Morning dawned gently over the ravaged land. The storm had long passed, leaving the world washed in dew and silence. The golden light of Surya slipped through torn clouds, glimmering across shattered spears, burned soil, and the faint steam rising from bodies of the fallen.
Among the ruins, a lone man stirred — breath shallow, spirit heavy. Aarvian.
The remnants of divine symbols shimmered faintly across his skin before vanishing into scars. His breath hitched; he could feel something ancient inside him pulse once, then fade. The whispers of the previous night — voices, flames, betrayal — returned in fragments, as if the universe itself taunted him with the ghosts of his past.
He dragged himself to a nearby banyan tree, its roots spreading like veins through the wounded earth. There he collapsed, back against its trunk, eyes hollow.
And then he heard it — the sound of soft footsteps, the delicate rustle of anklets echoing through the morning mist.
Through the haze came a woman dressed in white and gold robes, carrying a bowl of steaming water. Her presence was serene yet commanding, her eyes like deep wells of calm, holding the quiet strength of someone who had seen both life and death.
"You're alive," she said softly, kneeling beside him. "That's rare around here."
Aarvian blinked, his throat dry. "Who are you?"
"My name is Saanviya," she replied, wringing a cloth and placing it against his wounds. "A healer of the forgotten, a wanderer of the broken. I tend to those whom the gods have turned away."
He winced as the cloth touched his skin — not from pain, but from the strange warmth that followed. It wasn't ordinary. There was energy in her touch, soft but vast — the kind that flowed from ancient hymns and half-remembered prayers.
Her gaze lingered on his arm where golden traces had once glowed. "You bear marks that shouldn't exist in this age," she murmured. "These aren't mortal wounds."
His voice was calm but guarded. "You must be mistaken."
Saanviya smiled faintly, though sadness shadowed her eyes. "Perhaps. Or perhaps you've simply forgotten who you are."
Those words hit harder than any blade. Forgotten who you are. The phrase echoed through him, stirring a thousand buried memories — a throne, a woman's dying breath, a blade through his heart. He looked away.
"You don't have to tell me your truth," she continued, washing the blood from his hands. "But whatever you are, the winds are changing. I've seen omens — black shadows devouring the stars, temples trembling in their sleep. The old powers stir again."
Aarvian's gaze sharpened. The old powers. He knew that phrase. It was what the gods once whispered before his fall — before his world burned.
"Thank you," he said, masking the tremor in his voice. "I'll rest a while, then go."
"You'll die if you move before your body mends," Saanviya said firmly. "Stay at least until sunset."
He hesitated. Pride told him to refuse, but instinct told him to listen. "Very well. One day."
"One day is all the Fates need to change a life," she said with a soft smile.
As she treated his wounds, Aarvian studied her quietly. Her hands moved like they remembered ancient rites, and her hum — a low, haunting melody — stirred something divine within him.
When her shadow fell across him, he almost felt peace.Almost.
Because deep inside, beneath the silence of his mortal flesh, something stirred — power flickering like a trapped flame, whispering of vengeance, love, and the world that once bowed to him.
The beginning of remembrance had come.
"Fate does not heal; it reopens wounds to remind us who we were."