Chapter 2 The Edge of Forgotten Flame

Ashra awoke to the scent of ash and morning dew.

The fire had long since burned down to faint embers, and pale blue light filtered through the trees like the memory of a forgotten dawn. Sable, her black-feathered companion, perched silently on a stone nearby, his head tilted as if listening to something she could not hear.

The events of the night before pressed against her skull like a dream half-remembered. The name whispered by the wind, her name. Not the one the villagers used in sneers and mutters, but the one that had thundered through her bones.

Ashra.

It didn't feel like a name. It felt like a key. A call. A weapon.

She knelt by the remains of the fire, brushing soot away from the strange pendant now strung around her neck. Obsidian and silver, shaped like an eye wreathed in flame. She hadn't remembered taking it, but she had woken with it against her chest.

"Did you give this to me?" she asked Sable.

The crow only blinked.

Ashra stood and brushed off her cloak, glancing once more toward the ruined stones of the keep. Something had awakened within her last night, something tied to the bloodline she didn't know she possessed. The visions. The fire. The voice.

She couldn't stay. Not here, not in the quiet shell of what was once her home. The world beyond the forest called to her now.

With Sable on her shoulder, Ashra began to walk.

The old forest deepened as the hours stretched on. Towering trees arched above like cathedral spires, their twisted roots forming a path as ancient as the stone ruins she'd left behind. Ashra moved with careful steps, eyes wary, hands close to her belt. She had no sword. No map. Only the pendant, the crow, and the strange warmth lingering in her veins.

Birdsong faded the deeper she went, replaced by silence that was almost... listening.

In a clearing, she found a shattered statue humanoid, though moss and time had erased its face. One hand pointed north. On its base, a single rune glowed faintly as she approached, flickering like starlight.

She touched it.

The vision hit her like lightning.

Snow. Screams. A child in the arms of a woman running through flame. Soldiers in black armour, swords dripping with blood. The woman turned. Her eyes, Ashra's eyes, glowed with fury.

"Protect her."

Then, silence.

Ashra staggered back, chest heaving. The rune on the statue had gone dark.

"What is happening to me?" she whispered.

Sable cawed once, sharp and warning.

She turned. Behind her, the shadows shifted.

From the forest stepped a figure, hooded, cloaked in tattered robes the colour of bone. A mask hid their face, and in one hand they held a staff carved with hundreds of tiny runes.

"You walk the path too early, Ashra," the figure said, voice both male and female, old and young.

Ashra froze. "How do you know my name?"

"Names are the first things stolen. Yours has returned."

"Who are you?"

"A Seer of the Ashbone. One of the few who remembers."

Ashra took a step back, heart thudding.

"Remember what?"

"That the throne still calls to its heir. And the world will burn to keep her from rising."

The figure raised their staff. Sable flared his wings but did not fly.

The runes on the staff glowed-then a spark leapt from the end, not to harm, but to reveal.

The world shimmered.

And Ashra saw it.

A great city of flame and gold, floating in the sky. A throne carved from bone and obsidian. A crown broken in half. And a child wreathed in fire, screaming as the world fell around her.

Then, darkness.

The Seer lowered the staff. "You must choose Ashra. To run, or to reclaim."

Ashra clenched her fists. "Why me?"

"Because the blood in your veins is not just royal. It is cursed."

The Seer turned and vanished into mist.

Ashra was left alone. Her heart was pounding. Her purpose is uncertain, but no longer lost.

She looked down at the pendant again.

It pulsed once.

Then she kept walking.

To the north.

Toward the beginning of everything.