Chapter One: The Petalwind Ceremony
Part Seven
Date: Maelis 23, Year 204 PCR
Location: Cradle of Aegir – Legato Stronghold
Time: Midnight
The wind didn't rest.
Not out here.
It clawed against the cliffside like something alive—howling through fractured glyph windows and rattling the hollow stone bones of the stronghold.
Above, Buta stood unmoving, gaze locked on the black horizon beyond the Veil. Smoke rose from his hand in slow, curling lines, disappearing into the night like promises he never made.
He didn't open the scroll.
He didn't call a meeting.
He simply watched.
Waiting for the glyphs to speak first.
Below, Zephryn thrashed in his sleep.
No sound came from his throat, but his body twitched with quiet violence—arms shuddering, fingers curled tight. The floor beneath him faintly glowed, Veilmark script flickering through the stone like firelight beneath skin.
Then—his glyph lit.
Not fully. Not violently.
But a pulse.
Infinite. Quiet. Remembered.
And somewhere in the dark between his breath, he whispered:
"Solara…"
Selka sat across the hall, her eyes open, staring into nothing.
She didn't sleep. She hadn't in days. Not since the orb.
The hum of Zephryn's glyph pulled her eyes toward him. Not with surprise. But with recognition.
She rose.
Buta finally moved.
He walked the length of the upper hall in silence. Every footstep echoed off walls that hadn't heard rhythm in months.
He descended into the training chamber.
It wasn't a room. It was a pit—open air, glyph-lined walls, wind rushing through a broken skylight above. At its center sat a single slab of stone shaped like a pulseplate—meant for resonance sparring.
He lit three glyph torches around it, each one flaring a different color:
Crimson. Azure. Ash-white.
Then he called out—quiet, sharp.
"Legato. Wake."
They came fast.
Kaelen first, shirt half-off, dragging his boots.
Yolti behind him, rubbing her eyes.
Selka already walking.
Zephryn staggered last, pulse still thrumming under his skin.
They stood in a rough circle.
Buta didn't face them. He stayed in the center.
"You think that ceremony made you Resonants?"
"It didn't."
He finally turned, eye glinting in the half-light.
"It named you.
It didn't shape you."
He pointed to Zephryn. "What is your power?"
Zephryn opened his mouth. Nothing came out.
"Exactly."
Buta tapped his foot against the pulseplate, and the glyph beneath it sang—just once. A single note.
"What you call Veilmarks—those are tools.
What lives beneath them… that's your Essence."
He walked between them now, voice sharpening.
"Each of you carries a pulse buried beneath your name. A frequency that doesn't just channel energy… it remembers who you are."
"Resonant Essence is not raw power. It's song."
He raised a hand and pointed to Yolti.
"Essence: Water.
Frequency: Weaving flow.
Form: Unknown."
To Kaelen:
"Essence: Fire.
Frequency: Shattered tempo.
Form: Still hidden—likely fury-class."
To Selka:
He paused.
"Essence: Ice.
Frequency: Suppressed.
Form… awakening."
To Zephryn?
He didn't speak.
He stared at him for a long moment. Then said:
"Yours sings too loud for this place."
Kaelen crossed his arms. "So what? We're made of music now?"
Buta stepped up fast—so fast Kaelen didn't flinch, he stumbled.
"Yes."
"And if you don't learn your rhythm—
you'll burn out your glyph before it ever learns your name."
The room grew quiet.
The wind howled again above them. And somewhere deeper in the stronghold… a distant chord rang out.
Not from a torch. Not from stone.
From Lumyra's direction.
She stood at the corridor's edge again, watching.
This time she wasn't cleaning.
She was listening.
"Tomorrow," Buta said, "you'll face your first song trial.
No glyphs. No spells. Just you. Your essence.
Let's see what answers."
He looked at Zephryn last.
"Because something already has."