The iron-bound chains clank behind me as I seal the vault door. My breath stills in the chill air; even the walls seem to hold their silence. The novice closes the second lock, her eyes wide with fear and fascination. "Master?" she whispers. "What did you see?"
I do not answer. The memory of that book's pages—serpentine glyphs burning behind my eyelids—lingers like an ember. I must return to my desk before the monastery itself begins to bleed its secrets onto my quill.
Back in the candlelit study, papers lie scattered across the oak planks. One sheet bears a fresh smear of ink where my hand slipped; another carries a fragmentary map of Va'rakan's trade routes, annotated in a spidery script. I press my fingers to my temples, listening for the echo of that final word the novice spoke: "they… you summoned them."
The Inner Echoes stir in reply. "They were there, waiting," hisses the older voice. "You opened the gate."
A third, quieter voice murmurs, "What gate? You forget too much, old friend."
I stand abruptly, chair scraping. Outside the window, storm clouds blot out the twin suns—even though this chamber should be sealed from weather. Lightning flickers beyond thick glass, illuminating the desert ruins visible through the high arch. For a moment, I glimpse figures moving among the crumbled pillars—tall, faceless silhouettes.
I seize my staff, the fragment of Memory Stone glowing faintly blue, as though in warning. I steel myself and step into the corridor. Every torch guttering along the walls seems to pulse in time with my heartbeat. The novice follows at a distance, clutching her lampshade lantern.
At the end of the hall, the eastern stacks stand silent—until the sealed door begins to splinter. Runes carved into the heavy oak flare with phosphorescent light, and the novice gasps. I raise a hand. "Do not come closer."
A shard of wood falls with a crack. Beyond the door, a heat like a forge's breath seeps through. I recognize that sensation: the volcanic forges of Drak'Ur pulsing beneath my skin. My fingers tighten around the staff; a ribbon of power coils up my arm.
"Master, are you all right?" she pleads.
I do not trust my own reflection anymore—I might be a vessel for something else. Yet I step forward and touch the rune. Pain lances through my skull, and for an instant I am back in a crimson cavern, the Gildia Eteru's forges roaring. I hear the hammer's ring, the hiss of molten metal, and behind it a chant in a tongue older than memory.
The rune blazes, and the door bursts inward. A wave of sand tumbles out, and I stagger back. The corridor fills with a swirl of dust and half-light. I see a shape emerge: a man in a tattered coat, eyes like scorched glass, dragging a cage of bones behind him.
He lifts his head, and I know this visage—he was once my lieutenant in the Battle of Twin Suns, the one who betrayed me at Sur'ut's gates. But here he stands again, not dead, not alive—an echo summoned by my hand.
"Commander…" I rasp.
He smiles with hollow lips. In his hand gleams a shard of the Heart of Sur'ut—brighter than mine, red as blood fresh on sand. "You called us," he says. "Now witness the price of remembrance."
I raise my staff, but words scramble in my mind. Is this revenant real, or a specter born of Alzheimer's? The Inner Echoes argue: one demands I strike, the other that I release him. I grasp the Memory Stone and force my will outward.
A pulse of azure light collides with the red shard. The corridor shudders. The novice cries out as dust and echo collide, twisting space. For a heartbeat, I glimpse distant stars and burning moons beyond the walls. The revolting corridor becomes a conduit to multi-solar realms.
And then the vision collapses. The revenant falls like smoke, the cage of bones scattering. The rune sputters and dies. The corridor falls silent once more.
I lower my staff, legs trembling. The novice rushes to my side, eyes brimming. "Master, you saved us."
I force a nod. "Or damned us all," I murmur.
She does not understand, and I cannot explain. My memories bleed into reality; every fragment I record, every shard I touch, risks tearing the world apart.
I lead her back to the study. She dresses my wrist wound—scorch marks in a spiral pattern—and places a fresh sheet before me. "Should I seal the stacks again?" she asks.
I stare at the blank page. For a moment, the room tilts, and I see that book open once more. The glyphs writhe. I close my eyes and taste smoke, sand, and metal. Then I dip the quill.
"The walls between life and memory are thin. Tonight, they shattered."
My hand jerks as I write. The Inner Echoes fall silent, listening. Outside, the twin moons rise over the dunes, pale witnesses to the unseen war unfolding inside my mind.
I do not know if I have penned salvation or doom. Only that the Memory Stones tremble in their vaults—and that the chronicle continues, fed by the fracture of my own soul.