The first star fell before anyone could speak.
It tore across the heavens in silence, trailing fire like a wound through night. When it struck the sea beyond Elarion's coast, the water rose in a pillar of light that burned blue, then crimson, then vanished—leaving a circle of stillness where no wave moved.
Then came the second star.
And the third.
Each impact whispered through the bones of the world, not as destruction but as memory reawakening—every fallen star releasing something that had once been forgotten. The sky itself seemed to split open, bleeding history back into the present.
Arenne stood at the balcony of the Hall of Origins, watching as the firmament unraveled. The air shimmered, thick with old songs, lost voices, fragments of places that no longer existed. Her eyes—one gold, one violet—reflected the chaos like twin mirrors of dawn and dusk.
"Every star is a door," she whispered. "And they're all opening."
Seraphyne joined her, flickering faintly, her light weaker now as the Veil struggled to remain whole. "Each one holds a soul that was never meant to wake again. The Echo is unraveling the boundary between memory and matter."
Arenne's hand trembled. "Then she's rewriting the pattern of creation itself."
"She's not destroying," Seraphyne said softly. "She's restoring the silence that existed before life began."
"Silence isn't peace." Arenne's voice hardened. "It's absence."
Seraphyne turned toward her. "And what are you without absence? Without loss? Would your love mean anything if you hadn't lived through centuries of it?"
Arenne looked at her, hurt shadowing her eyes. "Don't speak as though you're defending her."
"I'm not," Seraphyne whispered. "I'm reminding you that she's not just your enemy. She's the part of you that never forgave yourself for surviving."
Below, the streets of Elarion warped.
Time fractured like glass—moments looping, overlapping. A girl chased her shadow through the same alley three times before vanishing into her own echo. A soldier knelt beside his older self, dying from a wound that had not yet been struck.
The people cried out for their queen.
And in the chaos, the First Echo appeared again—walking through the storm of memory as though it were her home. Every step she took turned the air to crystal, every word unmade the sky.
This world was born from my silence, she said. It will return to it.
Arenne stepped down from the balcony, her feet bare against the trembling marble.
"I made this world," she said. "I bled for it. You are my beginning—but I will not let you be my end."
The Echo tilted her head. "Then merge with me. Remember what we were before love weakened you. Before mortality stained your light."
Seraphyne's glow brightened sharply. "Don't listen!"
But Arenne had already frozen. The Echo's voice was too familiar—its tone, its calm, its conviction. It sounded like herself before she had learned how to care.
The Echo raised a hand, and the stars above stilled mid-fall. They hung there like frozen tears in a wound that refused to close.
You think eternity is cruel because you live it alone. Join me, and no loss will ever touch you again.
Arenne's pulse thundered. "And what would become of them?" She gestured to the city, to Seraphyne, to the thousands crying her name.
They will rest. Perfect, unchanging. The way creation was before you breathed chaos into it.
"I can't," she said, almost pleading. "Life is meant to move. Even pain gives it shape."
The Echo's eyes flared with distant stars. "Then you choose death."
Arenne drew in a breath. "No. I choose love."
Light and shadow collided.
The world convulsed, caught between two heartbeats—the heartbeat of a god who wanted stillness and that of a queen who remembered warmth. The air became a storm of mirrored selves, fragments of every life Arenne had ever touched spiraling outward like glass petals.
In that storm, Seraphyne reached for her, eyes burning with faith. "Arenne! Don't fight her with your power—fight her with your truth!"
Arenne turned, her tears scattering like starlight. "Then stay with me."
"I always do."
Their hands met—and where divine power once divided, it now fused.
The storm shuddered. The Echo faltered, her perfect symmetry cracking. Through the fissures, Arenne saw glimpses of herself—not divine, not immortal, but human. Crying. Laughing. Loving.
For the first time, the Echo stepped back.
What have you done?
"I've reminded you what we lost," Arenne said. "And what we chose to keep."
The sky pulsed once, then fell silent. The stars hung suspended, no longer falling, no longer burning.
But it was not victory—only a pause.
The Echo was still there, fading yet far from gone, her form dissolving into mist.
If you will not merge, I will show you what love costs when eternity refuses to end.
And with that, she vanished—leaving the world trembling between dawn and night, unfinished, unresolved.
Arenne sank to her knees, her light dimmed, Seraphyne's hand still clasped in hers.
"The war isn't over," Seraphyne said softly.
"No," Arenne whispered, looking at the still sky. "It's only learned to wait."
And far above them, one last star began to fall—slow, deliberate—aimed not at the world, but at her.