Then he says, “Valen was born in the mountains—northern edge of the Air Clan’s territory. Not the part with courts and politics. The part where wind carves through stone and no one dares to interfere.”
I glance at him. His tone is softer now, almost reflective.
“His family were lorekeepers—going back generations. Not mages or nobles. Just people who believed the Elements weren’t meant to be wielded, but understood. They studied patterns, prophecies, celestial shifts. Keepers of the old ways, before the clans traded reverence for control.”
The wind shifts as we move deeper into the trees. It rustles the leaves above us, cool against my skin, carrying with it the scent of moss and damp earth. I glance at Thane again, waiting to see if he’ll say more.
He does.
“Valen was different, even back then. He couldreadthe wind—sense a storm before it gathered, map pressure shifts without ever lifting a hand. Said he could feel how the elements spoke to each other.”
He pauses as a hawk cries above us, wings slicing through the canopy. Then he continues.
“Valen can do more than most give him credit for,” Thane says, his voice reverent, like the memory is a precious stone. “Even though he can’t channel magics the way riders can . . . he has something more.”
I look at him, curious. “More?”
Thane nods slowly. “The way he saw the world—the way he understood the elements—went beyond technique or combat. He could feel the balance of a place just by standing in it. Knew when something was off and how to fix it.”
Thane nudges his horse closer, angling around a small boulder in the trail. The shift is subtle, but the pressure is enough—my horse mirrors the movement, falling into step beside his.
Our legs brush—light, brief, but enough to jolt awareness through me. I glance at him, and for a heartbeat, our eyes meet. Then he looks away, adjusting his reins and straightening his horse with practiced ease.
The space between us widens again, like nothing happened.
But I still feel it.
“Valen told me once—the most powerful thing a wielder could do wasn’t command the elements . . . it was listen to them.” Thane’s expression shifts slightly. That rare glint of respect in his eyes. “He listens better than anyone I’ve ever met.”
I blink, trying to picture a younger Valen. Curious. Unrelenting.
And suddenly, I wonder—how long have the elements been waiting for me to listen?
“He started asking questions no one wanted to answer. The elders called him a nuisance—too bold, too rooted in a past they’d already chosen to forget. So he left.”
Thane’s voice is low, but there’s a thread of admiration woven through it. Maybe even something closer to kinship.
“He wandered. For years. Studied with seers and outcasts, found pockets of knowledge even the clans had let rot. Learned how to read the stars the way dragons once did. How to find truth in forgotten scripts. By the time I met him, he knew more about the Elements than any mage or scholar I’d ever trained with.”
I don’t speak. I just listen. Let the wind move through the trees—let it settle the weight of everything he’s saying.
Thane continues. “After leaving the Air Clan region, he traveled through every territory. Lived with reclusive mages, old mind-stillers from the Water Clan, earth-binders so ancient they barely spoke. He mastered techniques the clans had forgotten. Lesser magics most don’t use anymore. But they weren’t lesser to him. They were the root.”
I nod slowly, taking it in. The puzzle of Valen begins to click into place, one quiet piece at a time.
The mountains rise steeper around us, the path narrowing, winding between jagged cliffs that drop into nothingness. The sky above is vast, unbroken—a kind of openness that makes you feel small and limitless all at once.
It’s late afternoon. The golden light stretches long across the cliffs as we continue our slow ascent. Lyra and Valen are still ahead, their conversation drifting back to us, but I haven’t been listening.
Not when Thane is still here, riding beside me.
We’ve fallen into a comfortable silence, his presence no longer something I’m questioning. And it feels dangerous because I should be questioning it. He’s so inconsistent with me, it’s maddening.
But instead, I find myself thinking about everything we’ve talked about over the weeks—the questions he’s asked, the things he now knows about me.
We camp for the night in a clearing.
The fire crackles, flames licking the cool night air. The scent of smoke drifts on the mountain breeze, wind carrying the hush of unseen creatures through the cliffs. The sky is scattered withstars, the moon casting long shadows along the uneven ground.
