Smoke rolled like ocean waves across the village paths, dark and oily, clinging to every breath. Evelyn's lungs burned as she sprinted behind Torren, the roar of collapsing timber chasing them like a tide.
Behind them, Isenhold screamed.
The eastern ward-post flared one last time—an amber pulse—then shattered in a burst of light that was too bright, like glass breaking beneath the sun. The sound wasn't a crack or a thud—it was more like something being undone.
Evelyn stumbled, catching herself against a fence post now scorched black.
"What was that?" she gasped.
"The last Warden sigil." Torren turned, his sword drawn, breath ragged. "They're through."
And then they were—the Echoed.
Not beasts in any real sense. Not with their too-thin limbs, their blank faces stretching into grins without mouths. They didn't move like living things; they glided, like memory made flesh, like a nightmare skipping frames in a dream.
The first struck a farmer's son, pulling him up with impossible strength and twisting—no blood, just a flash of white heat and ash. Evelyn screamed.
Torren lunged.
His blade struck one of them in the chest, and sank. Not into flesh—into something brittle and cold. The creature hissed without sound and scattered into black splinters.
"Run," he growled. "We get to the root path. The ravine."
"But my mother—"
"Evelyn. Look at me." His hand was on her shoulder, firm. "She knew. That's why she sent you."
Something heavy landed behind them. A second Echoed—a larger one, spider-limbed and dragging a bone-carved staff. It turned its head toward Evelyn and stared—as if it recognized her.
And that was when the shard in her chest pulsed.
Like a heartbeat. Like a flare.
The Echoed hesitated.
Just for a moment.
And Evelyn moved.
She turned, instinct guiding her, and whispered without meaning to: "Back."
A ripple of force burst from her chest—barely visible, more of a distortion than light. But the Echoed reeled, shrieking in reverse, as if unmade by her voice.
Torren stared at her.
"What was that?"
"I—I don't know."
They fled through the back grain fields. Behind them, flames rose against the dusk like a funeral pyre for their childhood. Evelyn looked back once, saw her father's carving post half-burned, and bit her lip so hard she tasted blood.
They found a thicket near the old river path and collapsed in the roots of a broken tree. Evelyn curled into herself.
Torren sat beside her, blade still slick.
"Do you think anyone else made it?"
Evelyn didn't answer.
Because in the smoke and flame, in that ruined lull between escape and despair, she heard it again—
The song.
And now, it was louder.
It sang her name.