The Hollow stirred on the fourth night. Kaelira woke with her name echoing through the stones—not the name she bore now, but the one she once had.
Anira.
Elarin stood in the clearing, barefoot, her fingers dusted with old ash.
"It's time," she said.
Kaelira nodded, though her chest tightened.
"For what?"
"To remember."
---
They returned to the stream—the one that whispered. But this time, Elarin cut her palm and let her blood drip into the water. The stream shimmered gold, then black.
The Hollow answered. Mist thickened, swirled, and rose like hands from the earth.
"Don't fight it," Elarin said. "Let the memory have you."
Kaelira stepped forward.
And the world split open.
---
She stood in another life. Velvet skies. A palace of glass and thorns. A younger self, dressed in crimson, a crown of fire blooming on her head.
At her side—Dorian.
But not the Dorian she knew now. He was sharper then. More reckless. Still wearing the sigil of the Highblood guard. But his eyes… even then, they only softened for her.
---
"I shouldn't be here," he whispered in the memory.
Anira smiled. "And yet here you are."
He touched her hand, reverent. "You're promised to another."
Anira tilted her head. "Not by choice."
"You're a Flame-Bride. Your fate was sealed the moment you were born."
Anira's voice was soft. "Then let me steal a night that belongs to me."
And they did. Under stars and silence, they gave in to what they shouldn't have.
---
Back in the present, Kaelira gasped—but the vision dragged her under again.
Another flash.
The altar. Two girls kneeling. Anira and Elarin.
A priestess chanting.
"You must choose," the priestess said. "Only one may carry the flame. Only one may live."
Elarin looked at her sister.
And Anira whispered, "Take me."
But something shifted. The flame surged—toward Elarin. She screamed.
Anira lunged—
—and darkness.
---
When the memory ended, Kaelira collapsed beside the stream, shaking.
"I didn't want it," Elarin said behind her. "I didn't take it. It was given."
"But I remember now," Kaelira whispered. "I chose you. I tried to give you everything—and you still blame me."
Elarin's eyes were wet. "I don't blame you for surviving. I blame the world that made us choose."
---
Kaelira stood.
"Dorian was part of this too."
Elarin nodded. "He was meant to protect us. Instead, he loved you."
"And that love… cost us everything."
---
The sisters stared at one another. Wounds reopened. Truth revealed. A bond broken, reforged by pain. Kaelira looked to the sky.
"What do we do now?"
Elarin's eyes darkened.
"Now… we finish what we started."