The name struck her like a thunderclap in a still room. It had no syllables she could speak aloud, yet it echoed in her spine. It wasn’t Elthara. It was the shape of a self she’d abandoned before the Spiral was even born.
The figure did not move, nor smile, nor blink. Their voice was still lingering in the air like smoke clinging to broken stone. “You wore it once,” they said. “When your will was still your own.”
Elthara took a step back, though the air itself resisted her. Her throat was tight, her pulse galloping against bone. This wasn’t the Spiral's voice, nor the girl’s memories, nor even flame-born divinity. This was older.
“You think the Spiral began you,” the figure said. “You’re wrong.”
Around them, the world pulsed, not with heat but attention. The trees quivered though there was no wind. The ground shifted without sound. She felt unseen limbs brushing her mind like threads testing their weight.
“You gave it up,” the figure whispered, “long before flame. Long before any
