Ashmark’s skies were calm, but not silent. From the east came winds laced with pollen and the chirping hum of new life. Fields that once bore ash now trembled with green, and children chased one another under banners no longer marked with flame—but with symbols of shared stories.
Still, Kaelin felt the stirrings of something unfinished.
In the Sanctuary of the Fireless Reaches, where once-silenced voices were given space to speak, an anomaly had emerged.
A woman named Sahlra had arrived at its edge. Mute. Drenched in rain no one else felt. Her skin bore no sigils. Her eyes, no color. She carried no shard, no journal.
But wherever she stepped, the earth sang.
Aven, now the Sanctuary’s steward, sent word to Kaelin with urgency:
"She doesn’t speak. But the world listens to her anyway."
