Elira woke before the sky changed.
The shack was still dark — just pale threads of moonlight slipping through the slats. Ash sat near the door, back to the wall, eyes closed but not asleep. His breathing was slow. Controlled.
She watched him for a moment.
Then slipped on her boots, wrapped her cloak tighter, and stepped outside without a word.
Ash didn't move. he let her go.
The old chapel ruins looked worse in morning fog.
What little structure remained leaned to one side, like it was waiting for an excuse to fall. The altar was half-crushed under a beam, overgrown with moss. A rusted censer hung by a single chain, creaking faintly with each breeze.
Elira stepped over the collapsed archway and into what was left of the sacred space.
No birds. No wind. Just the cold breath of a forgotten place.
She knelt slowly in front of the altar.
Pulled her sleeves back.
And began.
Not loudly. Not theatrically. Just soft motions — fingers tracing old patterns in the air. A breath held at the wrong moment. A whisper in a forgotten dialect. Bureau-approved divine ritual sequence #17-A: Standard Re-Channel Initialization.
Nothing.
She tried again. Slower. With more focus.
No spark. No warmth. No presence.
Her lips tightened. She moved into the second sequence — one she'd never liked, too ceremonial — and shaped the divine field as best she could. Weaving threads, anchoring belief, invoking Sigil memory. Her gestures were perfect. Her voice didn't waver.
Still nothing.
No backflow. No ping from the divine plane. Not even the faint static of a severed link.
Just the weight of a world that didn't want her anymore.
Elira sat back on her heels. Hands trembling now.
Then she whispered it. The oldest invocation she knew — not from her training, not from the Bureau. From before.
"Mother of light… let the line return."
The wind didn't answer.
She slammed both palms against the stone.
The flow pushed back.
Just once — hard.
A searing pulse ran up her arms like boiling ink. Not divine backlash. Not punishment. Just rejection. Like the world didn't recognize her as anything but mortal.
Elira bit down on a cry.
She stayed kneeling, head bowed, breath shallow.
One of her palms was bleeding — scraped raw against a jagged stone edge.
She didn't notice.
"…why won't you answer me," she whispered.
The chapel gave no reply.
Not even an echo.
Ash had been watching since before she spoke.
He stayed just inside the treeline, shadowed by frost-covered brush, breath slow, posture still. Long enough to watch her start the rites. Long enough to know she wasn't faking.
He saw the moment her hands shook. Saw the blood.
He stepped forward.
Elira didn't turn.
"You always this bad at stealth?" she said hoarsely.
"You're the one who tripped the field," Ash replied.
She gave a weak laugh — brittle, cracked.
He walked slowly toward the edge of the ruined chapel. Didn't step into the sacred space. Just stood near the broken wall, arms crossed.
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
Then: "Whatever that was," Ash said, "it hurt you."
Elira didn't answer.
He waited.
She finally sat back, wiping her hand across her cloak. The blood smeared. Her voice, when it came, was small.
"I used to open gates with a word," she whispered. "I could read soul patterns from orbit. I managed thousands of threads at once. I was divine. Not powerful, not glorious — just… connected."
She looked at her hand again. Flexed her fingers.
"Now I can't light a candle."
Ash still didn't move.
"I don't know who I am without it," she said.
A pause.
Then, flat and quiet:
"Then figure it out."
She flinched. Just slightly.
"That easy, huh?" she muttered.
"No," he said. "But necessary."
She looked up at him. Not with anger — just rawness. "You think I'm pathetic dont you?"
"I think you're bleeding."
He tossed a cloth to her. She caught it on instinct.
"…Thanks."
He didn't reply.
They stood there a while longer — Elira sitting in the broken light, Ash just outside the edge of what used to be sacred.
Neither of them said another word.
They didn't need to.
They walked back without speaking.
The fog had begun to lift. Hearthmere looked the same — tired, patched, holding itself together by habit. But Elira walked slower now. Shoulders slightly hunched. Not defeated. Just… quieter.
Ash kept his usual pace. Still scanned corners. Still tracked movement. But he glanced at her once. Then again.
She didn't notice.
At the Guild, a boy swept the front steps with a bundle of twigs tied to a broom handle. Inside, the hall had begun to fill — traders arguing over rates, someone yelling about a burned stewpot, boots scuffing across wet floorboards.
"Are we taking another mission ash?"
She didn't notice he glanced at her again.
He reached for the board.
Pulled a new contract.
Quietly:
"Nothing cursed this time."