Chapter 2

  The sun was higher now, warm on the tops of the trees. The morning chill had melted into damp earth and drifting insects, the kind that hovered just out of reach and never seemed to land. Kyle moved through the underbrush in silence, ears tuned more to the hush of the forest than the faint echoes of festival sounds rising from the village below.

  He hadn’t meant to walk this far. But once he’d left Lem behind at the stump, his legs had kept moving.

  The path bent near a cluster of split pines, roots knotted over a stone shelf slick with moss. Kyle stepped up, boots scuffing bark. From here, he could see the tips of the festival streamers in the distance—flickering blue threads dancing above rooftops he wanted to forget.

  “You always come out here when you’re thinking too loud,” said Lem.

  Kyle didn’t startle. He hadn’t heard him approach, but he wasn’t surprised.

  Lem sat cross-legged on the stone, chewing something woody and spitting flecks into the leaves.

  “You followed me.”

  Lem shrugged. “Didn’t feel like sitting alone.”

  Kyle didn’t reply.

  They sat there for a while, letting the wind speak between them. Distant laughter rose, muffled by trees. A drumbeat started up—faint, rhythmic, hollow.

  “We’re not ready,” Lem said finally, picking at a loose thread in his sleeve.

  “We’ve been ready.”

  “Then why haven’t we gone?”

  Kyle said nothing. The silence filled in with birdsong.

  “I just think,” Lem continued, “maybe we wait. A little longer. After the festival. After Harret stops sniffing around.”

  “There’s always something,” Kyle said. “That’s how they get you to stay.”

  “I’m just saying—”

  “No. You’re scared.”

  Lem didn’t flinch. “Yeah. I am.”

  Kyle looked at him for a long moment, then stood.

  “We go at week’s end. No more waiting.”

  Lem squinted up at him. “What happens if we don’t have enough by then?”

  “Then I go without you.”

  That landed harder than it should have. Lem’s face didn’t change, but his posture shifted—shoulders drawing in, mouth pressing tight.

  Kyle turned and walked back into the trees.

  Behind him, Lem didn’t follow.

  --

  Kyle was nearly past Mara’s hut when her voice stopped him.

  “You move like someone with weight in his pockets.”

  He froze. The path turned just ahead, dipping toward the deeper trees. He could’ve kept walking. Pretended not to hear. But he didn’t.

  He stepped back and leaned on her crooked fence. The old pine above her hut rattled in the wind.

  “I’m empty as ever,” he said.

  Mara sat on her stool beneath the lean-to eave, one leg stretched out and wrapped, eyes narrowed just enough to see through him.

  “You were seen,” she said.

  He said nothing.

  “I don’t care about the cider. Or the shed. Or who you’re trying to be angry at this time.”

  Still, he didn’t speak.

  “But I’ve lived long enough to recognize the shape of someone trying to tear free of their own skin.”

  Kyle looked at the ground.

  She gestured with her chin. “Sit. You’ve earned a story.”

  He sighed but obeyed, settling on the low stone near her garden bed, half-choked with weeds.

  “You ever heard the tale of the Grey Plague?” she asked.

  He shook his head.

  “Most haven’t. The church doesn’t like stories that remind people Aurora can forget them.”

  That caught his attention.

  Mara eased back, the wood creaking behind her.

  “There was a village, once—small, quiet, devout. Or so they thought. Then the Dust stopped coming. Crops withered. Babies failed to cry. The water turned to ash on the tongue. They prayed louder. Nothing changed.”

  Kyle’s jaw tightened, but he said nothing.

  “They sent word. Waited for a Lightbearer. When one came, he was young. Scared. He told them what no one wanted to hear: they hadn’t been punished. They’d been overlooked. Aurora hadn’t judged them. She just didn’t remember they existed.”

  Mara’s voice turned sharp and dry. “So they lit fires. Burned tithes. Offered their strongest to the woods. Still nothing. In the end, they walked away. Left their homes to rot. Their names were lost. Their bones weren’t.”

  She fixed him with a gaze that knew too much.

  “Some people scream at the goddess, thinking it’ll save them. Some go quiet and hope she passes by.”

  “And what do you do?” Kyle asked.

  She smiled, but it didn’t touch her eyes. “You stay where the wind doesn’t carry your name.”

  Kyle stood. “Thanks for the story.”

  “It’s not a story,” she said. “It’s a warning.”

  “Thanks for the warning. I’ve got plans that don’t require a goddess.”

  Mara frowned at his back and sighed.

  --

  The mill's waterwheel groaned nearby, its slow rhythm echoing across the stream. Behind the mill, on the northwest side, where the grass grew tall and the barrels lay half-forgotten stood the old lean-to where they used to meet. No one came here unless there was work to do. That made it perfect.

  Kyle leaned against the worn beam, eyes scanning the horizon even though he knew who would come. The shed still smelled faintly of barley and old rope. He kicked a rock into the grass, then stilled when he heard the soft tread of boots.

  Tina ducked under the slats and stepped into the shade, folding her arms the way she always did when she was bracing for something hard.

  “You shouldn’t be here,” she said, voice light with practiced teasing—but not quite hiding the worry underneath.

  “Neither should you.”

  “I was checking the mash barrels. That’s what I’ll say, anyway.”

  Kyle didn’t answer. She stepped closer, eyes not quite meeting his.

  “My father asked me if I’d seen anything. He’s not angry yet—but he knows something’s missing.”

  Kyle stayed silent.

  “I lied, Kyle.”

  “I didn’t ask you to.”

  “You didn’t have to.”

  They stood in silence. The stream bubbled quietly beyond the far fence. A bird shrieked once and fell silent.

  “You remember the first time we met here?” she asked, forcing a smile. “You were hiding from father. I was hiding from the festival. We sat on a barrel and you swore you’d leave the next day.”

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  “I meant it.”

  “You always do.”

  She brushed her fingers across a beam, the wood worn smooth where her palm had rested before. Kyle watched her—not the way he usually did, but like he was memorizing her outline.

  “I want to go,” he said.

  “I know.”

  “You could come.”

  Her smile didn’t reach her eyes. “You know I can’t.”

  “My mother, my life, it’s all poison here.”

  “My life is here,” she said gently. “My father. The inn. The chapel. The people.”

  He stepped closer, hands balled at his sides.

  “I love you,” she said. “But you want to burn everything down. And I keep hoping I can put out the fire before it spreads.”

  His mouth opened, then closed.

  Her hand brushed her stomach again. This time, he saw it.

  She didn’t speak of it.

  Instead, she said, “Please. Just… be careful. Don’t make me lie again.”

  She stepped back and disappeared through the slats, leaving him alone with the smell of old grain and waterweed.

  He didn’t follow.

  --

  The green had bloomed into noise and motion, in the afternoon sun.

  Benches lined the grass in messy rows, filled with villagers picking through plates of bread, fruit, and roasted root. Children darted beneath the tables, shrieking and laughing, faces smudged with juice. Someone played a flute near the chapel. Someone else tried to sing over it. The whole place felt like a held breath let loose.

  Kyle leaned on a wall, looking into the green, chewing a wedge of fried barleycake that someone had left unattended on a plate. It was cold and dry, but it filled his stomach, which was all he’d wanted.

  No one spoke to him. A few glanced his way, then looked elsewhere. He preferred it that way.

  On the far side of the green, the crowd thickened near a raised plank dais—the kind only dragged out for holy days or weddings. Jorgen stood atop it, arms raised, robes sweeping like curtains in the wind.

  Kyle moved closer, but stayed in the shadow of the chapel.

  The children gathered at Jorgen’s feet, wide-eyed. Even the grownups quieted as the Lightbearer began to speak.

  “Long ago,” Jorgen intoned, “when Aurora first turned her gaze upon the world, she saw a land dark and full of hunger…”

  A flick of his hand sent Dust spiraling upward—soft blue threads at first, twining like smoke around his arms.

  “She gave us breath,” he said, “and from her breath, light. From her light, the Saints. And from the Saints, safety, blessings.”

  The crowd called for more:

  “The Saint Who Burned the Sky… The Maiden of the Stream… The Silent Heretic… The Cloaked Pilgrim…”

  Jorgen’s voice deepened. Dust coiled into shape—glowing silhouettes in the air above him: a robed figure with a blade of fire, a woman pouring water from her hands, a man kneeling in chains.

  Kyle stared up at them, arms folded tight. He’d heard these stories before. Everyone had. Saviors sent by Aurora to reshape the broken world. Saints, they called them. But he’d heard whispers too. Different endings. Darker ones. But he listened anyway.

  “And so,” Jorgen said, “they stood at the gates of ruin, unburned. And the sky wept light.”

  He raised both hands.

  The Dust surged upward, too fast.

  For a moment, the blue light flared white, and one of the figures—The Saint Who Burned the Sky—ignited in a burst of flame. A ripple of heat rolled across the green. A girl screamed. One of the banners above the dais curled inward, blackening at the edges.

  Jorgen’s arms snapped downward.

  The Dust collapsed in on itself, vanishing in a hiss of cold vapor. The air fell silent, thick with unsettled awe.

  He smiled then—too wide, too smooth—and bowed slightly to the crowd. “Even Aurora's light must be handled with care.”

  Laughter broke out. Nervous, then growing. A few people clapped. The children clapped harder.

  Kyle didn’t move.

  His eyes stayed on the empty space where the figures had been, and the faint scorch mark left behind on the edge of the platform.

  --

  The festival had begun to settle into the kind of noise that came just before silence. Most of the food had been eaten. Music still drifted from the green, but slower now—less revelry, more tradition. Families started gathering their children, and firelight from the chapel’s braziers painted shadows across the walkways.

  Kyle didn’t care. He wasn’t here for the festival anymore.

  He skirted the green’s edge, staying in the darker gaps between lanterns, his boots whispering over the dirt. He kept his hood low, not to avoid being seen—but because he wasn’t sure what he’d do if he was seen. After everything, only one thing still pulled him back.

  The inn’s back entrance loomed ahead. Its shutters were half-closed, but light glowed through the cracks, and soft voices rose beneath the drone of the crowd.

  He didn’t knock.

  Tina opened the door before he reached it.

  She looked tired. Not just from the day’s work, but from holding something in.

  “I figured you'd come,” she said.

  Kyle hesitated, then stepped inside. The kitchen smelled of cider mash and smoked herbs. A fire crackled low in the hearth. They stood facing each other for a long breath.

  “I didn’t come for the cider,” Kyle said.

  “I know.”

  She crossed her arms, then uncrossed them. Her fingers twisted the edge of her apron.

  “I wanted to talk to you earlier,” she said. “But I couldn’t. Not with—” she gestured vaguely toward the green.

  He stepped closer. “What is it?”

  Her hand hovered near her stomach. “It’s been too long since the last sign,” she said softly. “Something’s changed. I can feel it.”

  Kyle didn’t speak at first. He looked at her and for a heartbeat, the rest of the world quieted.

  Tina met his eyes but didn’t flinch. “I don’t know for sure. But I’m not wrong often.” The sound of laughter carried faintly from the green. A drumbeat, distant and out of rhythm, like a heart unsure of itself.

  “You should’ve told me sooner,” Kyle said.

  “I couldn’t. Not until I was sure. And now…” She shook her head, swallowing. “Now… it always feels like the wrong time. And I’m tired of waiting for the right one. ”

  He stepped closer, a shadow falling between them. “I wouldn’t leave you—not like this. Not now. ”

  Her mouth twitched like it might smile, but didn’t. “That’s not the part I’m afraid of,” she whispered.

  A floorboard creaked behind them.

  Kyle spun. Harret stood in the hallway’s shadow, a dish towel still in one hand. He didn’t need to raise his voice—he never did. Broad and imposing, his stare carried the weight of every room he entered.

  He’d heard.

  Tina’s breath caught. “Father—”

  He didn’t shout. He didn’t even move at first. Just looked between the two of them, like he was sorting through a ledger and found a debt that didn’t belong.

  “I knew something was wrong,” Harret said at last. His voice was low. Cold. “But I thought it was just the cider.”

  Kyle straightened. “It’s not her fault.”

  Harret’s eyes fixed on him. “You think I care about fault?”

  He stepped into the room, slow, deliberate.

  “You’ve been a shadow on my doorstep for years. I tolerated it. For her. Because she’s too kind to see what you are.”

  “Stop,” Tina whispered.

  Harret’s voice sharpened. “And now this? This?” He shook his head. “You think you can take something from her and run?”

  “I wasn’t running from her.”

  “But you were running.”

  Silence stretched. Tina didn’t move.

  “I’ll leave,” Kyle said. “Tomorrow. You won’t see me again.”

  “Damn right I won’t,” Harret said. “If I do, you’ll wish I hadn’t.”

  Kyle didn’t flinch.

  He looked at Tina one last time. There was nothing to say. Everything they might’ve had collapsed between them, unfinished, fragile.

  Then he turned and walked out into the night.

  Behind him, Harret didn’t follow. Neither did Tina.

  --

  The hut was dim, lit only by the embers in the hearth and the last color of twilight slipping through the shutter. Kyle pushed the door open without knocking.

  His mother sat on her heels beside the fire, sorting dried roots into a clay bowl. She didn’t look up.

  “You’re back early,” she said. Her voice was calm, but there was steel beneath it.

  “I’m leaving tomorrow.”

  She didn’t answer.

  “I told her,” he added, after a beat.

  Now she looked up—sharp eyes catching the firelight. “Tina?”

  He nodded.

  “And?”

  “Her father heard.” Kyle exhaled slowly. “He didn’t say it, but I’m not welcome anymore.”

  A long silence settled between them, not heavy—just full.

  Then she sighed. “You never were.”

  That might’ve hurt, if her tone hadn’t been so quiet. Almost resigned.

  “I didn’t plan for this,” Kyle said. “But I’m not running from her.”

  She nodded once, as if that was the one thing she needed to hear.

  “I don’t know what kind of man I’m becoming,” he added.

  “You’re still choosing,” she said. “That counts for something.”

  She reached beside her, pulling out a small bundle wrapped in faded cloth. She placed it carefully on the floor between them.

  “I kept this hidden,” she said. “It was his. Your father’s.”

  Kyle didn’t move.

  “He told me to destroy it if anyone ever came asking. But I never could. I think… maybe he knew it would be you instead.”

  He crouched beside the bundle, opened it slowly.

  Inside was a pendant—dull silver disc, a circle within a circle split in twelve. No markings, no chain. Just a cold weight that felt heavier than it should.

  “What is it?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “But I know it’s important. He risked too much to hide it.”

  Kyle turned it in his fingers. “Why give it to me now?”

  “Because something’s shifting. And because whether I like the choices you’ve made or not, you’re still my son.” She met his eyes. “And I trust you.”

  That landed harder than any judgment could have.

  Kyle tucked the pendant into his shirt.

  “I won’t lose it,” he said.

  “I know,” she replied. “Now go. Before I say something that makes you stay.”

  He hesitated at the door, then looked back.

  “She said something’s changed. That she can feel it.”

  His mother’s face tightened—but she nodded again, slower this time.

  “It has,” she said.

  Then Kyle stepped into the dark.

  --

  The forest had cooled. Evening mist clung low along the tree roots, curling like fingers around the underbrush. Kyle moved without sound, weaving through the trails he knew by memory, until the old stump rose into view—his one constant.

  He crouched and pulled the stone aside. Still there. Wrapped bundles. Coins. A thin knife Lem had found months ago. Kyle fingered the cord ties, counting by feel. Nothing missing. Nothing added.

  He let out a breath.

  Not because he trusted the stash—but because he didn’t trust anything else.

  Behind him, a branch cracked.

  “Didn’t think you’d come back,” Lem said. He stepped out from behind the pine with a twig between his teeth and his arms crossed tight.

  Kyle didn’t turn. “You talk to anyone today?”

  Lem blinked. “Just your mother. Mara. Tina. Jorgen a bit.” He kicked at the dirt. “Why?”

  Kyle finally looked at him. “What did you say to Jorgen?”

  “Nothing important. He was talking about the Dust acting strange. Said he felt ‘pressure in the light.’ Whatever that means.”

  Kyle didn’t answer.

  Lem lowered his voice. “I might’ve mentioned we were thinking of leaving. Not specifics, just—y’know, the usual complaints.”

  Kyle stood, slow and rigid. “You what?”

  “I didn’t say names! I just said people like us don’t get blessings. That maybe it’s time to find our own way.”

  “You said enough.”

  Lem’s face fell. “He didn’t seem to care.”

  Kyle stared past him, into the dark.

  “That’s what scares me,” he said.

  Lem didn’t reply.

  Kyle stepped away from the stump, brushing moss from his hands.His shirt shifted—just slightly—and something glinted beneath the collar. Not much. Just a flicker of fractured silver in the twilight.

  Lem’s eyes narrowed. “What was that?”

  Kyle tugged the fabric higher. “Nothing.”

  “That looked like—”

  “I said nothing,” Kyle snapped. Too fast.

  They stood there for a moment, the silence thick between them. Lem didn’t press.

  Kyle exhaled and turned away.

  “You should go home,” he muttered.

  “You too?”

  “Tomorrow,” Kyle said. “I’m done waiting.”

  He disappeared into the trees.

  Behind him, the forest pressed in tighter, like it knew something was coming.