The valley lay quiet beneath the morning veil. Mist clung to the grass like old memories. The mountains caught the first light of dawn, gold spilling down their edges like liquid faith.
I stood on a rise of rock, staring toward the distant Veilspire, where the sky had once been torn open. Even now, though the rift was sealed, a faint shimmer lingered—a scar in the heavens that refused to fade.
People gathered slowly. Wanderers. Survivors. The curious. Some came clutching the clothes they wore when the sky split. Some came barefoot, as if the ground itself called them. Their faces were a collage of awe, fear, and hunger—not for food, but for meaning.
I could still feel it. The whisper. It wasn't sound; it was weight. It had settled inside my bones that day and refused to leave.
The Mason
He had been a builder in the western villages. His hands were rough, his back bent from years of shaping stone walls that crumbled under time.
When the sky split, he had fallen to his knees in his field. Now, standing among strangers in this silent valley, he picked up a smooth stone from the riverbank. It was heavier than it should have been. He carried it to the rise and placed it on the ground.
No one told him to. No voice ordered him.
But as the stone touched the earth, a gust of wind swept through the crowd. The mist curled upward in a spiral, then faded. He stepped back, trembling.
They didn't understand what they were doing—and perhaps that was the point. Faith isn't built by instruction; it's carved by instinct, by moments that feel heavier than words.
Someone shouted that the gods had spoken. Another swore that the twin suns had burned their names into the sky. A third—an old woman—whispered that she saw a throne of blood and stars.
I raised my hand, and slowly the murmurs died.
"You saw what you were meant to see," I told them. "The dawn does not speak in one tongue. It shines, and each eye finds its own reflection."
The words weren't mine. They came unbidden—like embers rising from a fire I hadn't lit.
The Skeptic
The merchant leaned against his cart, arms crossed. His wares—bolts of cloth, spice jars, trinkets—were unsold. Business had died the day the sky split.
He scoffed when he heard the others speak of gods. "Sky breaks. People panic. That's all," he muttered. Yet he stayed.
That night, while others slept in makeshift tents, he walked past the stone the mason had laid. The moonlight had dimmed, but the stone glowed faintly. Not bright. Just enough for him to notice.
A whisper brushed his ear—not words, but presence. He spun around. No one was there. For the first time, his heart skipped.
He didn't leave the next day.
Arguments broke out in the morning. Each claimed their vision was truth. A sun worshipper spat at a man who swore he'd seen only the shadow. A young woman tried to draw what she'd seen in the dirt: two great beings passing through beams of gold and dark. Others mocked her until I knelt beside the drawing and traced it with my finger.
"This," I said softly, "is why we are here."
They grew silent.
I looked at the stone. Then at the earth. Then at the faces of those who had followed a whisper without knowing why.
"Let us build," I said. "Not a house for the gods—they have no need of roofs—but a shape for our silence. A place for our awe to dwell."
And so, they began.
The Widow and the Child
The widow's hands were raw from gathering stones. Her son, no older than six, followed her every step. He had been too young to understand the day the sky split—too young to fear, too young to doubt.
At dusk, she built a small fire near the river to keep them warm. Her son built one beside it, smaller but burning just as bright.
"Two fires," he said.
"For what?" she asked.
He shrugged. "Because it feels right."
And so each night, two fires burned: one great, one small. Others began to copy them, lighting twin flames as darkness fell. They did not know it, but ritual had begun.
The days passed in rhythm. Stone upon stone. Whispers in the wind. At times, golden rays would cling unnaturally to the half-built walls, refusing to fade with dusk. At night, silver mist pooled at the foundation, curling into faint runes I could not read—but I recognized.
Something watched. Not as a tyrant. As a father watching his children learn to speak.
One night, when the workers slept and the fires dimmed, I walked alone into the half-built structure. The stone walls glistened faintly in the moonlight. I knelt, forehead pressed against the foundation.
"Why me?" I whispered into the silence. "Why show me what others only fear?"
And then it came. Not like thunder. Not like command.
Like the hush before dawn.
"Stone remembers what flesh forgets."
The voice reverberated through the stone beneath my palms. It wasn't sound. It was memory. My breath caught in my chest. Tears burned my eyes.
I knelt until the cold numbed my skin. Then I rose, turned toward the valley, and spoke into the darkness.
"This place shall be called The Foundation of the Veil."
The wind carried the words away like a vow.
At sunrise, the valley awoke to light unlike any they had seen since the sky split. It wasn't harsh. It wasn't blinding.
It glowed.
The half-built temple caught the light, and for a heartbeat, it seemed alive. People stopped their work and stared. A shepherd miles away turned toward the valley and felt an ache in his chest. Travelers on the road paused and whispered to one another.
Faith had taken root. Not through fear. Through memory.
I stood on the rise again, watching the people gather. For the first time, I felt the weight of what was coming—not as a burden, but as a dawn.
Kaelíth did not speak again. He didn't need to.
The stones were listening now.