EMBERS OF THE FORSAKEN

The Memory Market

James had never met his grandmother because he didn't know he had one.

"Liar," he said.

Mira didn't flinch. "Your mother never told you about her family. That was intentional. We've been watching you from a distance for years, waiting for the Ember to wake."

"Why would my mother hide that?"

"Because your grandmother is a monster." Taylor's voice was flat. "Every Ember-touched who survives more than a decade becomes one. It's not a matter of if. It's when."

Mira's jaw tightened. "Elara is not a monster. She's a survivor. She's kept the Ember contained for fifty years using methods the Inquisition would call heresy and the Syndicate calls progress."

"Fifty years?" James stood up from the sofa. "She's been alive with an Ember fragment for fifty years?"

"The first of her generation. The strongest before you." Mira walked to the door. "You'll see for yourself tonight. Until then, rest. Eat. You'll need your strength for what comes next."

She left. The door locked behind her with a heavy click.

Taylor moved to the window, checking the lock. "We're prisoners."

"I noticed."

"You're not seriously considering her offer. The memory-wine? The transfer? She's using you."

James sat back down. The fire had burned low, and the room felt colder now.

"Tommy's life is on the line," he said. "What would you do in my position?"

Taylor didn't answer for a long time. When she spoke, her voice was quiet.

"I'd burn the whole city down. But that's why I'm not in your position." She turned from the window. "Your grandmother. Elara. I've heard stories about her. Inquisition hunters who went after her never came back. They say she doesn't age. Doesn't feel pain. Doesn't feel anything at all."

"That's what the Ember does?"

"That's what surviving the Ember does. It hollows you out until there's nothing left but the hunger." Taylor met his eyes. "You want to know what fifty years of that looks like? You're about to find out."

---

The Memory Market opened at dusk.

James had heard about it—everyone in Ravensbrook had. It was the city's darkest secret, hidden beneath the Gears in a network of tunnels that had been sealed off after the god-war. The Syndicate controlled it, but anyone with enough coin could buy anything there.

Memories, mostly.

Stolen moments from dying minds, distilled into wine that let you live someone else's life for a few hours. The rich used it for entertainment. The poor used it for escape. The desperate used it to forget.

Mira led James and Taylor through the tunnels, flanked by six armed guards. The walls were lined with phosphorescent fungi that cast everything in a sickly green glow.

"The Market is neutral ground," Mira explained as they walked. "No violence. No theft. The Syndicate enforces the rules with extreme prejudice. If someone starts a fight, they don't leave."

"And if I start a fight?" James asked.

"Then I'll be very disappointed." Mira glanced back at him. "Try not to draw attention. Your eyes are still glowing."

James touched his face. He hadn't noticed. But when he looked at his reflection in a puddle on the tunnel floor, his irises flickered with silver light.

They're watching, the voice whispered. All of them. They can smell me on you.

The tunnel opened into a vast cavern.

The Memory Market spread out before James like a nightmare carnival. Stalls made of bone and scrap metal lined the walls, their owners hawking vials of memory-wine in every color. Performers juggled balls of stolen dream-fire. Beggars with hollow eyes sat in corners, their minds burned out by too many doses.

And everywhere, the smell. Sweet and rotten, like fruit left too long in the sun.

"Stay close," Taylor murmured. "This place attracts predators."

They wove through the crowd. James saw things he wished he hadn't—a man selling memories of his own children's deaths, a woman trading her happiest day for a vial of forgetfulness, a child no older than Tommy offering glimpses of a life she'd never live.

This is what the Ember wants, the voice said. A feast. A banquet of stolen selves.

"Shut up," James whispered.

Taylor glanced at him. "What?"

"Nothing. The voice. It's talking again."

She didn't look surprised. "It'll get louder the closer we get to your grandmother. Ember fragments recognize each other."

Mira stopped in front of a stall that looked like all the others—bone counter, glass vials, a tattered curtain behind it. But instead of calling out to customers, the owner simply nodded at Mira and pulled the curtain aside.

"This way," Mira said.

They stepped through the curtain into a narrow hallway. The green light faded, replaced by silver glow that pulsed like a heartbeat.

James's chest ached.

She's close, the voice whispered. So close. I can taste her.

The hallway opened into a circular chamber. No stalls. No customers. Just a single chair in the center of the room, facing away from them.

And in the chair, a woman.

She looked young. Thirty, maybe. Pale hair that fell to her waist, skin so white it was almost translucent, and eyes that glowed silver—brighter than James's, more controlled.

She turned when they entered.

James's breath caught.

She had his mother's face. The same face he'd lost to the Ember. The same brown hair, tired eyes, small mole above the left eyebrow.

But older. Colder. Wrong.

"James," Elara said. Her voice was soft, musical, and utterly empty. "I've waited so long to meet you."

"You're not my grandmother," James said. "You're wearing her face. My mother's face. Why?"

Elara smiled. It didn't reach her eyes—nothing reached her eyes.

"Because I've forgotten my own," she said. "The Ember took everything. My childhood. My first love. The sound of my mother's voice. I'm a patchwork now, stitched together from memories I've bought, traded, stolen." She gestured at her face. "This one belonged to a woman who died in the Shallows three years ago. I bought it for a thousand vials. It felt familiar."

James felt sick.

"You're not helping him," Taylor said. "You're showing him what he'll become."

"I'm showing him the truth." Elara stood. She was taller than James expected, and when she moved, she didn't seem to walk—she flowed, like smoke. "The Ember doesn't care about good or evil. It cares about consumption. You can feed it your own self, piece by piece, until you're nothing. Or you can feed it others."

"The memory-wine," James said.

"Partially. The wine slows the hunger, but it doesn't satisfy it. Not completely. To truly survive, you need living minds. Fresh experiences. Raw emotions." Elara's silver eyes fixed on him. "I've killed hundreds of people, James. Not out of malice. Out of necessity. Their dying moments—their fear, their regret, their desperate love—that's what keeps the Ember full."

James stepped back. "You're a monster."

"I'm what you'll become if you don't find another way." She walked toward him, and the guards tensed, but Mira held up a hand. "The Syndicate has been searching for a solution for fifty years. A way to satisfy the Ember without destroying lives. They haven't found it."

"Then why am I here?"

"Because you're different." Elara stopped a few feet away. "The fragment inside you is stronger than mine. Older. More complete. You have something I don't."

"What?"

"Choice." She tilted her head. "I woke my Ember when I was twenty-five, as expected. I had no warning, no training, no preparation. You woke early. That means something triggered you. Something that might also give you control."

"The voice," James said. "It talks to me. Guides me."

Elara's eyes widened—the first genuine emotion he'd seen from her.

"The fragment speaks to you?"

"Yes. Doesn't yours?"

"No." She turned away. "Mine sleeps. It feeds, but it doesn't talk. If yours is communicating, that means it's more awake than any fragment in recorded history."

She's afraid, the voice said. Good. Fear is useful.

James ignored it. "Can you help me control it or not?"

Elara was silent for a long moment. Then she laughed—a dry, hollow sound.

"I can teach you to survive," she said. "To last longer than most. But control?" She shook her head. "No one controls the Ember. They just learn to aim it."

"Then teach me to aim."

She studied him. The silver glow in her eyes pulsed in rhythm with the ache in his chest.

"Very well. But the lessons will cost you."

"What cost?"

Elara walked to the wall and pressed her palm against a hidden panel. The stone slid aside, revealing a small alcove filled with glass vials—each one containing a different colored liquid.

"You'll help me feed," she said. "The Market is full of dying people. Criminals. Debtors. People no one will miss. You'll harvest their final moments and bring them to me. In exchange, I'll teach you how to make the Ember take those moments instead of your own."

"That's murder," Taylor said.

"That's survival." Elara picked up a vial of red liquid. "This belonged to a man who owed the Syndicate money. He died screaming. His fear was exquisite. It kept my Ember quiet for three whole days."

James looked at the vials. Dozens of them. Dozens of lives, reduced to colored liquid in glass containers.

She's efficient, the voice said. You could learn from her.

"No," James said out loud. "I won't kill innocent people."

"Innocent?" Elara laughed again. "There are no innocent people in the Memory Market, James. Only the hungry and the eaten."

Mira stepped forward. "We don't have time for this philosophical debate. The Dying King's followers are mobilizing. If they capture James before he learns to control his Ember, they'll use him to resurrect their master. The entire continent will burn."

"Then teach me another way," James said to Elara. "A way that doesn't require murder."

Elara set down the vial. For a moment, something flickered behind her silver eyes. Something almost human.

"There is another way," she said quietly. "But you won't like it."

"Tell me."

She walked back to her chair and sat down. When she spoke, her voice was barely a whisper.

"The Ember can be starved."

Taylor frowned. "Starved?"

"Sealed. Contained. Fed nothing. It takes tremendous willpower—more than most people possess—but it's possible. I did it for five years, once. I locked myself in a cell with no memories, no emotions, no outside contact. The Ember screamed. It clawed at my mind. But it weakened."

"What happened after five years?"

Elara's face twisted. "I broke. I killed my guards. I drank their memories like wine. And then I spent the next decade making up for lost time."

"So starving it doesn't work," James said.

"It works temporarily. Long enough to buy you time to find a permanent solution." Elara looked at Mira. "The Syndicate's transfer research. Is it real?"

Mira nodded. "We've made progress. Not enough for a human trial, but close."

"Then that's his answer." Elara stood again. "Starve the Ember long enough for the Syndicate to perfect the transfer. Then give it to someone who wants it."

"No one wants this," James said.

"The dying do." Elara's voice was soft. "People with nothing left to lose. People who would trade their remaining years for a chance to feel something—anything—before the end. There are volunteers. There are always volunteers."

James looked at Taylor. Her face was unreadable, but she didn't object.

"You're asking me to pass a curse to someone else," James said.

"I'm asking you to survive." Elara walked to him and placed a cold hand on his cheek. "You're young. You have people who love you. Don't throw that away for pride."

She's right, the voice said. But she's also lying. The transfer will kill whoever receives it. She knows that. She just doesn't care.

"I need to think," James said, pulling away from her touch.

"You have until midnight." Elara returned to her chair and turned her back on him. "Then I'll start your training—whether you're ready or not. The Dying King won't wait. Neither will I."

---

Mira led them back through the Memory Market. The crowds had thickened, and the smell of memory-wine was almost overpowering.

Taylor walked close to James, her hand on her sword.

"She's using you," Taylor said. "The transfer won't work. It's never worked. She just wants you to keep feeding her memories while the Syndicate runs its experiments."

"Maybe. But she's also the only person who understands what I'm going through."

"She's the only person who's given up." Taylor grabbed his arm, stopping him in the middle of the crowded aisle. "Listen to me. I've seen what the Ember does to people. I've hunted them. Burned them. Buried them. They all end the same way—empty, hungry, and dangerous. Your grandmother isn't a success story. She's a warning."

"Then what do you suggest?"

Taylor's grey eyes were hard.

"We run. Tonight. We find Tommy, we take him, and we disappear into the Fracture. The Syndicate won't follow us there. Neither will the Inquisition."

"The Fracture is a death sentence."

"So is staying." She released his arm. "But it's your choice. Just know that every day you spend with the Syndicate, you lose another piece of yourself. And once it's gone, you can't get it back."

James looked around the Memory Market. The faces of the crowd blurred together—hungry, desperate, already hollow.

She's not wrong, the voice said. But running won't save you. The Ember is inside you. Wherever you go, I go.

"What if I don't want to run?" James asked.

Taylor sighed. "Then we fight. But fighting means learning to use the Ember without losing yourself. And your grandmother is the only teacher available."

"Then I'll learn from her. But on my terms."

"And what terms are those?"

James looked at the silver glow in his palms. It pulsed with his heartbeat, with the voice's hunger, with the cold that never quite left his chest.

"I'll feed the Ember the memories of people who deserve to lose them," he said. "Criminals. Murderers. Inquisition torturers. People like your commander."

Taylor's expression shifted. "Voss."

"Yes. He took your squad. He branded you. He's still out there, burning children for the crime of being poor." James met her eyes. "Help me learn to control the Ember. And when I'm strong enough, we'll hunt him together. We'll feed his memories to the hunger. Every last one."

Taylor was silent for a long moment.

Then she nodded.

"Deal," she said. "But if you start to slip—if the Ember starts taking pieces of you that matter—I'll put you down myself. No hesitation."

"I wouldn't expect anything less."

They walked out of the Memory Market together, leaving the green glow behind.

But James could still feel his grandmother's silver eyes on his back.

And the voice in his head was laughing.