Graythorn did not sleep that night.

  Not really.

  There were no songs for the fallen. No ale shared by the fire as old stories softened new scars. Only quiet houses and shuttered windows, and the sound of people trying to cry where no one could hear.

  Joren lay in Bran’s old spare room—the one Bran had bullied him into taking months ago because it was closer to the hearth in winter.

  Now it felt borrowed. Too large. Too empty.

  Lantern light flickered against the rafters. Shadows moved when the flame did, stretching and shrinking in strange shapes.

  He stared up at them until they blurred.

  Every time he closed his eyes, the clearing came back.

  Not just the death.

  The moment after.

  The orbs.

  The voices.

  The way four lights had slammed into his chest like falling stars.

  He turned onto his side, pulling the thin blanket up more from habit than comfort.

  “You’re imagining it,” he muttered to himself. “You broke something in your head. That’s all.”

  Silence answered.

  Eventually, exhausted beyond sense, he slipped under.

  —

  He was back in the clearing.

  But it wasn’t ruined.

  The ground was unbroken. The campfire was unlit. The air was still and quiet, not yet poisoned by demon shrieks.

  Bran stood a few paces away, arms crossed, saying something to Lira that made her roll her eyes. Sera laughed softly at some half-heard joke. Tyren spun his spear and nearly clipped a branch.

  Joren walked toward them.

  “Bran,” he called.

  No response.

  He moved closer, waving a hand in front of Tyren’s face.

  Nothing.

  “What…?”

  His foot made no sound when it touched the ground.

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  He looked down.

  His shadow was wrong—faintly outlined in silver-blue around the edges.

  The world dimmed.

  Colors bled out of the sky. Shadows lengthened. The trees beyond the clearing darkened into silhouettes.

  The air stopped.

  He’d lived in Graythorn his entire life.

  He’d never known the forest could feel this… held.

  The scene sped up without him.

  Demons burst from the trees.

  Bran shouted orders. Lira’s arrows flew. Tyren roared. Sera’s staff glowed.

  Joren tried to move. Tried to grab his own shoulder—shove himself into a better position, change the way it had gone.

  His hand slid straight through his own arm.

  “I don’t want to watch this again,” he choked.

  The Revenant stepped between the trees, all crackling purple veins and bone and pressure.

  Joren still couldn’t move.

  Still couldn’t scream.

  Lira fell.

  Tyren broke.

  Sera reached for him one last time.

  Bran smiled that small, tired smile.

  The Revenant raised its claw over his remembered self—

  And everything froze.

  Blood hung in the air like beads of glass.

  Ash refused to fall.

  The Revenant’s claw stayed suspended inches over his past self’s head.

  Four soft lights glowed.

  Amber, by Lira’s body.

  Blue, by Tyren’s.

  Soft white, by Sera’s.

  Green, steady, by Bran.

  They unraveled from the fallen like threads pulled free from cloth, drifting upward.

  Not toward the sky.

  Toward him.

  Joren stepped back.

  The lights followed.

  “No,” he said, voice shaking. “No, you’re not—this isn’t—”

  They stopped a few paces away, hovering.

  Warmth washed over him—tainted by grief, but alive.

  He didn’t hear words.

  He felt them.

  A steadiness like a hand on his shoulder.

  You’re not losing your mind.

  A sharp, irritated twist that still somehow felt fond.

  You’re just slow at accepting things.

  A gentle ache that sat behind his ribs.

  You’re not alone, Joren.

  And a stubborn, reckless spark.

  If you can hear this, you’re already doing better than you think.

  Shapes began to form around the lights—not solid, not fully human. Just hints.

  A familiar stance. A tilt of the head. A way of folding arms. A half-smirk.

  “Bran?” Joren whispered.

  The green light pulsed, resolving just enough into a broad-shouldered outline that could only ever be him.

  “Is this… real?” Joren asked.

  The question came out raw.

  The answer brushed through him like a heavy exhale.

  Real enough.

  The other shapes lingered at the edges of his awareness, close but not crowding him. Not all trying to talk at once. Just there.

  “I dragged you in,” he said. “I stole you. I—”

  You didn’t drag us anywhere, that same steady presence cut in. We chose. Something in you opened. It felt… safe.

  Safe.

  The word hurt worse than any wound.

  “This isn’t how it’s supposed to work,” Joren said. “Souls cross over. They fade if they don’t. They don’t… stay.”

  A faint flash of amusement from one of the others—sharp and quick.

  We never did what we were supposed to, that echo hinted.

  “For how long?” Joren breathed. “How long are you going to be… in here?”

  The lights pulsed in a slow, uncertain rhythm.

  They didn’t answer.

  The Revenant’s frozen claw twitched.

  Cracks spread across its mask.

  The dream shook like glass under strain.

  We’ll talk when you’re not about to wake up screaming, the green presence said. For now? Breathe. Don’t break.

  The vision shattered.

  —

  Joren jerked awake with a strangled gasp, nearly falling off the bed.

  Sweat soaked his shirt. The lantern still burned low, flame almost out.

  He sat there, chest heaving, hand pressed over his heart.

  His reflection stared back faintly from the small piece of fogged glass propped against the wall.

  Same face.

  Same messy dark hair.

  Same scar along his jaw.

  He leaned closer.

  For a heartbeat, his eyes glowed.

  Not brown.

  Silver-blue rings flared around his pupils.

  Then faded.

  Joren exhaled slowly.

  “…Great,” he muttered. “Now my eyes glow. That won’t freak anyone out.”

  No one answered.

  But somewhere behind his ribs, four faint presences shifted—quiet, not speaking, simply… there.

  He pulled the blanket tighter around his shoulders and stared at the dying lantern.

  Sleep did not come again.