The wind changed at dawn.
Not in strength, but in memory. It carried whispers that did not belong to the living , fragments of old chants, voices braided into the current like forgotten prayers. Kael woke to them before the others stirred. He sat upright, the storm mark across his chest faintly pulsing as if responding to a heartbeat not his own.
Aurelius sat nearby, sketching the runic patterns of the relic they had recovered. The ink trembled each time Kael's mark glowed.
"You feel it again," Aurelius said, not looking up. "The storm speaks to you more clearly now."
Kael nodded. "It is not speech. More like… remembering."
"Then perhaps you should listen carefully," Aurelius replied. "Memories can be more dangerous than words."
Lyren approached, eyes sharp from her dawn watch. "The sky to the north looks wrong," she said. "Still, but bleeding light. It is like dawn got lost."
Aurelius closed his journal. "That will be the rift's edge. The place where the valley's wound reached too deep. We are crossing into old god territory now."
Kael looked up. The horizon shimmered faintly , not from heat, but from distortion. The air bent in unnatural rhythm, like a pulse beneath the clouds. The storm around him stirred as if impatient to meet something familiar.
They broke camp quietly. The silence between them had grown thicker since the valley collapsed , since Kael had torn open time itself to save Lyren. None spoke of it, but all carried the weight.
As they moved forward, the landscape changed. The soil blackened and glittered, veins of glass cutting across the earth. Stone spires jutted upward like bones caught mid-rise. Every gust of wind brought with it faint echoes of battle , metal against metal, and beneath it, a low hum like breathing earth.
Aurelius stopped often, studying symbols half-buried in crystal. "This place was not only a battlefield," he said softly. "It was a forge. They made weapons here, not of iron , but of belief."
Lyren frowned. "Belief does not shatter mountains."
"It does when gods still walked," Aurelius replied.
Kael barely heard them. The wind had begun to pull at his attention, dragging his mind inward. The whispers grew clearer , fragments of a name, perhaps his own, perhaps another's. He could almost see faces in the shifting clouds above , eyes that burned like stormlight, watching, waiting.
They reached a ridge by midday. Below lay a basin of mirror-black water, perfectly still, reflecting the sky like an open wound. In its center stood a massive obelisk, cracked down the middle, lightning scars etched along its length.
Kael stopped breathing for a moment. He knew that shape. He had seen it before , in the vision within the Valley of Broken Names.
Aurelius followed his gaze. "You recognize it."
Kael nodded slowly. "It was there when the god fell."
"Then this," Aurelius said, "is where he died."
Lyren looked between them, her unease sharpening. "And you want to walk into that?"
Aurelius exhaled. "We do not have a choice. That obelisk may hold what Varok seeks. If Kael's storm remembers this place, then so does his enemy."
The descent was treacherous. Every step near the basin distorted sound , their footsteps echoed twice, one ahead of them, one behind. The air grew heavier, charged with unspent power. Kael's skin tingled; sparks leapt between his fingers unbidden.
When they reached the water's edge, Kael felt the storm within him surge. The surface rippled though no wind touched it. He stepped forward, and the reflection of the sky shattered , replaced by scenes that were not his own.
He saw legions of armored figures wading through lightning. A massive figure at their center , cloaked in stormlight, voice like thunder. Words of command rolled through the heavens, calling the wind by name. And then , betrayal. A blade of pure silence striking from within.
Kael gasped and fell to one knee. The vision faded as the others rushed to him.
"What did you see?" Lyren asked.
Kael's voice was low, steady. "The god who fell. But it was not Varok who killed him."
Aurelius stiffened. "Then who?"
Kael met his eyes. "The god's own bearer , the one who held the storm. Me. Or someone who wore my face."
The silence that followed was unbearable.
Lyren looked between them, disbelief raw in her tone. "You are saying you… killed a god?"
Kael shook his head. "I do not remember it. But the storm does."
Aurelius crouched beside him, studying the mark across Kael's chest. "Then it is worse than I feared. You are not merely linked to the storm, Kael. You are its continuation. The bearer who ended divinity , reborn without memory."
The words hung heavy in the air. Kael stood, the storm flickering wildly around him. "If that is true, then Varok's goal is not to reclaim the gods' power. He wants to undo what I did."
Lyren swallowed hard. "Then why reach for you? Why hunt you?"
Aurelius's answer came slow, deliberate. "Because to reverse the fall, he needs the one who caused it."
The ground trembled then , a deep rumble rising from the basin. The black water churned, and the obelisk pulsed once with blue light. Kael's reflection looked back at him , but it was not his face. The figure in the water wore the same storm mark, but his eyes burned brighter, older.
"Do you remember now?" the reflection asked, voice echoing across the rippling surface.
Kael staggered back. The others could not hear it , only the wind that followed.
The reflection stepped forward, rippling like a mirage. "You were not the first stormbearer. You were the last. You ended what should have never begun."
Kael clenched his fists. "Then tell me why."
The reflection tilted its head. "Because gods forgot fear. You reminded them."
The vision shattered as the obelisk cracked further, lightning spearing upward into the clouds. Aurelius pulled Kael away as energy arced through the basin. The ground split, revealing ancient mechanisms , gears and chains forged of light and shadow, still moving despite the ages.
Lyren shouted over the thunder. "We need to move!"
But Kael stood frozen, eyes locked on the storm forming above , not his, not Varok's, but something older. The voice of the reflection lingered in his mind. You reminded them of fear.
They barely escaped the basin before the water erupted, swallowing the obelisk whole. The ridge behind them collapsed into itself, sealing the place beneath molten stone.
When the chaos ended, silence returned , the heavy kind that follows revelation.
Aurelius turned to Kael. "You understand what this means."
Kael nodded slowly. "If the storm remembers me, then it also remembers what I can do. Varok is not trying to kill me. He is trying to wake me."
Lyren's voice trembled. "And if he succeeds?"
Kael looked toward the northern horizon where thunder rolled faintly, as if answering his thought. "Then the world will remember too."
They walked on as dusk fell, the storm behind them still churning. None spoke. Each carried their own dread.
But far above, unseen, the sky flickered , not from lightning, but from recognition.
Somewhere, across endless plains of metal and wind, Varok paused mid-stride, eyes narrowing.
He smiled faintly. "So he has begun to remember."
The wind howled louder, carrying the promise of reunion.