The flames no longer listened to him.
They obeyed, yes—but not because of will. Not the way they once had. When Kael summoned fire now, it came like breath from a second pair of lungs—instinctual, reflexive, alive. And behind that breath, something else breathed too.
Watching.
Whispering.
Feeding.
He walked alone beneath the fractured sky, eastward toward the old capital roads, where pilgrims once wandered and peddlers wheeled silver bells through summer air. Now, the wind was brittle. The fields burned too dry. And birds no longer sang near him.
Kael didn't feel tired, though he hadn't slept in days.
He hadn't needed to.
Sleep had become a door, and behind that door waited Solvane, laughing with flame-kissed teeth… and Veyrith, wearing Kael's own face like a mirror left too long in the dark.
He pressed a hand to his chest as he walked.
The second Remnant had awakened only a day ago. The first had settled like a wound. The second had settled like a secret—woven into him, subtle and soft, threading through every memory like needlework. His thoughts no longer felt like they belonged to him alone.
"That's because they don't," came the voice, dry and amused.
Kael didn't stop walking.
"You're not carrying us. We're not passengers. We're inheritance."
"You think you still have a self. How sweet."
He stopped at dusk in a grove of silverbark trees—long-limbed, hollow, once used by priest-guardians to store relics during storms. They hadn't been touched in years.
Kael moved through the clearing and found a dead campfire ringed with stones. He dropped to one knee and placed his palm on the ash.
Still warm.
Someone had been here recently.
Not just anyone.
A bearer.
His hand curled. Flame sparked at his knuckles. But instead of orange or red, the fire bloomed violet—coated in the shimmer of Veyrith's influence. It danced like a mirage and hissed like doubt.
Kael hissed too, under his breath. The mark was starting to burn again.
The one on his back.
He removed his cloak, unfastened the buckled half-plate beneath, and peeled back the torn undershirt that clung to his skin like second flesh.
In the dying light, the Pactbrand glowed.
A twisting sigil, curved like a coiled serpent, seared between his shoulder blades. A half-mark when Solvane claimed him. A second layer had formed when Veyrith settled in—interlocking with the first, forming an ouroboros of ash and deceit.
He traced it with a fingertip, grimacing at the heat.
It was changing.
Growing.
Kael grit his teeth and leaned forward, breath shallow.
You are becoming more than a man, whispered Solvane.
You are becoming a chorus, whispered Veyrith.
He dropped to both knees, fists clenched.
The fire in the grove flickered back to life without his touch.
A vision took him.
Not a dream. Not a memory.
A fragment.
He stood on blackened stone, beneath a sunless sky. A figure knelt at his feet—bound in chains made of light, weeping blood. Not human. Not anymore.
Kael raised a hand, and the chains turned to fire.
The figure screamed.
He didn't.
Then he looked down and realized he wore a crown.
Not a golden one. Not forged.
It was burning. Alive. Screaming with every lie he had yet to tell.
The Pactbrand pulsed.
And Kael woke gasping.
He stood slowly, the pain in his back dulling but not vanishing. The fire around him still burned, though he'd never touched it. Not really.
The Remnants were starting to act on their own.
And if he didn't get control soon—
"Still breathing."
Kael turned sharply, drawing his blade in a blink.
A figure leaned against a tree on the edge of the grove, arms crossed, head tilted. Cloaked in gray, a sword strapped across her back. A veil covered the lower half of her face, but her eyes were sharp, unreadable.
She hadn't made a sound. Not a snap of twig. Not a crunch of leaf.
Another Remnancer.
She stepped forward casually, ignoring his drawn weapon.
"Relax. If I meant to gut you, I wouldn't have said anything."
Kael didn't lower the blade.
"Then why are you here?"
She pointed lazily at the fire.
"I followed that. It called louder than you think."
"Who are you?"
She stopped just beyond the light.
"I go by Mara."
"What Remnant do you carry?"
She tapped her chest, over her heart.
"None yet. But I'm listening."
Kael frowned. "You're hunting them."
"Maybe." A shrug. "Or maybe I just want to see what happens to the rest of you. The ones who said yes."
Kael didn't trust her.
Didn't trust how steady her voice was. How her hand never went near her blade. How she stood just at the edge of flamelight, letting the shadows keep her half-formed.
Mara smiled behind her veil.
"Don't worry. I'll leave you to your fire. Just thought you should know…"
She turned, her voice drifting like smoke as she vanished into the woods.
"…someone else is hunting you too. Not for power. For memory."
Kael stared into the fire long after she left, his body motionless, the Pactbrand still pulsing like a second heartbeat.
He could feel something approaching.
Not a god.
Not a mortal.
A third choice.
And the next Remnant was closer than he wanted it to be.