The night grew deeper, and the cold creeping along the riverbank began to bite straight through to the bone.
Only the campfire between them stood as a fragile guardian against the darkness. Its orange glow flickered and danced, painting shifting shadows across their faces.
Crickets sang their melancholic rhythm beneath a sky overflowing with silent stars, watching from above like distant witnesses.
Yet beneath the calm of nature, something heavy still lingered in the air.
The emotional weight left behind by Kaera's confession.
Kaera sat quietly, carefully wrapping an old wound on her arm. Her eyes were focused on the white cloth slowly staining red from friction, but her mind had drifted far beyond the present.
Across the fire, Eira remained completely still.
She stared into the burning flames, her gaze distant and empty, as if her mind had slipped somewhere beyond this moment… somewhere buried deep within time itself.
"You said earlier…"
Kaera's voice broke the silence. Soft. Almost swallowed by the crackling wood.
"…that you'd be there for me. When I'm okay. And when I'm not."
Kaera stopped wrapping the bandage and looked up.
The dim firelight illuminated Eira's face.
"But what about you?" she asked quietly.
"Did you ever have someone like that?"
Eira's fingers, which had been idly playing with the edge of her cloak, froze instantly.
She inhaled slowly, letting the sharp cold air fill her lungs before releasing it in a long, heavy sigh.
"…Never," Eira replied.
Her voice was calm, but Kaera caught the faint tremor hiding at the edge of it.
"Because everyone else… is gone."
Kaera set the bandage aside. She knew that wasn't just an answer meant to end the conversation.
It was the key to a door leading into a far darker place.
The Night the Sky Turned Red
"My people once lived deep within the forest of Elun'vahl," Eira began.
Her eyes remained fixed on the flames, as though she were reading memories written within the burning embers.
"It was the birthplace of the Elves. We lived in isolation, never leaving the forest… never involving ourselves in the corruption of the outside world."
"For us, that forest was everything."
Eira paused.
Her shoulders seemed smaller now, as though she was gathering the strength needed to face the memory she feared most.
"But one night… the sky turned blood-red."
"Dark flames fell from above, burning the sacred branches we had worshipped for thousands of years."
"There was someone… someone who came that night."
Her voice lowered.
"He wasn't a demon."
"But he was far worse."
"He didn't come to conquer.
He didn't come to rule."
Her fingers tightened slightly.
"He came to erase everything."
Kaera's eyes narrowed.
"And you… back then?" she asked quietly.
Eira slowly shook her head.
Her gaze had become hollow now, like her soul was being dragged back into the ashes of Elun'vahl.
For the first time since they met, the cheerful warmth that always surrounded her vanished completely. In its place was the face of someone who had lost her entire world.
"I… don't really remember what happened."
"My memories are blurry… like something locked them away."
"All I know is that when I woke up… I was alone."
"In the ashes of Elun'vahl."
Her voice trembled slightly.
"Even now, I don't know if anyone else survived."
"But in all my travels…"
She swallowed.
"I've never found another one of my kind."
"Just me. Alone."
The Journey of a Ghost
Eira wiped her tears roughly with the back of her hand.
She forced a smile again—but this one looked fragile. Like glass moments away from shattering.
"So I started walking."
"Decade after decade, I wandered from place to place."
"I helped small villages decode ancient relics."
"I drove dark creatures away from sacred grounds."
"I became a bridge to history for other people…"
Her smile faded slightly.
"…but I had no history of my own."
Eira turned to look at Kaera.
This time, her smile was gentler. More honest, despite her reddened eyes.
"People saw me."
"They respected me."
"They feared my power."
"But no one ever truly saw me."
"I felt like a ghost walking among the living."
"Existing… but never truly felt."
Her eyes met Kaera's.
"Until you appeared."
A faint laugh escaped her.
"You're scary, quiet, and you tried to chase me away half the time…"
"But you never feared me."
"You never treated me like something strange."
"And even when I was troublesome…You never left."
Her voice softened.
"You made me feel like… maybe I'm not a ghost anymore."
Kaera said nothing.
She lowered her head, staring at the dark, stony ground beneath her feet.
Eira's words pierced straight into the deepest part of her heart, tearing through the walls she had built for years.
She knew that feeling.
The feeling of being seen as a weapon.
A monster.
But never as a person.
"…We were never normal, Eira," Kaera finally said.
Her voice was quiet but sincere.
"But we're real."
"We live."
"We feel pain that other people will never understand."
She lifted her gaze again.
Her eyes met Eira's.
"And I… feel the same thing."
"I feel like I exist… when I'm with you."
That night, beside the silent river that witnessed two broken confessions, two shattered souls slowly reached toward each other.
Kaera and Eira were no longer just two travelers walking the same road.They had become something more.
A refuge.
The only shelter each of them had in a world growing colder and crueler with every passing day.
Now Eira knew the truth behind Kaera's identity as the daughter of the missing General Astaroth.
And Kaera now carried the secret of Eira being the final remnant of a race erased from history.
Yet deep within Eira's heart, one question still lingered like a whisper in the dark.
Was her blurred memory of the red night truly the truth?
Or was there something far greater… waiting ahead?
Was the lock on her memories a gift?
Or a curse?
"Alright, enough," Kaera suddenly said, breaking the heavy atmosphere.
She quickly returned to her usual cold tone.
"Let's sleep. Tomorrow's journey is long."
"And I don't want to hear your stomach growling again while we're climbing a mountain."
Eira giggled softly.
The sound was warm, cutting through the cold night air.
"Okay, boss!"
"But tomorrow you're cooking breakfast as payback!"
Kaera snorted.
But this time, she didn't look away.
She let Eira see the faint smile on her face.
A quiet sign that the wall she had built for years had finally collapsed.
The cold night suddenly felt a little warmer. Not because of the fire.
But because, for the first time in a long while…
Neither of them had to walk alone.
Two people who once trusted no one—
One shattered by the betrayal of the past. The other searching for fragments of her lost identity.
—had found something far more valuable than any ancient relic.
They had found a place where they no longer needed to pretend to be strong.