The orchard was quiet in a way that didn’t make sense.

  Azandra walked between the rows of old trees, their branches heavy with pears that had fallen and begun to rot in the grass. The air was still. Even the leaves didn’t move the way they should have. The light filtering through the canopy was too even, too soft.

  She touched the nearest trunk, rough bark under her fingertips. It felt solid, but something about it was wrong. Her hand didn’t leave any warmth behind.

  This was her family’s orchard. She knew every bend in the path, every tree her father had planted when she was small. She could still picture him sitting on the porch after a day’s work, carving wood with that patient focus he always had. She used to sit nearby, pretending not to watch him but always waiting for him to smile and tell her to fetch another piece of pine.

  And then, just ahead, there he was.

  Her father sat on the old bench beneath the biggest tree, the one that had always yielded the sweetest fruit. His hands were steady as they held a knife and a half-carved piece of pine. His hair was a little grayer than she remembered, but his face was the same. Calm. Kind.

  He looked up at her and smiled. “You found me.”

  Her throat tightened. She hadn’t realized how much she missed that voice until she heard it again. “I thought I’d never see you again,” she whispered.

  “I was never far,” he said, resting the carving in his lap. “I’ve been close all along, Azzy. Watching you grow. You’ve done things I never could have dreamed of. You went looking for answers when everyone else was content to stop asking questions. That’s courage.”

  She sat beside him on the bench. The wood creaked under her weight just as it always had. For a moment, everything felt right, the smell of fruit, the sun on the grass, her father’s presence beside her.

  But something was off. The warmth didn’t touch her skin. The air didn’t move. And when she listened for birds, there was nothing. And her father had never been so encouraging of her adventurous spirit.

  His knife gleamed too brightly, as though it had just been made. It hadn’t dulled from years of use like it should have. The edge caught the light again and again, flashing white.

  Her smile faltered. “You’re not really him,” she said quietly.

  He didn’t speak right away. When he finally did, his voice was lower, heavier. “Does it matter?”

  Azandra’s pulse quickened. “What are you?”

  Her father’s eyes lifted to meet hers, only now, they were darker. There was light inside them, but not the kind that came from love or memory. Tiny orange flecks shimmered in the black, like sparks from a dying fire.

  “The relic,” he said. His voice had changed. It sounded layered, as if several people were speaking at once. “You touched it. You woke what slept beneath it. You opened the path when you lifted the stone.”

  Azandra stood up, heart pounding. “What are you talking about?”

  The orchard began to change. The air rippled. The grass under her feet turned to stone. The trees warped and bent as though burning from the inside. The sky dimmed until it looked like smoke pressing down from above.

  “You heard it whisper,” the voice continued. “You listened when you should have turned away.”

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  She shook her head, backing away from the bench. “No. I was studying ruins. That’s all. I didn’t mean to—”

  The world around her flickered. The bench was gone. The orchard was gone.

  In its place stood a figure, tall and cloaked in darkness. Its edges wavered like smoke trying to hold shape. The scent of ash filled her lungs. She coughed, covering her mouth.

  The figure spoke again. Its voice was low, but it carried through the stone chamber that now surrounded her. “You lit the spark,” it said. “And I have come to kindle the flame.”

  Azandra stumbled backward, her heel scraping against stone. “Stay away.”

  “I have been a whisper in the courts of kings,” the figure continued. “I have worn their armor, forged their swords, and whispered into their dreams. They built their empires on the fire I gave them.”

  The figure’s presence pressed down like weight on her shoulders. The shadows shifted as it moved closer. She could almost see a face beneath the hood, not human, but something that had once tried to be.

  “I have lived in every age,” it said. “When your kind forgets my name, I wait. When they grow weak, I return.”

  Azandra’s breath came fast and shallow. She didn’t understand what it wanted from her. “Who are you?” she asked.

  It leaned forward slightly, and she felt the air between them grow colder. “You already know,” it said. “You’ve read my name. You’ve written it. You carry it in your tongue, but you are too afraid to say it aloud.”

  Her mind scrambled. She’d studied dozens of ancient names in her research, myths, curses, spirits whispered about in the ruins she explored. She thought of the scrolls she’d poured over, of the stories she’d half-believed.

  Galvinar, the fallen mage. Tol Keth, the cursed watcher. No. This voice didn’t belong to them. This was older. This was something that had been there long before Arnathe, before the kingdoms, before the wars.

  Her lips moved before her thoughts caught up. “Nezzarod.”

  The figure shifted. The sound that followed was like laughter, but it had no warmth. “So the flame remembers its kindling.”

  The world cracked open around her. The orchard burned away entirely, replaced by darkness. The air itself seemed to crumble. She tried to scream, but the sound wouldn’t come. The sky, if it could still be called that, split into veins of red light.

  She shut her eyes.

  When she opened them again, everything was still.

  She sat on a stone chair carved from rough rock, its surface worn smooth by time. A single beam of light fell from a crack in the ceiling far above, thin and cold. The walls around her were gray and uneven, carved into strange patterns that looked almost alive.

  Her heartbeat slowed, though her hands still trembled. The smell of ash was gone, replaced by the faint scent of damp earth.

  She was alone.

  Azandra pressed her palm to the stone beneath her. It felt cool and real this time. She traced the lines carved into the surface, recognizing some of the symbols, the same ones she had studied in her scrolls. Ancient wards. Protective markings.

  But they had failed.

  “What have I done?” she whispered.

  Her voice echoed through the chamber, the sound thin and distant. She rose slowly from the chair, her legs unsteady. Every sound she made, the scrape of her boots, her uneven breathing, seemed too loud.

  She turned toward the tunnel that led out of the chamber, but the walls shifted subtly, like they were breathing. The darkness ahead was thick and heavy, almost liquid.

  “Nezzarod…” she said again, testing the name aloud.

  It answered from somewhere unseen, its voice soft now, almost gentle. “You opened the door, Azandra of House Sofine. The world will thank you in time.”

  She backed away, her heart hammering. “You’re lying.”

  “I never lie,” the voice said. “Truth is what burns most.”

  The words lingered in the air even after the sound faded.

  Azandra sank back against the stone wall, wrapping her arms around herself. The fear didn’t come as a scream or panic, but as a slow and steady weight. She wasn’t sure if she was still dreaming, or if she had already crossed into something else entirely.

  She thought of Phoebe. Of the promise she’d made to write. Of how she had left without saying goodbye.

  “I just wanted to understand,” she whispered. “That’s all.”

  The air stirred faintly, carrying with it a voice that was almost kind.

  “And now you will.”

  The light above her dimmed until the last trace of it disappeared.

  She closed her eyes again.

  And the dream, if that’s what it was, began once more.