The God's Instrument

WHEN THE GOLDEN BLOOM AWAKENS AND THE HUNTER'S BLADE TREMBLES, LIGHT AND SHADOW SHALL MEET ONCE MORE — AND THE WAR OF AGES SHALL EITHER END, OR BEGIN ANEW. Thunder split the sky open, again and again, like something vast and angry was trying to break through from the other side. Rain came down in sheets, flooding the narrow paths between the rocks, swallowing the sound of everything beneath it. Everything except the cry. It cut through the storm the way only one thing can — sharp, new, furious with life. And deep inside the mountain, in a place no map had ever marked, a flower bloomed. Golden. Quiet. Impossible. Its petals opened slowly, glowing against the dark like a held breath. For a moment, the storm itself seemed to pause — as if the world was deciding something. Then it screamed louder than before. Inside the hidden chamber, the woman pressed her child to her chest and didn't breathe. Her hands were shaking. The baby was still crying — small, red-faced, furious at being born into all this noise — and she pulled her closer, tighter, like her arms alone could hide them both from whatever was coming. They will find her. The thought moved through her like ice. They will find her and they will kill her. She looked down at her daughter's face. So small. So impossibly new. Eyes shut tight against a world that had already decided to be her enemy before she'd drawn her first proper breath. The mark on the back of her neck glowed faintly — golden, delicate, undeniable — and the woman's throat tightened until she couldn't swallow. She had prayed. For months she had prayed it wouldn't be there. That the stories were wrong, that the prophecy had chosen someone else, that her daughter would be born ordinary and safe and free to live a life no one was hunting. But there it was. And now there was no time. No time to grieve it, no time to rage against it — only time to do the one thing a mother could still do. "Please." She looked up at the woman kneeling beside her — the only other person in that room, the only person she still trusted with something this irreversible. Her voice came out quiet. Not weak — quiet the way a person sounds when they have already made a terrible decision and are simply seeing it through. "Take her. Take her far from here before they feel it." "Feel what?" the woman asked. She didn't answer. There was no time to explain what she herself barely understood — only that the mark on her daughter's neck was already there, already glowing faintly gold against soft newborn skin, and that certain people in this world had been waiting a very long time for exactly that. She pressed her lips to her daughter's forehead. One breath. One second. The only goodbye she was going to get, and she knew it. "You are going to be so much," she whispered against the child's skin, her voice finally cracking — just once, just slightly — before she pulled it back together. "So much more than they are ready for. I'm sorry I won't be there to see it." The baby's crying softened. Just for a moment. As if she heard. The woman's arms tightened one last time — then she loosened them. Slowly. The hardest thing she had ever done. "Go," she said, looking back up. Her eyes were dry now. Her jaw was set. "Don't stop. Don't look back. And don't let her know what she carries — not until she is strong enough to carry it without breaking." "And if they find her before then?" A pause. Thunder cracked overhead, shaking dust from the ceiling. "They won't," she said. Not because she believed it. Because she needed it to be true. The woman took the child and ran. And the mother stayed — back against the cold stone wall, arms empty, the sound of her daughter's fading cry mixing with the rain until she could no longer tell them apart. Outside, deep in the mountain, the golden flower stopped glowing. Its petals folded one by one — slowly, like something grieving. Then it was gone — as if it had never been there at all, as if the storm had swallowed the only proof that something extraordinary had just entered the world. The mountains went quiet. But it wasn't the quiet of peace. It was the quiet of something that had just begun. The thunderstorm echoed through the mountains. 19 years later. "Why the rain?" Ariya muttered, closing her window. "Who angered the gods." Her phone rang. "Hey b***h!" "Tomorrow's the exam," Lina's voice chirped in. "I hope your lazy ass studied?" "Yeah, right," Ariya said, smirking. "You have to at least score high so we can party all night!" "Alright, alright — stop calling me. I need to pretend I'm studying." "Pretend?" "Exactly. Good night." She ended the call, smiling to herself. I paused in front of the mirror without meaning to, like something in me needed to check in. I stand at five-six — not tall enough to intimidate, not short enough to be overlooked. Just enough to make you look twice. My skin is brown and warm, the kind that catches light like it was made for it. My hair is curly — thick, a little wild, the kind that has its own opinions about what it wants to do each morning. I stopped fighting it a long time ago. We have an understanding now. My lips are naturally pink. Soft. Always on the edge of something — a smirk, a comeback, a laugh I haven’t decided to let out yet. I know what I am. Confident, stubborn, sassy enough to make the wrong people uncomfortable and the right ones grin. I’ve never once tried to sand those edges down and I don’t plan to start. My body is small but it doesn’t apologize for itself. Petite, curved in the right places — not loud about it, just present. Just there. My gaze drops slightly. And at the base of my neck, sitting quiet against my skin — the tattoo. A small flower, very delicate. Nobody notices it. I make sure of that or my dad made sure I did that. My dad’s voice lives in the back of my head every time I leave the house — that beauty is not meant for the world to see. I never fully understood what he meant. I just learned to keep my hair down, my collar up, and my questions to myself. Some things you carry quietly or maybe because of respect. I blink, breaking the moment, then turn away from the mirror and head to the corner of the room where my study table sits. I drop into the chair, pulling a book toward me like I actually plan to read it. I don’t. My eyes skim the same line over and over, my fingers flipping a page I didn’t understand in the first place. A curl slips into my face again and this time I don’t even bother fixing it. “Yeah… not happening,” I mutter. I close the book with a soft thud, pushing it away before I can pretend any longer. The bed looks a lot more inviting anyway. I fall onto it without ceremony, staring at the ceiling for a second before turning to my side, pulling the sheets with me. Maybe I’ll think about things tomorrow. Or maybe I won’t.