The mountain rose before them, a jagged crown piercing the heavy sky.
The path grew steeper, narrower, littered with the bones of old stones and forgotten wars.
The wind howled low between the rocks, carrying with it a sound that might have been a voice or might have been memory.
She pulled the cloak tighter around her shoulders, feeling the broken sword shift against her spine.
The crystal at her neck pulsed faintly, uneasy.
Beside her, he was tense.
Every line of his body was wound tight, like a bowstring ready to snap.
It was not the climb that made him wary.
It was what waited above.
"They know we're coming," he said quietly.
"Who?" she asked, though she feared she already knew.
"The ones who never left."
The path twisted sharply, leading into a narrow gorge where the sunlight barely touched.
Mist pooled thick on the ground, rising in tendrils like hands reaching from unseen graves.
They moved cautiously, every step muffled by the soft, damp earth.
Halfway through the gorge, the mist thickened abruptly, forming shapes that moved against the current of the wind.
Figures stepped out of the fog
Not echoes.
Not Hungering.
Something worse.
The air grew heavy, pressing against her lungs, making it hard to breathe.
The figures were wrong somehow
Too tall.
Too thin.
Their faces hidden behind masks of bone and black glass, their movements too smooth to be human.
She stumbled to a halt.
He stepped protectively in front of her, one hand slipping toward the hidden dagger at his waist.
"They are the Woken," he said grimly.
"Servants of the true enemy."
The Woken moved with eerie grace, encircling them without sound.
No weapons.
No threats.
Only presence.
Suffocating.
Inevitable.
One stepped closer, its mask catching the dim light and reflecting a thousand fractured images of her own terrified face.
It spoke not with words, but with a voice inside her head.
Return what you have stolen.
She recoiled, clutching the crystal at her throat instinctively.
"What do they mean?" she gasped.
He placed a steadying hand on her back.
"They mean your light," he said. "They mean your soul."
The Woken tilted their heads in perfect unison, as if hearing some silent command.
The pressure in the air thickened until it pressed against her ribs, squeezing the breath from her lungs.
Her knees buckled.
He caught her before she hit the ground, lifting her into his arms without hesitation.
"We run," he said, voice hard as iron.
She clung to him, the broken sword digging into her side as he sprinted through the mist.
The Woken followed, gliding over the ground like shadows torn loose from the earth.
The gorge narrowed further, forcing him to leap over fallen stones and duck under low-hanging branches.
Still, the Woken came.
Relentless.
Silent.
She felt the edges of their hunger clawing at her mind, pulling at the corners of her memories, trying to unravel her from the inside out.
"Don't let them touch you!" he shouted over the roar of the wind.
"I'm trying!" she cried back.
Ahead, the gorge split into two paths one leading upward into a sheer wall of stone, the other descending into a cavern mouth yawning open like the throat of some waiting beast.
Without hesitation, he chose the descent.
The darkness swallowed them whole.
The darkness inside the cavern swallowed sound and light alike.
Her heart pounded wildly in her chest as he carried her deeper into the earth, the crystal at her throat pulsing frantically against her skin.
Behind them, the Woken did not scream or howl.
They didn't need to.
Their silence was worse.
It filled the world with the certainty of being hunted, of being seen by something that should not exist.
He slowed only when the tunnel twisted sharply and widened into a hollow chamber.
Here, the mist thinned slightly, revealing walls covered in strange markings runes she could not read, etched deep into the stone as if clawed there by desperate hands.
He set her down gently but did not release her hand.
"We're safe here," he said, though doubt laced his voice.
She nodded, trying to catch her breath.
The crystal pulsed slower now, calming.
"What were they?" she whispered.
He didn't answer right away.
Instead, he turned to study the runes on the walls, one hand brushing the ancient stone.
"They are the remnants of a pact," he said finally.
"A promise twisted by fear and forgotten by those who made it."
She frowned, stepping closer.
"What kind of promise?"
He traced one of the runes with his fingertip.
"That when the world ended, they would be the ones who remained."
She shivered.
"And they think… I stole that right?"
He nodded slowly.
"Your light… your memory… your very existence challenges the bargain they made."
She hugged herself, the broken sword at her back a cold weight.
"I don't want to take anything from anyone."
"You didn't," he said fiercely.
"They chose their end. You chose to live."
The cavern trembled slightly, as if the mountain itself remembered the old oaths spoken here.
A low hum filled the air, rising from the runes, vibrating beneath her feet.
She stumbled, and he caught her again, his arms closing around her like a shield.
"Hold on to me," he said, voice raw.
She clutched his cloak, burying her face against his chest.
The hum grew louder, and with it came voices
Whispers from the walls.
Soft. Accusing.
Her own voice among them, distorted and cruel.
You left them.
You broke them.
You are the ruin you fear.
"No," she whispered.
The shadows thickened at the edges of the chamber, twisting into familiar shapes
The woman.
The boy.
The soldier.
Not real.
But real enough to wound.
She shook her head, tears burning her eyes.
"No!"
He tightened his hold around her.
"Look at me," he commanded.
She lifted her head, meeting his gaze.
Dark. Steady. Unshaken.
"You are not the ruin," he said.
"You are the one who survived it."
The whispers faltered.
The shadows recoiled.
The runes dimmed.
She pressed her palm against the crystal at her throat.
It flared once with a pure, bright light
And the illusions shattered.
The cavern grew silent once more.
She sagged against him, trembling.
He cupped her face between his hands, thumbs brushing away the tears she hadn't realized had fallen.
"I am here," he whispered.
"I will always be here."
She believed him.
Not because of the vow.
Not because of the past.
But because in this moment, when the darkness had tried to claim her, he had pulled her back.
Not as a shadow.
Not as a memory.
But as a man.
She rested her forehead against his, closing her eyes.
They stood there, breathing in the silence they had fought to reclaim.
When she opened her eyes again, she was not afraid.
Not of the darkness.
Not of the past.
Not even of herself.
They would climb the mountain.
They would face what waited at its peak.
And they would do it together.