The fire had consumed everything before I even woke.
Homes. Forest. People. Even the shrine.
I stood in the center of Elaran's ruins, barefoot, clothes singed, my breath visible in the oddly cold morning air. The sky was a bruised violet, and the air smelled of copper and soot. Around me, silence. Not the peaceful kind—this was the silence of something broken. Something… ended.
And on my finger, the ring.
Smooth black metal. Cold even in the fire. A single symbol etched in its surface: a crescent locked inside a circle, with a slit like an eye in the middle. It wasn't there before I wore it. Not that I remember.
"This is yours now, Erevan. Don't lose it," Aunt Mirelle had said."And whatever happens, never wear it while you sleep."
I didn't listen.I should have listened.
High above the valley, in a hidden observatory forged from obsidian and bone, a man watched the boy through an ancient lens.
His name was Sahl'Kharel, known to some as the Archivist of Broken Time. He had not blinked in over a century.
"It's begun," he whispered.
From the far side of the chamber, a woman cloaked in shadow stepped forward. Her eyes were stitched shut, but her steps were sure.
"The Veilborn awakens."
"And the veil unravels."
They looked down upon the boy standing in ashes.
"Does he remember?" she asked.
"Not yet. But he will. They always do."
I was eleven when the dreams started.
At first, they were just colors. Then shapes. A door made of bone. A wolf with no eyes. Stars that bled when I looked at them. Then voices—dozens, hundreds—speaking languages I didn't know but somehow understood.
The last dream before the fire was clear.
I stood in a circle of flame, surrounded by people wearing golden masks. One of them—taller than the others—held a blade made of smoke. He pressed it against my chest and whispered:
"The seal is cracking. The blood remembers. You are the last."
I woke choking on smoke.
And the world had changed.
They came for me before nightfall.
Three riders cloaked in bone-white leather, faces hidden behind porcelain masks. They didn't speak, only pointed toward the ring. When I refused to give it, one of them tried to cut off my hand.
He didn't get the chance.
The ring burned. Not like fire—more like light turned solid, twisting through the air and tearing the attacker apart in midair. Flesh peeled from bone, his scream swallowed by silence. The other two fled.
I stood there shaking, the smell of blood thick around me.
What was this thing?
What was I?
In the Echoes, deep beyond the mortal world, ancient watchers stirred.
Eyes opened beneath the sea.
Roots shifted in forgotten tombs.
And a whisper ran through the veil:
"He walks."
That night, I found what was left of Aunt Mirelle's cabin. Half-burned. Collapsed. But under the hearthstone, just like she said, was the box. Wrapped in leather, sealed with wax and twine.
Inside: a letter, a black journal, and a name I didn't recognize.
Erevan,If you're reading this, it means the ring woke up. And the fire came.It wasn't your fault. It never is. The ring doesn't destroy things—it reveals them. That fire was already burning.The world just didn't see it until you did.
You are Veilborn. That word will mean many things, some of them terrible. But it means you have a choice:Run. Or remember.
If you choose to remember, go to the Hollow City. Find the man with the silver eye. Show him the ring. He'll know what to do. If he doesn't kill you first.
I'm sorry, Erevan. I wanted more time.
Love, always—Mirelle.
I burned the letter.
I don't know why. Maybe I didn't want the words to be real. Maybe I didn't want the world to be real.
But deep down, I knew. There was no going back to normal. No returning to the boy I was.
The fire had changed me.
The ring had chosen me.
And the world was watching.
In a tower carved from the bones of the first god, a council of hooded figures passed around a shard of obsidian pulsing with red light.
"He wears it," said one.
"Too soon," said another.
"Not soon enough," said a third.
"The seal will break."
"The Veil will fall."
"And we... will return."
That night, I looked up at the stars and realized something terrifying.
They were staring back.
And they were waiting.
[END OF CHAPTER 1]