Chapter Five – Of Swords Once Lost to Time
Part Four – The Smoke Beneath the Rift
The cliff came into view not as a shape, but as a sound—screaming wind, crackling wood, and something else. A vibration beneath the ribs. Like the world was humming wrong.
Selka raised a hand, halting them just before the final bend.
Below, the fishing village burned.
Homes carved into the edge of the cliff lay splintered, some torn free of their foundations, others already swallowed by fire. Riftborn howled through the smoke—four of them at least, lurching, glass-eyed beasts with gnarled limbs and spiraled ribs that pulsed with static between bone.
Kaelen dropped to a crouch, eyes narrowing. "Too many. They breached mid-village."
Yolti ducked beside him. "They're not targeting anyone—they're thrashing. Erratic."
Selka didn't kneel. Her eyes stayed fixed on the wreckage.
The Riftborn weren't moving with the same eerie cohesion they normally did. They were afraid of something. Retreating, even. One snapped its head toward the center of the chaos—and stilled.
Then came the strike.
A crack of lightning—pure, blue, and unnatural—split from above the rooftops. One Riftborn shrieked as its body twisted violently midair, bones collapsing inward from the force before it slammed through a watercart and did not rise again.
The three of them froze.
Out from the thickest smoke walked a figure draped in black. Cloaked. Hooded. He stepped lightly, yet each footfall shook ash from the air around him. No hesitation. No flourish.
He moved like silence given shape.
Another Riftborn lunged at him. He spun once, low to the ground, and a surge of arc-light flared from his palm—not cast, but released, like it had been caged. The Riftborn's body convulsed before hitting the earth in two pieces.
Kaelen's mouth opened. No sound came out.
Selka stepped forward, but not recklessly. Like she was afraid if she moved too fast, he'd vanish.
He didn't speak. Not to the Riftborn. Not to the villagers. Not to the fire.
He simply moved—each strike clean, inevitable. No wasted effort. Every gesture an echo of training long forgotten. He didn't look like a boy.
He looked like a myth remembered.
The last Riftborn howled toward the trees—and ran. It bolted back into the forest, severed and bleeding, vanishing into the fog it came from.
Silence.
The wind returned as the fires dimmed.
Villagers crawled out from beneath shattered beams. A mother clutched her child. An elder dragged a broken spear from the ground. They gathered in a circle around the figure who now stood with his back to them, already walking away.
Yolti whispered, "Is it…"
Kaelen stood.
He didn't wait. He didn't signal. He just walked down the hill, slow but certain, every step carrying weight he hadn't spoken of since the fire years.
Selka and Yolti followed.
The cloaked figure paused as the trio approached. Not surprised. As if he'd been expecting them all along.
Kaelen stepped between him and the rising sun, casting a long shadow.
"…Why didn't you come back?" Kaelen asked. Not with anger. Just pain.
The figure's head tilted.
He reached up—and unclasped the mask.
It hit the ground with a soft metallic ring.
Crimson eyes. Familiar jawline, sharper now. White hair curled at the edges from heat and travel. A face half-worn by fire and memory.
"Zephryn…" Selka said, barely above a whisper.
He looked at her. Then Yolti. Then Kaelen.
Then toward the village behind him.
His voice came low, steady.
"I am Zephryn.
Son of Solara.
And I won't stop…
Until we all remember."