“If you’d like more answers, I’ll be at the old outpost at the edge of the Frael Forest at daybreak,” Kael calls to me. “Bring your weapons. Your questions. I’ll be there.” All signs of the arrogant Shadowweave from earlier are gone, and I feel the spark of something genuine.Something real.
“You’re wrong—I’m no one.”
But even as I say it, something in me knows—this is only the beginning.
CHAPTER FIVE
I can’t breathe.My lungs seize, desperate for air.
The shock claws at my chest.
He knows.
Ronyn heard him.
Kael knows.
The truth—Lightborne—echoes in the hollow spaces of my mind, louder than the chaos that still lingers in the dark warehouse. My head spins. My chest heaves.
I’m no one. Just a thief. A shadow. A scrappy girl from the slums of Virellin.
But I am also someone—someone fated, marked, destined.
My name was written in the Stars the moment I was born. Under a rare constellation that hasn’t graced the heavens since King Thalmyr himself—The Eye of Lireal.
For twenty summers, I have carried that prophecy like a secret, a promise, and a curse.The Lightborne.I have whispered those words to myself in the quiet moments when the darkness of the slums threatened to consume me. They have kept me alive. They have fueled my every step, every choice, every dream of vengeance.
Twenty summers ago, conscription and prophecy brought theRoyal Guard to my door—to take me, to use me, like they do to all Starborn children of Dravara. But they didn’t want to stop there—they wanted to abuse my power, to remove me as a threat.
Twenty summers ago, they murdered my parents in cold blood. I was just a child—five summers old—when the world collapsed around me. Their screams, raw and agonized, have been the fuel on the fire of my nightmares ever since. I hear them still, echoing in the darkest corners of my mind. Not even sleep offers reprieve.
I’ll never forget the way my father stood between me and the guards, unyielding even as their blades tore into him. I cannot forget the way my mother clutched me close, whispering her final words as blood soaked her hands.“Live, Little Star. You are our only hope.”
I am the only child in Dravari history to escape conscription. But it cost me everything—my parents, my name, my magic. It's still bound with the ancient spell they put on us at birth. But I’ve felt it stirring—rebelling against its constraints like a caged animal.
Even now, there are pieces missing from that night. From the past. Not just from me, but from the world around me.
Questions that never get asked. Histories no one remembers. As if someone took a blade to our past and carved out the truths too dangerous to leave behind.
Sometimes I wonder what else they stole—what else we’ve forgotten.
But I refuse to forget them.
Their names—Salvis and Lesara—are my prayer and my battle cry. Every night, I fall asleep whispering them like a mantra, their memory the only light in the endless shadow of my grief.
Salvis. Lesara.
Salvis. Lesara.
Salvis. Lesara.
Their deathswillmatter. One day, their names will be the last words the King chokes out before I end him—just as he ended them.
They say having a Starborn child is an honor for parents in the Kingdom of Dravara—or so they want you to believe. A blessing bestowed upon them by the Stars themselves, who have deemedthem worthy of wielding magic—and paying for the privilege with a lifetime of service to the crown.
Even the Runewrights—Starborn under the Amber Forge constellation—end up drunk on the King’s doctrine. Sweet, scholarly children with a flair for language, crafting and logic become beasts who carve violent runes into weapons without flinching.
But I can see the truth: service is just another word for obedience, and honor is just a prettier word for sacrifice. But that sort of thinking gets you hanged for treason around here.
