"The Dawn that Rose from Fire"

Day 13 of Novel November- The Party Departs

This is a continuance of Chapter 8.

Then Mirael rose. Her silver hair shimmered like threads of moonlight, her blind eyes turned toward the covenant as though she could see every line of it.

“The Song remembers,” she said, her voice low but carrying. “It remembers every oath sung beneath its sky. Be wary, children of the Maker, for promises sung in desperation bind deeper than iron.”

Her hands lifted, palms open toward the gathered. The air stirred, faint notes rippling through the hall, not words, but a vibration that made the heart ache with recognition.

“You make a covenant beneath a dying world,” she continued. “And in this, the Song shifts. I hear the turning of the Great Chord, and the silence that waits beyond it. But the Song will endure. It always does.”

The Harmonies bowed their heads. Kaelen’s throat worked as if he wanted to speak, but no words came.

Alenyah did not move. She could feel the prophecy settle like a weight across her shoulders, familiar as the ache of an old scar. Still, she met Mirael’s sightless gaze.

“Then let it be,” she said quietly.

And with a single stroke, she pressed her seal into the wax - binding the Fey’ri, the Stoneborn, and whatever fate the Song had already chosen for them.



What followed was hours of debate and logistics- what routes they would wake, the possibilities of what danger they would prepare for. The Harmonies stayed, to give their wisdom and their blessing. Although, Alenyah could have done without Tharion and Wren’s prickly input. Alenyah brought up the idea of Althea returning to The Vale, but the Rhea insisted over and over again that she could handle it.

“But you cannot fight,” Alenyah said impatiently, brushing her hair out of her eyes. In the debates, her hair had begun to come undone from her braids and fall about her shoulders. “What will you do? Weave us a blanket when we get cold?”

Althea flinched, and Alenyah gentled her tone. “This is unlike anything you’ve seen before.”

“Well,” Althea said slowly. “My mother always said there’s what you can do and what you should do, and they don’t always align. I know what I need to do, and that's to go with my brother to see this through to the end. If his knowledge will help you, I intend to make sure he survives.”

But that just raised the idea of why Berin needed to come at all. He had done his research, he had brought them all together. After all, what good was a SCHOLAR going to do?

Alenyah pinched the bridge of her nose, exhaling sharply. “Berin, you understand this is not a scholarly expedition. This is life and death. The Great Wyrm does not respond to theory.”

Berin lifted his hands defensively. “I am aware, Resonant, but knowledge is a blade as well. Without understanding the paths, the history, the ways the land itself has twisted, we will stumble blindly and die. I can help prevent that.”

Foxran muttered something under his breath about scholars and swords, but Alenyah ignored him.

“Berin is right,” Korith added. “I do not believe I can join you on this journey, so you’ll need his knowledge.”

Multiple voices protested, and Alenyah’s stomach dropped. He meant to send her as the only Fey’ri on this expedition?

“You mean to send her with no protection?” Wren snapped. “No Fey’ri?”

Korith sighed heavily. “I am too old. I will not survive the journey, and I fear I will only slow them down.”

“There must be someone-” Vaelen muttered thoughtfully.

“No,” Alenyah silenced them. “I will not condemn any of my people. I will not ask any of them to correct my own failings.”

An army and a singer could not slay the Great Wyrm a century ago. She couldn’t bear losing any more of her diminishing people to this mission. Her eyes lifted to the blue sky, peering like a great eye through the hole in the ceiling. The sun would shine on her people again. She was sure of it.



Supper was brought that night, and it was decided they would depart the next morning. Vaelen found rooms for them within the city. A quiet departure was found to be most prudent, and Alenyah would meet them at dawn by the stables. She watched as Kaelen almost reverently folded up the contract before handing it off to Sareth.

He inclined his head towards the Resonant before slipping out the main door into the setting sun.

That night, Alenyah’s sleep was not dreamless. She dreamed of the Reach alive and singing, its rivers silvered and trees pulsing with the Maker’s Song, but the melody twisted and stuttered, fractured by a presence she could feel more than see. Through the ripples of the Song, amber eyes glowed, steady and unyielding, cutting through the chaos as if they alone could hear her voice and judge it. She reached for them in the dream, and the music shivered in response, promising both reckoning and a bond she could neither name nor escape.

Chapter 9

The dawn rose a dull gray shaded in rose along the horizon. Alenyah had arrived first at the stables with Valka, saddlebags packed and slung over the Fylgja’s black haunches. The Fey’ri’s eyes watched as the pink began to blaze with a thin line of gold, piercing like fingers through the eastern sky. She hoped it was a good omen. Alenyah had never planned to return east. In fact, she had intended to make a sanctuary for her people, moving forward towards progress.

A boot scuffed on the cobblestone behind her, and she turned. Valka raised her head, panting softly in the dim light. Kaelen shifted his weight on his feet, a pack slung over his right shoulder. His eyes scanned the stalls, and finding no one else, he cleared his throat.

“I’m the first to arrive.” He said redundantly.

Alenyah raised an eyebrow. “After me.”

“Yes,” he coughed again. “After you, of course.”

The silence stretched between them, like the squark of violin strings. He set his pack on the ground and strode past her, tensing to where his horse, a roan, steamed in the morning mist. Valka snorted and put her head on her paws, rolling her eyes back at her friend in judgement. As he fiddled with the straps on his saddle, Alenyah took pity on him. After all, what did you say to the woman who wanted to kill you? She leaned against Valka, staring at the strong line of his shoulders.

“We met once,” she said conversationally. He paused, and straightened.

“I remember.” His voice was quiet, his gaze not moving from his mount. He stroked the horse’s flank, contemplative. “The Resonant arrived at my father’s throne with a young woman. You were shorter then.”

Alenyah breathed in, and chanced a joke.

“Ah, but barely. The years have given me wisdom, not inches.”

His head turned slightly towards hers. “You didn’t speak,” he continued. “Your feet barely touched the floor seated, and you swung them just like Althea.”

“And you?” Alenyah interrupted. “You looked like you’d rather be anywhere but in a room full of Fey’ri.”

“That’s exactly how I felt.” The tension returned.

His hands fell, and the Stoneborn turned to face her, his silvered skin glimmering in the morning sun. Silver and amber, she thought distantly. Silver from stone, amber from trees.

“My father, through the Stone, sensed an evil in the far North. He tried to warn your-” Kaelen sucked in his breath. “The Queen. He doubted we could keep our people safe. That she could keep both our peoples safe.”

His voice grew bitter. “And he was right.”

Alenyah flinched and turned away. She wanted to rage at him, to call him a liar. Her mother didn’t deserve to die for her failings.

“I was too young to understand,” she murmured. “And by the time I did, it was too late. My mother was dead.” Her eyes hardened. “And she didn’t die in the Wyrm’s fire.”

Kaelen’s fists clenched. She shifted her weight forward, and butterflies tensed in her stomach. Would he finish what she started that night?

“Careful,” he said, his voice a low warning.

She faced him, eyes flashing green in the pale dawn. “You think I don’t know what happened in that chamber? The Wyrm was still leagues away when your father struck her down.”

“That’s a lie,” he snapped, stepping closer before he could stop himself. “My father died trying to stop the Wyrm from reaching your borders. He gave everything for both our peoples, and you would stain that with rumor?”

The air between them felt charged, pulsing with the same tension that thrummed through the earth before a storm. Valka lifted her head, growling softly.

Alenyah’s voice dropped, trembling but fierce. “I saw his blade. The iron that pierced her heart was no accident.”

For a moment, she thought he might strike her or worse, walk away. But instead, Kaelen’s jaw locked, and he turned his face toward the horizon, where the gold light split the clouds.

“You don’t know what you saw,” he said finally, each word measured and pained. “None of us do.”

Her breath came fast, her pulse wild in her throat. “Then perhaps,” she whispered, “we’ll find the truth when we reach the Reach.”

Kaelen’s amber eyes met hers, fierce and unyielding. “If we survive that long.”

The silence that followed felt alive with sharp, unspoken things flickering between them like sparks on dry tinder.

Then the sound of approaching hooves broke it apart, the rest of the company emerging through the fog. Alenyah turned away, her face set in stone, though her heart was far less steady.

Berin and Althea arrived next. The Rhea were a study in opposites. Althea was smiling, chattering away at Berin, who yawned and nodded at both of them sleepily. Alenyah strode over, lifting Althea’s bags and walking with her to where to smaller horses had been stabled.

“I picked these out myself,” Alenyah told her, settling the bags on the horse. It rolled a dark eye towards her and pounded one hoof on the ground in protest. “They’re supposed to be our most docile horses. This is Bumpkin, and that’s his twin-” she pointed. “Pumpkin.”

Pumpkin was light and almost gold in color. He was also rather fat for a horse, but Alenyah preferred to call him “stout”.

“Bumpkin’s gait can be a little,” she smirked. “Well, Bumpy- so you both can decide who rides which.”

“Oh, I think I can handle Bumpkin.” Althea said eyeing the russet horse. “He can’t be grumpier than that old cat Laila liked to keep around. What was his name, Berin?”

Berin yawned again. “I dunno. Maybe Baron?”

“Berin and Baron?” Alenyah laughed. “Did she name a cat after you?”

“Course she did! He’s just as grumpy as that cat.”

“I like to think,” Berin said stiffly. “It’s because we had a similar hair color.”

The women snorted and helped Berin get his belongings situated on Pumpkin’s back. The whole time, Alenyah was aware of Kaelen’s eyes, boring between her shoulder blades. She knew their troubles, and their conversation, was not over. It’d have to wait for now.

The rest arrived shortly after, and without Korith, Alenyah felt even more alone, her build and ears at odds with everyone around her. But she had no time to be uneasy. Dawn was breaking over Eirethan, and the road north waited.