The days that followed the dawn did not bring peace. They brought silence. A silence that clung to Elarion like morning mist, soft yet heavy, full of the echoes of prayers that no longer had names.
Lyssara rose each day before the sun. She would walk through the broken courtyards where flowers now grew through stone, her hands brushing the dew from petals born of ruin. The people called her queen, yet she did not feel like one. She felt like a ghost who had forgotten how to fade.
They came to her with questions she could not answer — about harvests, about omens, about how to live in a world where the heavens no longer watched. She gave them what she could: a smile, a word, a promise that they no longer needed to be perfect to be loved.
At night, when the stars appeared, she spoke to the wind. It was her way of praying — not to any god, but to the memory of one.
Sometimes, when the wind moved just right, she thought she heard a voice answering back.
"You kept your promise."
She would close her eyes and whisper, "So did you."
But when she opened them again, there was only the sky — wide, and terribly quiet.
Weeks passed. Then months. The seasons turned, and life began again. Children laughed in the streets. Bells rang not for worship but for weddings, for births, for rain. And though the world still ached, it learned to breathe.
Yet inside Lyssara, the ache did not fade. It became something quieter, something that lived behind her ribs like a heartbeat she could not ignore.
One evening, as twilight spilled over the city, a traveler came to her gates. He was thin and pale, his robes frayed by years of wandering. It was Iren Vale, the scholar who had once guided her through the fall of faith.
He bowed low before her. "My queen," he said softly, "I bring word from the edge of the world."
She studied him, her voice barely above a whisper. "What word?"
"There are storms where there should be none. The sea burns with silver fire. And those who dream… speak of wings."
Lyssara felt the air leave her lungs. "Wings," she echoed.
He nodded. "They say the sky has begun to fracture — as if the heavens are remembering what they once were."
That night, she could not sleep. The wind rose again, carrying the scent of rain — not mortal rain, but something older, colder. It smelled of moonlight and sorrow.
She stepped out onto her balcony, her hair moving with the storm. Lightning flickered in the distance, illuminating the horizon with red light.
Then, faint and trembling, she heard it.
"Lyssara…"
Her name, carried through the storm like a sigh.
She froze. Her heart beat once, then again, each pulse louder than thunder. She whispered into the wind, "Seraphyne?"
No answer. Only silence — and the low hum of the storm moving closer.
When dawn came, the sky was bruised with silver clouds. The world below seemed to hold its breath.
And for the first time since the queen's passing, Lyssara felt the old pull again — the one that had once drawn her into the heart of eternity itself.
She turned to the horizon, her hand trembling as she touched the locket that held a single white feather.
"Then I will find you," she whispered. "Even if the heavens fall again."
And as the storm gathered beyond the mountains, it seemed to whisper back — soft, sorrowful, and full of longing.
"Then come."