The valley woke before the sun. Mist clung to the creek like a blanket refusing to be folded away. Roofs sweated dew; a rooster bragged at nothing. The first cookfires sighed into pale blue and turned it gray.
He sat on the orphanage steps and watched the village breathe itself into the day. His own breath curled in front of him, slow and small—as if he didn't want the day to notice him.
A thin vein of silver cracked the sky—so quick the eye could doubt it. No thunder followed. Only the pop of wet wood in a stove, a cart's wheel complaining, a bell jangling at the baker's shop. Lightning? On a clear morning? His hand rose halfway, then fell. Stories adults told were not arguments to be won.
He stretched, shook the cold from his arms, and began the morning that never changed: the pump's squeal, the rush of water, the kitchen, the trough. The hen eyed him like it had seen too much. He split kindling, poorly.
"Ren!" the matron called from inside, voice measured, certain. "Don't forget the big logs behind the dormitory."
"Yes." The word curled in on itself, polite, small. He didn't mind the work. The ache afterward made him feel brighter somehow, like something beneath his skin remembered it was alive.
"Still no glow, huh?" a boy at the gate jeered as Ren passed with an armful of wood. The scar on his lip stretched when he grinned. Laughter followed, thin and familiar. "Bet he's the only one at the Trials who lights nothing! Maybe he'll invent a new Nature—nothingness!"
Ren looked at his hands. Clean. Empty. Yesterday he'd tried again, out beyond the fields. Thumb to finger, willing the knot of power to answer. It never did. Just a tremor. Just air.
He wanted to tell them: I'm trying. But trying didn't count.
The matron met him at the door and handed him a wrapped loaf. "Take this to Dayne on the east road," she said. "He's leaving before the market opens."
"Why me?"
"Because you won't eat it on the way. And because you're quick."
That part was true. If he couldn't summon fire or light, he could at least outrun the ones who could.
He jogged through the waking village. Mist lifted in ribbons, and for a few minutes the world felt unsure enough to grant him anonymity.
At the east road, a trader argued with his mule. Dayne looked up, saw the bread, and smiled, lines fanning from his eyes.
"Saved me, lad. What do I owe?"
"Nothing. Matron said."
Dayne broke the loaf with careful hands. "You thinking of standing out there with the other hopefuls?"
Ren hesitated. "At the Trials?"
"That's the one. Valenreach hosts 'em next week. Anyone under sixteen can test. Even the unnatured."
He watched Ren's face. "You didn't hear?"
"I heard," Ren said. Wanting hurt more than silence.
Dayne chewed, then nodded toward the distant road spined with fog. "Don't let them think for you. They don't pay your rent."
Ren almost smiled. Dayne flicked the reins. The mule grudgingly obeyed. As the cart rolled off, the man called back, "Lightning's quiet before it's loud!"
Ren stood in the road until the sound faded. Lightning's quiet before it's loud.
He went to the hill behind the fields when chores were done. The hill was nothing special—stubborn grass, one dying tree that cracked when the wind came hard—but it was his.
He sat, legs stretched, palms on his knees, and breathed. Find the knot. Not with your hands.
His mind offered everything except quiet: the scar-lipped boy, the flash of dawn, the knight who once told a six-year-old, "Never fear the storm." At the time, he thought he meant rain. Now he wasn't sure.
In. Out.
A hush slid over the grass. Hairs on his arms lifted. A gnat drifted aside, nudged by something unseen. Ren opened his eyes too soon. The hill looked the same: brown, green, stubborn. His hands were empty.
"Again," he muttered. Saying it out loud made it real.
He tried until the sun bled behind the ridge and his throat tasted of metal. Tried until trying became sitting, and sitting became pretending.
When he returned, the village glowed copper in the fading light. Children were loud with victory over chores. Someone had made stew out of everything; everything tasted like salt. He ate on the steps. Alone was a habit.
Two older boys leaned on the fence.
"He's going," one said. "To the Trials."
"Maybe the Prism'll see something we don't."
"Maybe he comes back burned." Their laughter fell short.
The matron sat beside him without looking. She handed him another piece of bread.
"You heard the talk?"
"About the Trials."
"It's a door," she said. "Doors don't open for anyone sittin' outside waitin'. You knock, or you rot out here."
He stared at the bread.
"What if I can't—"
"What if you can?" she cut in, voice tired but kind. "Either way, you'll know. Most folk die wonderin'."
When she went inside, he stayed until the steps cooled beneath him. The creek whispered; smoke thinned; the sky bruised. Clouds crept in, thick-bellied and impatient. The first drop struck his cheek like a coin slipped by mistake.
He climbed the hill. The wind turned suddenly and sideways. Grass lay flat. The dying tree reached up with black fingers. Rain came hard, stitching the field white. He tilted his face to it and let the day wash away.
Then—light.
A white rib split the sky, bright enough to carve shadows in mid-air. The world froze, each raindrop a bead strung on invisible wire. In that frozen light, he saw himself: a thin figure holding out empty hands. And he felt it—not in his skin, but in the space behind his ribs. A held breath deep inside him, waiting to exhale.
The air tasted of metal and snow. The world leaned toward him. A pulse circled his body—cool, deliberate, alive. Not a voice, but a rhythm forming around him like a question with no language. It tightened once, twice, then withdrew, leaving only the echo of movement.
Ren's knees gave. The pressure eased. Breath returned like a slow apology. The light went. The rain remembered its fall. Far off, thunder arrived late—heavy, human, final. It sounded like a heartbeat.