Chapter 4: Whispers Beneath the Canopy
Arin awoke to the filtered glow of dawn seeping through the thick canopy. For the first time since the raid, his heart did not immediately leap with panic. The forest carried its own silence, not empty, but alive—the kind that hummed with unseen life. He lay on the bedroll given by the cloaked strangers who had rescued him, his ears keen to every rustle and whisper. He had only known blindness until yesterday, and now each detail his eyes caught felt both miraculous and overwhelming.
But the memory of fire, of screams, of the village he could not save still throbbed like an open wound. Arin's chest tightened. He pulled his knees in, remembering the way his mother's hand felt when she guided him through crowded markets. That warmth was gone, replaced with ashes. For a moment, he wished he could return to blindness, to shut the world away and pretend none of it had happened.
Leira stirred nearby, her hair tousled from restless sleep. She rubbed her eyes and studied her brother carefully. "You didn't sleep well," she murmured.
Arin looked up, his new sight catching the faint lines of worry around her face. "How do you know?" he asked. His voice cracked.
"Because I didn't either," Leira said, and something softened in her tone. "We both lost too much."
Her words anchored him, and for a brief moment, he didn't feel like a lost boy but someone seen. Still, the questions churned in his mind. Why had his eyes awakened like this? Why had they survived when so many hadn't? And most of all, what was he supposed to do now that everything he knew was gone?
Later that day, Selene, the leader of the cloaked survivors, guided them deeper into the forest. She was tall, with a braided silver streak through her dark hair, her voice calm and steady. Selene's people moved with a silence that unnerved Arin—like they belonged to the trees. They were not many, perhaps two dozen, men and women clad in muted colors, their faces half-hidden under hoods. Their destination was a village, but not like the one Arin grew up in. When they reached it, he gasped.
The forest opened into a clearing where wooden walkways spiraled high into the trees, binding trunks together like veins of a living giant. Rope bridges swayed gently above, connecting platforms dotted with huts that glowed with soft lanterns. Children ran across the planks without fear, laughter echoing. Below, streams of water flowed through carefully dug channels, feeding gardens bursting with herbs and bright flowers. The air carried the fragrance of earth and smoke and something else—safety.
It was a hidden world within the world, built high above so enemies could not easily reach. Arin felt small, yet his chest expanded with wonder. This was life rebuilt from ruins, not just survival but defiance.
"You're staring," a boy's voice interrupted. Arin turned and found a youth his own age standing nearby, hands crossed. His eyes were sharp, assessing. "Never seen a treetop village before?"
Arin shook his head. "I've… never seen anything before. Not until yesterday."
The boy's expression faltered. "You mean you were—"
"Blind," Arin finished. He tried to sound matter-of-fact, but the word still carried a strange weight.
The boy introduced himself as Kael. Unlike Selene, his manner was rough, impatient, but his curiosity was genuine. "So what's with your eyes? They glow, you know. Kind of unsettling."
Arin stiffened. He hadn't realized. "They do?"
"Like embers in the dark," Kael muttered. "Some of the others are whispering already. They think you're marked."
"Marked?"
Kael shrugged, though his gaze lingered. "This forest has its stories. People who awaken with gifts after tragedy. Not all of them survive long. Some go mad. Some… change."
Arin's stomach twisted. Was that his fate? To be saved only to be consumed by something inside him? He clenched his fists. No, he would not let that happen.
Days passed in the treetop village. Arin tried to adjust, learning how to move across the bridges, how to eat the bitter roots they offered, how to listen when Selene spoke of survival. Yet every night, when he closed his eyes, the visions returned—flashes of fire, yes, but also glimpses of places he had never seen. Towering spires of stone. Oceans that glowed under two moons. A battlefield littered with weapons of light.
Each morning he woke trembling, unsure if these were dreams or something his awakened eyes now revealed.
On the fourth night, the village drum rang out, sharp and urgent. Arin bolted upright as lanterns flared across the platforms. Kael burst into his hut.
"Raiders," he hissed.
Arin's blood ran cold. Not again. He stumbled out, heart hammering, as Selene barked orders. Men and women armed themselves with bows and blades. The children were herded deeper into the village's core. The night was thick, but Arin's eyes caught movement at the forest's edge—dark shapes slithering between trees.
He should have been afraid, but something surged within him instead. His vision sharpened, pulling threads of motion from the darkness. He could see paths, possibilities—the way an arrow might fly before it was even loosed, the step an enemy would take before their foot touched the ground.
And then it happened. As the first raider leapt from the shadows, blade gleaming, Arin moved without thinking. He seized a fallen staff and struck—not where the raider was, but where he would be. The man crumpled mid-step, disbelief frozen on his face.
Gasps echoed. Kael stared. Selene's sharp eyes narrowed, but she said nothing.
The battle raged. The raiders were fewer than those who had destroyed Arin's home, but their cruelty was the same. He fought clumsily at first, untrained, but the sight guided him, pulling him where he needed to be. For every strike he blocked, for every life he spared, a piece of his fear burned away.
Yet victory came at a cost. As the last raider fell, silence pressed heavy. Bodies lay broken at the edge of the village. Some of Selene's people were among them. Children cried softly. Smoke from the fires stung Arin's throat.
Leira rushed to his side, clutching his arm. "You're hurt," she said, scanning him with frantic eyes.
"I'm fine," Arin lied, though his body trembled with exhaustion.
Selene approached him, her expression unreadable. "Your eyes," she said at last. "They are not a curse. But they will make you a target."
Arin's chest heaved. He felt the truth of her words settle like chains. The raiders were not after food or land. They had been searching for something. Searching for him.
And as he gazed past the treeline, his strange vision caught something—distant, flickering lights, like torches carried by an army still on the move. This was not the end. This was only the beginning.
Selene placed a hand on his shoulder, grounding him. "You must choose, Arin. Run from what you are—or learn what these eyes were meant to see."
The boy who had once been blind now stared into a horizon filled with fire and shadow. For the first time, he did not flinch.