Chapter 2 The Flame Remembers

Rael's POV

The flames crackled like impatient soldiers, mirroring the rage simmering beneath my skin.

I stood in the war chamber of Emberhold, staring at the floating crystal projection. The image was grainy, flickering-but clear enough. A girl. Barefoot. Hair braided in the Wind Kingdom's humble style. Kneeling beside a dying man. And then... the light.

Spirit magic.

My fingers clenched at my sides.

It couldn't be.

The Moon Shard was dead. Gone. Erased by the war twenty years ago. That's what the High Priestess told us. What everyone believed.

Yet here she was. A flicker of power that hadn't been seen in decades. The same white glow I remembered from that night-the night the Spirit Queen breathed her last. The night my mother was burned alive.

General Varen stood beside me, arms folded, expression unreadable. "We intercepted the vision crystal from a Wind spy," he said. "It was sent toward the North, but our hunters snatched it. You'll notice the girl bears a royal crest-look near her collarbone."

I didn't need to. I had already seen it.

That mark... it haunted my dreams.

I turned away from the image, shoving the fury back down where it belonged. "Send scouts. Quietly. I want her captured and brought to me alive."

Varen hesitated. "Alive, Your Highness? She may be-"

"I said alive." My tone was ice. Fire and ice. Always my curse.

He bowed and left.

I stared out the arched window of the palace, watching smoke coils rise from the volcanic forges below. Emberhold was always burning. Just like me.

If she was the Moon Shard, she was the reason for my pain.

If she was just a girl, she was still dangerous. Spirit power didn't return to the world without consequence.

But... something gnawed at me as I replayed the vision.

Her face.

It wasn't the face of a sorceress or a queen.

She looked... lost. Fragile. Like she had no idea what she had done.

My mind rebelled against the softness trying to take root. I couldn't afford doubt. Not now. Not when the balance of the Five Kingdoms was tilting again.

Still, I couldn't stop watching her image in the crystal, over and over.

Not because she might be a threat.

But because deep down, in a place I refused to admit existed-

I knew that face.

Not from politics.

Not from war.

From somewhere older. Deeper.

From a dream.