The forest floor cracked beneath Elowen's feet.
Not from fire.
Not from war.
But from memory.
Roots pulled apart like ancient jaws, revealing a spiral of stone steps descending into darkness. Cold air rose from below, smelling of rain and something older—like the breath of a world long buried.
Ashen limped to her side, blood still wet on his lip. "That path wasn't here before."
"It was always here," Elowen whispered, her voice steady. "We just forgot."
The runes on her spear pulsed softly. Not with warning—but with recognition.
This place knew her.
And it was calling her home.
They descended in silence.
The deeper they went, the stranger the walls became. What began as rough earth turned smooth and polished, etched with symbols that shimmered faintly in the dark.
Not runes of magic.
But of history.
Ashen paused, brushing a hand over one of them. "These are names," he said. "Generations of daughters. Bloodline carved into stone."
Elowen traced her fingers along one, half-erased by time.
Seris.
She swallowed hard. "They tried to erase her. But even stone remembers."
At the bottom, the air changed. Thick. Cold. Still as death.
They entered a vast cavern. At its center stood a giant, leafless tree, its bark as black as midnight, its roots sunken into a pool of silver water.
It was unlike any living tree.
It was dead… and yet, dreaming.
And beneath its gnarled trunk rested a stone altar.
Ashen stepped back. "This is a Grave-Tree," he breathed. "A sacred one. The kind only planted when a god dies."
Elowen moved toward it, drawn by a pull in her chest that wasn't her own.
You were born of fire, the voice inside whispered.
But your roots lie in ash.
The altar was covered in dust and broken bones.
Elowen placed her hand upon it.
Pain flared up her arm—not sharp, but deep. Like a cold thread being pulled from her heart.
Images rushed through her mind:
A young Seris cradling a newborn child.
A temple hidden in roots.
Betrayal. Fire. A scream that split the Stillwoods in half.
And then… a choice.
Seris had not simply vanished.
She had buried her magic. Hidden it in a child.
A bloodline carried in silence, generation after generation…
Until Elowen.
She pulled her hand back, trembling. "I was never lost. I was hidden."
Ashen's eyes widened. "Seris didn't fail. She planted you like a seed."
Elowen turned toward the Grave-Tree.
Its black bark began to flake away, revealing silver veins beneath. The pool around it stirred.
And from the roots, a shape began to rise—thin, feminine, cloaked in mist.
A spirit.
She had no face. No voice. But Elowen knew her.
"Mother," she whispered.
Not the woman who raised her.
But the one whose blood she bore.
Seris.
The spirit extended her hand.
Elowen stepped forward. Pain lanced through her chest as the silver waters climbed her legs and wrapped around her body like a second skin.
Flashes of power burned in her mind—fire, root, and storm.
And then a whisper, quiet but final:
"You are the last seed.
But you will not be the last flame."
The spirit vanished.
The waters stilled.
Elowen opened her eyes.
The spear in her hand had changed.
Now carved with two names: Seris and Elowen.
A line drawn across centuries.
Ashen knelt beside her. "Are you ready?"
She nodded.
"For what?"
"To burn what must be burned. And to grow what must be born."
As they climbed from the hollow, the forest trembled again.
Not in fear.
But in awakening.