"So, where's the Harbinger now, Mahesa?"
Mahesa didn't answer immediately.
Instead, he looked toward the flame, its light now steady, almost expectant, before turning his gaze back to the Headmaster.
"Somewhere safe… He doesn't know what he is," Mahesa said at last, voice low, tinged with something between reverence and regret. "Not yet. He wanders the world, unaware of what stirs within him"
Another Mentor, one cloaked in green and gold, their face hidden behind a wooden mask shaped like a falcon... Spoke, voice sharp and measured:
"You mean to tell us the Harbinger walks the world without a guide? Without protection?"
Mahesa nodded once.
"He was never meant to be caged or groomed. The First Flame chose him freely. It's not for us to bind him"
"But he is vulnerable," The masked Mentor snapped. "If others sense even a fragment of what you claim, he won't survive long"
Mahesa's eyes turned cold.
"He's survived more than you think. More than most here ever could. He's already been tested. By the shadows... By the Hollowed, he's surviving on his own, not with the help of others"
There was a long pause.
Then, from the shadows near the rear of the chamber, another voice spoke, a Mentor so old their presence felt more like an echo than a man.
"Does he know?" The voice rasped. "Does he know what it means… To be the Harbinger?"
Mahesa's reply was soft.
"... No"
Another pulse from the First Flame.
Stronger now.
Almost impatient.
And Mahesa continued:
"But he will"
He looked up again, voice steady now.
"He's coming. Whether by choice or fate. He will find this place… Or this place will find him. And when he does"
He turned fully, addressing the whole chamber.
"... We must be ready. Not to teach him. Not to command him. But to remember. To serve the purpose we've long forgotten beneath tradition and fear"
Silence fell once more, but this time, it felt different.
Less uncertain.
More... Inevitable.
And then the Headmaster finally spoke again, quiet but firm:
"Then may the Flame guide him"
Mahesa closed his eyes and bowed his head.
"It already is"
--------
The chamber emptied in silence, the flames along the walls dimming one by one. The echo of footsteps faded until only two remained: Mahesa and the Headmaster.
For a moment, neither spoke. The First Flame flickered softly between them, less intense now, less expectant, perhaps. Just... Listening.
The Headmaster finally broke the silence.
"You shouldn't have told them that much"
Mahesa didn't look at him. He kept his eyes on the embers.
"I told them what they needed to hear"
"You told them more than that," The Headmaster said quietly. "You spoke like a man who still hopes"
Mahesa's eyes narrowed faintly, the smallest ghost of a smile on his lips.
"And you speak like a man who doesn't"
The Headmaster sighed, moving to sit on the stone bench beside the Flame.
"I did hope. Once. When he was born, I thought perhaps the old dreams would stir again. But then the signs scattered. The prophecies contradicted each other. We've lost more than just faith, Mahesa... We've lost clarity"
Mahesa finally turned, his voice lower now, threaded with something rawer than before.
"He's my friend... My best friend's grandson. The world doesn't need clarity to know what he is becoming. It only needs time"
The Headmaster's gaze sharpened.
"And if he doesn't become what you think? There are many before him, Mahesa... And I Witness all of them fall to the shadow... And you also see one of them, Moona's Father... You Discip-"
"Master!"
The word cracked through the chamber like a whip, louder than Mahesa intended. It echoed against the ancient stone walls, bouncing back at him like a rebuke.
The Headmaster's gaze turned sharp, his wrinkled hands pausing mid-motion as he'd been about to reach for the embers.
The silence that followed was immediate, taut with unspoken words and the gravity of what had almost been said.
Mahesa took a breath, his chest rising with effort. His fists trembled slightly at his sides, not from fear, but restraint.
"Forgive me for raising my voice, Master," He said at last, voice quieter now, clipped with control. "However, it would be better if we did not speak about that"
He didn't meet the Headmaster's eyes. Instead, his gaze fell to the flickering Flame between them, watching its dance like it might erase the image of that name. That man.
Moona's father.
The silence returned, but this time, it was cold.
The Headmaster sat back slowly, folding his hands in his lap. The firelight etched deeper lines into his face, highlighting the sorrow that never quite left his eyes.
"You're still carrying it," He said, almost to himself. "After all these years…"
Mahesa's jaw clenched, his expression unreadable.
"Some burdens don't pass," He said. "They settle into your bones"
The Headmaster studied him, his voice lowering into something gentler, older.
"You trained him, Mahesa. Just like you're watching over the boy now. Don't pretend the two aren't connected"
Mahesa's eyes narrowed, flicking up at last, just briefly to meet the Headmaster's.
Firelight met steel.
"They are not the same"
"No," The Headmaster agreed. "But the shadow they walk toward... Is"
Another silence stretched between them, heavy with history, with memory.
"He was your disciple. And you loved him like a son"
Mahesa's eyes closed for a long second. When he spoke again, the words came from deep beneath years of grief.
"He had the Light within him. It sang in his spirit. But in the end… He surrendered to the Shadow. Willingly. He didn't fall." His voice dropped, dark and steady. "He walked"
A long silence.
The Headmaster leaned forward, elbows on his knees.
"Does Moona know?"
Mahesa's head turned slightly, just enough to show the glint of sorrow in his eyes.
"No. To her, both her parents are simply... Gone. No grave. No final words. Just absence"
The flames along the chamber walls dimmed, as though mourning too.
"And that's how it should stay," Mahesa finished. "The truth would only poison her heart. Let her mourn the dead. Not chase the damned"
The Headmaster nodded slowly, fingers threading together as he stared into the embers.
"You protect her like she was your own"
"She is my own," Mahesa said, with quiet conviction. "She may carry his blood, but she'll never carry his burden. Not if I can help it"
For a long while, neither spoke.
The First Flame flickered gently, now less a beacon, more a companion to grief. It listened, and in its light, the past danced quietly between two old men, one who bore the weight of memory, and the other who bore the duty to the future.
The silence stretched on until the Headmaster finally rose. His bones creaked like old wood, and the Flame flickered with the movement as if acknowledging his age.
"We are nearing the edge," He murmured, not looking at Mahesa. "And when the edge comes… It doesn't matter whether we fall or walk into the dark. The result is the same"
Mahesa stood, too, slower this time. Tired. Not from age, but from carrying too many memories.
"Then we make sure he doesn't reach the edge alone," He said.
The Headmaster nodded faintly. "And if it's too late? If the Shadow already has its claws in him?"
Mahesa didn't blink. "Then I'll go into the dark myself and tear them out"
For a heartbeat, the First Flame flared, not in warning, but in resonance. Like it remembered what such words once meant. What kind of men once made them.
The Headmaster turned toward the passage leading out of the chamber.
"We'll summon the others," He said. "Quietly. The Circle must prepare. Not for his arrival... But for his awakening"
"And the girl?" The Headmaster added, pausing just before the archway.
Mahesa's voice was soft, but firm.
"She stays with me. She trains, she studies. But she never learns the truth... Not yet. If she finds it, it must be by her own light"
The Headmaster lingered for a moment, then gave a single nod and left.
Mahesa remained.
He turned back toward the First Flame. It had quieted again, pulsing faintly like a heartbeat beneath stone and ash.
He reached into his robes and pulled out a small, blackened coin, worn smooth by time. One side bore the faded sigil of a forgotten order; the other was scorched blank.
He placed it gently at the Flame's base.
"A marker," He said, almost to himself. "For the one who walked away"
Then he turned and walked out, leaving the chamber in silence, save for the whisper of the Flame.
--------
- Shadow Realm
The air here did not move.
It watched.
A sea of shifting black, still as oil but alive beneath its surface, spread endlessly in all directions. Towering spires of obsidian jutted from the void like broken teeth, their shapes unnatural.
Wrong, in ways the mind refused to name.
Then, something stirred.
Not in the Realm.
Within it.
Beneath the surface of its silence, a ripple echoed, a breath inhaled in a world that should not breathe. Something old, something forgotten by the stars and shunned by time, opened eyes that were never meant to open again.
Eyes that saw without light.
A memory awakened.
It wasn't human. Not anymore.
Maybe it never was.
It had once been something, once known something. But the centuries had stripped that away, buried it beneath nightmare and oath, sorrow, and war. All that remained was an echo, buried in the marrow of the Realm itself.
But now…
Now it rose.
"... So it's already begun"
....
...
..
.