Cold air burned Ray’s lungs as he half-ran, half-slid down the slope, boots skittering on loose rock. Peter sagged in his arms, too light, too limp, mouth opening on thin, broken sounds that never quite formed words. Ray kept his grip locked under the boy’s shoulders and knees, forcing his legs to do the work while his mind stayed sharp enough to read the ground ahead. The amulet’s warmth pressed against his chest, a crawling heat that made his skin prickle. It was not pain, yet it carried the same warning as a grip tightening around your throat.

  I’m out, he pushed at the bond, hard enough that it made his own temple throb. I’m coming back hot. Eyes on the trail.

  I’m already moving, Miu sent, her presence darting ahead through scrub and stone. Don’t slow down. If you slow down, you die.

  He didn’t argue. He moved.

  The convoy came into view in staggered groups along the track. They had not made much progress since he’d left it, the line slowed by thicker brush and the way the ground kept forcing them to detour around boulders and gullies. People were cutting through grass and low scrub with swords and tools, shifting packs forward in short bursts, stopping to re-tie straps, then pushing again. Fighters kept the edges covered, heads turning constantly toward the slopes and treeline. Ray had no time to match their pace. He pushed harder, using the last of his legs to close the distance before anyone got a clear look at what he was carrying.

  The amulet went dead.

  The warmth vanished so suddenly it left a cold patch against his skin, a phantom chill where heat had been. Ray’s stride stuttered once. His head snapped up, eyes cutting across the moving line, then past it, searching the trees and higher ground. Nothing moved. No shadow shifted. No figure stood in the open. The sensation of being examined lingered anyway, fading with the same reluctance as a bruise.

  Someone saw him.

  A woman near the edge of the moving line straightened, squinting through scrub. Recognition flickered across her face and the tension in her shoulders eased for half a breath, then her eyes dropped to the stranger in Ray’s arms and her expression tightened into something closer to dread. She stepped back, then waved someone over with a sharp motion of her hand.

  “Ray?”

  More heads turned. People recognised him first, then their gazes snagged on Peter’s slack limbs, the raw marks at his wrists, the way his mouth hung open like he’d forgotten how to close it. Murmurs ran through the convoy, fast and uneven.

  “Off-world…”

  “System-touched.”

  “Is he with Teddy’s kind?”

  “Teddy helped,” someone said, the words half defensive, half pleading, as if saying it out loud made it safer. “He helped the dragonkin.”

  “I know,” another answered. “That doesn’t mean the System isn’t still on him.”

  Fear kept the group in a loose ring. People held back with pinched faces and hard eyes, watching Peter like he might spring up and change the rules. A few weapons came up, not aimed to strike, held ready in case Peter woke wrong or the air shifted the way they’d learnt to fear. The wounded were eased behind sturdier bodies. A mother pulled her child close and whispered something Ray couldn’t hear.

  They’re watching you, Miu sent, her voice tight through the bond. I’m close.

  Ray felt her nearby in a different way than the bond, a faint scrape of movement through undergrowth, the smallest shift in the trees. He did not look directly. Looking would give her away. He kept his eyes on the people in front of him and kept his breathing steady.

  The amulet sat cold against his chest. It should have been reassuring. It wasn’t.

  Ray stopped a few steps short of the convoy’s centre, where the ground was packed down from repeated pauses. He lowered Peter carefully onto his cloak, folding it beneath the boy’s head so his face did not press into dirt and crushed leaves. Peter’s breathing hitched. Ray kept one hand on his shoulder, firm and steady, and made sure everyone could see he wasn’t panicking.

  “He’s alive,” Ray said, loud enough to carry without shouting. “He’s hurt. He was chained.”

  That last part landed. The anguish didn’t vanish, but it shifted. People looked past Ray into the brush and the higher ground, scanning for shapes that weren’t there.

  “He can’t come into the middle,” someone said, voice strained.

  Ray nodded once. “I’m not taking him into the middle.”

  A man with a spear stepped forward one pace, then stopped himself, jaw working. “If the System’s still on him…”

  Ray kept his tone even. “Then we find out before anyone does something stupid.”

  Vaeldren’s name was already moving through the convoy in low, urgent fragments. Ray didn’t need to add to it. He stayed still, letting the moment settle, because treating fear like an enemy would make it worse.

  Vaeldren appeared at Ray’s side like he’d been there the whole time.

  Ray flinched anyway. “Mate,” he muttered, keeping his voice low, “you’re going to give me a heart attack one day.”

  Vaeldren’s mouth twitched, a flash of humour that never reached his eyes. “Then stop wanderin’ off, laddie.”

  He turned to the nearby cluster and his presence did what Ray’s words couldn’t. The murmurs eased. Shoulders lowered a fraction. Weapons settled into a less desperate grip.

  “Easy,” Vaeldren said, calm and hard at the same time. “Nobody’s strikin’ anyone. Not while I’m standin’ here.”

  He pointed at two warriors with a flick of his fingers. “You two. On the edges. Watch the trees, watch the ridge. Not him. If someone followed, I want to know.”

  Both men moved instantly, peeling away into the scrub with practised quiet.

  Vaeldren looked down at Peter, then up at Ray. “Where’d ye find him?”

  “Cave off the route,” Ray said. “He was bound. I carried him back. On the way, I felt eyes on me. The amulet heated up each time. Then it stopped the moment I hit the convoy.”

  Vaeldren’s gaze sharpened. He didn’t ask for the amulet yet. He didn’t touch it in front of everyone. He made a decision first.

  “Right,” he said. “We do this proper.”

  He raised his voice just enough for the nearest cluster to hear, not the whole convoy. “We’re stoppin’ five minutes. Tight circle. No one crowds. Keep your voices down. If you’ve got a job, do it. If you don’t, step back and keep your hands to yourself.”

  It wasn’t a threat. It was structure. People obeyed because it gave them something to do with their fear.

  Vaeldren motioned Ray closer with two fingers. “We take him off to the side. Away from ears. Away from the centre. I want to see what’s clingin’ to him.”

  Ray lifted Peter again, shifting his weight carefully. Vaeldren led them to a low outcrop near the treeline, close enough that the convoy could still see they weren’t hiding anything, far enough that the questions couldn’t pile on top of them. Vaeldren gestured to two fighters to hold position behind them.

  “You,” Vaeldren said to the pair, “stand there. No one follows. If someone tries, you turn them around polite first. If they insist, you turn them around rough.”

  Ray moved Peter onto the ground again, cloak beneath him, then straightened. He felt Miu drift through the trees to their flank, silent and unseen. He caught the faintest flicker of her eyes between leaves, then she was gone again.

  Vaeldren crouched beside Peter, one knee in the dirt. Two fingers went to the boy’s throat, then to his wrist. His gaze tracked across Peter’s face, the lines of exhaustion, the marks at his wrists. He didn’t flinch from what he saw, and he didn’t waste time guessing.

  A faint sheen of light flashed across his pupils, quick enough that Ray almost missed it.

  Vaeldren’s Analysis skill was working.

  He stayed crouched, voice low. “Breath is steady. Heart’s quick. He’s starved and dehydrated.” His jaw tightened as he looked at the chafed skin. “And someone’s been enjoyin’ themselves.”

  Ray’s hands curled into fists. “Is the System on him?”

  Vaeldren didn’t answer immediately. His eyes shifted again, that same subtle flicker, then he lifted his head a fraction as if he was listening to something that wasn’t sound.

  “I’m checkin’ for the residue,” Vaeldren said. “When the System takes hold of an off-worlder, it starts by makin’ them feel less alone. It feeds them pieces of what they miss. It makes it feel like home is one good choice away. Teddy told me it tried to convince him this was a game. I don’t understand the word the way he meant it. I understand the hook behind it. It tries to turn fear into instructions, then it hands out missions so they’ll walk the path without question.”

  Ray’s stomach tightened. “So it pushes them.”

  “Aye,” Vaeldren said. “And if they don’t break out, they stop bein’ just a person. They become a tool. Sometimes they preach. Sometimes they pull others along. Sometimes they’re a beacon that draws the System’s eyes straight into a crowd.”

  Peter’s eyelids fluttered, then stilled. Vaeldren’s fingers pressed gently at the boy’s jaw, checking his mouth, then moved to the base of his skull, searching for a reaction that might not be physical.

  “Any prompt when you touched him?” Vaeldren asked.

  “No,” Ray said. “Nothing. No windows. No sound. Just the amulet heating up on the way back, and then it stopped.”

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  “Show me,” Vaeldren said, and he kept his voice low enough that it wouldn’t carry.

  Ray pulled the cord free and placed the amulet in Vaeldren’s hand. It sat there cold and silent, looking ordinary in a way that made Ray distrust it more. Vaeldren turned it between his fingers, eyes narrowing, his pupils flashing with that faint light again.

  “Feels… quiet,” Vaeldren murmured. “Could be somethin’. Could be a trick.”

  He handed it back, then his gaze lifted to Ray’s face. “Hold still.”

  Ray did.

  Vaeldren’s eyes flashed and the air tightened for a heartbeat, the faint pressure of an attempt to read him. The amulet warmed instantly, a sharp pulse against Ray’s chest, and the pressure snapped away like it had hit a wall.

  Vaeldren’s brows drew together. “Hmm.”

  Ray let out a slow breath. “It blocked you.”

  “It blocked me,” Vaeldren agreed, and there was no humour left in him at all. “Whoever was watchin’ ye either had direct line of sight, or they’ve got an artefact throwin’ a net. Either way, we’re out of our league.”

  Something’s wrong, Miu sent, and her words had a bite to them. I can smell it. Old magic. Not undead. Not beasts. Something that doesn’t belong here.

  Ray kept his face on Vaeldren. Stay close, he sent back. Don’t let anyone see you.

  I’m already in the trees, she replied, offended. I’m not stupid.

  Vaeldren’s gaze swept the brush and higher ground again, and Ray realised he was doing the same thing as Miu, reading the world for a shape that didn’t show itself.

  “Then we act as if we’ve stepped into someone’s trap,” Vaeldren said. “We move, faster. We drop the wagons. We drop anything that slows us. We keep only what can be carried or shoved into storage. I’m not waitin’ to die polite.”

  Ray’s stomach tightened. “Now?”

  Vaeldren rose smoothly. “Now. We’ve got a stranger with System pressure who might be a victim, might be a mouthpiece, might be bait. We’ve got you feelin’ eyes. We’ve got your amulet reactin’ to a skill I’d trust on any other day. That’s enough.”

  Ray looked down at Peter, then back toward the convoy beyond the outcrop. People were still watching. They weren’t threatening. They were frightened and tired and trying to hold onto the small order Vaeldren gave them. Ray understood it, and he hated that he understood it.

  You’re safe, Miu sent, and there was a faint edge to it, like she’d had to confirm it by stalking the perimeter herself. Nothing close. Something far. It’s watching and it’s waiting.

  Ray didn’t ask how she knew. He trusted her instincts when his own senses failed.

  Vaeldren walked back toward the convoy with the same calm authority he used in battle. He didn’t shout. He didn’t need to. His voice carried because people were already listening for it.

  “Pack up,” Vaeldren called. “Now. We’re changin’ plans. We go high. We go hard. We do not keep the wagons.”

  A wave of shock rippled through the moving chain. Wagons were safety. Wagons were food. Wagons were the last scraps of their old lives made useful. Ray saw hands pause mid-knot. He saw someone’s face crumble in tired disbelief.

  Vaeldren kept speaking, steady and brutal. “If ye can carry it on your back, ye keep it. If ye can store it, ye keep it. If it needs wheels, it dies here.”

  Someone started to protest.

  Vaeldren turned his head and pinned the sound in place. “We’re bein’ watched,” he said, and the words landed heavier than any shout. “We’re bein’ tracked. If we drag a line of wagons through open ground, we’ll be found. If ye want to keep your cart, ye can sit beside it when trouble comes. Otherwise, move.”

  That did it.

  People didn’t like Vaeldren’s decisions. They trusted them.

  The convoy broke into frantic motion. Packs were torn open. Food was redistributed by handfuls, thrown into satchels, stuffed into pockets. A man tried to lift a barrel and swore when it didn’t budge. Two dragonkin grabbed it anyway, strained, then shoved it aside with a look of grief that made Ray’s throat tighten. Someone else threw a bundle of blankets onto the track and then snatched only one back, clutching it like it was worth more than coins.

  Ray returned to Peter and crouched, keeping his body between the boy and the worst of the stares. Vaeldren motioned two healers over with a sharp gesture.

  “Water first,” Vaeldren said to them, lower now. “A few sips, slow.”

  The healers nodded fast and knelt, careful and tense, offering a damp cloth to Peter’s lips and coaxing water into him a mouthful at a time.

  Ray kept his eyes up. People looked at Peter with a mixture of pity and unease. Teddy’s shadow was in those faces. The memory of an off-worlder who fought for them, bled for them, joked with them. That memory softened the edge.

  It didn’t erase it.

  Vaeldren leaned close to Ray, voice barely above breath. “You carry him. Keep him near you, away from the centre. If the System tries to tug his head, I want you to feel it first.”

  Ray nodded. “Got it.”

  “And if he wakes wrong,” Vaeldren continued, “you don’t argue with him. You don’t get drawn into a chat. Ye keep him calm, ye keep him movin’, and ye tell me. The System likes words. Words become hooks.”

  Ray swallowed. “Understood.”

  You’re tense, Miu sent, and her mental voice came through gentler than usual. I’m here.

  I know, Ray replied, and the relief of it made his chest ache.

  The convoy lurched back into motion, but it was different now. Tighter. Harder. People cut across scrub without caring how loud they were because silence didn’t matter if something already had their scent. Fighters spread wider, not to hunt, but to make sure nothing cut in close. Vaeldren moved along the line, correcting spacing, ordering breaks with the same ruthless economy he used in battle.

  Ray lifted Peter again and fell into the moving chain, keeping to the outer edge where he could see the treeline and the slope above. His arms burned from the weight and the distance, but he didn’t risk putting Peter on anyone else’s shoulders. Peter was his responsibility. Peter was also his problem.

  Hours passed in broken chunks of effort. The land rose steadily, brush giving way to rock and wind. The air thinned and turned sharper. The track narrowed until it stopped being a track at all and became a series of choices between boulders and gullies.

  Somewhere near dusk, as the sun bled behind a jagged ridge, Peter stirred properly.

  It started with a shudder through his whole body. Ray felt it through his grip and tightened his hold automatically. Peter’s head rolled against Ray’s shoulder. His lips parted.

  A sound came out, raw and confused. “W… water…”

  Ray stopped long enough to lower him onto a flat stone. The convoy didn’t halt fully, but Vaeldren noticed immediately and angled the line around them, signalling a short pause with a hand.

  Ray pulled his waterskin free and held it to Peter’s mouth, tipping only enough for a sip. Peter choked, coughed, then drank again with desperate restraint, like his body couldn’t decide if it was allowed to trust this.

  Peter’s eyes cracked open, unfocused at first, then locking on Ray’s face with sudden panic.

  Peter jerked, trying to scramble back, but his limbs didn’t obey. “Where… where am I? Who are you?”

  Ray kept his voice steady. “Ray. You’re safe. Don’t try to move too fast.”

  Peter’s gaze flicked past him and caught the shapes of people, the weapons, the dragonkin, the way everyone kept their distance even while pretending they weren’t watching. His breathing quickened.

  “They’ll kill me,” Peter rasped. “They’ll… I didn’t do anything.”

  “They won’t,” Ray said, firm enough to cut through the spiral. “They’re scared. You’re an off-worlder. They’ve seen what the System does to new arrivals.”

  Peter blinked hard. “Off-worlder…”

  Ray nodded once. “Earth.”

  The word hit Peter like a punch.

  His face went slack, then twisted, grief and disbelief fighting for the same space. “No,” he whispered. “No, I was… I was at work. There was an explosion. The building…”

  Ray’s throat tightened. He didn’t need details. “Same for me.”

  Peter stared at him, eyes widening. “You… you died too?”

  Ray let out a slow breath and looked past Peter for a moment, up at the ridge line where the wind combed through scrub. “Yeah.”

  Peter’s hands shook as he tried to push himself upright. His wrists were bandaged now, fresh cloth wrapped over raw skin. He stared at them like they belonged to someone else. “I… I woke up here. There was a thing. A voice. A window. It told me…”

  He swallowed, searching for the words that wouldn’t make him sound insane.

  He’s telling the truth, Miu sent, and there was no smugness in her this time. I can smell fear. It’s real.

  Ray kept his focus on Peter. “What did it tell you?”

  Peter’s mouth worked. “It told me it was a tutorial. It said I had to complete objectives. It said I’d get rewards. It said I’d get stronger, and I thought…” His voice cracked. “I thought it was a game. I thought maybe I was in a coma and this was some hallucination. That it wasn’t real.”

  Ray felt something cold settle in his stomach. He glanced toward Vaeldren. The dragonkin had stopped a short distance away, arms crossed, eyes on Peter with the careful stillness of a predator deciding whether prey was sick.

  Ray spoke louder, for Vaeldren’s benefit as much as Peter’s. “Teddy said the same thing.”

  Peter flinched at the name. “Teddy?”

  Ray nodded. “Another off-worlder. He helped this group. He died.”

  Peter’s eyes filled fast and he wiped at them angrily. “So it’s real,” he whispered. “Earth’s gone. The apocalypse… it happened.”

  Ray didn’t correct him. There was nothing to correct.

  Vaeldren approached, slow and controlled, and crouched a few paces away, keeping space as a deliberate choice. His voice stayed calm, but there was iron under it.

  “Name,” Vaeldren said. “And don’t lie.”

  Peter’s head snapped to him, startled by the accent and the weight in the words. “Peter,” he said quickly. “Peter Martin.”

  Vaeldren nodded once. “Peter Martin. Ye’re from Earth.”

  Peter swallowed. “Yes.”

  Vaeldren held his gaze. “And the System spoke to ye.”

  Peter hesitated, then nodded, misery written into the movement. “Yes.”

  Vaeldren’s pupils flashed faintly again. Analysis. Ray watched the way Vaeldren’s posture shifted, the way his attention sharpened, the way he didn’t just listen to Peter’s words but to the spaces between them.

  “Did it tell ye to come here?” Vaeldren asked.

  Peter’s eyes widened in horror. “No. No, I swear. I didn’t even know there were people. I was taken. I was chained in a cave. Someone kept checking my windows. Kept laughing when I didn’t understand. They said the System liked watching me fail.”

  A ripple went through the nearby fighters. Quiet anger, held in place by exhaustion.

  Ray felt his jaw tighten. “That cave had tools,” he said, voice hard. “Fresh. Someone’s doing this to off-worlders.”

  Vaeldren’s nostrils flared. “Aye.” He looked back to Peter. “Listen close, human. This group has children. Wounded. People who can’t fight. If the System tugs your head, I need to know. If you feel a pull, a voice, a mission, anything, you tell me. Immediately.”

  Peter nodded too fast. “I will. I swear.”

  Vaeldren studied him for a long heartbeat, then glanced at Ray. “He’s frightened. He’s thin. He’s not tryin’ to charm anyone. That’s good.”

  Ray didn’t relax. “And the residue?”

  Vaeldren’s eyes flicked, the faint sheen returning. “It’s there,” he said quietly. “Fading. Better than strong. Still dangerous. Still possible the System can tug him. He stays close. He stays watched. He doesn’t get trusted with decisions.”

  Peter’s shoulders sagged with relief that didn’t fully land because he was still terrified.

  Vaeldren rose. “We move. No more stoppin’. Night’s coming and this ground is awful for a fight.”

  Ray helped Peter upright. Peter swayed, nearly falling, and Ray caught him under the arm. He couldn’t carry him fully anymore unless he wanted to collapse himself, but he could keep Peter on his feet.

  They climbed.

  The first night in the mountains was a series of short rests and longer stretches of forced movement. Vaeldren didn’t let them settle into anything that looked like camp. They tucked into hollows and behind boulders, kept fires small or absent, ate cold food with numb fingers. People complained under their breath and then stopped because there was no point. Fear made obedience easier.

  Ray stayed near the edge, Peter beside him, and felt Miu’s presence weaving through the trees and rocks, always out of sight, always close enough that his bond with her stayed firm.

  He smells wrong, Miu sent at one point, not about Peter himself, but about the air. Something has been here. Something that shouldn’t climb mountains.

  Undead? Ray asked.

  No, she replied immediately. This is cleaner. Colder. It watches.

  Ray’s stomach tightened.

  On the second day, the beasts started.

  Nothing grand. No organised undead. Just hungry mountain predators drawn by the scent of blood and the sound of too many feet. A pack of lean, grey things with long jaws and too-bright eyes tested the line near a narrow pass. Vaeldren didn’t waste time. Fighters formed a wall, spears and blades flashing. Ray kept Peter behind him and drew his sword, heart pounding, ready to use Speed Burst if the line broke.

  It didn’t.

  The beasts fled after losing two, and the convoy moved on with fresh scratches and fresh tension, everyone’s nerves worn thinner.

  Peter watched the aftermath with a pale face. “This isn’t… normal,” he whispered.

  Ray almost laughed at the understatement and stopped himself. “Nothing’s normal.”

  They kept climbing.

  Days blurred. The mountains didn’t care about grief or plans. They were rock and wind and cold, punishing in a way that forced focus. People lost weight. Feet blistered. Tempers snapped and then quieted again because there was nowhere for anger to go that didn’t end with someone falling behind.

  Ray told Peter what he could, in broken conversations while they walked. He spoke about the undead, about Finrial, about Teddy and the dragonkin, about Vaeldren’s leadership. He explained the basics of the System without drowning Peter in windows and numbers, because Peter’s eyes already had that haunted look of someone who’d been watched while he suffered.

  Peter shared pieces in return. He worked in an office. He had a sister. He’d been on the phone with her minutes before the explosion. He didn’t know if she was alive when the world ended and the thought twisted his face every time it surfaced.

  Ray didn’t offer comfort he couldn’t prove. He stayed present. He shared water. He shared food. He let silence sit when words would turn into lies.

  One evening, when the wind cut hard and they were huddled behind a slab of stone, Peter finally asked the question Ray had been avoiding.

  “Do you think… there are more of us?” Peter murmured, voice low so it wouldn’t carry.

  Ray stared at his hands, at the dirt under his nails, at the scar on his knuckle from a fight that felt both recent and distant. “Yeah,” he said. “I think there are more.”

  Peter’s throat worked. “And do you think they’re alive?”

  Ray hesitated, then answered honestly. “Some are. Most probably aren’t.”

  Peter shut his eyes and swallowed a sound that might have been a sob.

  He’s breaking, Miu sent softly.

  Ray’s chest tightened. So are we.

  She didn’t argue.

  They moved again.

  Time didn’t have clean edges in the mountains. The days ran together in cold breath and aching legs. They descended slightly into a stretch of pine and stone where the air warmed by a fraction and the wind stopped screaming long enough to let people hear themselves think.

  Vaeldren called for a proper halt near dusk, the first one in days that felt intentional rather than forced. People dropped packs with groans. A few sat with their backs against rock and stared into nothing. Someone laughed once, sharp and tired, then cut it off.

  Ray helped Peter lower himself onto a flat stone and handed him a strip of dried meat. Peter ate slowly, chewing like his jaw hurt.

  Vaeldren approached, scanning the terrain as he did, then crouched near Ray without fully relaxing.

  “We’re close,” Vaeldren said.

  Ray frowned. “Close to what?”

  Vaeldren’s eyes lifted to the line of trees ahead. “Somethin’ old. I’ve been feelin’ it for a day. A pull in the air. A pressure.”

  Ray’s fingers brushed the amulet under his shirt. It stayed cold.

  I don’t like this place, Miu sent, tight and wary. There’s a line ahead. I can’t explain it. It feels marked.

  Ray’s skin prickled. A trap?

  No, she replied. A border.

  Vaeldren rose. “I want eyes forward. Quiet eyes. Ray, you and me go first. Peter stays with the healers.”

  Peter’s head snapped up. “What?”

  Vaeldren’s gaze pinned him. “Ye’re weak. Ye’re still a question. Sit.”

  Peter’s jaw clenched, but he didn’t argue. He looked at Ray instead, fear flickering.

  Ray squeezed Peter’s shoulder once. “Stay put. Eat. Breathe.”

  Peter nodded reluctantly.

  Ray followed Vaeldren through the trees.

  The ground dipped, then opened.

  Ray stepped out of the last line of pines and froze.

  A valley sat below them, cupped in rock and green, thick with grass that looked almost too soft after weeks of stone. A stream cut through the centre, bright and clear. Ruins dotted the far side, half-collapsed walls swallowed by vines and time, the bones of something that had once been a village or a fort.

  And in the middle of it, standing on a low rise of stone, a crystal spire caught the last of the sun and threw it back in a clean, steady glow.

  It wasn’t enormous. It didn’t need to be. It hummed with presence, the kind that made the hair on Ray’s arms rise. The light inside it wasn’t firelight. It was structured. Ordered. Alive in a way that made Ray’s stomach drop.

  Vaeldren stood beside him, quiet for once.

  Ray’s mouth went dry. “That’s…”

  “A civilisation crystal,” Vaeldren said, voice rougher than usual. “A proper one. Old. Untouched.”

  Ray stared, heart thudding, because he understood what it meant even without anyone explaining. A claim. A centre. A chance. A reason for people to finally settle down.

  Behind him, he felt Miu’s presence press tight against his mind, and for the first time since she’d bonded with him, her telepathy carried something close to dread.

  Master… she sent. That thing is going to change everything.

  Ray didn’t answer. He couldn’t.

  He kept staring at the crystal as the last of the sun bled across it, and the light inside remained steady, waiting for someone to touch it and decide who they were going to become.