Kael had wandered these woods all his life, but today, something was different. The wind felt older. The silence, heavier.
He was following a sound he couldn't explain—a low hum, soft and warm, like a song trapped in the trees. It led him past familiar paths, beyond the last standing stones, to a clearing he'd never seen before.
At the center of it… fire.
Not wild. Not natural. It hovered above the ground like a living breath, golden and silent, burning without smoke or heat.
He reached out.
The moment his hand touched it, pain shot through his wrist—blinding, electric, alive. He dropped to the forest floor, breath caught in his throat, as a glowing spiral of flame burned into his skin.
A voice, soft as wind, echoed in his ears:
Flamebearer.
The mark pulsed with warmth.
Kael stumbled back, staring at his wrist in disbelief. Something ancient had chosen him. And from deep within the earth, something else had awakened—and it had felt him.
Far across the land, eyes
opened in the dark.