The descent was steep.
Eira's boots echoed against the smooth stone steps, each one warmed by the forge's residual heat. The spiral narrowed as they went, the walls lined with metal-veined rock that glimmered faintly in the light of her shard. Her breath quickened, not from exertion but from the press of something vast and watching.
Thorne walked at her side, silent as always. But his hand remained close to the hilt at his hip, and his eyes flicked constantly between shadows. He didn't trust the quiet.
Neither did Eira.
The deeper they went, the less the magic felt like hers. The forge above had welcomed them. This place felt older. Heavier. Not cruel just burdened with memory.
"I can feel them," she whispered.
Thorne looked at her.
"Who?" he asked.
"Not names. Just… people. Generations. Blood and flame. They built something down here and buried it."
At the bottom of the stairwell, the spiral opened into a vast underground hall. Pillars shaped like twisted flame lined the chamber, each one etched in circular script. The floor was metal and stone, fused as if once melted together, and at the center stood a dais, empty, save for a single brazier long extinguished.
But when Eira stepped forward, her shard flared. Gold light spilled from her chest, arcing out like threads across the brazier. It ignited.
Flame roared to life, not red, not gold, but deep orange, like a hearth long cold finding heat again.
Images shimmered in the fire.
Not visions. Not prophecy.
Memory.
Thorne stepped closer, eyes narrowing. "What is this?"
Eira watched in silence. In the flames, she saw figures, Mageborn, younger than she'd imagined, lifting their hands to build, not to destroy. She saw a city carved into cliffs, a forge burning with light and song. She saw the first shard being forged from the heart of a star. And then…
She saw betrayal.
One of their own, turning. Twisting fire to dominate. To burn without mercy.
The images vanished in smoke.
Eira fell to her knees, clutching her head. Her shard pulsed once, violently, then dimmed.
Thorne caught her. "You alright?"
She nodded shakily. "I think I just saw the reason they buried this place."
He glanced at the flame, which now burned steady. "And the reason the Veil wants it uncovered."
Eira stood, slower this time. "This isn't just a forge. It's a warning."
—
Above, Maelis raised the corrupted shard in her palm.
Dark tendrils of shadow curled around her wrist. The shard pulsed not with light, but with hunger.
She stood at the edge of the eastern tunnel, eyes fixed on the warded stone that blocked her soldiers' advance. Her magic couldn't touch it. But the Harrower's gift could.
"You said this could cut through anything," she murmured.
The tracker beside her nodded hesitantly. "If the flame built it, this… thing should unmake it."
Maelis pressed the shard to the stone. It sizzled, and the warded wall groaned as if it were alive.
Cracks spidered out.
Beyond the barrier, villagers scrambled to brace the tunnel, but it was too late. Stone split like paper, and the Veil surged through.
Kaela shouted for reinforcements. Lena fell back, clutching a wounded child. Torin blocked the tunnel mouth with a stolen shield, laughing breathlessly as arrows clanged against it.
"Do they ever run out of soldiers?" he shouted.
Kaela fired an arrow that dropped a cloaked warrior mid charge. "Not before we run out of patience!"
The forge light above them flared.
The entire chamber trembled, first with heat, then with sound. A deep, humming chant reverberated from below, as if the very walls had begun to sing. The runes flared gold.
Lena turned toward the brazier. "They've reached the core."
Torin's grin widened, even as he wiped blood from his temple. "About time."
—
Below, Eira stepped forward and placed her palm on the edge of the brazier. The shard in her chest responded, humming in tune with the flame.
This forge had been made to arm protectors. Guardians.
But it could be misused.
She looked at Thorne. "We can't let her reach this."
"She won't," he said simply. "Not while I'm breathing."
Eira placed both hands on the dais. The fire surged upward into her, around her. It didn't burn. It remembered.
When she opened her eyes, the flames had carved symbols into the floor. A second shard had formed in her palm, smaller, warm, but brilliant. A fragment of the forge's core.
"A gift?" Thorne asked.
"A weapon," Eira said softly. "But not for killing. For binding."
She closed her fingers around it.
"We'll stop her."
And above, in the chamber crumbling under siege, the villagers felt something shift.
A wind not from outside, but from deep within the earth.
A forge's breath.
And the promise that fire, when wielded with care, could still become hope.