That night, sleep came slowly to the three of them, their minds burdened by revelations and truths long buried. But when it finally did, it took each of them into dreams that were anything but ordinary—each one caught in the pull of the shards, their connection to the past rippling through the veil of time.
Elara's Dream
Elara found herself in a field of silver grass beneath a sky painted with auroras. The wind carried whispers—not in any language she recognized, but she understood them all the same. As she moved through the field, the grass shimmered beneath her feet like liquid starlight.
Ahead stood a massive tree, its branches reaching into the heavens. She knew this tree, though she couldn't remember how. A voice called to her from within the bark, low and familiar.
"You are the key, Elara. The world lives and dies by your choice."
She stepped forward, pressing her hand to the bark, and was suddenly pulled backward—falling through time. She saw herself as a child, tucked away in the arms of her Grams. She saw Luna, glowing with moonlight, and Veridian, shadowed but steady. She saw her slumber begin, the spell woven over centuries. And then… the war.
Flashes. Screams. Fire. Her own voice commanding armies. And Taryn—her sword gleaming with the light of the sun—falling.
Then the sky cracked open. And a crown of flame hovered above her brow.
She gasped awake.
Taryn's Dream
Taryn was running through a palace corridor, her boots echoing on marble floors scorched with ash. The air stank of smoke and blood. She carried a message—no, a promise—to someone she couldn't name.
She burst through gilded doors and found Elara—past Elara—sitting on a throne of silver and glass, wearing that same flaming crown. Her eyes were haunted.
"They'll come for you," Taryn said. "You have to run."
_"Not without you," Elara replied, voice trembling.
Taryn reached out to take her hand, but the world around them crumbled. Assassins flooded the hall. Taryn stood before Elara, blades drawn, her final stand imminent.
_"I'll buy you time," she said.
"Taryn—no."
"I'd die a hundred times to keep you safe."
Darkness fell. And she felt it again—that sharp, lancing pain in her chest. The death that never quite left her.
When she opened her eyes, there were tears on her cheeks.
Ronan's Dream
Ronan stood on a mountain peak bathed in moonlight. His armor was bloodstained, his blade chipped. Before him stood Veridian—not as the harsh judge from the illusion, but as a younger version, smiling faintly.
"You were the heart of our resistance," Veridian said.
"I failed Caelan. I failed you."
"You chose love over victory. That was never failure."
Ronan's dream shifted to the day he swore his oath to Caelan, their hands clasped over the blade they forged together. Brotherhood. Loyalty. Sacrifice.
He watched himself again—charging into battle, shielding Caelan from certain death, and finally… falling.
But this time, when the blade pierced him, he did not feel pain. He felt warmth. Acceptance.
"You are reborn not for redemption," Veridian's voice echoed, "but to fulfill what once could not be finished."
Ronan woke in silence, but the stars above seemed just a little closer.
As dawn broke, the three of them sat around the fire, quiet and contemplative, until Elara finally said:
"I think… I saw what came before."
Taryn nodded, her voice still hoarse. "I felt it. I was there again. And it still hurts."
Ronan poked at the fire. "But we're here now. Together. And maybe this time… we change how the story ends."
Elara reached for the shard glowing faintly in her pouch. "Then we find the next one. Before it's too late."
And so, with pieces of their past unveiled and purpose solidifying, they readied themselves for the road ahead—knowing that the past was never truly gone, and that the future was theirs to shape.
The days that followed their second trial passed in a steady rhythm—quiet, thoughtful, almost solemn. The mountain faded behind them, its hidden cave and shattered illusions now a memory, but the weight of what they had seen lingered in each step they took. They followed the shard's pull, now only a faint vibration, flickering with distant urgency.
They crossed rolling hills blanketed in early morning mist, wandered through forests still untouched by man, and passed villages that held no answers. It was on one such lonely road, just as twilight dyed the sky in rose and violet hues, that they stumbled across him.
A boy—no more than sixteen, maybe seventeen—collapsed near the side of the path, half-covered in leaves and dirt. His robes, once elegant, were torn and scorched, the embroidery frayed and unrecognizable. Blood darkened the fabric around his ribs, and one of his hands still crackled faintly with raw, unstable magic.
"Wait!" Elara rushed forward, her heart hammering. "Someone's here."
Taryn and Ronan instinctively flanked her, weapons half-drawn, eyes scanning the area for signs of ambush. But there was no one else. Just the boy and the silence of the road.
Ronan crouched beside him. "Still breathing. Barely."
The boy stirred, lips parting. He muttered something faint, the words slurred and cracked with pain.
"Luven'ara sel threnas… shal viretai."
Elara froze.
The words were strange—soft and lyrical, like wind over glass—but they struck something deep inside her. Recognition, sharp and sudden.
She knelt beside the boy, placing a hand gently on his shoulder. "Did you hear that?" she asked the others, voice hushed.
Taryn tilted her head. "Didn't catch a word of it."
"Me neither," Ronan said, frowning. "You understood it?"
Elara looked down at the boy, her brows furrowed. "Not all of it. But enough. It's Old Eldorian. A dialect from long before the war. Grams used to read me lullabies in it—songs passed down by those who remembered the time before the fall."
Taryn blinked. "Are you saying this kid's from your village?"
"I don't know. That's the thing," Elara said, brushing back the boy's soot-streaked hair. "Eldoria isn't supposed to exist anymore, not the way it was. And he's too young. Unless…"
"Unless he's like us," Ronan finished for her.
Elara nodded slowly. "Or worse—unless someone out there remembers, and taught him."
"Either way," she added, her voice firm, "we can't leave him here."
Taryn hesitated, then sighed. "Of course not. Never a dull day with you, Elara."
With careful effort, Ronan lifted the boy into his arms. He winced as magic flickered again in the boy's fingers, sparks of pale blue dancing like fireflies.
"I'll carry him until we can make camp," Ronan said. "But if he starts throwing spells, I'm dropping him."
They walked until night fully draped the sky, eventually setting up camp near a quiet brook, nestled in a grove of white-barked trees. Elara tended to the boy's wounds while he slept, trying to coax his magic into calming.
Later that night, as the fire crackled and the others settled in for rest, Elara kept watch beside the mysterious boy. She studied his face—he looked peaceful now, less ghostly. Still so young. Yet the magic that coursed through him was old. Far older than he should be.
She brushed a hand over the glowing shard around her neck. It didn't react to the boy. Not yet. But her instincts told her he was connected to this, somehow. The language. The injuries. The way fate had placed him in their path.
"Who are you?" she whispered. "And how do you know the words of a world that's been gone for centuries?"
The boy shifted in his sleep, mumbling once more.
"El'nara… mor silain…"
Elara's heart skipped.
El'nara.
Her true name, before she became Elara.
The boy knew her name.
She turned to glance at her friends, sleeping soundly beneath their blankets, unaware of the quiet storm that stirred beside them.
And for the first time in days, she felt the future inch closer—pulling them into a truth older and deeper than any of them could yet imagine.