He couldn't sleep.
The fire was down to embers, but still Kaelen stared, motionless, as the others lay curled in the quiet hush of night. Lyra slept, or seemed to, her breath even, her presence both grounding and unsteadying.
Too many memories, too fast. And not enough answers.
So he did what he always did when the world felt like it was coming apart—he drifted back, to a simpler time. Or at least, one that wore the mask of simplicity.
It was late spring in Eldhollow. The forest groves had burst with green and the wind tasted of earth and moss. He was twelve, Lyra barely ten. The world beyond their village didn't exist yet. Not really.
They had snuck out from a dull lesson in incantation glyphs, trading the cramped stone classroom for sun and secrets. He still remembered the thrill of it—how Lyra had grabbed his hand and whispered, "Come on, I found something."
She always found things. Forgotten stairwells. Cracked ruins. Hollow trees that weren't hollow at all.
That day, it was a door in the roots of an ancient tree.
They had to crawl to get in—Lyra first, of course—and found themselves in a tiny, earthen chamber beneath the roots. The walls were damp but braced with stone and laced with strange glyphs he didn't recognize. And in the center, a wooden chest, covered in vines.
Lyra had pulled back the lid with a triumphant grin.
Books. Dozens of them. Worn, bound in leather, smelling of ink and time.
"They belonged to the old sages," she whispered. "Before the Order even existed. My grandmother said the forest keeps what it loves."
Kaelen had watched her pull one out, hands reverent, eyes gleaming.
"You think they'll teach us magic?" he asked.
"They'll teach us truth," she said, ever the dreamer. "The kind they don't tell us. Real stories. Real names."
She opened one and began reading aloud—not incantations, not spells—but poetry. Strange verses in a language that echoed through the hollow like falling leaves.
He didn't understand any of it, but the way she read—soft, steady, like she was unearthing something sacred—made his chest ache.
They spent hours there. Days, even. Sneaking back, again and again. Reading by torchlight. Laughing in whispers. Sometimes not even reading, just… being.
It became their place.
Once, during a thunderstorm, Lyra had turned to him and said, "Promise me you won't forget this."
Kaelen had blinked at her. "Forget what?"
"This. Us. Before everything changes."
He had scoffed, trying to be clever. "You mean before we both become archmages and wear ridiculous hats?"
She'd rolled her eyes, but her smile faded. "Before war. Before someone tells us who to be."
There was fear in her voice. And something else. Something Kaelen didn't yet have words for.
He hadn't known what to say. So he made a promise.
"I won't forget."
Now, years later, under a different sky, that promise echoed in him like a curse.
The memory ended there—not because it faded, but because it hurt to follow. Because he remembered what came after. The night the village burned. The day he thought she died. And the ache of a promise broken by time and fire.
He sat by the dwindling fire, fingers curled around the hilt of his blade.
Lyra stirred in her sleep, a soft sigh escaping her lips.
Kaelen watched her, wondering—was that girl from the library beneath the roots still there?
Or had she, too, been swallowed by whatever came after?