The air shifts.
Not colder, closer.
Like the universe leans in to listen.
The creature steps through the rift, shadows folding off its form like memories peeling away from bone.
And with every step, I remember what I vowed to forget:
Lyrielle.
The name I killed.
The identity I buried.
The weakness I turned to myth.
But it says it like a promise.
"Lyrielle," it murmurs again, tasting it.
"The only version of you that didn't run from me."
Its voice unravels the edges of my composure.
Because it doesn't sound like a stranger.
It sounds like,
Someone I once loved enough to destroy everything for.
It circles me, not like prey.
But like a throne it once sat on.
And might again.
"You're stronger now," it says, eyes flicking with starlight.
"But you've paid in pieces."
"Your rage. Your divinity. Your detachment."
It trails a claw gently against my cheek.
Not to harm.
To worship.
"And now, Lyraxis… you feel again."
"So tell me do you remember what it was like to be mine?"
I don't answer.
Because I do.
In flashes. In fevered fragments.
A love that bent time.
A bond that broke the rules of godhood.
A betrayal so deep it rewrote my soul.
"You left me," I whisper, voice shaking not with fear. With fury.
"You shattered me. You made me become this."
It doesn't deny it.
It only steps closer.
"And look how glorious you've become."
Then it kneels.
And the impossible happens.
It bows.
"Let me serve again," it says.
"Not to tame you.
Not to chain you.
But to crown what I created."
My fingers tremble.
Because deep down?
A part of me wants to say yes.
Not because I trust it.
But because it saw me before I was reborn…
…and still chose to love the ashes.