That was what Kay had been taught—what was etched into steel-bound tomes, whispered by elders, enforced by blood and fire. Lore did not bend. Lore did not soften. Lore did not lie.
And yet—
Kay stood alone in the western archive, staring at a stone relief that made his hands tremble.
The carving was older than the temple’s collapse, older even than the Bloodroot’s deepest veins. Time had worn it smooth in places, but the figures were unmistakable.
A goddess—the goddess she didn’t look like sun, if the records were to be believed—stood crowned in flame.
Before her knelt mortals.
Not in worship.
In terror.
Their bodies were twisted, scorched, broken. Children clung to one another as fire poured from the goddess’s outstretched hands. Her face was cold. Detached. Divine.
Kay swallowed.
This was the image every order knew. The justification for the hunts. The reason fragments were slaughtered before they could awaken.
She burns worlds, the lore said.
She cannot love what she rules.
Mercy is beyond her.
Kay stepped back—and nearly collided with another carving.
This one was hidden behind a curtain of Bloodroot, protected, not erased.
It showed the same goddess.
But here, she was kneeling.
Her crown lay shattered at her feet. Her hands were pressed to the earth, roots wrapping gently around her wrists—not binding her, but holding her steady. Around her stood spirits. Children. Creatures of fang and feather and light.
And her face—
Kay’s breath caught.
Her face was grief.
“She didn’t burn them,” he whispered.
The Bloodroot pulsed faintly, as if in agreement.
“She burned for them.”
The lie did not shatter all at once.
It fractured slowly, like ice spreading through glass.
Kay began to see everything differently.
What the orders called rampages were battles fought in defense of sanctuaries. What they named corrupt growth was the Bloodroot sealing wounds left by wars mortals had started. What they described as possession was a goddess pouring herself into fragile vessels to spare the world from bearing her full weight.
And Sun—
Sun did not fit the lore at all.
The first weeks passed without blood.
That alone felt wrong.
Sun rose with the dawn each day, standing barefoot in the temple’s heart, eyes closed, palms open. She practiced not with force, but with patience—listening to the way the Bloodroot hummed beneath the stone, the way the air thickened when she drew too deeply, the way exhaustion crept in like a warning, not a failure.
Kay watched from a distance at first.
Always armed. Always alert.
She noticed.
“You think I’ll lose control,” she said one morning, not opening her eyes.
“I think power like yours has consequences,” Kay replied.
She smiled faintly. “So does fear.”
That unsettled him. “For someone who was seeking death you seem at peace”
“I am….. I’ve finally found a home”
Her abilities manifested differently than the lore described.
There was no raging inferno. No uncontrolled devastation.
When she reached for the earth, roots responded like old friends. When she faltered, they steadied her. When she pushed too hard, the spirits intervened—Rose darting in front of her face, Thorne anchoring her ankles, Sage whispering calm.
The temple flourished.
Life crept back into the cracks. Moss bloomed. Small creatures emerged from hiding. The Bloodroot no longer bristled at Kay’s presence—it brushed against his boots, curious, almost fond.
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
The children—Rose, Thorne, and Sage—grew bolder still.
They followed Kay during patrols, mimicking his stance, copying the way he held his sword.
“You’re terrible influences,” he muttered.
They laughed.
At night, Sun would sit near the fire, exhaustion softening her features, hands wrapped around a cup of warmed root water.
“I was afraid,” she admitted once. “That if I stopped running… the world would find me.”
Kay stared into the flames. “The world isn’t kind to those that are different.”
She glanced at him. “And what of you? You’re out here alone”
The question struck deeper than any blade.
“I swore an oath,” he said slowly. “To destroy fragments before they awaken.”
Her shoulders stiffened—but she did not pull away.
“And now?” she asked.
Kay’s jaw tightened.
“Now I don’t know what a fragment is anymore.”
Silence stretched between them.
Not hostile.
Heavy.
Something began to crack.
The night his oath fractured, it did not break loudly.
It whispered.
Kay dreamed of fire.
Not Sun’s warmth—but execution pyres, screaming children, orders carried out without question. He saw his own hands stained red, heard elders praise his obedience.
Then the dream shifted.
Sun stood before him, smaller somehow, bloodied, holding the spirits close to her chest.
“You would kill me,” she said—not accusing, just stating truth. He reached out for her, blood began to run down her face covering her body, soaking the children as she began to melt into a pool of red.
Kay woke gasping.
The temple was quiet.
He sat up, hands shaking.
“I won’t,” he said aloud.
The Bloodroot stirred.
“I won’t.”
From that night on, Kay trained Sun himself.
Not to fight—but to survive.
He taught her how to ground herself when power surged too quickly. How to shield rather than strike. How to read intent in an enemy’s stance. How to retreat without shame.
“You don’t have to prove anything,” he told her. “Living is victory enough.”
She laughed softly. “You sound like someone who’s lost many wars.”
He met her gaze. “I’ve won too many.”
They grew closer in the quiet ways.
Shared meals. Shared watches. Shared silences that did not need filling.
Friendship took root—not sudden, not fragile—but steady.
And somewhere beyond the temple walls, far from this fragile peace—
Kay’s father still lived.
And the lie that protected him was beginning to die.
———————————————————————————-
“Someone is coming” rose whispered
“malicious” sage added
“mother this is murderous intent” all three shouted
Kay sword in hand “I will find them….”
Sun placed her hand on his shoulder “let me try”
eyes glowing, runes on her skin hummed and glowed golden as she commanded “find the one that wishes me dead, bring them to me”
The Bloodroot screamed as roots flew forward, weaving thought the forest…..
. The roots beneath the temple shuddered, veins glowing a dull, warning red instead of their usual living crimson.
Kay was on watch at the eastern parapet when the wind changed.
Not direction.
Intent.
“Sun,” Kay said quietly.
She was already there.
She stood barefoot on the stone, hair loose, eyes unfocused—not in fear, but in listening. The spirits clustered close to her shoulders, their glow dimmed, uneasy.
“He’s near,” she whispered.
Kay’s hand closed around his sword hilt.
The air tore.
A figure emerged falling from the sky as if it was flung towards them, collapsed onto the temple steps in a sprawl of blood , legs mangled.
A courier.
Or what remained of one courtesy of the blood root
His armor bore the sigil Kay knew too well—etched deep into his bones since childhood. The crest of the Order. Of his father.
The man coughed wetly, crimson spilling across the white stone.
Sun took an instinctive step forward.
Kay stopped her with one hand.
“I’ll handle this.”
The courier’s eyes fluttered open, pupils blown wide with terror. When they focused on Kay, recognition flickered—and then relief.
“You…” the man gasped. “You’re alive.”
Kay knelt, expression carved from stone. “You have a message.”
The courier laughed weakly, blood bubbling at his lips.
“Oh, yes,” he whispered. “A message.”
He reached into his breastplate with shaking fingers and withdrew a sealed scroll bound in black cord—not waxed, not formal.
Personal.
Kay’s throat tightened.
“This was meant for the mage tower” the courier said. “But your father thought… you might intercept.”
Sun’s breath caught behind him.
The man’s gaze slid past Kay, landing on her.
Fear overtook him completely.
“You’re real,” he whispered. “The ruined one.”
Kay froze.
“What did you say?”
“The one that’s hiding,” the courier rasped. “The one who hides behind mercy.”
Sun flinched.
Kay’s voice dropped, lethal. “Finish your message.”
The courier smiled—a broken, awful thing.
“He says the lie is over.”
The courier’s hand fell limp.
Dead.
The scroll burned in Kay’s palm.
They took the body beyond the Bloodroot’s reach and let the earth reclaim him. Sun stood silently throughout, face pale, hands trembling despite her effort to still them.
Back inside the temple, Kay broke the seal.
The parchment inside was not a threat.
It was worse.
It was a confession.
My son,
You were always too soft for this work. Too curious. Too willing to listen.
But I raised you to finish what I could not.
The fragments are surfacing again. The ruined one has revealed herself, just as the old texts predicted.
You have always been wary of what others think. I see now why.
Do not mistake mercy for innocence.
She will burn the world if left alive.
Bring her to me, Kay.
Or stand aside while I correct your failure.
The final line was written darker, pressed so hard it tore the parchment.
If you stand with her, you stand against humanity.
remember your oath
Silence crushed the chamber.
Sun said nothing.
She could not.
Her chest felt hollow, like something vital had been named and condemned in the same breath.
Kay folded the letter slowly.
Every lesson of his life screamed at him.
Humanity first.
Order above self.
Fragments are threats.
He thought of Sun restoring the temple stone by stone.
Of her collapsing after healing children who were pieces of herself.
Of the Bloodroot no longer recoiling from his touch.
Of the lie carved into history.
“I won’t give you to him,” Kay said.
Sun looked up sharply.
“You don’t have to choose me,” she whispered. “If it means—”
“I already have,” Kay cut in.
He stepped closer, voice shaking—not with fear, but with finality.
“My father believes this world can only survive by burning anything it doesn’t understand.”
He clenched the letter until it crumbled.
“I believe he’s wrong.”
The temple trembled—not violently, but in recognition.
The Bloodroot brightened.
The spirits surged with light.
Sun stared at him, eyes shimmering gold, voice barely audible.
“That means he’ll hunt you too.”
Kay met her gaze, steady.
“Then let him.”
Outside, far beyond the sanctuary—
Kay’s father felt the shift.
An oath had broken.
And war, long delayed, had finally chosen its sides.