Not all fires burn with heat — some burn in silence, under skin and breath, where doubt takes root.
---
The ruins were quiet again.
Flames from the battle still hissed in cracked stone, and ash floated lazily through the air like forgotten snow. No more screeches. No more Hollowborn. Just the soft crackle of their campfire, and the weight of what they'd survived.
Elira sat sharpening her blade, silent, her gaze flicking toward Marini every few minutes. The new one moved with ease — too much ease — like someone who'd walked these ruins before. She seemed to know where the clean water flowed. She'd even found the sealed chamber beneath the stone archway and revealed a hidden cache of dried rootfruit and ancient bandage cloths.
"How did you know that was there?" Elira asked finally, keeping her voice level.
Marini smiled. "I've read maps of this place. Studied what little history remains about the Pillars before the War of Withering. The architecture sings if you listen long enough."
The boy looked up from the fire, curiosity sparking in his flame-lit eyes. "You studied this place?"
"I've studied a lot," Marini replied, tossing a small piece of fruit his way. "The world is full of forgotten truths, if you know where to dig."
Elira's grip tightened on her blade.
---
Elira didn't respond. She just kept sharpening, the metal edge sliding against the whetstone in slow, deliberate strokes. But inside, her thoughts stirred like a storm:
She moves like one of us… yet carries herself like something else.
She knows too much. She speaks like a leader. And the boy… he listens to her.
Across the fire, Marini sat cross-legged, cleaning one of her curved blades. The runes on it shimmered faintly — not magical, but old, etched in a script Elira couldn't read.
"You've fought Hollowborn before?" the boy asked.
Marini glanced up. "Twice. Once near the Fangs of Shorak, where the sky never clears. And once deep in the Rotwood Swamps." She paused, then added with a strange calmness, "I lost a brother in the first fight. A friend in the second."
Elira's eyes narrowed. Loss, she thought. Convenient pain. Worn like a badge.
"Then why keep chasing them?" the boy asked.
Marini looked at him — really looked — and for a moment, her smile vanished.
"Because vengeance gives me purpose. Same as it does for you."
The fire cracked. The air tightened.
Elira stood and sheathed her blade. "We've all lost something," she said, voice low. "But grief doesn't make you right."
Marini raised an eyebrow. "Neither does surviving."
The boy looked between them, quiet. Watching. The same way he watched the stars when they spoke in riddles. But this silence wasn't holy. It was tense. Sharp.
He rose. "We should rest. Tomorrow we move."
Marini gave a small nod and stretched out beside the fire, eyes closed in moments.
Elira remained standing, unmoving. Watching.
Not long after, when both of them seemed asleep, she whispered under her breath:
> "I don't know what you're hiding, Marini…
But I will find it before it finds us."
---
Ashix lay on his back, eyes open, staring at the ruined sky. Sleep drifted around him like mist — close, but never settling. Marini's words lingered in his mind, wrapping around thoughts he couldn't untangle.
Then — a whisper. Soft, from across the fire.
> "Kael… not yet… they still don't trust…"
He sat up fast. Heart pounding.
But Marini was still. Breathing slow. Asleep.
He stared for a while, unsure. Had she really said that? Or was it just the ghosts in his head, stirred by battle and fire?
He lay back down, eyes wide open.