Kaelen's fire dimmed.
Every word from the phantom-Lyra scraped against his heart, reopening scars he thought he had burned away long ago.
"You scorch everything you touch. Your world. Your people. Me."
He wanted to shout that it wasn't true, that he'd sworn never to fail again. But doubt slid in like a blade between his ribs. He could still see the ruins of his past, the ashes that clung to his soul.
Lyra, on the other side of the stair, gripped her sword tighter. The phantom-Kaelen circled her, his black fire licking at her blade.
"Do you think he'll keep you? He doesn't need you. You're just steel to him—useful until you dull."
Her breath shook. She had been called many things in her life: tool, weapon, pawn. She had endured all of it. But Kaelen's voice—even a twisted echo of it—pierced deeper than any wound.
The candle-bearer sobbed softly, clutching their tiny flame as the void swallowed it inch by inch. "I can't… I can't hold it. It's slipping—"
Kaelen tore his eyes from the phantom, catching the small figure trembling in the dark. Their flame sputtered, dying. If it went out—
"No!" he roared, his fire lashing upward. But the phantom-Lyra seized him, hands like iron, black fire searing against his skin.
"You can't save them. You can't even save yourself."
Kaelen dropped to one knee, the heat of his own blaze burning him from within.
The watchers' voice rippled through the stairwell, cruel and certain.
"Unity falters. See how easily they splinter. This is the truth of all bonds—fragile, temporary, destined to break."
Lyra's knees buckled. For a breath, she almost believed it. She almost lowered her sword.
And in that instant, the candle-bearer's flame guttered to a whisper—one heartbeat away from vanishing forever.