The sky was no longer bleeding shadow.
Instead, a soft dawn breath pulsed within it—wide and boundless, as if the world had exhaled a sigh after a lifetime of holding its breath.
But peace had a sound.
Not silence—but the gentle thrum of life remaking itself. Birdsong suspended above dew-cooled fields. Laughter on the horizon. The gentle thrum of hope remade.
But beneath it all… something stirred.
Kael stood atop the overlook, gazing out over the Loomscar Valley, his cloak fluttering gently in the wind. The valley below was green now, ablaze with wildflowers and the faint sheen of new beginning. But he still felt it—the undertow. The throb.
A memory that hadn't been passed on. A thread not yet spun.
"Does it ever stop calling to you?" Elira asked, approaching, her hair swept into loose braids along the center of her back, her fingers brushing down his arm with a comfort that still made his heart stumble.
Kael didn't answer right away.
He allowed the wind to answer first.
