited beyond Act III.
As they crested the crater's rim, Connor cast one last glance over his shoulder. Far below, for just an instant, he thought he saw a faint glimmer in the air, as if some formless eye winked at him from the shadows of broken stones. Then it was gone.
Connor couldn't be sure if it was real or imagination. Perhaps an echo of a voice brushed his mind—warm, familiar, and oddly content: We will meet again, conduit.
He shivered, but Thea's hold tightened around him, and he turned away resolutely. If there were more echoes to come—be they of men or gods—he would face them on his own terms.
Act III closed under the midday sun, the heroes battered but unbowed as they journeyed back, their figures growing distant against the wild horizon. And though none could say what shadows or lights would play out in Act IV, one truth rang clear in Connor's heart with each step: in a world of echoes, he would strive to remain a voice of his own, forging fate from choice, and guided always by the friendships that had become his true home.