The dawn came slow.
A sky once smeared with ash now unfolded in soft grays and pale golds. Elara sat near the edge of the hollow, the Heart in her lap. It no longer pulsed urgently. Instead, it breathed—slow, steady, alive.
Across from her, Kael—no longer masked, no longer Ashbringer—sat with hands in the soil. His flame had not returned. Not in anger. Only warmth remained, flickering quietly beside him like an ember that had finally learned stillness.
Rin leaned against a half-burned tree, sharpening one of his blades with mechanical focus. Not because it was needed, but because it gave him time to think.
Sira walked the perimeter, watching the treeline. Her steps were light, but her eyes were heavy. They had won a battle. But not the war.
"Three more splinters," Rin said, breaking the quiet. "That's what the Heart showed you?"
Elara nodded. "Three pieces of what was taken from Elsewhere. Three echoes… of what should never have entered this world."
Kael looked up, his voice quieter than before. "They're not all like Elaiah. Not yet. Some… still resist what they've become."
Sira joined them. "Then they can still be saved?"
"No," Kael said, not cruelly. Just honestly. "But they might *choose* to end it. If given the truth."
Rin looked at Elara. "And the Heart shows them that?"
She hesitated. "The Heart doesn't force. It remembers. It's up to them to accept it."
Kael turned toward her, firelight reflecting softly in his eyes. "You've done what none of us could. You *opened* it. Not by power. By belief."
"Not belief," she said. "Grief."
No one spoke for a long moment. The forest was healing, but slow. The sanctuary was cracked, but alive. Like all of them.
Elara stood. "There's one thing the Heart hasn't shown me."
Kael raised an eyebrow.
"My mother," she said. "It showed her near a gate. Bound. Waiting."
"Then she crossed," Kael said. "But she may not have crossed alone."
Elara's fingers tightened around the Heart.
"She was a Keeper," Kael added. "One of the last true ones. If she went into Elsewhere willingly, she might have left behind more than just echoes."
Rin stood too, now alert. "Then we go."
"Where?" Sira asked.
Elara turned to the north.
"There's an old lighthouse beyond the Vale of Thread. Built before the world knew maps. It calls to the Heart in my dreams."
Kael nodded slowly. "Then that's where the next splinter is."
"And maybe," Elara said, "the path to my mother."
Rin stepped beside her. "We move before the next shadow wakes."
Sira smiled faintly. "Good. I'm tired of waiting for the end. Let's go rewrite it."
They left the grove behind them—four now, not pursued but called forward by something deeper. The Heart glowed with every step Elara took, and the sky above was no longer splintered… but watchful.