Caleb had always believed the world could still sing, even when it was broken.
The remains of the village held no music of their own. Only cracked earth, silent walls, and scorched timbers surrounded him now. But within his hands, the violin hummed with life. His fingers danced across the strings, coaxing melody from memory and loss alike. He sat alone on a makeshift stool fashioned from fallen beams, framed by crumbling stone and soft emberlight. The night's cold air clung to him, and above, the sky was a sea of darkness pierced only by stars—and one, strangely dim yet pulsing.
A dark star.
He hadn't noticed it before. Not really. It didn't belong.
But Caleb's attention was on the notes flowing from his instrument. He closed his eyes and let the bow glide. The music wasn't cheerful—it was longing shaped into sound. Something in him needed to reach beyond the ruins, to speak into the silence.
He didn't know who might hear it.
Avesari did.
Hidden by the veil of the Mirrored Weave, she stood watching from a perch just beyond his sight. The spell shimmered faintly now, faltering with the exhaustion of her wounded state. The music... it stirred something too deeply buried. It called to her core, the remnant of divine light that even her Fall had not entirely extinguished.
She took a step forward, caught in the pull of fate.
But then she stopped.
No. He wasn't ready. And neither was she.
She vanished in a shimmer of fading light and smoke.
A heartbeat later, someone else approached the ruins.
"You've been playing for hours, you know."
Caleb's bow faltered slightly at the sound. He opened his eyes.
Serenya stood at the edge of the collapsed path, cloaked in charcoal and crimson, her expression calm, unreadable. Books and old scrolls were strapped across her back, half-concealed beneath her travel cloak.
"Didn't hear you come in," Caleb muttered, lowering the violin. "Thought I was alone."
"You weren't. Not entirely," she said, her voice quiet.
He frowned but didn't question it. Serenya always spoke in half-truths and riddles. Daughter of the Silent Chronicler, guardian of secrets too ancient for most minds to hold, she carried the weight of histories long buried. And yet, to Caleb, she was just a friend. One who often disappeared for weeks, only to reappear with cryptic warnings and a knowing look in her eyes.
Tonight, she was watching him closely.
"That melody... it wasn't just music," she murmured. "Something stirred. You felt it too, didn't you?"
He hesitated. "It felt like... something was listening."
Serenya stepped closer. Her eyes flicked briefly to the sky, and for the first time, Caleb noticed the tension behind her calm.
"Something was. Or someone. The council will want answers."
"What council?"
She didn't reply immediately. Instead, she held his gaze for a long moment. "They've summoned a gathering. In the ruins of Iskar's hall. They requested a performance. Your performance."
Caleb stood slowly. "Me? Why?"
Serenya looked away. "Because your music may be part of something... older. Something that's waking."
In the far distance, thunder rolled—yet there were no clouds in the sky. The dark star pulsed once more, dim light brushing the broken rooftops like a beacon.
Caleb didn't understand what was happening. But a feeling had taken root in his chest: anticipation laced with dread.
The world was shifting.
And someone was listening.
---
Unseen above, Avesari hovered beneath a veil of shadow and broken will. Her wings—fractured and spectral—flickered with each heartbeat. Her Mirrored Weave, already straining, faltered as the boy played. The music tore through her in a way she had not prepared for. There was something true in it. Something raw. It called not to her ears, but to the faded grace still buried in her core.
She had told herself she would only watch. That he was not ready.
But the threads were already binding.
He played on, preparing for the Council's gathering, unaware, as a pulse of warmth—unmistakably divine—spread outward from him. It wasn't holy light. It wasn't magic. It was something older than either. A resonance.
Below, hidden among shadows, Serenya paused in the middle of the shattered cloister where the council was still convening. Something had changed. She felt it—not as a scholar, not as a Chronicler's daughter, but as a vessel of old truths. A ripple had crossed her path, a shift in the script of reality.
She stood quietly, feigning attention to the droning arguments of the council elders. Their words clashed over doctrine, territory, fear. None of them noticed the shift. None except one.
Serethiel.
The elder's gaze had snapped toward the plaza just before the tremor began, his fingers twitching at his side as if grasping something unseen. A flicker of recognition crossed his features—followed by something colder. Calculation.
He excused himself and slipped into the ruins, cloak trailing behind like a shadow.
Serenya watched him go, heart beating faster.
Above it all, Avesari saw him move. She felt the poison in him, the purpose wrapped in celestial mimicry. This one served the fallen light—the corrupted will of a greater traitor.
She followed.
"You've grown soft, little star," he muttered, voice laced with cruel mirth.
What unfolded next would be carved into silence and dust.
---
Ash clung to Caleb's boots as he walked the worn path toward the heart of the ruins.
Ancient stone corridors framed by twisted iron and scorched glass led to a place few civilians were ever allowed: the inner sanctum of the Faithbound Council. That he had been summoned at all was nothing short of a miracle—or a trap. He wasn't sure which.The violin case at his side felt heavier than usual.He stepped into the broken cathedral-like chamber, its high ceilings supported by fractured pillars of luminous crystal. Faint light flickered from the core lamps, powered by prayer and old technology, casting long shadows across the rows of stone benches. At the far end, the council sat in a crescent formation. Some elders were stoic, their faces veiled or hooded. Others bore the remnants of celestial favor—tattoos that shimmered faintly, or eyes that seemed to glow faintly in the dim light.Caleb bowed slightly, unsure of the protocol. He had been invited as a musician. A bearer of art, not judgment.
A tall man stood as he entered—Serethiel. Council Elder. Advisor. Unknown to Caleb, he was also something else entirely: the hidden agent of a fallen archangel.
"You honor us, Caleb," Serethiel said, voice smooth as silk and just as binding.
"In these times, music is more than art. It is a form of remembrance. Please… play."Caleb nodded, lifting his violin. He didn't speak—his words were in the music. The bow met string, and the first aching notes resonated through the chamber. The melody unfurled slowly, rich and full of longing. It was a hymn he had once heard whispered through a memory—though he could not say where. The notes carried weight. Ancient. Raw. And as they echoed, something shifted in the room. The air grew thicker. The light—brighter. Or perhaps dimmer. Hard to say.
Avesari, veiled in a broken weave high above the council chamber, felt the pull in her core. The boy's song wasn't merely beautiful, it echoed of prophecy. Of things Heaven had sealed and buried. Of a choice long delayed.
She gasped as her form faltered briefly, the healing of her celestial core still incomplete. Her grip on the weave slackened.And Serethiel noticed. He smiled. Not the smile of a kind man. Something darker.
"Remarkable," he said aloud, but not to Caleb. He was speaking to the others. Or maybe to himself.
"This... is the spark."