The Heartforge lay silent.
Where once the source shard had pulsed with forbidden fire, now there was only stillness. Shattered fragments glittered on the floor, no longer humming with power, no longer tempting with promises of flame-carved dominion. Kaelin stood at the center, chest heaving, Cinderlight buried in the cooled remains of the anvil.
Theron reached her side. "You did it."
Kaelin didn’t answer at first. She stared at the remains of the shard, eyes filled not with triumph—but dread.
"It was alive," she said quietly. "That voice... it wasn’t just the shard. It was a piece of me. A version of myself that could have been."
Myrra approached, face pale in the dim firelight. "You resisted what Isara couldn’t. You severed the Flameborn’s legacy. But we have to go. The wards holding
