Ash drifted down like snow from a dying sky.
The once-golden capital was reduced to rubble—its towers crumbled, banners burned to black threads, and streets stained in memory and blood.
Beneath the shattered stones of the throne hall, a hand twitched.
Then fingers. Then breath.
Kael rose from the ashes.
His blonde hair, now stained with soot, clung to his forehead. His royal cloak—once a symbol of dignity—was now tattered rags wrapped around a boy no longer a prince, but not yet a monster.
His hand found the sword embedded beside him. Cold to the touch. Black veins of shadow pulsed along its hilt.
"This... isn't a dream."
He looked around. The twisted remnants of the marble hall, scorched pillars, shattered stained glass—all as he remembered. Except one thing:
He was alive. Again.
"I remember dying. I remember betrayal. And… her face."
He stood slowly, bones creaking as if the earth itself resisted his return.
"Then this is the past."
The realization hit like a hammer.
The world didn't just give him a second chance.
It rewound time itself.
The quiet of the ruins was broken by a scraping sound.
Steel against stone.
A figure limped through the wreckage, using a broken sword as a cane.
Orren—Kael's old knight. Weathered. Scarred. Eyes weighed down by time.
When he saw Kael standing, alive, something cracked in his expression. Not fear. Not disbelief.
Hope.
He dropped to one knee.
"My prince... You've returned."
Kael stepped forward, uncertain.
"Orren. You remember?"
"Not everything. But… enough. The dreams. The day of fire. Your scream when she…" Orren's voice trailed off.
Kael's fingers clenched.
Lysira. The girl he once loved. The one who let the blade fall.
"I was a fool. Blind in love," Kael muttered. "But this time—"
"I'll make sure you see clearly," Orren said, rising to his feet. He held out the sword. "We rebuild. One piece at a time."
Kael took the blade. Its shadow coiled around his arm like a living creature.
A cursed sword for a cursed king.
Far across the frozen plains, Lysira stood at her camp, her silver braid glistening in moonlight.
She trained beneath the watchful eye of her father's statue, every strike with her spear precise, perfect, and cold.
But tonight, her form faltered.
Again.
And again.
"What is this feeling?" she asked herself, panting.
Her reflection in the icy stream flickered—her crimson eyes haunted by something more than exhaustion.
"Why do I keep dreaming of flames? Of… him?"
Flashes surged behind her eyelids. Blue eyes. A broken crown. Her own hands shaking as she dropped a bloodied blade.
"No," she hissed. "It's just a dream. I never—"
But her hand trembled.
The spear fell from her grip.
"Why does his name hurt?"
In the emerald heart of the rebel forests, Thalia knelt by a wounded deer, fingers glowing with green light.
The animal stirred, wounds closing in silence.
"Another life saved," she whispered, brushing her wild brown curls back.
Beside her, the trees rustled like old friends.
She turned her eyes north—toward smoke, toward the mountains of the old empire.
He's back.
She didn't need visions or scrolls to know. The magic pulsed differently now. Something ancient had awakened.
"Kael… the prince of flames," she muttered. "Let's see if you still burn the same."
The wind answered with a shiver.
Snow fell upon the ruins of the throne.
Kael stood atop the steps of his broken palace, the shadows of the blade flickering around his feet.
He wasn't alone.
She arrived quietly—boots crunching across the frozen stones.
Lysira.
Wrapped in royal furs, spear at her back, crimson eyes flickering with conflict.
"Kael," she said softly.
He didn't turn.
"So it's true," he said, voice low. "You followed your father's orders even after you broke my heart."
"I…" she hesitated. "I don't remember all of it. But in my dreams, I see your face… I feel guilt."
"You should."
Kael turned, blue eyes burning.
"But I also see myself… stopping the blade."
She stepped closer, the cold fog between them swirling like ghosts.
"I don't know who I was in that life. But I feel something real now. When I look at you."
Kael's hand hovered near his sword.
"You don't get to feel. Not yet. Not until I know if I can trust you again."
She looked down, then back up.
"Then test me."
In the trees above, Thalia watched silently.
Her lips curled into a smile.
"How sweet," she whispered. "Shame one of them will break first."