The wind changed.
Where the Heartwood had been still, the path beyond it trembled under skies swirling with dark intent. Lightning flickered at the horizon, not jagged and wild-but precise. Controlled. Each flash struck the same point over and over, as though trying to unmake the world at its edges.
Kael, Liyara, and Garran stood at the forest's edge, gazing out across the cragged expanse of the Scorreach-a deadland once whispered about in half-believed legends. Now it stretched before them, dry and cracked, littered with the ruins of towers long forgotten.
And at its center: the storm.
Liyara wrapped her cloak tighter. "That's no natural tempest."
Kael shook his head. "No. That's the Warden's work."
Garran spat. "He's still alive, then."
"He never was just alive," Kael replied. "He was bound. To the Cycle. To the Flame. But now, with it freed..."
"He's trying to seal it again," Liyara finished, realization dawning.
Kael's jaw tightened. "Or reshape it in his image."
They pressed forward. The Heartwood's warmth faded with every step. Magic here was... wrong. Twisted. Spells flickered, misfired. Time skipped like a stone across a black lake. At times, their shadows moved before they did.
Hours-or minutes-later, they reached the first ruin.
It was a tower, toppled and half-buried.
Etchings on its broken stones told stories of the Flame's earliest Keepers-guardians who once believed balance was salvation. But the carvings turned violent halfway up. Images of betrayal. A figure cloaked in stormlight. A crown of thorns. Eyes like voids.
"The Warden," Garran growled.
Kael nodded. "He was one of them. Before he chose dominion over duty."
As they moved deeper into the Scorreach, the storm's voice grew louder-a low hum threaded with whispers. It spoke in memories, trying to erode resolve. Kael heard his father's final words. Liyara saw her sister's face the day she vanished. Garran heard a war horn that hadn't sounded in decades.
They walked through it all.
And at last, they reached the base of the Stormspire.
It was massive, floating just above the ground, anchored by arcs of lightning that tethered it to the shattered earth. At its summit, a figure waited.
Tall. Still. Cloaked in stormclouds.
The Warden.
He raised his hand.
The storm screamed.
Wind howled like a chorus of the damned, and the sky cracked open above the Stormspire.
Bolts of lightning slammed down around them, exploding stone into dust, but Kael didn't flinch.
He stepped forward, eyes locked on the figure at the summit.
"WARDEN!" he shouted, his voice carried by the storm itself.
The figure turned slowly. His cloak billowed like smoke, face obscured by a crown of coiling energy. When he spoke, his voice came from everywhere at once-sky, ground, memory.
"You have broken the Cycle. Unleashed what was meant to be sealed."
Liyara stepped beside Kael, magic already swirling around her hands. "We freed the Flame from your prison."
"You freed chaos. The world is not meant to burn unchecked."
Garran barked a laugh. "You mean rule unchecked."
The Warden raised one arm-and with it, the storm surged. A wall of wind and power blasted toward them. Kael barely raised his sword in time, his blade cutting a narrow corridor through the force. The three staggered forward, leaning into the gale.
"We didn't come here to argue," Kael shouted.
"We came to end this."
"Then die as the last who tried."
In a flash, the Warden descended-no flight, just motion, sudden and absolute. He struck the ground with a shockwave that hurled Kael and Garran backward. Liyara spun mid-air, landing in a crouch, sigils flashing beneath her boots.
She cast first-threads of light arcing toward the Warden like spears. He swept his hand, and thunder answered, scattering her spellwork like sand.
Kael gritted his teeth and charged. His blade, still carrying the echo of the First Flame, sparked as it met the Warden's arm.
Metal met lightning.
The ground cracked beneath them.
"Your flame is a memory," the Warden hissed, voice suddenly human again-too human.
"Mine is the future."
They clashed, blow for blow. Sparks rained as fire met storm. Garran leapt back into the fray, hammer glowing with runes. He struck the Warden's side-an opening.
But the Warden turned and placed a single finger on Garran's chest.
A pulse of lightning erupted.
Garran flew backward, slamming into a stone pillar with a sound Kael never wanted to hear again.
"Garran!" Liyara screamed, hurling a burst of arcane flame.
It hit.
The Warden staggered, cloak ablaze for a moment before snuffing it out with a wave. He looked at Kael-no longer a god, but a man furious, hurt, and afraid.
"You don't understand," the Warden growled.
"The Cycle was protection. I kept the world spinning. You broke the wheel."
Kael rose, sword blazing with fire and memory. "Then we'll build something better."
He ran.
The Warden roared.
And their final battle began.
Blades clashed. Magic screamed. Time seemed to fracture.
The Stormspire quaked beneath the weight of power unleashed. Kael moved like instinct-parrying a strike that shattered the air, dodging arcs of lightning that burned through stone. Liyara, bleeding and breathless, anchored him with spells-defensive runes flaring with every heartbeat. Garran, though wounded, pressed forward with grim resolve, his hammer sparking with each labored swing.
But the Warden...
He never faltered.
He moved with inhuman precision, every strike calculated, every counter effortless. It was like fighting the storm itself-cold, inevitable.
Kael lunged, blade humming with Flame-memory, and at last—he struck true.
Steel met flesh.
The Warden staggered, a shallow gash across his side. He looked down, surprised.
Blood.
For the first time in centuries-he bled.
Kael didn't press the advantage. He stared.
"You're... human."
The Warden's face-bare, no longer masked by the storm-was gaunt, weary. Eyes ringed with sleepless centuries.
He didn't deny it.
"I was," the Warden said softly. "Before I became the Wheel."
The storm faltered.
Liyara stepped closer, sensing the shift. "You were one of the first Keepers. You chose to carry the Cycle."
"I had to," the Warden whispered. "Someone had to bear it. Someone had to remember the pattern, or the world would tear itself apart."
Kael lowered his sword slightly. "So you bound yourself to it."
"I didn't want power," he said. "I wanted peace.
But the longer I carried the Cycle, the more it became me. Until I couldn't tell where I ended... and it began."
Lightning flickered dimly across his shoulders.
Kael breathed in the silence that followed.
"Then let us carry it with you. Together."
The Warden blinked. For the first time, uncertainty crossed his face.
"You'd... share the burden?"
"We already did," Liyara said gently, holding up a glowing sigil. "The Flame didn't destroy us. It reminded us. That we were never meant to do this alone."
The Warden swayed, thunderclouds unraveling slowly around him like mist at dawn. The energy crackling off him dulled.
Above, the storm began to break, revealing a sliver of stars.
Kael stepped forward.
"Let go."
The Warden looked at his hands-scarred, shaking. And for the first time... he did.
He fell to his knees.
The storm... stopped.