Ashwood Hold was silent now. The echoes of the battle with Ser Thorne had faded into the wind. No blood, no bodies—only ash and shadow and the lingering tremor of memory.
Arjuna sat alone in the ruined chapel where Thorne had fallen. Frost crept across the stone floor like veins in broken marble. His shoulder ached where the blade had struck, but it wasn't pain that unsettled him.
It was the voice.
It had begun as a hum. Soft, like wind through iron chimes. But now it had form—words, if not yet meaning.
A whisper.
Low. Intimate.
—"Not yet, not yet. The oath was fire, but the wound was truth."
He stared at the sword across his lap. It no longer felt like a weapon. It felt… inhabited.
The blade shimmered faintly, runes crawling like veins of red flame across its fuller. They hadn't been there before—not when he'd drawn it in the cave. Not even when he'd fought Thorne.
He reached out, ran his fingers along the edge. Not a single nick. The sword drank light like water, and in its reflection, he saw something impossible.
A face.
Dark-eyed. Smiling.
A woman.
The image vanished as soon as it came.
"Tellen," Arjuna called out, voice hoarse. No answer.
The rogue historian had wandered off to explore the west wing of the hold—claiming there were old records stashed in a surviving tower. Arjuna hadn't argued. Not because he trusted Tellen to be safe, but because he needed the silence.
Or maybe… to hear more clearly.
The whisper came again.
—"You buried us. All of us. Beneath oath and ash. And still, we remember you."
"Who are you?" Arjuna asked the sword aloud.
No answer.
Instead, something moved. A flicker at the edge of his sight. He stood, sword in hand, and followed the disturbance out into the courtyard.
Wind stirred the overgrown grass. The broken statue of a knight lay toppled, its helm cracked in half. Vines had overrun the battlements, thick with thorn and rot.
He remembered none of it.
But his heart pounded like he did.
Something pulled at him, deeper into the ruins.
He passed the broken bell tower where ravens circled, then through an arch of warped stone into the inner keep. Dust and ivy choked the narrow halls. Old paintings peeled from the walls—faces blurred, names eroded.
Yet the deeper he walked, the more he felt it.
Like stepping into a memory not his own.
Finally, he found it.
A great iron door, rusted but intact. The whispering grew louder here. Not outside his head, but within it.
—"Beyond. Below. What you broke sleeps here."
The door was locked by an old ring seal, the sigil half-worn—two crossed swords and a crown of thorns.
His fingers hesitated at the seal.
Then the sword in his hand burned. Just for a moment—heat that didn't sear, but remembered.
The sigil flared.
The door opened.
Darkness greeted him like an old friend.
A spiral stair led downward, carved from obsidian-black stone. He descended with only the sword's faint glow to guide him.
Whispers greeted him at every step.
—"Ash to ash."—"Oaths unkept bleed eternity."—"He weeps for her still."
He didn't know if the voices were memories or madness.
At the base of the stairs, a small chamber opened. A vault, untouched by time.
Pillars lined the walls, each etched with names. Thousands of names.
He stepped closer.
The nearest pillar bore a single name.
THORNE OF THE THORN-CROWN
He moved to the next.
SERIAH OF THE VEIL
And the next.
VAELIN SUN-BINDER
He froze.
Vaelin.
He didn't remember the name—but his chest ached when he read it. Like the word had been carved into him once, and then scraped away.
He pressed a hand to the pillar.
It was warm.
A flash surged through him.
Rain. Blood. A battlefield of silver flames.A woman standing over him, screaming.Her voice—Vaelin."Arjuna, don't—!"
The vision shattered.
He staggered back, breath ragged.
The sword in his hand was humming now. Not a whisper. A song.
He dropped it.
It landed without a sound. The light within it flared.
And from it, a voice spoke—not a whisper, not a hallucination. A true voice. Female. Ageless.
"You left me behind."
Arjuna turned.
No one.
But the shadows shifted. Took shape. A ghostly figure stood across the vault—vague, veiled, feminine. Made of smoke and memory.
He tried to speak, but the figure raised a hand.
"You swore the Vow at Ashwood. You swore to love her through flame, through ruin. You broke it. Now the sword remembers for you."
Arjuna clenched his fists.
"What was the vow?"
The ghost tilted its head. "To love, even forgotten. To protect, even unworthy. To remember, even cursed."
"Who… did I love?"
The ghost did not answer.
Instead, the sword on the floor pulsed—and an echo of his own voice rang through the chamber.
"Nyssara… please."
Arjuna fell to his knees.
The ghost vanished.
Only the sword remained.
Its runes now read a name.
NYSSARA