The storm had passed, but its echoes lingered in the palace walls.
Elara sat in the quiet stillness of her new chamber no longer the cramped servant's quarters near the kitchens, but a high-vaulted room with marble floors and windows that overlooked the moon-kissed gardens.
A promotion, they said.
A gift from the Empress for bravery.
But Elara knew a gilded cage when she saw one.
Her fingers brushed the fabric of the silk sheets. Soft.
Too soft.
Too still.
It made her skin itch.
She couldn't stop thinking about M.
His words haunted her more than the fire beast ever had.
You're a spark. And sparks start fires.
But she didn't want to start a fire.
She wanted to understand why the stone had chosen her, what it meant.
Why it felt like something ancient and half-alive was now curled beneath her ribs, humming like a second heartbeat.
Every day, it grew stronger.
And harder to hide.
A soft knock broke the silence.
Not a guard too timid.
Not the Empress too proud to knock.
Elara rose slowly and opened the door.
It was Rina, the young maid who once snuck her bread crusts in the cold of winter when no one else noticed her.
Her cheeks were flushed, her breath short, eyes wide with something between fear and urgency.
"Mistress Elara," Rina whispered. "You have to come with me. Now."
Elara frowned. "What is it?"
"There's someone… someone in the old catacombs.
He says he knew your mother."
Elara's world tilted.
"My mother is dead," she said, almost a breath.
"I know," Rina said quickly.
"That's why I think you need to hear what he has to say."
The catacombs were forbidden.
They coiled beneath the palace like a serpent's skeleton sealed off after the Rebellion, after a fire, after a death no one dared name.
But Rina knew the way, guiding Elara past rusted grates and forgotten halls.
The air turned colder, the silence heavy with memory.
They stopped at a cracked stone archway. Rina handed her a torch.
"He's in there.
I won't go further."
Elara nodded and stepped inside.
Shadows clung to the curved walls, shifting with each flicker of her torch.
At first, there was only silence.
Then a voice, dry as dust and sharp as broken glass, cut through the dark.
"You have her eyes."
She turned sharply.
A tall man stepped from the shadows, draped in tattered navy robes that had once belonged to a man of station.
His silver hair fell in strands, his posture proud despite the years.
"You knew my mother?" Elara asked.
"I served her," he said. "Before they erased her name. Before the Empress took the throne."
Elara's blood ran cold. "You're saying my mother… was royalty?"
He stepped closer.
"She was more than that.
She was a Flamebearer.
A guardian of the sacred stone. Like you."
She shook her head, voice cracking.
"No. My mother was a palace maid.
She… she seduced the king.
Got pregnant.
And like all the others, she died after giving birth.
That's how it works.
That's why I became a maid."
The man's eyes softened, but not with pity with pain.
"That's the story they let you believe.
The truth was buried, along with her."
Elara took a step back, shaking her head.
"I don't....this can't be right.
Why would anyone lie about that?"
He pulled something from within his robe a folded piece of parchment, edges brittle with time.
Attached was a faded sketch: a young woman, hair like moonlight, eyes unmistakably Elara's.
"I've kept this safe," he said, voice low.
"She gave it to me when she knew her time was near.
She said, 'Give this to her, when she's ready to know who she is.'"
Her hands trembled as she took it.
The handwriting was delicate, rushed, as if penned in hiding:
My dearest Elara, If you are reading this, then I am gone.
But know this: you were not born of shame. You were born of love, real and defiant.
The Empress feared it.
Feared us. And so she ended me.
But she could not end you.
Live.
Learn.
And when the time comes… rise.
Your Mother, Selene of the Flame.
Elara stared at the name. Selene.
"She was to be queen," the man said.
"The king was going to make it official.
He loved her.
Not the Empress.
She was his political match, nothing more.
But when she found out he planned to name Selene his bride, she bewitched him.
Poisoned his mind.
Turned his court against him. Then…
she held your mother hostage for months."
Elara could barely breathe. "While she was pregnant with me?"
"She died giving birth, yes but not because of tradition.
Because she was weakened, tortured, isolated.
The Empress called it justice.
Claimed your mother was a seductress, a traitor."
Her knees gave out.
She fell onto the cold stone floor, gripping the letter like a lifeline.
"You were born in secret," he continued, voice gentler now.
And when she died, they didn't kill you like the Empress wanted.
She ordered you placed as a servant.
Safer that way.
Hidden.
Forgotten.
"And you?" Elara whispered.
"I watched you.
From a distance.
Always.
I made sure you were never assigned you to the worst tasks.
That you were never beaten like the others.
I bribed cooks to feed you, guards to ignore you. And when the stone stirred when it began to call to you, I knew the time had come."
Elara looked up at him. "Why me?"
"Because it chose you.
Because you carry more than its power.
You carry her will.
Her fire.
That's why they fear you.
Not for what you are… but for what you represent."
Elara stood slowly, spine straightening.
Her voice, though quiet, was no longer trembling.
"They'll come for me."
The man nodded once.
"They already are."
She tucked the letter close to her chest.
"Then I won't run," she said.
"Not anymore."