PROPHECY – When shadow crowns the sunless sky,And five flames flicker in scattered lands,
One with ember's mark, born of fire and ash;
One of frozen blood, upon a throne of thorns;
One with silver tongue, where truth bends to gold;
One with iron fist, where valor yields to rule;
One of spirit's breath, where root and wind remain.
Together they shall shatter blood and chain,
But only one shall rise as silence reigns.
The forge of fate demands one fire.
And all but one must fall.
PROLOGUE — Sulfur and smoke cloaked the skies the day the village fell.
Ash drifted on the wind — soft as feathers, yet hot enough to sear skin. Sear had lived long enough in Volkara to know the difference between a blaze born of volcanoes and one lit by human hands. He tasted it now: iron, soot, and the sharp tang of burning blood.
This fire was not of the earth.
He dropped the bundle of herbs in his arms and sprinted toward the rising smoke, boots sliding on blackened dune. His fingers clutched the emerald medallion that hung from his neck on a frayed leather cord — a family heirloom, and a symbol of his oath.
Please. Let him be safe.
The smoke thickened as he crested the ridge. What had been a small village nestled near a quiet vent was now a ruin of obsidian rubble and flame-scarred stone. Homes collapsed. Bone and glass crunched beneath his boots.
Sear called out, once, twice — the boy's name echoing into the dead air.
No answer. Just the crackle of fire and the silence that followed it.
Then he found him.
A child's body lay near the square, small and broken. The mark was unmistakable — a curling flame etched into the flesh above the right eye. The ember's sigil.
The child of prophecy.
The one he was sworn to protect.
Dead.
Sear knelt beside the boy, his broad shoulders hunched, fists clenched around the medallion. His jaw locked. No tears came. Not here. Not now.
He had failed.
Then — a scream.
Thin. Human. Still alive.
Sear snapped up and saw movement through the haze: a figure in a green cloak darting between the shattered buildings, a curved crimson blade flicking into view beneath one sleeve. A flash of gold in the other — coin or command.
He ran after them, but his legs were heavy with dread. The assassin vanished into the smoke before he could close the gap.
Gone. A blade-for-hire from foreign lands. Whoever sent them wanted the prophecy extinguished.
I was too slow.
But another sound pulled him back — a whimper, faint and fractured.
He turned and followed it to a collapsed archway, where a small figure crawled free of the rubble. A boy — soot-streaked, bronze-skinned, no more than six. His tunic was torn, his face smeared with ash and tears.
A burn curled around one eye. Red. Raw. In the shape of a twisted flame.
Not a birthmark. A wound. But to the untrained eye…
Sear knelt beside him. The boy didn't flinch. Just looked up, silent and wide-eyed.
"What's your name?" Sear asked, voice low and rough.
"…Terin," the boy whispered.
Sear stared at him, then at the scar. He knew this wasn't the child from the prophecy — the real one had been hidden carefully, known only to a few. But the villagers didn't know that. They had only heard of the ember sigil.
And now, the prophecy was dead.
Unless…
Sear gathered the boy in his arms.
"You're safe now," he said. "You'll come with me."
Terin said nothing. He didn't ask questions. He just held on.
As they walked away, smoke curling behind them, the medallion at Sear's chest pulsed faintly with warmth.
Behind them, the lie began.