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A ruined home. A dangerous road. A strange power beginning to wake. Step into Torian's first journey and meet the world that starts the shelf.
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Featured
Fantasy · Adventure
by Wayne Wild
A ruined home. A dangerous road. A strange power beginning to wake. Follow Torian into a world of loss, survival, ancient forces, and a bond that changes everything.
New
Fantasy · Adventure
by Wayne Wild
Kyren Solen is banished for stealing three loaves of bread, dies alone in the wild, and awakens changed by a strange power. What begins as a fight to understand his new strength becomes a full journey across Solen, through impossible threats, strange worlds, and the choices that shape the man he becomes.
MULTIVERSE BOOKS
Books in this collection push past a single kingdom or planet and into the larger forces, worlds, and fractures surrounding Torian's universe.
Finished · Multiverse
TORIAN UNIVERSE
Torian begins as a thirteen-year-old survivor whose road into the wild leads him to Skarn, an ancient winged beast. What starts as fear becomes a bond built on trust, protection, and choosing to face the world together.
Across 38 finished chapters, Torian's awakening Spiral carries them through forgotten ruins, hidden magical cities, broken seals, violent skies, and a growing threat tied to the history of the flame itself. Along the way, Torian discovers an ancient glider and learns to take to the sky beside Skarn.
Coming SoonAfter surviving the battles that shaped their world, Torian and Skarn are suddenly ripped away from everything they know and thrown onto a strange, massive planet unlike anything they have ever seen.
This new world is filled with towering landscapes, unfamiliar civilizations, and colossal Titans far larger and more dangerous than the creatures they have faced before. With no clear way home, Torian and Skarn are forced to explore the unknown, uncover the secrets of this new planet, and survive enemies that seem to grow more powerful with every step.
But something far worse is waiting for them.
A new threat is rising, and it may become the hardest fight Torian and Skarn have ever faced.
Coming SoonTorian’s universe is breaking apart.
Reality has been torn open, leaving shattered timelines, broken worlds, and fractured versions of existence scattered across the void. As Torian travels between the remains of his universe, he is forced to face threats unlike anything he has encountered before, knowing that this may be the one fight he cannot simply walk away from.
His only goal is to restore what was destroyed and find a way to put his universe back together. But along the way, Torian discovers a young girl stranded within the chaos, alone and in desperate need of help. Reluctant to take on another responsibility, he ultimately chooses to bring her with him.
Now Torian must protect her while crossing unstable realities, facing enemies born from the collapse, and pushing his power further than ever before.
Because this time, saving the universe may require a sacrifice he cannot take back.
Coming Soon
Asgrim Hróðmarsson is a hardened craftsman who climbs Helgrind during a brutal winter and discovers Fellgnýr, a thunder-forged hammer. His power is tied to oaths, sacrifice, and protecting a starving fjord.
Coming Soon
Dren Mako begins as a scavenger on the brutal world of Khar Tor. His path leads into buried technology, an ancient world node, and a power awakening that pulls him far beyond the life he once knew.
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Free to Read
FREE SERIAL · CHAPTER 1 AVAILABLE
Kaelor leaves the only brutal home he has ever known and pushes beyond the red cliffs into land no one from his settlement has described. Deep in a strange forest, he discovers glowing purple roots leading somewhere they should not.
STORY HAVEN LORE
Meet the major characters, visit important places, understand the powers, and browse signature weapons from the Story Haven shelf. This guide stays intentionally spoiler-light so new readers can explore without having the endings ruined.
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A thirteen-year-old survivor whose destroyed village sends him into the wild. The Spiral Mark and an awakening ember power make him part of an older flame history he never asked to inherit.
A colossal winged beast who becomes Torian’s partner rather than his pet. Their bond grows from wary survival into a protective, brother-like partnership.
A silent, leonine figure with sphinx-like features and amethyst eyes. Karnis joins Torian and Skarn in the highlands and becomes part of the journey toward the Spiral Core.
The lord whose soldiers destroy Torian’s village over unpaid taxes. As Torian learns more about the old flame order, Malvorn’s connection to that history becomes far larger than a local ruler.
A forty-five-year-old laborer banished for stealing bread for the hungry. He dies in the wild, awakens linked to Solen’s planetary lattice, and must learn to carry enormous power without destroying what he wants to protect.
A scholar who traces Kyren’s transformation to fragments of the Heart-Engine. Cale becomes one of the people helping Kyren understand the lattice beneath Solen and the threats using it.
A disciplined city captain first seen around Kyren’s exile. When larger dangers appear, Renn becomes a practical military link between Kyren’s power and the people the city needs to protect.
A hovering, human-shaped threat from beyond the ordinary defenses of Solen. He appears without armor or visible weapons and tests Kyren as part of something much larger than a single battle.
A hardened craftsman who climbs Helgrind during a brutal winter and finds Fellgnýr. His strength comes with rules: thunder answers oaths, and every promise has a price.
A hard-edged figure of the Whale-Road who understands the sea, storms, and the forces moving around Fellgnýr. She becomes one of the important voices guiding Asgrim beyond his fjord.
Two of Asgrim’s closest practical allies. They help turn dangerous power into work that can actually protect homes, fields, roads, and people instead of becoming spectacle.
A scavenger from the brutal world of Khar-Tor whose encounter with ancient technology rewrites his body with storm-like power. His path leads from survival into the forgotten systems of Wardens, Titans, and world-scale forces.
A storm-scribe at Emberfall, sharp-tongued and analytical. Neral studies the sky and challenges Dren to think about the damage and consequences that follow power.
Two allies sent with Dren on dangerous work beyond Emberfall. Their unusual senses make them valuable when ordinary sight and hearing are not enough to read the threats ahead.
Once known as a city of gardens, Grayreach becomes a major battleground in Torian’s journey as older forces close in around the people still trying to hold it.
An ancient stronghold that feels more like a reliquary than a fortress. Burned banners, erased names, and old flame law survive here alongside the Trial by Oathsteel.
A deep, ancient place beneath a rift in the planet’s crust. Luminous stone, silent inscriptions, and the geometry of the first flame make it one of the central locations in Torian’s power history.
Kyren’s home world. Beneath its cities, seas, mountains, and air runs the Heart-Engine lattice, a planetary network that carries force and links distant nodes together.
A southern region tied to one of Solen’s major anchor sites. Its vents and hidden structures become part of Kyren’s larger journey through the planetary Warden system.
A line of towers buried in the northern ice. The pillars are tied to endurance, the planetary grid, and one of the keys Kyren must reach while the world’s larger defense system awakens.
Dren’s harsh home world: broken stone, scavenger routes, ancient wreckage, and the remains of forces powerful enough to shape entire landscapes.
A defended settlement built around survival, engineering, and hard decisions. Emberfall becomes a key gathering point for people trying to stand against threats larger than any one city.
A dangerous region shaped by colossal beings and ancient systems. It is a place where scale stops being normal and the remains of older powers become part of the terrain itself.
The winter mountain Asgrim climbs when his fjord is starving. A crater high on Helgrind holds Fellgnýr and begins the oath-and-thunder path that changes the fate of the coast below.
The sea routes and coastal world surrounding Asgrim’s fjord. Weather, debt, ships, bells, and the people who understand them make the Whale-Road as dangerous as any battlefield.
A place where silence is not simply the absence of sound. The forces tied to the White Jarl and the Great Quiet turn the island into part of a wider struggle over voice, weather, and memory.
A mark carried in Torian’s palm that reacts to old flame sites, danger, and ancient power. It can flare with heat or pressure and grows more responsive as Torian changes.
Torian’s awakening power lets him feel heat beneath the world, warm stone, and eventually spark fire without flint. The power is tied to will, restraint, and the deeper rules of the Spiral.
An advanced flame discipline Torian studies through old writing that emphasizes heat, will, surrender, and cost. The lesson is clear: the bearer cannot simply force the fire without consequence.
After death at the stream, Kyren becomes tuned to fragments of Solen’s Heart-Engine. The bond connects him to a lattice running through stone, sea, and air.
Kyren can channel red lightning through his body and shape it with increasing precision. Later techniques let him spiral and direct the current instead of releasing it as raw destruction.
His transformed body can lift loads ordinary people cannot and move through the air. Much of his training is about restraint: landing, accelerating, and moving without turning every action into a shockwave.
Warden training combines speed, phasing, and stillness so movement can happen without warning the world around him. These abilities become essential against threats that can read ordinary motion.
Ancient technology floods Dren with lightning and rewrites his body rather than simply shocking it. White lines, sparks, and a new internal rhythm mark the beginning of his transformation.
A sharpened instinct for weaknesses, routes, pressure, and structural truth. It does not hand Dren answers, but it points him away from bad choices and toward the seams that matter.
Three great lines in the old Warden system: Crown carries the sky’s patience, Spine the stone’s memory, and Heart the hidden water’s will. The old Wardens worked through their crossings to keep worlds in balance.
Fellgnýr lets Asgrim work with wind, pressure, rain, and thunder rather than merely call down lightning. The best results come from guiding weather instead of trying to dominate it.
A controlled stamp of silence that can mute the air for a heartbeat. It is useful against hush-scars and other sound-based dangers, but it must be handled carefully.
Runes awaken beneath Asgrim’s skin after he takes up Fellgnýr. Oaths, names, promises, and the cost of keeping them are built into how his power works.
Torian’s father’s blade survives the destruction of the village. Dark steel, a worn leather grip, and an old crest make it less a trophy than a family promise: a sword meant to protect, not conquer.
A heavy curved blade used in the Iron Hold’s Trial by Oathsteel. Its blackened body carries runes along the spine that glimmer when the weapon is gripped.
A blackened hooked spear carried by a spiral-scarred attacker. The wound it leaves bleeds unnatural cold, and the weapon can snap back into its wielder’s hand.
A thunder-forged hammer found in a crater on Helgrind. Iron-black with a hidden violet cast, it answers Asgrim through runes, silence, storm, and the oaths he is willing to keep.
A weapon built around silence rather than impact. The bell drinks or distorts sound and becomes part of a larger attempt to teach the sky, sea, and people to go quiet.
Razor-pressure columns Dren can form and throw as precise weapons. They are not ordinary swords or lightning bolts, but shaped force designed to cut, pin, or disrupt mechanisms.
A polearm used by masked enforcers Dren encounters after falling into an unfamiliar kingdom. Its hybrid spear-and-halberd profile matches the hard, controlled authority of its wielders.
A thirteen-year-old survivor and emerging Spiral bearer. In this journey he grows from a hunted boy into a skyfaring traveler who learns to control his fire, trust Skarn, and choose what kind of bearer he wants to become.
A colossal black-and-silver winged beast bonded to Torian through trust rather than mastery. In Cindralore, watchers recognize his legendary shape and call him the sky-guard beast and the Bound Fang.
A godlike figure wrapped in blackened armor and green fire, tied to the broken history of the Spiral bearers. His presence bends the battlefield around him and forces Torian to confront what the old flames were created to do.
A keeper of old Spiral knowledge who points Torian toward hidden survivors and forgotten places. He gives Torian a memory-etched disc that reveals the road to more of the truth behind the broken seals.
A vast chain of obsidian-colored cliffs crossing the northern wilds. Strange carved caverns and ancient Flamewright remains lie inside the range, turning the mountains into both a route and a record of a lost age.
A perfect circular collapse in the forest rimmed by enormous ancient roots. The roots recognize Torian and open into a hidden Spiral sanctuary where memory, flame, and forgotten bearers still linger.
A hidden magical city built through a mountain, where bridges hang over a glowing sideways river and towers are grown from crystal, vine-glass, stone, and old magic. It is governed by the Council of Light.
A broken cliff-city carved into a massive mountain wall. Spiral-stone terraces and shattered fire-glass bridges hang over a thousand-foot drop while unnatural wind tears through the ruins without stopping.
The City That Couldn’t Burn, a half-submerged ruin of pale stone and blue crystal surrounded by a violent maelstrom. Broken bridges, flooded streets, lightning-filled water, and impossible winds guard what remains.
A vast inverted wound in the world where the stone seems to breathe. Pale roots wrap a central spire and green light drifts through the depths, creating one of the quietest and strangest places Torian enters.
Torian’s core power. The Spiral can form focused fire through his hands, strengthen his strikes, react to ancient seals, and shift from a wild survival force into something increasingly controlled and deliberate.
The Spiral reacts to old temples, seals, glyphs, memories, and other bearers. At times it behaves less like a weapon and more like a key or language, recognizing places and histories Torian himself does not understand.
Torian learns to drive concentrated Spiral power through close-range attacks. Flame can burst from his hands and fists at impact, allowing ordinary movement and martial strikes to hit with supernatural force.
The green power associated with Kaelgor. Unlike the Spiral’s connection to memory and legacy, the Verdant is described as a countermeasure built to consume what the Spiral preserves.
Torian and Skarn learn to move through the air together without needing commands. Torian reads currents through the glider while Skarn adjusts beside him, turning flight into an extension of their trust.
An ancient folding glider discovered on a raised plinth inside a buried ruin. It is made from cloth and dark alloy with Spiral-etched braces and glowing glass clasps. Light, self-balancing, and responsive to wind, it becomes one of Torian’s signature pieces of gear.
The old sword Arel gives Torian before the fall of the village. It has a leather-wrapped hilt, a simple crossguard, and a single Spiral rune near the base of the blade, making it both a weapon and one of Torian’s last links to home.
A balanced, curved warrior’s blade made from crystal and rune-metal rather than Spiral flame. A young scholar in Cindralore secretly gives it to Torian as a weapon that can still be trusted if his fire is suppressed.
A Spiral-forged metal artifact given to Torian by Rovas. When touched, it glows and reveals hidden locations, serving as a map toward forgotten bearers and ruined cities rather than a normal paper chart.
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The village was gone.
Ash drifted through the air like dying snow, falling soft and slow upon the bones of a life once whole. Smoke clung to the wreckage like a wounded beast, curling through the hollow frames of houses, bleeding from the mouths of dead hearths that would never burn again. Every breath Torian drew seared his lungs with cinders and something colder still. Grief.
He stood at the edge of what used to be a world, boots sunk into scorched earth where once he had run barefoot in summer. His fists clenched at his sides, trembling with a fury that had nowhere to go. In the crushing silence, his heartbeat thundered a hollow drum echoing through the vast emptiness inside his chest.
No birdsong. No wind. Even the trees stood motionless, their limbs bare and blackened, as if they too mourned.
Torian stepped forward.
The ground crunched beneath his boots splintered wood, shattered pottery, the ghosts of lives turned to dust. He did not blink. He did not breathe deeply. He moved like a shadow across the memory of his childhood.
The village square once alive with music, laughter, and barefoot dances beneath the stars was now a graveyard of stone and ash. His eyes traced the ruins: the baker’s windows, once flung open with warm bread and louder jokes, now blackened hollows; the weaver’s stall, collapsed into a sagging curtain of soot. And beyond them, barely visible through the ruin, stood what was left of his home.
He halted before the path curved toward it.
The air shifted. Beneath the smoke and ruin, a familiar scent lingered pine resin. Old leather. His father’s sharpening oil. Faint, but real.
He walked on.
Each step was both a prayer and a punishment. He passed the twisted remains of a cart, its wheels split, a bundle of scorched herbs spilling across the ground. He stepped over the broken rim of the village well, its rope burned away, the bucket gone.
His home waited at the end of the lane or what remained of it.
The roof had collapsed. The walls leaned outward, warped as if they had tried to scream. Half the door lay buried beneath a fallen beam. Smoke still curled from within, slow and silent.
Torian paused at the threshold, staring into the skeleton of his childhood.
Then he stepped inside.
The air was thicker here heavy, close, as though grief itself had soaked into stone. The hearth where his mother had once sung while baking lay buried beneath soot and broken brick. The family table had vanished. Shelves were nothing but black smears across the walls. Splinters of chairs, a rusted hinge, a cracked plate half buried in ash these were the remnants of a life.
But near the hearth, something small caught his eye. He knelt, brushing ash aside with careful fingers. A small wooden wolf. Roughly carved, its nose chipped, its tail worn smooth by little hands.
He stared at it for a long time. His father had carved it for him when he was six seated beside the fire, hands steady, shaping life from a scrap of oak. Torian had carried it everywhere for a year, until it was lost beneath the floorboards.
Now it had survived.
He pressed it to his forehead and closed his eyes.
For a moment there was only breath. Only the weight of wood and memory.
But the past came anyway.
It had begun at dusk.
They came like a tide of iron. No horns. No shouts. Just the soft thunder of boots and the orange glow of torches cresting the hill.
Torian had seen them first dark figures moving in lockstep, armor black, swords drawn. No hesitation. No question.
A voice cut through the air.
Cold. Commanding.
“By order of Lord Malvorn, your debts are due.”
Arel, his father, stepped forward.
He did not cower. He did not plead. His voice was calm, steady.
“We have nothing left. The last tax took it all.”
The man in the blackened helm the one who did not speak nodded once.
And that was all.
The soldiers moved like clockwork, seizing Arel and dragging him toward the square. Panic erupted. Shouts. Screams. Torian’s body had refused to move. His legs locked. His mind emptied.
He remembered his mother’s scream.
The crack of wood on flesh.
The fire.
They burned the houses one by one. Not in rage. With purpose.
He had only moved when someone seized him strong hands yanking him into the trees. He had kicked. Fought. Screamed. But the light vanished behind the branches, and the forest swallowed the last of his world.
Now, back in the ruins, the cold seeped through his bones.
He slipped the wooden wolf into his belt pouch and stood.
There was one place left to check.
The workshop.
Tucked behind the house, half buried beneath a collapsed beam, lay the door to Arel’s workroom. It had always been locked not out of secrecy, but reverence. It was where the family sword had been kept. Wrapped in cloth. Hidden beneath a false floor.
Not just any blade.
Forged in the time of the old kings. Passed down through generations not for war, but for protection. Simple steel. Purposeful. Unyielding.
To anyone else, it would have been a fortune.
To them, it was sacred.
Torian crouched low, pushed the charred beam aside, and reached for the blackened door. It groaned but held. Using the hinge as leverage, he pried it open.
The workshop was a cave of ruin. Shelves splintered. Windows gone. But in the far corner, under a heap of scorched cloth and ruined tools, he found the trapdoor.
He crawled to it, cleared the wreckage, and pulled it open.
The scent struck him leather oil, cold steel.
He reached in and lifted out the bundle.
Wrapped in smoke darkened canvas, it was heavier than he remembered. Slowly, he peeled it open.
The sword was still whole.
Dark steel. Simple. Its edge caught the light like water. The leather grip, worn smooth by time and toil. Near the base, an old crest was etched into the blade subtle, elegant, like smoke caught in metal.
Torian knelt, cradling the weapon.
“This survived,” he whispered.
He could see Arel now sharpening it, whispering to it as though it were alive. This sword doesn’t conquer, he had said once. It protects.
Torian fastened the scabbard across his back.
Not for vengeance. Not for pride.
For memory.
He gathered what little else remained: a tin of dried meat, a half empty waterskin, a length of cloth for wounds. Not much. But enough.
As the sun dipped behind the mountains, Torian stepped through the broken frame of the door one last time. He paused at the edge of the ruins, taking in the hushed bones of the village his village.
The wind shifted. Smoke curled low across the hillside.
He turned back.
“I will not forget,” he said.
His fingers brushed the wooden wolf at his belt. The sword rested against his spine his father’s blade, his father’s legacy.
And then he walked.
Into the forest.
Into the silence.
He did not know where the path led.
But he would survive.
And one day, he would return.
When he did, Malvorn would burn.
They brought Kyren Solen before the throne on a short chain. At forty-five, he was lean from labor and the recent hunger that had settled into every district beyond the palace hill. He stood straight anyway. Two wheat-crested banners hung behind the king, bright against walls blackened by years of torch smoke.
“Kyren Solen,” the king said, “you stole from the royal granary.”
“Three loaves.”
“For yourself?”
“For anyone I could reach. I had no money.”
The king’s face remained still. Kyren had once worked inside these walls and knew that expression. It meant the decision had been made before the accused entered the hall.
“You know what follows when the law gives way,” the king said. “You will keep both hands, but not your place in this realm. By my seal, you are banished. Return, and you die at the gate.”
The scribe’s pen scratched across the slate. No one else moved. Two guards turned Kyren by the shoulders and led him down the central aisle, the chain dragging between his boots.
At the gate, the officer beside the windlass was a man Kyren remembered from years before. The captain studied the ratchet as if it required all his attention.
“Three loaves,” Kyren said.
“Orders.” The captain still would not look at him.
The portcullis rose. The guards removed Kyren’s cuffs and stepped back, careful not to cross the shadow of the gate. He walked beneath the iron teeth. They struck stone behind him with a final sound that followed him well beyond the ditch.
The road crossed a dry plain of tough grass, pale rock, and thorn scrub. Old maps called the world Sol-World, though everyone Kyren knew shortened it to Solen. He had never traveled far enough to care about the distinction. By midday, the capital was a dark line behind him and the land ahead seemed large enough to erase a man.
He found water where shallow streams crossed the road, but nothing he trusted as food. The hunger that had driven him to the granary changed as the first day passed. It began as pain, sharpened into cramps, then settled into an emptiness so complete that his body seemed to be folding around it.
That night he slept in a hollow beside the road. Wind worried the brush above him, and twice cramps woke him hard enough to curl his legs against his chest. At dawn he wet his tongue from a puddle gathered in stone and continued west.
On the second day, the road bent north. Kyren left it for a distant band of trees where he hoped to find water and perhaps bitter roots. The ground rose in shelves, forcing him to shorten his stride. Before sunset he was choosing each destination by sight: the next rock, the next patch of shade, ten breaths of rest, then another hundred paces.
He reached the trees on the third morning. Water sounded somewhere beneath the insects and moving leaves. He followed it down a shallow slope, one hand brushing trunks for balance, until he found a stream narrow enough to step across.
Kyren knelt and drank. The water was cold, clear, and barely deep enough to cover his fingers. When he tried to stand, his legs folded. He sat against a root, waited for the spinning in his head to slow, and tried again. This time his arms failed before his knees had straightened.
Evening faded above the canopy. Kyren slipped lower against the root until his cheek rested near the stream. He slept, woke shivering, and watched the last daylight vanish from the water.
Then he noticed the lights.
They moved with the current, each no larger than a grain of sand. Their pale trails lingered for a heartbeat before disappearing. When Kyren lowered his hand into the stream, the lights changed course and gathered in his palm.
He should have been afraid. Hunger had burned away the part of him that could afford caution. He raised the water to his mouth and swallowed. The lights tasted of nothing. He drank again until the current around his fingers ran dark.
Heat opened beneath his breastbone. His heart struck once, missed, and began beating too quickly. Kyren tried to draw air, but his lungs would not open. His left hand slid from the bank. Before he could catch himself, his face struck the shallow water.
His arms no longer answered. A line of bubbles escaped his mouth and broke against the current. The pain in his chest receded, followed by the cold, the hunger, and the sound of the stream.
The clearing went on without him.
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FINISHED MULTIVERSE STORY · 38 CHAPTERS
At thirteen, Torian loses the village and family that had been his entire world and is forced into the wild alone. His path changes when he encounters Skarn, a colossal winged beast whose trust must be earned rather than commanded.
Their bond carries them through ancient Spiral ruins, hidden civilizations, forgotten bearers, and threats tied to a fire older than either of them. Torian's power grows, but so does the question of what the Spiral was originally meant to be.
One of Torian's defining discoveries is an ancient folding glider built from cloth, dark alloy, Spiral-etched braces, and glowing clasps. After weeks of crashes and practice, he learns to ride the wind beside Skarn—and later uses the glider in places where even Skarn cannot safely fly.
THE PURPLE ROOTS
The Purple Roots
Kaelor woke to the sound of men fighting outside his shelter. Their shouting carried through the gaps between the stone walls, followed by the hard strike of metal and the short cry of someone being wounded. He opened his eyes but did not move right away. Fighting was common in the settlement, especially before the morning fires were fully lit. Men fought over food, weapons, sleeping ground, women, insults, and old arguments that neither side clearly remembered. Sometimes they fought simply because there had been no killing the day before and one of them had grown restless.
He remained on the animal hide covering the dirt floor and listened until the struggle ended. One man groaned outside. The other walked away without saying anything. Kaelor could tell from the footsteps that the winner was limping. He sat up and reached for the stone knife beside his bed. The blade was chipped near the point, but it was still sharp enough to open flesh. He placed it inside the leather wrap around his waist, then pulled on a pair of thick boots made from the hide of a mountain crawler. The leather had hardened over time and carried several dark stains that no amount of water had removed.
The shelter belonged to him because he had killed the man who built it.
That had happened three years earlier. Kaelor had returned from a hunt and found the man searching through his belongings. There had been no discussion and no warning. Kaelor had grabbed him from behind, broken his right arm, and forced a sharpened piece of bone through the side of his neck. Afterward, he dragged the body outside and threw it into the burning trench at the edge of the settlement. No one questioned him. The shelter had become his before the body finished burning.
Kaelor stood and rolled his shoulders. He was broad through the chest and back, with thick arms built from climbing rock, dragging carcasses, and fighting nearly every kind of creature that lived near the settlement. His dark hair hung past his shoulders in heavy, uneven strands. He cut it with a knife whenever it became long enough for someone to grab. A deep scar crossed the left side of his face from his temple to the corner of his mouth. It had been given to him by a woman named Serka during a fight over a water pit. He had killed her brother the year before, and she had waited until Kaelor was drinking before attacking him. She had nearly taken his eye. Kaelor had respected her for trying.
He stepped outside into the heavy morning heat.
Smoke covered much of the settlement. It rose from cooking pits, burning bodies, broken shelters, and the distant fields where the ground itself had been burning for longer than anyone could remember. The sky above was dark red, with thick clouds moving slowly across it. Bright flashes passed inside those clouds, but rain rarely followed. When rain did come, it was warm and filled with black dust.
The settlement had no name. Names were given to people, weapons, and creatures. Places changed too often to deserve them. A settlement could stand for fifty years and disappear in one night if a titan crossed through it or a fire storm reached the walls. The people who lived there called it home because they had nowhere else to go.
Hundreds of crude shelters covered the uneven ground. Some were built from stone. Others were made from the bones and hides of large animals. Tall wooden posts surrounded the settlement, but most were cracked or burned. The wall did little to stop the larger creatures. It existed mainly to slow down human attackers long enough for the settlement to gather its fighters.
The wounded man from the fight lay several steps from Kaelor’s shelter. Blood poured from a deep cut beneath his ribs. He pressed both hands over the wound while trying to stand. His opponent was already gone. A few people watched from nearby fires, but none moved to help him.
Kaelor looked down at the man.
The wounded man looked back. His face was pale beneath the dirt. He knew what Kaelor was thinking.
“I have meat,” the man said.
Kaelor said nothing.
“In my shelter,” he continued. “Two cuts from a horn beast. Help me inside and one is yours.”
Kaelor studied the wound. It was deep, but the man might survive if the bleeding stopped. That meant the meat was worth taking.
“Both,” Kaelor said.
The man clenched his jaw. “One.”
Kaelor stepped over him and started walking away.
“Both,” the man called after him. “Take both.”
Kaelor stopped, turned, and lifted him beneath the arms. The man cried out as Kaelor dragged him toward a low shelter made from stacked black stones. Kaelor did not slow down. Pain did not matter. The man had asked to be moved, and Kaelor moved him.
Inside the shelter, Kaelor found the meat wrapped in dried leaves. He took both pieces and placed them in a pouch tied to his belt. The wounded man lay against the wall, still pressing his hands against his side.
“You said you would help me,” he said.
“I did.”
“You dragged me.”
“You are inside.”
The man stared at him but did not argue. Kaelor left before he could ask for anything else.
The center of the settlement was crowded. Hunters had returned during the night carrying the remains of a long legged animal with a narrow skull and six eyes. Most of its back had been torn away. The hunters claimed they had killed it themselves, but Kaelor could see bite marks around the missing flesh. Something larger had attacked it first. They had probably waited until the predator left and taken what remained.
Three women were cutting meat from the animal while armed men stood around them. The largest hunter held a heavy axe in both hands and watched anyone who stepped too close. He had painted his arms with white ash to show that the kill belonged to him. Kaelor had seen him do the same thing after finding dead animals before. No one challenged the claim because the man was large and had six brothers.
Kaelor did not need their meat. He walked past them and headed for the northern opening in the wall.
An old man sat beside the opening, sharpening a spear with a flat stone. One of his eyes was covered with a piece of leather. His remaining eye followed Kaelor as he approached.
“You are leaving again,” the old man said.
Kaelor stopped.
The man’s name was Varek. He had once been one of the strongest fighters in the settlement. Age had taken much of his speed, but not his awareness. He watched everything and remembered details that others ignored. Kaelor had learned how to hunt from him when he was a child, although Varek had never treated him like a son. Sons expected protection. Varek believed expectation made people weak.
“There is nothing here,” Kaelor said.
“There is shelter.”
“Stone above dirt.”
“There is water.”
“Less every season.”
“There are people.”
Kaelor looked back at the settlement. Two children fought beside a fire while their mother continued skinning an animal. A man kicked a woman away from a pile of bones. Three fighters argued over the ownership of a shield.
“There are bodies that have not stopped moving,” Kaelor said.
Varek scraped the stone along the spear point. “You speak as though you are different.”
“I am leaving.”
“That does not make you different.”
Kaelor looked north. Beyond the wall, the ground rose toward a line of dark hills. He had crossed those hills several times. Beyond them were fields of cracked stone, burning pits, and deep valleys where large predators nested. He had traveled farther than most people in the settlement, but there was always another ridge, another valley, and another stretch of land beyond what he knew.
Varek lowered the spear. “You have enough food for two days.”
“Three.”
“You eat more than you think.”
“I will kill something.”
“Something may kill you.”
Kaelor met his eye. “Then I will not return.”
Varek gave a slow nod. “That would solve the problem.”
Kaelor stepped through the opening.
“North is worse than it was,” Varek called after him. “A hunting group returned yesterday. They saw fresh titan tracks near the red cliffs.”
“How many returned?”
“Two.”
“How many left?”
“Eleven.”
Kaelor continued walking.
The ground outside the settlement was covered with broken stone and old bones. Most had been bleached by heat. Others were dark from fire. Kaelor passed the remains of a creature large enough that one of its ribs rose above his head. Nothing lived inside the bones now. The smaller scavengers had already eaten whatever had once nested there.
He traveled north with a spear in his right hand and a curved chopping blade across his back. The blade had been forged from metal taken from a fallen object that Varek claimed had dropped from the sky when he was young. The metal was darker than iron and held an edge longer than any weapon made in the settlement. Kaelor had killed its former owner during a raid and had carried it ever since.
The heat increased as the sun rose behind the clouds. Kaelor kept a steady pace. He did not waste energy by running. The journey ahead would be long, and there was little shade between the settlement and the hills.
Small creatures moved between the rocks. Most were covered in scales and had long mouths filled with narrow teeth. They watched him pass but did not attack. Kaelor was too large for them to risk alone. If enough gathered, they would follow and wait for weakness.
He reached the first hill before midday and climbed without stopping. The ground became steeper near the top. Loose stones rolled beneath his boots, but he kept his balance. When he reached the ridge, he looked back toward the settlement.
The smoke rising from it had become part of the larger haze covering the land. From this distance, the shelters were difficult to see. Kaelor felt no need to return. He had lived there all his life, but the place had never belonged to him. Nothing belonged to anyone for long.
He turned north and continued down the other side.
The land beyond the ridge was rougher. Deep cracks split the ground, and hot air rose from below. Kaelor moved carefully, testing unstable stone with the end of his spear before placing his weight on it. Falling into one of the cracks would mean death. Some led into underground fires. Others were deep enough that a body would break before reaching the bottom.
He found tracks near a field of sharp black rocks. Each print was wider than his chest and pressed deeply into the ground. Three long toes pointed north. A titan had crossed the area recently.
Kaelor crouched beside one of the prints and touched the broken stone inside it. The edges were still warm, although that meant little in this land. He found a small pool of thick blood several steps away. The titan had been injured. That explained why the hunting group had followed it.
Following a wounded titan was foolish. Even dying, the creature could crush a dozen men before falling. Kaelor understood why nine hunters had not returned.
He also understood why they had tried. A titan carcass could feed the settlement for weeks. Its bones could strengthen walls, its hide could cover shelters, and its teeth could be shaped into weapons. People on this world survived by taking risks that killed them. Those who refused risk eventually starved.
Kaelor followed the tracks for a short distance before they turned east. He continued north. He had not left to hunt a titan. He had left because he wanted to see what existed beyond the furthest place he had reached.
The reason was difficult to explain, even to himself. Curiosity was not valued in the settlement. People asked where food could be found, where water remained, and where enemies were moving. They did not ask what lay beyond distant mountains unless they intended to raid it. Kaelor had always wanted to know anyway.
As a child, he had climbed the tallest stone tower near the settlement and stared across the land for hours. His mother had beaten him when he returned because he had missed a gathering hunt. She told him that distance held nothing except new ways to die.
Kaelor had believed her.
He still wanted to see it.
By late afternoon, he reached the red cliffs. The stone rose sharply from the ground, forming a long barrier that continued in both directions. Kaelor had reached this place twice before but had never crossed it. The cliff face was too steep in most areas, and the narrow paths were often used by pack hunters.
He followed the base of the cliffs west, searching for a place to climb. Blood stained several rocks near the titan tracks. The creature had come through here and left deep scratches in the cliff wall. Kaelor could hear distant movement above him, but the wind made it difficult to determine the direction.
He found a narrow split in the stone just before dark. It was barely wide enough for him to enter. The passage angled upward and disappeared into shadow.
Kaelor stood at the entrance and listened.
Something moved inside.
He tightened his grip on the spear and stepped forward.
The passage smelled of old meat and animal waste. Scratches covered the walls at knee height. A low clicking sound came from deeper inside. Kaelor moved slowly, keeping the spear pointed ahead of him.
A creature rushed from the darkness.
It was low to the ground, with four powerful legs and a wide mouth that opened farther than its skull should have allowed. Pale skin stretched across its body, and its eyes had grown small from living inside the cliffs. It leaped toward Kaelor’s chest.
Kaelor stepped aside and drove the spear into its shoulder. The creature struck the wall and twisted around, tearing the spear from his hands. It snapped its jaws and charged again.
Kaelor pulled the chopping blade from his back.
The creature jumped.
He swung upward with both hands. The blade entered beneath its jaw and cut through the side of its neck. Hot blood covered Kaelor’s arms and chest. The creature hit him with enough force to knock him against the wall, but it was already dying. Its legs kicked against the ground while blood poured from the wound.
Kaelor pushed the body away and stood.
The spear was still inside its shoulder. He placed one boot against the creature and pulled the weapon free. The shaft had cracked near the point but remained usable.
He listened again.
More clicking came from deeper inside.
Kaelor backed out of the passage. Fighting one creature in a narrow space was manageable. Fighting a pack would be stupid. He climbed the rocks beside the split and found a ledge several body lengths above the ground. It was not comfortable, but it gave him a clear view of anything approaching from below.
He sat with his back against the cliff and ate one piece of meat. The flesh was tough and heavily salted. He chewed slowly while darkness covered the land.
Night on his world was rarely quiet. Distant animals called to one another. Fires moved across the plains as creatures disturbed burning ground. Something large roared far to the east, followed by several shorter cries. Kaelor rested with the spear across his legs and the chopping blade beside his right hand.
Sleep came in short periods. He woke at every unfamiliar sound.
Before sunrise, the pack hunters emerged from the split below him. Five pale creatures climbed over the body of the one he had killed. They tore into it without hesitation. Kaelor watched them eat. One lifted its head and smelled the air, but the wind carried his scent away from the cliff.
He waited until they returned inside, then climbed.
The cliff face was difficult but not impossible. Kaelor used deep cracks and narrow edges to pull himself upward. Several times, stone broke beneath his hands and fell to the ground below. He continued until his arms shook and sweat covered his body.
He reached the top as the sky began to brighten.
The land beyond the cliffs was different.
The ground remained broken and dry, but the burning fields were gone. Large sections of dark soil covered the low valleys. Thick plants with gray leaves grew between the rocks. Farther north, tall formations rose from the land in uneven rows. They were not mountains. They appeared narrower and smoother, with curved tops and deep openings along their sides.
Kaelor had never seen anything like them.
He stood at the edge of the cliff for a long time.
Behind him was every place he had ever known. Ahead was land no one from his settlement had described. There were no tracks, no trails, and no signs that hunters traveled there.
Kaelor started north.
The air became cooler as he descended from the cliffs. He touched one of the gray plants and found moisture beneath its leaves. He cut several and squeezed the water into his mouth. The taste was bitter, but it caused no immediate pain.
He continued through the valley.
The tall formations became larger as he approached. Some rose higher than the stone tower near his settlement. Their outer surfaces were dark brown and deeply grooved. Wide structures spread from their tops and held thousands of gray leaves.
Kaelor stopped beneath the nearest one.
It was alive.
He pressed his palm against the rough surface. The plant was thicker than ten men standing side by side. Its roots broke through the ground in several directions, each one large enough to climb.
Kaelor had seen small twisted growths near water pits, but nothing like this. He walked around the base and studied the branches above him. Small creatures moved between the leaves. They were covered in dark fur and had long arms. One watched him from above before disappearing.
He moved deeper into the strange growth.
The ground became softer. Dead leaves covered the soil and reduced the sound of his steps. Kaelor remained alert, but he felt no immediate danger. That made him uncomfortable. On the land near the settlement, danger made itself known through tracks, smoke, bones, or sound. Here, the signs were hidden.
He found another set of tracks near a shallow stream. They belonged to a large animal with four legs, but Kaelor did not recognize the shape. He knelt and touched the mud. The tracks were fresh.
A branch broke behind him.
Kaelor turned with his spear raised.
Nothing stood between the trees.
He waited.
A low growl came from his left.
The animal moved quickly. It came from behind a root, covered in thick brown fur with a long jaw and two curved teeth extending from the lower mouth. It was nearly as tall as Kaelor at the shoulder.
He threw the spear.
The weapon struck the creature’s chest but did not enter deeply enough. The animal roared and charged. Kaelor drew his chopping blade and moved behind the nearest tree. The creature tried to follow but struck the wide trunk with its shoulder. Kaelor stepped in and cut across its front leg.
The animal turned and snapped at him. One tooth tore through the leather covering his upper arm and cut the skin beneath. Kaelor struck the side of its head with the flat of the blade, then drove his knee into its wounded leg.
The creature fell.
Kaelor brought the blade down into the back of its neck. The first strike cut through fur and muscle. The second broke bone. The animal stopped moving.
Kaelor stood over it, breathing hard. Blood ran down his arm. He checked the wound and found it shallow. He wiped the blade clean against the animal’s fur, then retrieved his spear.
He could have cut meat from the body, but the smell of blood would attract larger predators. He left it behind and continued.
The trees grew closer together as the day passed. Kaelor marked several trunks with his blade to keep track of his direction. He had expected the strange land to end after a short distance, but it continued north without any clear boundary.
Near evening, he noticed a purple mark in the soil.
Kaelor stopped.
He crouched and brushed away the leaves.
A thin root ran beneath them. It was smooth, warm, and bright purple. Faint light moved beneath its surface.
Kaelor touched it with one finger.
A sharp pulse traveled through his hand and up his arm. He pulled away immediately and drew his knife.
The root remained still.
He had never seen the color before. There were red fires, black stone, gray plants, white ash, and dark blood. Some insects carried patches of blue or yellow, but nothing in his world looked like this.
Kaelor followed the root.
It grew thicker as it continued between the trees. Other purple roots appeared beside it, all leading in the same direction. Some broke through the soil. Others wrapped around stones and entered the ground again.
The light beneath them became stronger.
Kaelor moved carefully, keeping his spear ready. The forest had grown quiet. He could no longer hear the small creatures above him or the distant calls of larger animals.
The roots led him into a wide clearing.
At its center stood the remains of a dead tree. Its trunk had split open, and the purple roots surrounded it from every direction. They covered the ground, climbed the broken wood, and disappeared into a deep opening beneath the tree.
Light shone from inside the hole.
Kaelor remained at the edge of the clearing.
He had traveled farther than anyone he knew. He had crossed the red cliffs, entered a land filled with enormous plants, and found something that did not belong anywhere he understood.
Every lesson from his world told him to leave it alone.
Kaelor tightened his grip on the spear and walked forward.
The Purple Roots
Kaelor tightened his grip on the spear and stepped into the clearing. The deeper he walked, the more unnatural the place became. Every sound that had followed him through the forest had disappeared. There were no insects crawling beneath the leaves, no distant calls from hunting beasts, and not even the sound of wind passing through the branches overhead. The silence pressed against him in a way he had never experienced before. On his world, silence usually meant something dangerous was waiting nearby, but this felt different. It was not the silence of a predator preparing to strike. It was the silence of a place that nothing living wanted to disturb. Even so, Kaelor continued forward. Fear had never stopped him before, and he refused to let it stop him now.
The dead tree towered over him as he approached. Time had hollowed out most of its trunk, leaving only thick splintered walls rising toward the sky. Around its base, enormous purple roots spread across the clearing in every direction. Some disappeared beneath the soil while others wrapped around exposed stone before climbing over the remains of the tree itself. Their smooth surfaces reflected a steady purple glow that moved beneath them like flowing liquid. Kaelor had spent his entire life surrounded by fire, ash, black stone, and blood stained earth, yet he had never seen this color before. Nothing on his planet carried it. Nothing grew like this. He reached down carefully and rested his fingertips against one of the roots. It was surprisingly warm, almost as though it possessed a heartbeat hidden beneath its surface. A faint pulse traveled into his hand before fading away. He immediately pulled back and watched for movement, but the root remained exactly as it had been.
His eyes slowly searched the clearing once more. He found no footprints, no broken branches, and no bones left behind by hungry predators. It was impossible. A place this quiet should have been filled with signs of life avoiding one another, yet there was nothing. The roots had claimed the entire clearing, forcing grass and smaller plants aside wherever they spread. They all seemed to travel toward the same destination beneath the center of the dead tree. Kaelor followed them with his eyes until they disappeared into a circular opening in the ground. Brilliant light poured upward from it, bright enough to illuminate every corner of the clearing, yet it cast no heat against his skin. He stood there for several moments simply staring at it before deciding he had come too far to leave without knowing what lay beneath.
He planted the butt of his spear into the earth beside him before lowering himself onto one knee. The light remained steady as he leaned closer. His instincts urged him to stop, but curiosity had carried him farther than anyone from his settlement had ever traveled, and it continued pushing him forward now. He slowly lowered himself onto his stomach, allowing his chest to rest against the cool ground while inching toward the edge of the opening. One hand gripped the dirt tightly as the other supported his weight. When his head finally extended over the edge, he looked down expecting to find glowing stone or some underground fire unlike anything he had seen before.
Instead, he looked into another world.
Kaelor’s breathing stopped. His eyes widened as he struggled to understand what he was seeing. There was no cavern beneath him and no bottom to the hole. Far below stretched an enormous landscape beneath a brilliant blue sky. Mountains reached high above forests so vast they disappeared beyond the horizon. Rivers cut through valleys like shining ribbons while lakes reflected sunlight brighter than polished metal. Clouds drifted peacefully overhead without a trace of ash or smoke. It looked more alive than every place Kaelor had walked throughout his entire life combined. For several seconds he simply stared without blinking, convinced his mind had betrayed him. He lifted his head away from the opening and looked around the clearing. The dead tree still stood behind him. The purple roots still glowed beneath the fading daylight. Nothing had changed. Slowly he leaned forward once more. The impossible world remained exactly where he had left it.
He cautiously reached one hand toward the opening until his fingers hovered just above the light. Cool air drifted upward across his skin, carrying a scent unlike anything he had ever smelled. It was clean. Fresh. It carried moisture instead of smoke and ash. Before he could lower his hand any farther, movement flashed across the distant sky below. A figure streaked overhead at incredible speed, trailing flames behind him as though fire itself carried him through the air. Another figure rose to meet him from the opposite direction. It was larger, its body covered in dark armor with long curved horns extending from its head. Purple energy surrounded its arms as the two closed the distance between them in an instant.
Their collision shook the world.
Kaelor instinctively pulled his head back as a deafening crack echoed upward through the opening. When he looked again, both figures had already separated. The warrior surrounded by flames launched himself forward again, weaving effortlessly through the sky before driving a burning fist into his opponent’s chest. The horned warrior barely moved beneath the impact. Instead, he answered by raising one hand toward the mountains below. Massive sections of stone tore free from the cliffs and rose into the air as though they weighed nothing. With a single motion, the boulders shot toward the fire warrior. He answered with a wave of his arm, sending a wall of blazing flames crashing into the attack. The mountains of stone exploded into dust before ever reaching him.
Kaelor had watched titans destroy entire settlements. He had seen creatures tear through cliffs while hunting and crush forests beneath their feet. None of it compared to what unfolded before his eyes. Every strike exchanged between the two warriors carried enough force to shatter mountains. The earth itself seemed to recoil beneath their battle. Forests bent beneath invisible waves of pressure while rivers erupted high into the air every time their attacks collided. Neither warrior slowed. Neither appeared injured. They fought with complete confidence, as though destroying the land around them meant nothing at all.
Far beyond the battle another shape slowly rose above the horizon. Kaelor narrowed his eyes, believing at first that another mountain had appeared in the distance. Then the shape unfolded four enormous wings. They stretched across the sky farther than he could measure. A long neck rose above the clouds while an immense tail disappeared beyond distant mountains. Even from where Kaelor watched, the creature was so enormous that the warriors battling one another seemed insignificant beside it. It did not join the fight. It simply remained in the distance, watching with complete stillness as though waiting for something to happen.
The battle suddenly changed. The warrior surrounded by flames shot high above the clouds until he appeared as nothing more than a burning light against the sky. Below him, the horned warrior spread both arms wide. Purple energy erupted outward in every direction, swallowing the heavens until half the sky glowed with its light. The flames above continued growing brighter. The purple light below answered with equal force. Kaelor could feel the ground beneath him trembling despite the battle taking place in another world. He stared in disbelief as both warriors charged directly toward one another with everything they possessed.
Their fists met.
For a single heartbeat the entire world beneath him vanished behind blinding white light.
Then the explosion came.
The blast expanded across the sky with impossible speed, swallowing mountains, forests, rivers, and clouds beneath a single wave of overwhelming force. Kaelor watched it race toward the opening beneath him before he could even think to move. The instant it reached the portal, every purple root surrounding the dead tree erupted with brilliant light. The clearing shook violently as the roots twisted beneath the ground. Stone cracked apart around them while the dead tree groaned before splitting completely down the middle. Kaelor threw himself backward just as the opening beneath the tree widened. Purple light burst upward in a massive column before suddenly bending toward him.
The beam struck him squarely in the chest.
Pain tore through every part of his body at once. Purple light spread beneath his skin, racing through his arms, legs, and neck as though something alive had entered him. He tried to scream but his lungs refused to draw breath. Every muscle locked in place while the ground beneath him disappeared. The clearing vanished. The forest vanished. The sky itself vanished. Kaelor found himself hurtling through endless darkness as streaks of purple light rushed past from every direction. Worlds flashed by faster than he could comprehend. Some burned beneath oceans of fire while others were frozen beneath endless ice. Countless stars stretched across the void before him as he spun helplessly without control.
Far ahead, one world rapidly grew larger.
Its forests became visible first.
Then its mountains.
Then its oceans.
He crashed through the atmosphere surrounded by purple fire, tearing across the sky before slamming into the surface with enough force to shake the land for miles. Trees snapped apart as the earth exploded beneath him. Stone scattered across the forest while birds and beasts fled in every direction. When the dust finally settled, Kaelor lay motionless at the center of a deep crater. The purple light beneath his skin slowly faded until only darkness remained, and the stranger from a world of endless violence drew his first silent breath on a planet unlike anything he had ever known.
The Purple Roots
Kaelor’s eyes opened to pain.
Every part of his body ached. His chest felt as though something had crushed it from the inside, while his arms and legs refused to answer him at first. He remained on his back, breathing slowly as dirt and broken stone settled around him. The sky above was brighter than any he had ever seen. There was no thick layer of smoke drifting across it, no burning clouds, and no ash falling through the air. It stretched endlessly overhead, clear enough that it almost hurt to look at.
He forced himself onto one elbow and immediately winced. The movement sent another wave of pain through his ribs. His memory returned in scattered pieces. The dead tree. The purple roots. The impossible battle. The light that had struck his chest. After that, there had only been darkness.
Kaelor slowly sat upright.
He was lying at the bottom of a massive crater. Broken stone surrounded him in every direction, while dozens of enormous trees had been snapped apart where he had struck the ground. Fresh dirt covered everything. The impact had torn roots from the earth and thrown them high into the surrounding forest. By every measure, the fall should have killed him.
Yet he was alive.
He looked down at himself.
His clothing had been shredded across the shoulders and legs. Fresh cuts covered his forearms, and dried blood clung to his skin, but there were no broken bones pushing beneath the flesh. Even the wound he had received from the beast on his own world had disappeared. He ran a hand across his chest and paused.
His heart was beating unusually hard.
Not fast.
Strong.
Each beat carried a strange warmth through his body before fading again. He frowned but found no wound beneath his hand. Whatever had entered him through the portal was still there. He could feel it even if he did not understand it.
Kaelor pushed himself to his feet.
His legs trembled beneath him for only a moment before finding their strength. He reached for the spear that had traveled with him out of instinct, but his hand closed around empty air. His weapon was gone. The curved blade strapped across his back remained, though its leather harness had nearly torn apart during the fall. He tightened the straps and slowly climbed the side of the crater, digging his boots into loose dirt while pulling himself upward with exposed roots.
When he reached the top, he stopped.
The forest stretched farther than he could see.
Trees larger than the ones surrounding the portal covered rolling hills in every direction. Thick green leaves blocked much of the sunlight above, leaving patches of shade across the forest floor. Strange birds with bright blue feathers called to one another high overhead. Small animals darted between bushes before disappearing the moment they noticed him.
Kaelor stood completely still.
His home had never looked like this.
The air carried the smell of wet earth and growing plants instead of smoke. There was no ash coating the ground. No burning fields. No distant columns of black fire reaching into the sky.
For the first time in his life, he could hear water.
The sound was faint but steady.
He followed it.
Every step took him deeper into unfamiliar territory. His eyes constantly searched the trees while his ears listened for movement hidden beyond the brush. His world had taught him that surviving meant expecting an attack long before it happened. That lesson remained with him even here.
The sound of flowing water gradually grew louder until he stepped into another small clearing.
A river crossed through it.
Kaelor stared.
The water was so clear that he could see smooth stones resting along the bottom. Sunlight reflected across its surface while fish larger than his forearm swam lazily through the current. He had seen water before, but never this much gathered in one place without carrying ash or blood.
He knelt beside the river and studied his reflection.
A tired man stared back at him.
His dark hair hung in tangled strands around his scarred face. Dirt covered most of his skin, and dried blood had hardened across his arms and chest. His eyes looked exactly as they always had.
Whatever the portal had done to him had not changed his appearance.
He dipped both hands into the river and drank deeply.
The water was cold.
He had never tasted anything like it.
It carried no bitterness, no grit, and no smell of smoke. He drank until his thirst finally eased before splashing water across his face and washing away the dried blood covering his skin.
A sudden crack echoed somewhere behind him.
Kaelor stood instantly.
His hand moved to the hilt of his blade.
The forest became quiet.
He waited.
Several long moments passed before another sound reached him. Heavy footsteps moved through the trees somewhere beyond the river. Whatever was making them was too large to hide its weight.
Kaelor quietly stepped behind the thick trunk of a nearby tree and waited.
The footsteps continued.
Branches snapped.
Leaves shook.
A creature finally emerged between the trees.
It walked on four powerful legs and stood nearly as tall as Kaelor’s shoulders. Thick gray fur covered its body while two long tusks curved upward from its lower jaw. A row of hardened plates ran along its spine, giving the appearance of natural armor. It lowered its head toward the river and began drinking without noticing him.
Kaelor watched silently.
The creature showed no signs of aggression.
Its ears constantly turned toward distant sounds while its tail flicked lazily behind it. It behaved like prey, not a hunter.
His stomach tightened.
He had not eaten since the previous evening.
Slowly, Kaelor slipped the curved blade from across his back.
He circled through the trees without making a sound, keeping the wind against his face. The animal remained focused on the river until Kaelor reached striking distance.
He lunged.
The blade buried itself deep into the creature’s neck.
It let out a thunderous cry before spinning violently. One tusk clipped Kaelor across the shoulder, knocking him backward into the dirt. The beast charged again despite the blood pouring from its wound.
Kaelor rolled aside.
Its momentum carried it past him.
He sprang to his feet and drove the blade into its side with both hands. The creature stumbled several more steps before collapsing beside the river. Its legs kicked twice before falling still.
Kaelor remained where he stood.
He listened.
No other creatures answered the dying animal’s cries.
Only then did he approach.
He knelt beside the carcass and began cutting away strips of meat with practiced movements. He wrapped them inside broad leaves he found nearby before securing them with long blades of grass. It was not perfect, but it would keep the meat clean enough until he found a better place to stop.
By the time he finished, the sun had begun sinking lower through the trees.
He needed shelter.
Traveling through unfamiliar land after dark would be foolish.
Kaelor resumed walking, staying close enough to the river that he could always hear the water. Several times he noticed tracks pressed into the damp soil. Some belonged to animals no larger than his hand. Others were wide enough that he could place both boots inside a single footprint. Whatever had made those tracks had passed through recently.
He kept moving.
As the light faded, he found what he was looking for.
One of the massive trees had died long ago, leaving an opening near its base large enough for him to walk inside. The trunk was wide enough that several men could have stood shoulder to shoulder within it. Kaelor entered cautiously with his blade drawn.
The interior smelled of old wood and damp earth.
He searched every corner before lowering himself to one knee.
Nothing lived inside.
He gathered fallen branches from outside and stacked them across part of the entrance, leaving enough space to watch the forest while making it harder for anything to rush inside unnoticed. Afterward he sat against the inner wall and ate several pieces of raw meat. It was tougher than the animals from his own world but carried enough fat to satisfy his hunger.
Darkness slowly settled over the forest.
The sounds changed.
Birds disappeared while distant howls echoed between the trees. Strange insects filled the night with constant chirping. Somewhere far away, something large let out a deep call that rolled across the forest for several seconds before fading into silence.
Kaelor rested the blade across his knees and closed his eyes.
Sleep refused to come.
That strange warmth returned to his chest.
He looked down.
For only a heartbeat, faint purple lines appeared beneath the skin of his forearm before fading as though they had never existed.
Kaelor rubbed the spot.
Nothing remained.
His heart continued beating steadily.
Outside the hollow tree, heavy footsteps slowly passed through the darkness.
They did not stop.
They did not speed up.
Whatever owned them was larger than anything he had hunted before.
Kaelor tightened his grip around the blade and remained perfectly still until the sound finally disappeared into the forest.
The Purple Roots
Morning arrived slowly beneath the towering trees.
Kaelor opened his eyes before the first rays of sunlight reached the forest floor. For several moments he remained perfectly still, listening. The heavy footsteps that had passed outside the hollow tree during the night were gone. In their place came the sounds of birds calling from high above and countless insects hidden throughout the undergrowth. The forest had come alive again.
He stood, stretched the stiffness from his shoulders, and stepped outside.
The air was cool against his skin. A thin layer of mist rested between the trees, slowly drifting across the ground before fading beneath the rising sun. Kaelor looked around the area one final time before continuing north. He did not know why he had chosen that direction. It simply felt better than turning back. There was nothing waiting for him on the world he had left behind even if returning were possible.
The forest changed as the morning passed. The trees remained enormous, but the ground became easier to cross. Thick patches of grass replaced much of the exposed stone while colorful flowers appeared along the edges of small clearings. Strange birds flew overhead with feathers brighter than any creature Kaelor had ever seen. Several paused to watch him from the branches before disappearing deeper into the forest. None behaved with the constant fear he had grown used to. Animals on his world rarely relaxed. Every moment was spent searching for the next fight or the next meal. Here, life seemed almost peaceful.
That thought unsettled him.
Peace created weakness.
It was the first lesson every child on his world learned.
Kaelor pushed the thought aside and continued walking.
Several hours later he came across another stream, narrower than the river he had visited the day before. Fresh tracks covered the muddy banks. He knelt to examine them one by one. Most belonged to animals he did not recognize, but one set immediately drew his attention.
They were made by boots.
Kaelor remained crouched as his eyes followed the trail.
The footprints belonged to several individuals walking together. Their steps were evenly spaced, and none showed signs of running or fighting. Whoever they were, they had traveled through the forest calmly without expecting an attack every few moments. That alone felt strange.
He stood and silently followed the trail.
His pace slowed.
Every few minutes he stopped to listen before moving again. The prints eventually left the stream and entered a lightly wooded area where the trees stood farther apart. Before long he found another sign.
A branch had been cut cleanly from a young tree.
Kaelor reached down and picked it up.
The cut was smooth.
Too smooth.
No animal had done this.
Someone had used a blade.
He looked around carefully before continuing.
Not long afterward he discovered several tree stumps arranged beside a narrow path through the forest. Every stump had been cut evenly, leaving flat surfaces that had already begun growing new moss. Kaelor rested one hand against the nearest stump. Whoever had passed through here had not taken the tree for shelter or warmth alone. They had removed it with purpose.
His curiosity continued growing.
He followed the path until the smell of smoke drifted through the trees.
Kaelor immediately left the trail and moved into the brush beside it. He advanced much more slowly now, using bushes and thick tree trunks to hide his movements. The voices reached him before the people did.
They were laughing.
Kaelor frowned.
He had heard laughter before.
Usually it came after someone lost a fight.
This sounded different.
He crept forward until he reached the edge of another clearing.
Five people stood near a wagon loaded with wooden barrels and cloth sacks. Two large animals with thick brown fur were harnessed to the front, quietly eating grass while the group rested. One older man sat beside a small fire turning strips of meat over glowing coals. A young woman filled wooden cups from a barrel while another man repaired one of the wagon wheels. Two children chased each other around the clearing, laughing loudly until one stumbled into the grass. Instead of striking the child for being careless, the adults smiled.
Kaelor remained perfectly still.
He did not understand what he was seeing.
No one argued.
No one fought over the food.
No one threatened the weakest member of the group.
The older man finished cooking a piece of meat and handed it to one of the children without demanding anything in return.
Kaelor watched in silence.
Back home, a child would have fought to earn that meal.
If he failed, someone stronger would have taken it.
The little boy accepted the food with a smile before sitting beside the fire.
Kaelor had never seen anything like it.
His attention shifted to the wagon.
Metal tools hung from its sides. Coiled rope, blankets, baskets of fruit, and several long spears had been neatly secured beneath leather straps. Every item had its own place. Nothing had been thrown together carelessly.
These people planned ahead.
His settlement never had.
Survival there rarely lasted long enough to think beyond the next few days.
A sudden movement pulled Kaelor’s eyes toward the trees behind the travelers.
The bushes shook.
Once.
Then again.
None of the people noticed.
Kaelor slowly lowered himself closer to the ground.
The movement was wrong.
It was too careful.
A pair of yellow eyes appeared between the leaves.
Then another.
Then another.
Kaelor counted six.
Large bodies slipped silently through the undergrowth, spreading apart as they circled the clearing. Their gray fur blended with the shadows beneath the trees while long tails remained low against the ground. Their shoulders stood nearly level with the wagon wheels, and each possessed a mouth filled with narrow teeth designed for gripping prey.
Pack hunters.
Kaelor recognized the strategy immediately.
The travelers did not.
The children continued laughing.
The adults remained distracted.
The beasts were waiting for the right moment.
Kaelor tightened his grip around the handle of his blade.
He remained hidden behind the thick trunk of an ancient tree.
The predators continued closing in.
One more minute and the attack would begin.
For the first time since arriving on this world, Kaelor faced a choice he had never needed to make.
He could stay hidden and let nature take its course.
Or he could step into a fight that had nothing to do with him.
The Purple Roots
Kaelor remained hidden behind the broad trunk of the ancient tree, his eyes fixed on the six predators moving through the undergrowth. They spread themselves around the clearing with practiced patience, keeping low enough that the travelers remained completely unaware of the danger surrounding them. Their movements reminded him of the pack hunters that lived among the red cliffs on his own world. Those beasts attacked only when escape had become impossible.
These creatures were doing exactly the same thing.
The older man continued turning meat over the fire while speaking to the others. One of the children laughed as he chased his sister around the wagon. The woman filling wooden cups never once looked toward the trees. None of them understood what was about to happen.
Kaelor’s grip tightened around the handle of his blade.
He had no reason to help them.
He did not know these people. They belonged to a world that was not his, and whatever happened here meant nothing to him. On his own planet, no one would have risked their life for strangers. A weak group that failed to notice predators had earned whatever happened next.
Yet he remained where he was.
His eyes stayed on the children.
They were too small to survive the first attack.
The lead predator lowered itself until its stomach nearly touched the ground.
Its ears flattened.
Its muscles tightened.
Kaelor recognized the moment immediately.
The attack had begun.
The beast exploded from the trees.
The others followed a heartbeat later.
The older man looked up just as the first predator burst into the clearing. His eyes widened in terror. He shouted something Kaelor could not understand while reaching for a spear leaning against the wagon, but he was already too late.
Kaelor moved.
He drove one foot into the ground as hard as he could, throwing himself forward with everything his body possessed.
Then the world changed.
The sound disappeared first.
The laughter.
The shouting.
The pounding feet of the charging beasts.
Everything vanished.
Kaelor took another step before slowing to a stop.
His eyes swept across the clearing.
Nothing was moving.
The lead predator remained suspended in the air, its front claws stretched toward the child standing several feet away. Dirt hung beneath its paws instead of falling back to the ground. A woman’s hair floated behind her as she turned toward the attack, yet the strands barely moved. Even the smoke rising from the campfire had almost stopped climbing into the sky.
Kaelor stared in disbelief.
He slowly turned his head.
A single leaf drifted through the air beside him.
It moved so slowly that he reached out and caught it between two fingers without effort.
His breathing became heavier.
He looked down at himself.
He was moving normally.
Only everything else had stopped.
Another pulse of warmth spread through his chest.
The strange feeling returned.
The same warmth he had felt since awakening inside the crater.
He looked back toward the frozen predators.
Instinct took over.
Questions could wait.
He reached the first beast before it had moved another inch. Wrapping both arms around its side, he planted his feet and threw it with everything he had. The creature flew across the clearing and disappeared toward the trees. Before he had time to understand what he had done, Kaelor was already running toward the second predator. He caught it beneath the neck, twisted his body, and hurled it into another charging beast. Both disappeared together.
His eyes widened.
He had never been this strong.
The third beast still hung above the ground.
Kaelor struck it across the jaw with a heavy punch before grabbing the fourth by one hind leg and swinging it into the fifth. The final predator remained only a few feet from the wagon. Kaelor reached it in two long strides, buried his shoulder into its side, and drove it across the clearing until both crashed through a thick patch of bushes.
The warmth inside his chest suddenly became painful.
His vision blurred.
The strange stillness vanished.
Sound crashed back all at once.
The roar of the beasts.
The terrified screams of the travelers.
Wood splintering.
Bodies striking trees.
Everything happened together.
Kaelor stumbled forward and caught himself on one knee. A sharp pain spread across his chest, forcing him to draw a deep breath. He pressed one hand against the spot where the purple light had entered him days before. The warmth slowly faded, leaving only confusion behind.
The clearing fell silent.
The travelers stared at him.
The older man still stood beside the wagon with his spear only halfway raised. One child remained frozen exactly where he had been standing before the attack. The woman had not even finished turning toward the sound.
None of them understood what they had just witnessed.
Neither did Kaelor.
One of the predators struggled to its feet near the edge of the clearing. Blood poured from its mouth as it staggered several steps before disappearing into the forest. The remaining beasts fled after it without looking back.
No one chased them.
The older man slowly lowered his spear.
He looked toward the broken trees surrounding the clearing, then back toward Kaelor.
His lips moved.
He spoke several words Kaelor had never heard before.
Kaelor simply stared.
The sounds meant nothing to him.
The man cautiously stepped forward with both hands held away from his weapon. His expression carried no anger. No hatred. No challenge.
Only gratitude.
Kaelor had never seen that expression directed toward him before.
The older man placed one hand over his own chest before slowly bowing his head.
Kaelor frowned.
He did not understand the gesture any more than he understood the language.
For several long moments neither side moved.
Both simply stood there, strangers from different worlds, studying one another in complete silence.
The Purple Roots
Kaelor remained on one knee near the center of the clearing while the travelers stared at him. The warmth inside his chest had almost completely disappeared, but his body still felt different. He opened and closed his right hand several times while trying to understand what had happened. Moments earlier he had been standing behind a tree watching the predators surround these people. He had tried to run toward them, and then everything had slowed until the beasts, the people, the smoke, and even the dirt beneath their feet had nearly stopped moving. He remembered every step he had taken. He remembered grabbing the animals and throwing them away. He remembered looking around and wondering why nothing else could move. Whatever had happened had not felt like a dream. The broken branches around the clearing proved that. Kaelor looked toward the nearest predator lying motionless beneath a tree and then down at his hands again. He had spent thirty two years learning exactly what his body could do. He knew his strength, his speed, and how long he could fight before exhaustion began affecting him. What had just happened belonged to none of those things.
The older traveler slowly approached him with his hands visible. Kaelor immediately looked up, and the man stopped. Neither spoke for several seconds. The man’s eyes moved toward Kaelor’s curved blade before returning to his face. He carefully placed one hand against his own chest and lowered his head. Kaelor watched without responding. The gesture meant nothing to him, but there was no aggression behind it. The man spoke quietly and pointed toward the children. He then pointed toward Kaelor and repeated the same words. Kaelor could not understand a single sound. He had heard different groups use different words on his own planet, but most neighboring settlements shared enough language to understand threats, trades, and basic demands. These people spoke in a way completely unfamiliar to him. Kaelor finally stood, causing the man to take a cautious step backward. Kaelor looked past him toward the children. Both were unharmed. That was enough.
He walked toward the edge of the clearing where his blade had fallen during the attack. The travelers watched him retrieve it and secure it across his back. One of the younger men moved toward a spear near the wagon, but the older man immediately spoke sharply to him. The younger man stopped. Kaelor noticed the exchange and stared at him long enough that the man slowly moved his hand away from the weapon. Kaelor had no intention of attacking them, but he would not allow himself to be surrounded by armed strangers either. He moved several steps away from the group and stopped beside a tree where he could see the entire clearing. The woman gathered the children close while the others checked the wagon and searched the forest for the predators. No one attempted to follow them. The animals had learned enough.
The travelers began talking among themselves. Kaelor could tell they were discussing him because they repeatedly looked in his direction. One of the children spoke excitedly while moving his hands so quickly that the woman eventually had to grab his shoulders and calm him. The boy pointed toward Kaelor, then toward the forest, and made a throwing motion with both arms. The older man answered him before looking back at Kaelor with an expression Kaelor could not read. There was fear there, but something else accompanied it. Kaelor had seen fear throughout his life. Fear usually caused people to attack first or flee. These people did neither. They simply kept watching him.
The smell of cooked meat eventually reached him. The attack had scattered part of their meal, but the older man recovered several pieces that remained near the fire. He placed one onto a flat piece of wood and approached Kaelor again. This time Kaelor allowed him to come closer. The man held the food outward. Kaelor looked at it and then at him. There was no demand attached to the offer. No weapon was being exchanged. No payment was requested. The man simply waited. Kaelor reached out and took the meat. The traveler smiled slightly before returning to the others.
Kaelor stared at the food in his hand.
On his world, food was never given away without reason. Even parents stopped feeding children once they were strong enough to hunt. Someone giving meat to an able bodied stranger would have been considered stupid. Kaelor smelled it before taking a bite. The outside had been cooked over the fire and covered with crushed plants that gave it a flavor he did not recognize. He ate slowly while watching the travelers repair the damage caused by the attack. The younger man reset several barrels that had fallen from the wagon while the woman gathered the scattered cups. The children helped collect pieces of firewood. No one argued over who should work. They simply did what needed to be done.
Kaelor finished the meat and remained beside the tree.
After some time, the older man called to him. Kaelor looked over and saw the travelers preparing to leave. The animals had been returned to the front of the wagon, the barrels were secured, and the children had climbed into the back. The older man pointed down the road and then toward Kaelor. He repeated the gesture several times before beginning to walk.
Kaelor understood.
They wanted him to come.
His first instinct was to refuse. Following strangers into an unknown place violated nearly every rule that had kept him alive. He did not know where the road led, how many people waited at the other end, or what these travelers intended to do once they arrived. They had seen what happened during the attack. If people on his world had witnessed someone display an ability like that, they would have tried to kill him while he slept or force him to use it for them.
Kaelor looked back toward the forest.
He could leave.
He could disappear among the trees and continue alone. That was the safer choice.
Then his eyes moved toward the wagon. The little boy sat near the back watching him. When their eyes met, the child smiled and lifted one hand.
Kaelor stared at him for a moment before looking away.
He followed.
He stayed well behind the wagon at first. The travelers occasionally looked back to make sure he was still there, but no one pressured him to walk closer. Kaelor preferred the distance. It gave him room to react if something happened. His eyes moved constantly between the road and the surrounding forest while his ears remained focused on every unfamiliar sound. The travelers appeared much more relaxed. The younger man walked beside the animals while the older man sat at the front of the wagon holding the reins. The woman and children rode behind them. Another traveler walked near the rear carrying a spear.
The road itself interested Kaelor almost as much as the people. It had been intentionally cleared through the forest and packed down by years of travel. Drainage channels had been dug along both sides to keep rainwater from destroying it. Wooden markers stood at several crossings, each covered with symbols Kaelor could not read. He slowed near the first one and studied the markings. They were clearly made with purpose. He recognized repeated shapes but understood nothing beyond that. The older traveler noticed and pointed toward one of the directions before speaking a word several times. Kaelor looked from him to the sign. The man repeated the word and pointed down the road they were traveling.
Kaelor said nothing.
The man tried again.
Kaelor eventually repeated the sound.
His pronunciation caused both children to laugh.
Kaelor’s head immediately turned toward them.
They stopped.
The little girl’s eyes widened.
Kaelor stared for another second before returning his attention to the road.
A few moments later the children quietly began laughing again.
Kaelor ignored them.
The forest gradually opened into wide stretches of land unlike anything he had ever seen. Rows of plants covered enormous fields, all growing at nearly identical heights. People moved between them carrying baskets and tools. Wooden fences divided sections of land where animals grazed without attempting to escape. Kaelor slowed as they passed the first field. He had seen people gather plants before, but never grow them intentionally on this scale. On his world, anything planted in one place would eventually be burned, stolen, or destroyed by animals. These people had somehow created enough safety to spend months waiting for food to grow.
A man working near the road raised his hand when he saw the wagon.
The older traveler returned the gesture.
Kaelor watched both of them carefully.
The farmer had not reached for a weapon.
He had not demanded anything.
He had simply acknowledged another person and returned to work.
Kaelor continued walking.
Farther along the road they passed a small house built from carefully fitted stone and wood. Smoke rose peacefully from a narrow opening in the roof. A woman stood outside hanging wet clothing along a rope while two children carried buckets from a nearby well. A large animal slept beside the doorway. Nobody appeared concerned that strangers were passing within a short distance of their home.
Kaelor found himself looking back after they passed.
He remembered his own shelter. A stone box with an animal hide covering the entrance. He remembered waking to people fighting outside and sleeping with a knife close enough to reach before opening his eyes. He remembered killing the man who had owned the shelter before him because the man had tried to steal from him.
He looked toward the house until the trees blocked it from view.
Something inside him tightened.
He did not like the feeling.
The road continued climbing through low hills. As afternoon approached, more travelers appeared. Some walked. Others rode animals Kaelor had never seen. Several wagons passed carrying lumber, food, metal, and livestock. Each time, the people greeted one another before continuing in opposite directions. A group of armed men passed shortly after midday. Kaelor immediately moved his hand toward his blade. Their armor was clean, and matching symbols had been painted across their shields. One of them noticed Kaelor and stared at him, but the older traveler spoke before either side could react. The armed men listened, looked toward Kaelor again, and eventually continued walking.
Kaelor watched them until they disappeared.
Organized fighters.
That was something he understood.
He began paying closer attention to the road after that.
The travelers stopped near another stream later in the afternoon. The animals drank while everyone rested beneath the trees. Kaelor remained several yards away. The woman offered him water in a wooden container. He accepted it, drank, and returned the container without speaking. She pointed toward herself and said a word.
“Lira.”
Kaelor looked at her.
She repeated it.
“Lira.”
Then she pointed toward him.
Kaelor understood.
“Kaelor.”
The woman repeated it carefully.
“Kaelor.”
He nodded once.
The older man approached and touched his own chest.
“Dorran.”
Kaelor looked at him.
“Dorran,” the man repeated.
Kaelor nodded again.
The children immediately rushed forward and began saying their names at the same time. Kaelor understood none of them. They spoke too quickly, pointing at themselves and each other while laughing whenever one interrupted the other.
Kaelor raised one hand.
Both children stopped.
He pointed toward the boy.
The boy said his name slowly.
“Tarin.”
Kaelor repeated it.
“Tarin.”
Then he pointed toward the girl.
“Mira.”
“Mira.”
Both children smiled.
Kaelor lowered his hand.
That was enough talking.
They resumed traveling shortly afterward. The road widened as evening approached. More houses appeared between the fields, followed by workshops and small buildings Kaelor did not understand. He could hear metal striking metal somewhere ahead. Smoke rose from several chimneys, but unlike the smoke on his world, none came from destruction.
Then the village appeared.
Kaelor stopped walking.
A wooden wall surrounded dozens of buildings built closely together. Tall gates stood open along the road while armed guards watched travelers entering and leaving. Beyond the walls, Kaelor could see rooftops, rising smoke, and people moving through crowded streets. A tall stone structure stood near the center, rising above everything around it.
The wagon continued forward before Dorran noticed Kaelor was no longer following.
The older man turned.
Kaelor remained several dozen yards behind them.
His body had become tense.
Too many people.
Too many walls.
Too many places for someone to hide.
Dorran said something and pointed toward the village.
Kaelor understood what he wanted.
He looked at the forest behind him.
He could still leave.
The thought remained there longer this time.
Then a shout came from the gate.
One of the guards had recognized the wagon. Several people hurried outside as the travelers approached. The children jumped down and ran toward them. A woman dropped to her knees and wrapped both arms around Tarin and Mira. The children held onto her while she pressed her face against their heads.
Kaelor watched from the road.
Nobody fought for them.
Nobody demanded payment for their return.
They were simply happy the children were alive.
Kaelor’s jaw tightened.
He had spent his entire life learning how to survive among people who would kill for food, shelter, or pride. He understood anger. He understood hunger. He understood what it meant to wake each morning knowing someone might decide your life was worth less than whatever you carried.
He did not understand this.
Dorran looked back at him and waited.
Kaelor finally walked toward the gate.
He did not smile when the villagers noticed him. He did not acknowledge their curious stares or the guards whose hands moved closer to their weapons. He kept his shoulders squared and his eyes forward as he entered the settlement behind the people he had saved.
For the first time in his life, Kaelor walked into a place where people did not seem to be waiting for an excuse to kill one another.
He was not sure whether that made him feel safe.
He was not sure he remembered how.
The Purple Roots
Kaelor slept poorly inside the village. Dorran had brought him to a small room above one of the buildings near the outer wall and shown him a bed, a basin of clean water, and a wooden latch that allowed him to lock the door from the inside. Kaelor understood what the room was meant to be, but the comfort did little for him. He spent most of the night sitting against the wall beside the window with his curved blade resting across his legs. Every voice from the street caught his attention. Every closing door made him look toward his own. He could hear people walking below him long after darkness settled over the village, yet nobody screamed, nobody fought, and nobody tried to force their way inside. Eventually the streets became quiet, but Kaelor remained awake. He had slept more easily inside the hollow tree while something enormous walked through the forest outside. The village was filled with too many people he did not know and too many rules he did not understand.
When morning arrived, Kaelor left the room before anyone came looking for him. The streets were already filling with people. Doors opened along both sides of the road while merchants carried boxes and baskets toward wooden stands. A man rolled barrels from one building to another. Children ran between adults without anyone appearing concerned that they might be taken or attacked. Kaelor moved along the edge of the street, avoiding the center whenever possible. People noticed him immediately. Some simply stared at his clothing and scars. Others whispered to each other after recognizing him as the stranger who had returned with Dorran’s group. Kaelor ignored them. He had no interest in their attention.
He found Dorran near the village gate speaking with several armed men. The older traveler noticed him and raised one hand in greeting. Kaelor responded with a small nod. Dorran pointed toward him and spoke to the others. Kaelor recognized his own name among words he could not understand. One of the men looked him over carefully. He was broad through the shoulders and wore a thick leather coat reinforced with pieces of metal across the chest. A long knife rested at his side, and a bow was strapped across his back. The man pointed toward the forest beyond the gate, then toward several other men gathering nearby with bows and spears.
“Hunt,” the man said.
Kaelor did not understand.
The man pointed toward the forest again before pretending to draw his bow. He then pointed toward Kaelor.
That was clear enough.
Kaelor looked toward Dorran. The older man appeared uncertain, but Kaelor had already made his decision. Sitting inside the village while people stared at him held no appeal. The forest did.
He nodded.
Less than an hour later Kaelor left the village with six hunters. Dorran remained behind. The group carried bows, spears, rope, water, and several empty packs meant for meat. Kaelor carried only his curved blade. The hunters noticed but said nothing. They traveled east along the main road before leaving it and entering the forest through a narrow trail. Kaelor immediately felt more comfortable once the village disappeared behind the trees. He could hear what approached him here. He could see tracks. He could smell disturbed earth and broken plants. The forest was unfamiliar, but surviving in wild land required the same habits everywhere.
The hunters moved quickly and spoke very little. Kaelor respected that. The broad man who had invited him seemed to lead the group. He stopped several times to examine tracks and broken branches before changing direction. Kaelor watched him work and gradually understood what they were hunting. Large hoofprints appeared in the soft ground near a stream, accompanied by deep scratches along several tree trunks. Whatever animal they followed was heavy enough to leave clear impressions even on dry ground.
They continued for several hours before finding fresh droppings near a rocky slope. The leader crouched beside them, touched the ground, and said something to the others. The hunters immediately prepared their bows.
Kaelor looked toward the trees ahead.
He could smell the animal.
The scent was faint but fresh.
He pointed northeast.
The leader frowned and pointed east.
Kaelor shook his head.
He pointed northeast again.
The man stared at him before speaking to another hunter. After a short argument, they followed Kaelor.
They found the animal less than half an hour later.
It stood in a clearing eating leaves from a low tree. The creature was larger than the gray animal Kaelor had killed near the river, with thick brown fur covering its shoulders and two heavy horns curving forward from its skull. Several smaller animals grazed nearby.
The hunters spread out.
Kaelor understood their plan without needing their language.
They intended to surround the herd and drive one animal toward the archers.
He moved into position.
The lead hunter raised one hand.
Everyone waited.
His hand dropped.
The hunters moved.
The herd immediately scattered. The largest animal charged between two trees while the hunters pursued from several directions. Kaelor followed. The others were fast and clearly accustomed to running through the forest, but Kaelor had spent his entire life chasing prey across broken stone and burning ground. He lowered his body slightly and increased his pace.
The animal disappeared between the trees.
Kaelor ran harder.
For several seconds he focused only on the ground ahead. Roots passed beneath his feet. Branches struck his shoulders. He could hear the animal crashing through the forest somewhere in front of him.
Then something felt wrong.
Kaelor looked to his right.
No hunters.
He looked left.
Nothing.
He glanced behind him.
The forest was empty.
Kaelor slowed.
He could no longer hear the others.
He stopped completely.
His breathing was calm.
That made even less sense.
He had been running hard enough that his lungs should have been burning.
Kaelor looked back through the trees.
He had not felt the world slow around him this time. There had been no silence and no frozen leaves. He had simply run.
Yet the hunters were gone.
Kaelor looked down at his legs.
A faint purple glow appeared beneath the skin around his calves before disappearing.
His eyes widened.
The ground broke beneath him.
Kaelor dropped instantly.
He reached for the edge, but the stone collapsed beneath his hands. An entire section of the forest floor gave way, carrying dirt, roots, and broken rock into darkness below.
Kaelor fell with it.
He twisted his body and reached for anything he could grab. His fingers scraped across stone before losing contact. The opening above rapidly became smaller as he plunged deeper.
The fall did not end.
Kaelor looked down.
There was nothing beneath him.
Only darkness.
He struck the wall once, tearing skin from his shoulder before spinning away. Several pieces of falling stone passed beside him. The opening above had become no larger than a distant point of light.
Still he fell.
Seconds became longer.
The air rushed violently around him.
Kaelor had fallen from cliffs before. He knew what death looked like when the ground approached too quickly.
This was different.
There was no ground.
The tunnel continued downward farther than he could see.
Eventually even the light above disappeared.
Kaelor fell through complete darkness.
Then he hit.
The impact drove him through a layer of stone and into the ground beneath it. The cavern shook as broken rock collapsed around him. Dust filled the darkness.
Kaelor felt nothing after that.
Hours passed above.
The hunters eventually reached the collapsed section of forest. The lead hunter approached carefully and looked over the edge. He dropped a stone.
They waited.
No sound returned.
Another hunter lit a small bundle of cloth and dropped it into the opening. The flame fell farther and farther until it became a tiny orange point.
Then it disappeared.
The men stood silently around the hole.
One called Kaelor’s name.
No answer came.
He called again.
Nothing.
The leader looked toward the others.
There was no need to say what they all understood.
Nobody could survive that fall.
The hunters remained there for some time. Eventually the sun began lowering through the trees. They had no rope long enough to reach the bottom and no way of knowing where the tunnel ended. The leader finally stepped away.
One by one, the others followed.
Then the ground moved.
The hunters stopped.
A faint vibration passed beneath their boots.
The leader looked back toward the opening.
Another tremor followed.
Stronger.
Loose stones began rolling toward the hole.
The hunters backed away.
Deep below them, something exploded.
Purple light appeared inside the darkness.
It started as a tiny point.
Then it grew.
The entire tunnel filled with purple light as something rose from below at tremendous speed.
The hunters raised their weapons.
A figure emerged from the opening.
Kaelor.
He rose slowly above the ground.
His arms hung loosely at his sides. His head was lowered and his eyes remained closed. Purple energy covered his entire body, flowing across his skin and clothing before circling around him in long twisting streams. The same purple light burned beneath his skin, following his arms, chest, neck, and face. His dark hair lifted around his head while the force surrounding him pushed leaves and dust away from the opening.
The hunters stared.
Kaelor continued rising.
Ten feet.
Twenty.
Fifty.
He showed no sign that he understood what was happening.
His body stopped high above the trees.
The purple energy grew brighter.
Kaelor’s arms suddenly moved.
He crossed them tightly in front of his chest.
His knees lifted toward his body.
The hunters began backing away.
Purple light gathered around Kaelor until his entire shape became difficult to see.
Then his arms opened.
His legs extended.
The energy erupted.
A massive beam of purple power blasted straight upward.
The sky changed instantly.
Clouds split apart as the beam tore through them. The force flattened the tops of nearby trees and knocked several hunters to the ground. The beam continued climbing until it punched through the upper atmosphere and entered the darkness beyond the planet.
For several seconds, night appeared inside the daylight sky.
The beam could be seen from hundreds of miles away.
Farmers stopped working and looked upward.
Travelers abandoned their wagons and stared.
Soldiers standing along distant walls watched the purple column rise beyond the horizon.
In cities Kaelor had never seen, thousands of people poured into streets.
Across oceans and mountains, powerful creatures lifted their heads.
Far beyond the atmosphere, the beam continued into space.
It did not disappear quickly.
Its light traveled outward.
A signal Kaelor had never intended to send.
Eventually the beam weakened.
The purple column narrowed.
Then it vanished.
Kaelor remained suspended above the forest.
His arms slowly fell to his sides.
His eyes opened.
For several seconds he stared ahead without understanding where he was.
Then he looked down.
The ground was far beneath him.
His expression changed immediately.
Kaelor looked around.
Nothing held him.
His breathing quickened.
The purple energy surrounding his body flickered.
He dropped.
The hunters shouted.
Kaelor fell nearly twenty feet before the energy suddenly returned around his legs. His descent slowed violently. He twisted in the air, fighting against something he did not understand, before dropping the remaining distance and landing hard on both feet.
His knees buckled.
He caught himself with one hand against the ground.
Silence filled the forest.
Kaelor breathed heavily.
He looked at his hands.
Nothing.
No purple light.
No heat.
No explanation.
He slowly stood.
The hunters remained several yards away.
None approached him.
The lead hunter’s bow hung forgotten in his hand.
Kaelor looked toward the opening in the ground.
Then toward the sky.
He remembered falling.
He remembered darkness.
After that, nothing.
He pointed toward the sky.
“What?”
The hunters did not understand the word.
It did not matter.
None of them appeared capable of explaining it anyway.
The leader eventually lowered his bow.
He pointed toward the direction of the village.
Kaelor stared at him for several seconds before nodding.
They began walking.
Nobody hunted.
Nobody spoke.
The journey back took hours, and the silence remained almost complete. Several times Kaelor caught one of the men staring at him. Each immediately looked away. Kaelor did not blame them. He kept looking at his own hands whenever he thought no one was watching.
The sun had nearly disappeared when they reached the final hill overlooking the village.
Kaelor stopped.
Hundreds of people stood outside the walls.
More crowded the road.
Every face was turned toward the returning hunters.
They had seen it.
Kaelor knew before anyone spoke.
The gates stood completely open.
Dorran waited near the front of the crowd with Lira, Tarin, and Mira beside him. Guards surrounded them, though none had drawn their weapons.
Kaelor continued down the hill.
The hunters followed several steps behind.
As he approached the gate, conversations slowly died.
One voice stopped.
Then another.
By the time Kaelor reached the first houses, the entire village had become silent.
He walked between them without looking left or right.
Nobody touched him.
Nobody spoke to him.
Kaelor reached Dorran and stopped.
The older man stared into his eyes before looking toward the hunters behind him.
One of them quietly began speaking.
Dorran’s expression changed.
His eyes returned to Kaelor.
Kaelor stood surrounded by hundreds of strangers who had just watched his power tear through the sky.
He had never felt more alone.
The Purple Roots
Kaelor stood in the middle of the road while the village remained silent around him. Hundreds of people had gathered near the gate, filling the road and the spaces between buildings until there was barely room to move. Men who had been working in the fields still carried their tools. Shopkeepers had abandoned their stands. Children stood behind their parents while guards watched from the edges of the crowd with their hands close to their weapons. Every person Kaelor could see was staring at him. He did not need to understand their language to know why. The purple beam had crossed the entire sky. He had seen the light himself after waking above the forest, but unlike these people, he had no memory of creating it. He remembered the ground breaking beneath him and the long fall into darkness. He remembered hitting something far below. The next clear memory was opening his eyes high above the trees with nothing beneath his feet.
The hunter who had led the group stood several steps behind him explaining what had happened. He spoke quickly, occasionally pointing toward Kaelor before raising one hand toward the sky. The crowd reacted every time he did. Some people whispered to one another. Others simply continued staring. Dorran listened without interrupting. Lira stood beside him with Tarin and Mira close to her legs. When the hunter finished, Dorran remained silent for several moments before looking at Kaelor. There was something different in the older man’s expression now. Kaelor had seen fear from him after the attack on the road, but this was stronger. Dorran was trying not to show it.
Kaelor looked across the crowd. He had seen this before in a different form. On his world, when someone displayed unusual strength, everyone nearby immediately decided whether that person could be controlled, used, or killed. The safest response had always been to make the decision for them. Kaelor’s hand moved toward the handle of his curved blade. Several guards noticed. Their hands immediately moved toward their own weapons.
Dorran stepped between them.
He raised one hand toward the guards and spoke sharply. None drew their weapons. Dorran then turned toward Kaelor and slowly lowered his hand. His voice became quieter. Kaelor understood none of the words, but he understood what the man wanted.
Do not fight.
Kaelor removed his hand from the blade.
The guards did the same.
The crowd slowly began speaking again.
Dorran motioned for Kaelor to follow him. Kaelor hesitated before looking toward the open gate behind him. The forest remained visible beyond the walls. Leaving would be easy. He could disappear before these people decided what to do with him. Part of him wanted exactly that. He had survived alone before, and being surrounded by frightened strangers offered him nothing.
Then Tarin stepped away from Lira.
The boy walked directly toward Kaelor.
Lira immediately called his name, but Tarin ignored her. He stopped in front of Kaelor and looked up. Kaelor stared down at him. The child showed none of the fear visible throughout the crowd. Instead, he pointed toward Kaelor, then toward himself, and smiled.
Kaelor remembered the predators charging toward him.
He remembered trying to run.
He looked away from the boy and followed Dorran.
They entered a large stone building near the center of the village. Several guards came with them, along with the hunters, Lira, and an older woman Kaelor had not seen before. The doors closed behind them, shutting out most of the crowd. A long wooden table filled the center of the room. Maps covered one wall while shelves filled with books occupied another. Kaelor stopped when he saw them. He had never seen so much writing gathered in one place.
Dorran pointed toward a chair.
Kaelor remained standing.
Dorran looked at him for a moment before accepting the decision.
The hunters began explaining again. This time they moved slowly, using their hands and bodies to demonstrate what they had witnessed. One man pointed toward Kaelor before running several steps across the room. He then pointed far ahead, showing how Kaelor had disappeared into the forest. Another hunter mimicked the ground collapsing before pointing downward. The lead hunter held his hand above the floor and slowly raised it while making a low sound. Then he spread both arms and pointed toward the sky.
Kaelor watched carefully.
He understood enough.
He pointed toward himself and then downward.
The hunter nodded.
Kaelor pointed upward.
Another nod.
Kaelor crossed his arms over his chest.
Every hunter reacted immediately.
One stepped backward.
Kaelor lowered his arms.
So that had happened too.
He looked down at his hands.
“Kaelor.”
The older woman had spoken.
He looked at her.
She approached slowly. Her hair was almost completely white, and she leaned against a wooden staff. Unlike the others, she did not appear frightened. She pointed toward Kaelor’s chest.
Then she said a word.
Kaelor did not understand.
She repeated it.
“Power.”
Kaelor stared.
The woman pointed toward the sky.
“Power.”
Then toward him.
“Power.”
Kaelor finally understood what she was trying to teach him.
He shook his head.
“No.”
The word meant nothing to her.
Kaelor pointed toward himself, then toward his head, and shook it again.
The woman studied him.
He pointed downward, mimicking his fall. He closed his eyes and let his head fall forward. Then he opened them and pointed toward the sky.
Dorran understood first.
He spoke quietly to the others.
The room became silent.
They finally understood that Kaelor had not intentionally done any of it.
That realization did not make them less afraid.
It made them more afraid.
Kaelor saw it immediately.
A man capable of releasing that much power was dangerous.
A man incapable of controlling it was worse.
One of the guards began arguing with Dorran. Kaelor could not understand the words, but the guard repeatedly pointed toward him and then toward the village gate. Another man disagreed. Soon several people were speaking at once. Their voices grew louder.
Kaelor’s jaw tightened.
He hated being discussed while standing in the same room.
He struck the table once with the flat of his hand.
Everyone stopped.
Kaelor pointed toward himself.
“Kaelor.”
Then he pointed toward the door.
He began walking.
Dorran called after him.
Kaelor did not stop.
He opened the door and stepped outside.
The crowd had thinned, but dozens of people still waited nearby. They moved aside when he appeared. Kaelor walked through them without speaking. He returned to the small room where he had spent the previous night, retrieved the few belongings he had left there, and immediately headed toward the village wall.
He had almost reached the gate when someone grabbed his hand.
Kaelor turned sharply.
Mira stood behind him.
The little girl immediately released him.
She held something in both hands.
A small cloth bundle.
Kaelor looked at it.
Mira extended it toward him.
He did not take it.
She pushed it closer.
Kaelor finally accepted the bundle and opened it.
Bread.
Several pieces of dried meat.
A small piece of fruit.
Food for traveling.
Kaelor looked at the girl.
Mira pointed toward the forest and then toward him. She spoke several words he did not understand before pointing back toward the village.
Kaelor stared at her.
He understood anyway.
She thought he was leaving.
She wanted him to come back.
Kaelor closed the bundle.
He crouched until they were nearly eye level.
Mira remained still.
Kaelor had never known what to say to children. On his world, children learned quickly that adults had little patience for weakness. His own childhood had ended before he was old enough to remember much of it.
He placed one hand carefully on the girl’s shoulder.
“Kaelor.”
Mira smiled.
“Kaelor.”
He stood and continued toward the gate.
Dorran was waiting there.
The older man did not try to stop him. He simply walked beside Kaelor until they reached the outside of the wall. Then he pointed toward a small building sitting alone near the tree line. It appeared to be an abandoned hunting shelter.
Dorran pointed toward Kaelor.
Then toward the shelter.
Kaelor looked at him.
Dorran pointed toward the village and then back toward the shelter.
Kaelor understood.
Stay close.
Not inside.
Close.
Kaelor considered it.
That suited him better.
He nodded.
For the first time since entering the village, some of the tension left Dorran’s face.
Kaelor spent the next several days in the shelter outside the walls.
He preferred it immediately.
He could see the village from the doorway without hearing every conversation inside it. The forest stood behind him. Nobody could approach without being noticed. People occasionally brought him food, though he began hunting for himself as soon as his body recovered. Most villagers kept their distance.
Dorran did not.
Every morning the older man arrived carrying something different. Sometimes it was food. Other times it was an object.
On the first morning he brought a cup.
He held it up.
“Cup.”
Kaelor stared.
“Cup.”
“Cup.”
Dorran smiled.
Kaelor did not.
The next object was a knife.
“Knife.”
Kaelor repeated it.
Then a stone.
Then water.
Then fire.
Dorran pointed toward the ground.
“Ground.”
He pointed toward the sky.
“Sky.”
Kaelor learned quickly.
The words were strange, but remembering them was easy once he understood what they represented. Within several days he could identify dozens of objects. Soon Dorran began combining words. Kaelor struggled more with that, but he listened carefully and repeated everything until the older man was satisfied.
The children occasionally joined them.
Kaelor pretended not to notice how much faster he learned when they were present.
Tarin enjoyed deliberately pointing toward objects and saying the wrong word. The first time he did it, Kaelor believed him. When Dorran corrected the word and Tarin began laughing, Kaelor stared at the boy for so long that Tarin stopped.
The next morning Tarin did it again.
This time Kaelor knew the correct word.
He pointed toward the tree.
“Rock.”
Tarin immediately shook his head.
“Tree.”
Kaelor looked at him.
“Rock.”
“Tree.”
“Rock.”
Tarin began laughing.
Kaelor turned away before anyone noticed the smallest movement at the corner of his mouth.
By the end of the week, he could understand simple questions.
That was when Kaelor began asking his own.
He sat outside the shelter with Dorran one evening while the sun disappeared behind the village walls. Dorran had brought one of the maps from the stone building. He unfolded it across the ground.
Kaelor stared at it.
The land shown was enormous.
Dorran pointed toward a small mark near the center.
“Here.”
Kaelor nodded.
Dorran moved his finger toward a large section farther west.
“Kingdom.”
Kaelor repeated the word.
“Kingdom.”
Dorran pointed toward another.
“Kingdom.”
Then another.
Kaelor began understanding.
Many groups.
Many lands.
Many rulers.
Dorran pointed toward several mountain ranges and spoke words Kaelor did not recognize. He drew the shape of something large with his hands.
“Titan.”
Kaelor’s attention sharpened.
He knew that word now.
Dorran pointed toward the mountains.
“Titans.”
Kaelor leaned closer.
So this world had them too.
Dorran moved his finger toward an enormous forest in the north.
“Beasts.”
Then toward the ocean.
“Beasts.”
He spread his hands wider.
“Big.”
Kaelor nodded.
That he understood.
Dorran continued explaining. There were cities far larger than the village. Armies. Kingdoms that fought one another. Creatures that lived beyond settled land. Titans that sometimes destroyed entire towns. Monsters that hunters were paid to kill.
This world was peaceful only compared with Kaelor’s.
It still had plenty of blood.
Kaelor looked toward the distant mountains beyond the village.
For the first time since arriving, he understood something about where he had landed.
He also understood that people here still needed warriors.
That thought remained with him long after Dorran returned home.
Night settled across the forest.
Kaelor sat alone outside the shelter with his blade resting beside him. He looked at the stars while trying to remember which direction his own world might be.
There was no way to know.
His attention shifted when something changed inside his chest.
Warmth.
Kaelor immediately looked down.
Purple light appeared beneath his skin.
It spread slowly across his chest before traveling down both arms.
He stood.
The light grew brighter.
Kaelor clenched his fists.
“Stop.”
The word was one Dorran had taught him.
The energy continued moving.
“Stop.”
Nothing happened.
Kaelor’s anger rose.
He remembered the fall.
He remembered waking above the forest.
He remembered hundreds of people staring at him.
“Stop!”
Purple energy suddenly burst from his body.
The ground beneath his feet cracked.
Kaelor froze.
The energy disappeared instantly.
He stood completely still, breathing heavily.
A thin line had been carved through the earth several feet in front of him.
Kaelor stared at it.
Then toward his hands.
For the first time, the power had responded while he was awake.
He had not controlled it.
But it had heard him.
Far beyond the village, something else had heard him too.
Across the mountains, beyond the borders marked on Dorran’s map, a man stood on the highest balcony of a black stone fortress. Several armed figures waited behind him while a large crystal rested on a pedestal at the center of the balcony.
The crystal had been dark for generations.
Now a thin purple light burned inside it.
The man stared at the light without speaking.
One of the figures behind him stepped forward.
“What is it?”
The man placed his hand against the crystal.
The purple light immediately grew brighter.
His eyes narrowed.
“Power.”
He looked toward the distant horizon.
More than a hundred miles away, Kaelor stood alone outside a small hunting shelter with no idea that anyone was searching for him.
The man removed his hand from the crystal.
“Find where it came from.”
The armed figures bowed their heads.
Then they left.
The Purple Roots
Kaelor sat outside the small hunting shelter near the edge of the village with his back against the wall and a piece of cooked meat in his hand. The sun had only recently come over the distant hills, but most of the village had already been awake for some time. Smoke rose from cooking fires. Men moved between the fields carrying tools. A wagon creaked somewhere behind the nearest row of homes, followed by a man shouting at an animal that refused to move. Children ran between buildings until someone yelled at them to slow down.
Kaelor watched all of it without joining.
He had been here long enough that the constant movement no longer made him reach for a weapon every time someone came around a corner. That did not mean he liked it.
There were too many people.
Too many voices.
Too many people who wanted to know where he came from, what had happened in the cavern, how he had survived the fall, and what they had seen tear through the sky.
Kaelor had no answers for them.
He barely had answers for himself.
The memory of the purple energy leaving his body still returned whenever he closed his eyes for too long. He could remember the pressure inside him. He could remember rising through the cavern when there should have been nothing beneath his feet. Then came the light. The power. The beam that had gone so far into the sky that men in the village had sworn they watched it disappear beyond the clouds.
Kaelor looked down at his hand.
Nothing.
He tightened his fingers.
Still nothing.
He did not understand how to call the power. Sometimes it appeared when he needed it. Sometimes his body moved before he had even decided to move. Other times he could stand alone for an hour trying to force something to happen and feel no different than he had on the day before he found the purple roots.
That bothered him more than the power itself.
Anything inside his body should belong to him.
This did not.
Footsteps approached through the grass.
Kaelor looked up.
Dorran was carrying two wooden cups and wearing the same patient expression that had become increasingly irritating over the last several days.
He offered one cup.
Kaelor looked at it.
“Water,” Dorran said.
“I know water.”
Dorran smiled.
Kaelor stared at him.
The smile disappeared.
“Good,” Dorran said.
Kaelor took the cup.
Dorran lowered himself onto a piece of cut wood several feet away. He had learned not to sit too close.
For a short time neither man spoke.
Then Dorran pointed toward the village.
“Village.”
Kaelor sighed.
“I know village.”
Dorran pointed toward the fields.
“Field.”
“Field.”
Dorran pointed toward the forest.
“Forest.”
“Forest.”
Dorran pointed toward the sky.
Kaelor looked at him.
“Sky.”
Dorran nodded.
Kaelor took a drink.
For days Dorran had been doing this. Objects first. Then actions. Then people. Then simple sentences.
Kaelor had considered walking away from the lessons more than once, but the inability to understand the people around him had become intolerable. He hated depending on gestures. He hated having conversations happen in front of him without knowing whether the people were discussing food or deciding whether he should be thrown out of the village.
So he learned.
And he learned quickly.
Dorran picked up a small stone.
“Stone.”
Kaelor said nothing.
Dorran dropped it.
“Fall.”
“I know.”
Dorran raised his eyebrows.
“Then you say.”
“Stone falls.”
Dorran nodded. “Good.”
Kaelor pointed at the old man.
“Dorran talks too much.”
Dorran stared at him for a second.
Then he laughed.
Kaelor did not.
“Very good,” Dorran said.
“I know.”
Dorran shook his head and took a drink.
Their lessons had improved enough that Dorran had begun asking actual questions.
That was something Kaelor was beginning to regret.
Dorran pointed toward Kaelor.
“Kaelor.”
Then he pointed toward the ground beneath them.
“Not from here.”
Kaelor looked at him.
Dorran searched for the words.
“Where?”
Kaelor glanced toward the sky.
Dorran followed his eyes.
Kaelor had tried explaining it before. There had been too few words between them then. Dorran had assumed Kaelor meant another kingdom, perhaps some distant land beyond the maps he had shown him.
Kaelor pointed upward.
“Another world.”
Dorran looked at him.
Kaelor repeated it slowly.
“Another world.”
The old man remained still.
Kaelor pointed toward the ground.
“This world.”
Then toward the sky.
“My world. Far.”
Dorran’s face changed.
“You mean another land?”
“No.”
“Another kingdom?”
“No.”
Kaelor pointed upward again.
“World.”
Dorran looked toward the sky as if the answer might be written somewhere above them.
When he looked back, his expression was far more serious.
“You came from sky?”
Kaelor considered it.
“Not exactly.”
Dorran waited.
Kaelor hated this part. He knew enough words to begin telling people things, but not enough to explain them properly.
“On my world, I found something.”
“What?”
Kaelor looked at the ground near his feet and dragged one finger through the dirt, drawing several crooked lines extending toward a circle.
“Roots.”
Dorran leaned forward.
“Purple roots.”
Kaelor drew the circle larger.
“Here.”
He pointed at its center.
“Light. Opening.”
“Door?”
Kaelor thought about it.
“Maybe.”
Dorran’s eyes moved over the crude drawing.
“You walked through?”
“No.”
Kaelor’s jaw tightened as the memory returned.
“Two men.”
He held up two fingers.
“Fighting.”
Dorran nodded slowly.
“Strong.”
“Warriors?”
Kaelor looked at him.
“More.”
He searched for the proper words.
“Strong like nothing I know.”
That statement alone seemed to trouble Dorran. Kaelor had already told him enough about his home for the old man to understand that Kaelor did not frighten easily.
“They fought near roots?” Dorran asked.
“Yes.”
“What happened?”
“Light hit me.”
Kaelor struck his fist against his chest.
“Then I woke here.”
Dorran sat quietly.
He looked toward Kaelor’s chest and then toward the sky.
“The purple light from the cavern.”
Kaelor understood enough.
“Same.”
Dorran’s eyes widened slightly.
Kaelor looked away.
For several seconds only the sounds of the village filled the space between them.
Then Dorran asked, “Your world. Like here?”
“No.”
“People?”
“Yes.”
“Villages?”
Kaelor thought about the settlements he had known.
“Some.”
“Cities?”
“Some.”
Dorran waited.
Kaelor took another drink and stared toward the forest.
“My world is fighting.”
Dorran listened.
“Killing. Hunger. Water. Land. People fight for all.”
He searched for words again.
“Beasts.”
Dorran nodded.
“Large?”
“Some.”
Kaelor looked toward him.
“Titans.”
Dorran stopped moving.
Kaelor noticed.
“You know word.”
“Yes.”
That interested him.
“Here has Titans?”
Dorran slowly nodded.
“Some places.”
Kaelor looked back toward the distant hills.
That was something he would remember.
Dorran continued carefully.
“Your family?”
Kaelor’s face hardened.
The question did not need translation.
“Gone.”
Dorran lowered his eyes.
He did not ask another question.
Kaelor appreciated that.
A shout came from farther inside the village.
Then another.
Kaelor turned his head.
Three men were struggling beside a section of the outer wall where several heavy logs had been removed. One of the supports had split during a storm several nights earlier. The men were attempting to raise a replacement beam into position.
Dorran stood.
“Need help.”
Kaelor remained seated.
Dorran looked at him.
Kaelor looked back.
“They have hands.”
Dorran smiled again.
Kaelor narrowed his eyes.
“They have six hands.”
“Yes.”
“Enough.”
Another shout came from the wall.
The beam slipped from the men’s grip and struck the ground hard enough to make all three jump back.
Dorran looked toward Kaelor.
Kaelor muttered something from his own language and stood.
He walked across the village with Dorran behind him.
The men looked relieved when they saw Kaelor coming.
That was another thing that had changed.
When Kaelor had first entered the village, people moved away from him.
Now they called for him whenever something was too heavy.
Kaelor stopped beside the beam.
One of the men spoke quickly.
Kaelor caught perhaps half of it.
“Up. There.”
“I see.”
He bent, put both hands beneath the thick piece of timber, and lifted.
The men stepped backward.
Kaelor raised the entire beam alone.
He could feel its weight, but it was nowhere near what it should have been. He had noticed that as well. His strength had changed, although far less dramatically than his speed.
He pushed the beam upward until one end rested against the top of the wall.
“Move,” Kaelor said.
The men hurried into position.
One climbed a ladder and began securing it.
Kaelor held the beam without speaking.
Several villagers stopped to watch.
Kaelor noticed them.
“What?”
They suddenly found other things to do.
Dorran laughed quietly.
Kaelor looked at him.
“You talk too much even when not talking.”
Dorran laughed harder.
Kaelor shook his head.
Once the beam was secured, he left before the men could thank him.
He had made it halfway back toward the hunting shelter when someone called his name again.
Kaelor stopped.
He slowly turned around.
A hunter stood beside a wagon carrying two large animal carcasses.
The axle had broken.
Kaelor looked at the wagon.
Then at the hunter.
Then at Dorran.
Dorran raised both hands.
“I say nothing.”
Kaelor walked back.
By midday he had carried two logs, dragged both carcasses to the storage building, moved a stone trough that four men had been attempting to shift for several days, and lifted the broken side of the wagon long enough for the hunters to replace the wheel.
He returned to his shelter afterward and decided he was not leaving it again.
That lasted less than an hour.
Someone screamed.
Kaelor was already standing before he consciously decided to move.
Black smoke was pouring from a home near the center of the village.
People ran toward it carrying buckets.
Flames had spread across one side of the roof and were already pushing through the front opening. A woman stood outside screaming toward the doorway while two men held her back.
Kaelor reached them.
“What?”
The woman shouted something too quickly.
Kaelor grabbed Dorran as he came running behind him.
“What?”
“Her husband,” Dorran said. “Inside.”
Kaelor looked at the burning house.
A section of the roof collapsed.
Everyone near the entrance backed away.
Kaelor walked forward.
Dorran grabbed his arm.
“Kaelor.”
Kaelor pulled free.
“Stay.”
He covered his mouth with his forearm and entered.
Heat struck him immediately.
Smoke filled the room so heavily he could barely see the far wall. Burning pieces of wood fell from above. He moved beneath them and shouted.
No answer.
He went deeper.
A table had collapsed. Part of the ceiling lay burning across the floor. Kaelor stepped over it and entered the next room.
A man lay underneath a heavy support beam.
His leg was trapped.
He was conscious, but barely.
Kaelor crouched beside the beam.
The man looked up at him and began trying to speak.
“Stop.”
Kaelor grabbed the wood.
It was burning against his hands.
He lifted.
The beam rose.
The man dragged his leg free.
Another crack sounded overhead.
Kaelor looked up.
“Move.”
The man could not stand.
Kaelor grabbed him around the waist, lifted him over one shoulder and turned toward the doorway.
The roof began coming down.
Kaelor ran.
The world changed.
For only a moment, the falling pieces of burning timber seemed almost motionless.
Kaelor felt his feet hit the floor once.
Then he was outside.
The villagers shouted as he appeared several yards from the burning home with the injured man over his shoulder.
Kaelor stopped.
The strange sensation vanished.
The roof collapsed completely behind him.
He stared at the fire.
Again.
It had happened again.
One instant he had been inside.
The next he was standing outside.
He lowered the injured man to the ground as his wife rushed toward him.
People surrounded them.
Kaelor backed away.
A man grabbed his shoulder.
Kaelor turned so quickly that the man immediately released him.
“Do not.”
The villager raised his hands and nodded.
Kaelor walked away.
He could hear people talking behind him.
His name was repeated several times.
He ignored it.
That evening he sat alone beyond the final homes, looking toward the trees while the village settled behind him.
He held one hand in front of his face.
He remembered the roof.
He remembered the pieces of burning wood suspended above him.
He had not imagined it.
He closed his eyes.
Move.
Nothing happened.
Kaelor opened them.
He stood.
He looked toward a tree thirty paces away.
He lowered himself slightly.
Then ran.
He reached the tree at an ordinary sprint.
Fast.
But human.
Kaelor turned around.
Again.
Nothing.
His anger grew.
He tried several more times.
No sudden change.
No frozen world.
No impossible speed.
Eventually he struck the tree with his fist.
The trunk cracked.
Kaelor stared at the damage.
“Of course.”
He sat down again.
He could lift things no man in the village could move. He could survive a fall that should have turned him into broken flesh. He had flown out of a hole miles deep. He had sent purple energy into the sky. Now he could move fast enough to escape a collapsing building before the burning roof could reach the floor.
But only when whatever lived inside him decided to allow it.
Kaelor hated that.
“Are you angry at tree?”
He turned.
Mira stood several feet behind him.
Tarin was beside her carrying a small cloth bundle.
Kaelor looked at the damaged trunk.
“Tree started it.”
Tarin laughed.
Mira smiled.
Kaelor stared at both of them until they quieted.
“What?”
Mira held out the bundle.
“Food.”
“I have food.”
Tarin opened the cloth.
Bread. Cooked meat. A small handful of berries.
Kaelor looked toward the village.
“You steal?”
Tarin immediately shook his head.
Mira said something much faster.
Kaelor understood enough to know she was insisting they had been given it.
“Fine.”
He took a piece of meat.
The children remained standing there.
Kaelor ate.
They continued staring.
“What?”
Tarin sat down.
Kaelor frowned.
Mira sat beside him.
Kaelor looked between them.
“I did not say stay.”
“You did not say go,” Mira answered.
Kaelor stared at her.
Her language lessons were apparently working too well.
Kaelor tore the bread in half and handed a piece to each of them.
Tarin grinned.
For several minutes they ate without speaking.
Kaelor found he preferred children when they were eating.
They made less noise.
Tarin eventually pointed toward the cracked tree.
“You hit?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Angry.”
“Why?”
Kaelor looked at him.
Tarin waited.
Kaelor pointed toward the village.
“Too many questions.”
Mira laughed.
Kaelor almost smiled.
Almost.
He caught himself and looked away.
Later, after the children returned home, Kaelor remained outside long after darkness had covered the village.
He should leave.
The thought had been returning more frequently.
There was nothing keeping him here.
He had survived alone his entire life. He knew how to hunt. He knew how to sleep in the wilderness. He could learn the land by traveling through it. Somewhere beyond the hills were cities, kingdoms, mountains, old ruins, monsters and Titans.
And somewhere in this world there might be answers.
The village had none.
Dorran could teach him the language, but eventually Kaelor would know enough.
Then there would be no reason to remain.
He repeated that to himself.
No reason.
A scream tore through the darkness.
Kaelor stood.
It came from the far side of the village.
Then a child yelled.
Kaelor moved.
This time the speed did not come.
He ran normally through the narrow paths between homes until he reached the western field.
Several villagers were backing away from the fence.
A large animal had broken through.
It stood nearly twice the height of a man at the shoulder, covered in thick dark hide with two heavy horns extending from the front of its skull. One section of the fence hung from its side where it had smashed through.
A boy was on the ground in front of it.
The animal lowered its head.
Kaelor ran.
The boy tried crawling backward.
The creature charged.
Something changed.
The noise disappeared.
Kaelor saw dirt lifting beneath the beast’s feet.
He saw the boy’s eyes closing.
He saw the horns moving toward him.
Kaelor stepped between them.
Everything returned at once.
The beast hit him.
The impact drove Kaelor backward several feet, but he remained standing.
The animal stopped.
So did everyone else.
Kaelor had both hands wrapped around its horns.
The beast pushed.
Kaelor’s boots dug into the dirt.
“Wrong one.”
He twisted.
The creature’s head turned violently.
It bellowed.
Kaelor drove his knee into the side of its skull.
Bone cracked.
The animal staggered.
Kaelor grabbed one horn with both hands and pulled downward while stepping to the side.
The beast crashed onto the ground.
It tried rising.
Kaelor climbed onto its neck.
He pulled the head backward.
Then twisted with all his strength.
A loud crack broke through the field.
The animal stopped moving.
Kaelor climbed off.
Nobody spoke.
He looked toward the boy.
“Alive?”
The boy stared at him.
Kaelor walked over and crouched.
“Alive?”
The boy finally nodded.
Kaelor grabbed him beneath one arm and lifted him to his feet.
The child’s father ran forward and pulled him against his chest.
Kaelor stepped away.
Several villagers began talking at once.
He could understand more of it now.
They were thanking him.
Talking about the animal.
Talking about how quickly he had moved.
Talking about the house earlier.
Talking about the purple light.
Kaelor’s jaw tightened.
“Enough.”
They slowly became quiet.
Kaelor pointed toward the dead beast.
“Cut meat before bad.”
One of the hunters nodded.
Kaelor turned and left.
Dorran caught up to him near the shelter.
“You saved him.”
Kaelor kept walking.
“Yes.”
“You could have died.”
“No.”
Dorran looked at him.
Kaelor stopped.
He realized how certain he had sounded.
Dorran had noticed it too.
“You know that?”
Kaelor looked back toward the field.
“No.”
He entered the shelter.
Dorran remained outside.
“Kaelor.”
“What?”
“People here care if you live.”
Kaelor looked at him.
Dorran continued.
“You know?”
Kaelor said nothing.
The old man waited.
“Go sleep, Dorran.”
Dorran gave a small nod.
Then he left.
Kaelor sat inside the shelter alone.
He could still hear people outside preparing the animal.
People here care if you live.
It was a strange thing to say.
On Kaelor’s world, people cared about family. Sometimes friends. Sometimes the people who fought beside them.
But strangers were different.
People did not feed a man because he looked hungry unless they expected something.
They did not give shelter without demanding payment.
They did not teach someone their language because they simply wanted him to understand.
They did not send children to bring him food.
Kaelor looked toward the entrance.
He thought of the man trapped beneath the burning beam.
The boy lying in front of the charging beast.
He had moved before thinking both times.
That irritated him.
Because he knew what it meant.
He cared whether these people lived.
He did not know when that had happened.
He was not sure he liked it.
Far beyond the village, a man walked alone along a narrow dirt road.
He wore no armor.
He carried no pack.
He had no horse.
He had been traveling for days without either.
Another small farming settlement sat ahead of him.
The people there noticed the stranger approaching before sunset.
A farmer stepped into the road.
“Can I help you?”
The stranger stopped.
He was tall, with a strong build and clothing unlike anything common in the region. There was no dirt on him despite the distance he appeared to have traveled.
“I am looking for something.”
The farmer waited.
“A light.”
“What kind?”
“Purple.”
The farmer’s expression changed slightly.
The stranger noticed.
“You have seen it.”
The farmer hesitated.
“Everybody saw it.”
“Where?”
The farmer pointed toward the northern hills.
“That direction. Few nights ago. Lit half the sky.”
“From where?”
“Don’t know.”
The stranger stepped closer.
The farmer took one step backward.
The stranger’s voice remained calm.
“You know something.”
“I heard people talking.”
“What people?”
“Travelers.”
“From where?”
The farmer swallowed.
“A village north of here. Maybe a day’s ride.”
The stranger looked toward the hills.
“What did they say?”
“Something happened there.”
The stranger looked back at him.
“What?”
“Don’t know exactly. Someone fell into one of the deep caverns. Came back out somehow. Then the light appeared.”
The stranger remained completely still.
“A man?”
“I think.”
“What does he look like?”
“I don’t know.”
The farmer’s breathing had grown faster.
The stranger stared at him for another moment.
Then he looked north again.
“How far?”
“By horse?”
The stranger looked at him.
The farmer quickly corrected himself.
“North road. Cross the river. Keep toward the hills. There is only one village before the forest.”
The stranger nodded.
“Thank you.”
The farmer relaxed slightly.
The stranger walked past him.
“You’re going now?”
He stopped.
The farmer pointed toward the darkening sky.
“You won’t reach it tonight.”
The stranger looked upward.
Then back toward the farmer.
“I will.”
The farmer frowned.
The stranger bent his knees slightly.
The ground exploded beneath him.
The farmer was thrown backward as dirt and stone blasted across the road.
By the time he looked up, the man was already hundreds of feet above the settlement.
He continued rising.
Then he turned north.
A violent crack rolled across the fields as he accelerated.
Within seconds he was gone.
The farmer remained on the ground staring at the empty sky.
Miles away, Kaelor lay inside the hunting shelter with one arm beneath his head.
The village had gone quiet.
For once there were no questions.
No lessons.
No children outside his door.
He stared into the darkness.
Tomorrow, he decided, he would go farther into the surrounding land.
He needed to know what was beyond the village.
He needed to know where the nearest city was.
More importantly, he needed to begin finding someone who might understand the purple roots.
He closed his eyes.
High above the distant hills, something moved through the night sky.
Fast.
Straight toward him.
The Purple Roots
Kaelor woke before sunrise.
For several seconds he stayed still, staring at the wooden ceiling above him while the village remained quiet outside. The hunting shelter was cold, and pale morning light had only begun slipping through the gaps in the walls. He could hear someone moving far off near the fields and the faint sound of an animal pulling against a post. Nothing seemed unusual. Nothing felt different. Kaelor sat up, rubbed one hand across his face, and thought again about leaving. He had already decided the night before that he needed to see more of this world. The village had given him food, shelter, language, and more kindness than he understood, but it did not have the answers he needed. Somewhere beyond the forests and roads there had to be someone who knew what the purple roots were, or at least knew enough about this world to point him in the right direction.
He stood and stepped outside.
The air was cool and still. Smoke had begun rising from one or two homes as people started their morning fires. Kaelor looked toward the center of the village and saw Dorran walking slowly between two buildings with a small basket under one arm. The old man noticed him almost immediately and raised one hand. Kaelor gave a short nod. That was enough. Dorran had learned not to expect much more.
Kaelor started toward the village well.
Then the sky cracked.
The sound was so violent that every bird in the surrounding trees exploded upward at once. Kaelor stopped and looked toward the eastern hills. Something dark was moving through the sky with impossible speed. At first it looked like a distant bird. Then it grew larger.
Too fast.
Kaelor narrowed his eyes.
The object was not falling.
It was flying.
Straight toward the village.
Someone screamed.
Kaelor understood a moment too late.
The man hit the ground.
The center of the village erupted.
Wood, dirt, stone, and pieces of broken roofing blasted outward in every direction. Kaelor was thrown backward before he had even seen the impact clearly. He hit the side of the hunting shelter hard enough to break several boards and fell into the grass. A wall of dust rolled through the village. People screamed from every direction. Animals tore loose from ropes and fled. One building near the center collapsed immediately, followed by half of another.
Kaelor pushed himself up.
His ears rang.
He could barely see through the dust.
“Dorran!”
He had never shouted the old man’s name that loudly before.
There was no answer.
Kaelor moved forward through the cloud, stepping over broken wood and shattered stone. The village he had been standing inside seconds earlier looked as if some giant creature had slammed a fist into the ground. A crater had replaced part of the central road. Homes surrounding it had been crushed or thrown apart. One roof burned where something hot had struck it.
Then someone walked out of the crater.
Kaelor stopped.
The man from the night before’s distant road stood in the center of the destruction without a mark on him.
He was tall, broad through the shoulders, and completely calm. Dust drifted around his body but seemed almost unable to settle on him. His clothing was dark and fitted close to his frame, unlike anything Kaelor had seen in the village. He looked around at the broken homes and screaming people without concern.
Then his eyes found Kaelor.
Everything about him changed.
Not surprise.
Recognition.
Kaelor knew immediately.
This man had come for him.
The stranger stepped out of the crater.
“Purple.”
Kaelor understood the word.
His body tightened.
The stranger looked him over slowly, almost disappointed.
“You.”
Kaelor glanced toward the destroyed buildings. A woman was pulling a child from beneath broken boards. Two men were trying to lift part of a collapsed wall. Somewhere nearby, someone was crying out in pain.
Kaelor looked back at the stranger.
“You did this.”
The man did not answer.
Kaelor’s jaw clenched.
“Why?”
The stranger took another step toward him.
“Come.”
Kaelor stared at him.
“No.”
The man’s expression barely moved.
“Come.”
Kaelor looked once more at the destruction around them.
Then back at him.
“No.”
The stranger disappeared.
Kaelor felt a hand wrap around his throat.
Before he could react, the world turned sideways.
The man threw him.
Kaelor went through the first house like it was made of dry sticks. His back hit the wall, broke through it, crossed the room, and smashed through the opposite side. He barely had time to understand what happened before he hit the next building. Wood exploded around him. A table shattered against his shoulder. He went through another wall, then another, then struck the ground and rolled violently through the road.
He stopped against a stone foundation.
Pain hit him everywhere at once.
Kaelor tried to breathe.
The stranger was already standing above him.
Kaelor swung.
His fist never reached the man’s face.
The stranger caught Kaelor’s wrist with one hand.
Kaelor’s eyes widened.
The man twisted.
Kaelor felt his shoulder nearly tear out of place.
Then the stranger punched him.
Kaelor left the ground.
He crossed nearly half the village before smashing through another home and coming out the back side. His body struck the dirt, bounced once, then tore a long trench through the ground before stopping.
For a moment Kaelor could not move.
He tasted blood.
His ribs screamed every time he tried to breathe.
He had fought strong men before.
He had fought beasts larger than houses.
He had fought things on his home world that could tear people apart with one strike.
Nothing had ever hit him like this.
Kaelor rolled onto one knee.
The stranger landed several feet away.
Not jumped.
Landed.
He had flown.
Kaelor looked at him differently now.
The man walked closer.
“Come.”
Kaelor spit blood into the dirt.
“No.”
The stranger’s face finally showed something.
Annoyance.
Kaelor smiled faintly.
That was enough.
The man moved.
Kaelor barely saw him.
A fist drove into Kaelor’s side. Something cracked. Kaelor folded around the blow before another strike hit his face. The second punch lifted him off the ground. Before he could fall, the stranger grabbed him by the leg and swung him through the remains of a nearby building.
Kaelor hit wood, stone, furniture, then open air.
He landed hard.
Villagers were running in every direction now.
Kaelor saw Mira near one of the damaged homes.
Lira was dragging her away.
Tarin was with them.
Good.
Kaelor tried to stand.
The stranger appeared again.
Kaelor swung with everything he had.
The man leaned aside.
Kaelor missed.
The stranger grabbed the back of his head and drove him face first into the ground.
The earth split.
Kaelor’s vision flashed white.
The man lifted him again and threw him upward.
Kaelor rose several dozen feet into the air.
Then the stranger appeared above him.
A heel slammed into Kaelor’s chest.
Kaelor shot downward.
The ground exploded.
A crater opened beneath him.
Dirt and broken stone rose high into the air before raining back down.
Kaelor lay at the bottom.
Everything hurt.
His hearing came and went.
For a few seconds he could not feel his hands.
He stared upward through the dust.
The stranger hovered over the crater.
Kaelor saw him clearly now.
Floating.
No ropes.
No wings.
Nothing beneath his feet.
The man lowered himself slowly.
Kaelor tried to rise.
His arm shook.
The stranger landed beside him and grabbed the front of his shirt.
He lifted Kaelor with one hand.
“You are weak.”
Kaelor’s eyes focused on him.
The words took a moment to register.
Then Kaelor laughed.
It hurt badly, but he laughed anyway.
The stranger frowned.
Kaelor looked past him toward the destroyed village.
People were lying in the road.
Homes were burning.
The wall he had helped repair the day before had collapsed again.
All because this man wanted him.
Kaelor stopped laughing.
His face went completely still.
The stranger tightened his grip.
“What?”
Kaelor looked him in the eyes.
“You should have come for me alone.”
The stranger pulled him closer.
“I did.”
Kaelor shook his head.
“No.”
He looked toward the village.
“You came through them.”
The man’s expression did not change.
He did not care.
That made something inside Kaelor go cold.
The stranger launched upward.
Kaelor’s feet left the ground.
At first they rose only a few feet.
Then the speed hit.
The village disappeared beneath them.
Wind tore against Kaelor’s face so hard he could barely keep his eyes open. The man’s hand remained locked around his shirt as they climbed higher and higher. The trees became tiny. The roads became thin lines. The village became nothing more than a broken patch of color surrounded by forest.
Kaelor looked down.
They were still climbing.
The air became colder.
His ears hurt.
His breathing became difficult.
Clouds rushed past them.
The stranger did not slow down.
Kaelor grabbed his wrist and pulled.
Nothing.
The man’s arm felt like stone.
Kaelor struck him in the ribs.
No reaction.
Again.
Nothing.
The stranger finally looked down at him.
Then smiled.
It was the first time Kaelor had seen him do it.
They climbed farther.
Miles.
The land below became enormous and distant. Kaelor could see mountains far beyond anything visible from the village. Rivers cut through the forests like silver lines. The horizon curved beneath the morning light.
Then the stranger stopped.
They hovered in the open sky.
Kaelor hung from one hand.
The wind roared around them.
The man looked down at the world.
Then at Kaelor.
“You should have come.”
Kaelor stared back at him.
“Go to hell.”
The stranger opened his hand.
Kaelor fell.
There was no warning.
One instant he was hanging in the sky.
The next he was dropping.
The stranger remained above him.
Kaelor fell backward at first, staring upward as the man grew smaller. Then his body turned. The ground came into view beneath him.
Very far away.
Kaelor’s heart slammed against his chest.
Wind screamed around his body.
He spread his arms instinctively, but it did nothing.
He fell faster.
The clouds rushed toward him.
Kaelor tried to remember the cavern.
The moment he had stopped falling.
The moment the purple energy had lifted him.
“Come on.”
Nothing happened.
He fell through the first cloud.
Water and freezing mist covered his face.
He came out beneath it spinning.
The ground was closer now.
Still far.
But growing.
“Come on.”
Kaelor clenched his fists.
Nothing.
His anger rose.
“Move!”
Nothing.
The world below continued rushing toward him.
He thought about the village.
Dorran.
Lira.
Tarin.
Mira.
The burning homes.
The people screaming.
The stranger had done that because of him.
If Kaelor hit the ground now, the man would still be alive.
He would still be above them.
He might go back.
Kaelor’s fear disappeared.
Something else took its place.
The pressure returned.
Deep inside his chest.
Kaelor felt it.
Purple light flickered around his fingers.
His eyes widened.
“Now.”
The energy spread up his arms.
His fall slowed.
Not enough.
The ground still rushed toward him.
Kaelor screamed and forced everything he had into stopping.
Purple energy exploded around his body.
His descent slowed violently.
The air beneath him seemed to push back.
His body shook.
Then he stopped.
Completely.
Kaelor hovered thousands of feet above the earth.
He stared down.
Then looked at his hands.
Purple energy moved around them in thin streams.
He was flying.
Again.
This time he knew it.
Kaelor slowly lifted his head.
The stranger remained far above him.
Watching.
Kaelor’s breathing steadied.
The man had not expected this.
Even from the distance, Kaelor could tell.
Good.
Kaelor leaned forward.
The power surged.
Then he moved.
The distance vanished.
The air cracked behind him.
Kaelor shot upward faster than anything he had ever experienced. The world blurred. Clouds became nothing. Wind stopped feeling like wind and became pressure against his entire body.
The stranger moved.
Too late.
Kaelor reached him.
His fist struck the man’s jaw.
The impact snapped the stranger’s head sideways and sent him spinning through the air.
Kaelor stopped.
He stared.
The man recovered.
For the first time, his face showed real surprise.
Kaelor moved again.
The stranger swung.
Kaelor was already gone.
He appeared behind him.
The man turned.
Kaelor moved again.
Left.
Right.
Above.
Behind.
Every time the stranger tried to follow him, Kaelor had already changed position.
The world around Kaelor felt slow.
Not stopped.
Slow.
The man’s movements looked heavy and obvious.
Kaelor could see every turn of his shoulders.
Every shift in his eyes.
Every tightening of his hands.
The stranger tried to strike again.
Kaelor moved behind him.
This time he did not move away.
Kaelor wrapped one arm around the man’s forehead and the other beneath his chin.
The stranger reacted immediately.
His hands came up.
Kaelor pulled.
The man’s body fought against him.
For the first time Kaelor felt the full strength in the stranger’s neck and shoulders.
Enormous.
Kaelor growled and pulled harder.
Purple energy flowed across his arms.
The stranger tried to turn.
Kaelor twisted.
There was a loud crack.
The man’s body went limp.
Everything became quiet.
Kaelor held him for another second.
Then released him.
The body fell.
Kaelor watched it drop through the sky.
No words.
No speech.
No question.
The man had destroyed the village and tried to kill him.
Now he was dead.
Kaelor looked down.
The village was somewhere far beneath him.
He could barely see it.
Smoke rose from the area.
Kaelor remained in the sky.
The purple energy still surrounded his body.
He should go back.
The thought came immediately.
Help them.
Find Dorran.
Find the children.
Put out the fires.
Then another thought came.
The stranger had found him there.
Kaelor looked toward the falling body.
Why?
Because of the light.
Because of the cavern.
Because of whatever had entered him through the purple roots.
The man had not attacked the village for food.
Not for land.
Not for gold.
He had come for Kaelor.
If another came, the same thing would happen.
Kaelor did not know if there would be another.
He did not know who the stranger was.
He did not know where he had come from.
But now Kaelor knew one thing.
Someone knew he existed.
Someone had been looking for him.
He looked toward the village again.
Then turned away.
Kaelor flew.
At first he moved slowly, still learning how his body reacted to the power. Then he pushed harder. The land began passing beneath him quickly. Forests rolled by. Hills disappeared behind him. Rivers crossed beneath his path.
He kept going.
Miles.
Then more.
He did not know where he was going.
That did not matter.
He needed distance.
He needed to get away from the village before anyone else came.
If the people there hated him for leaving, fine.
They would be alive to hate him.
Kaelor flew until the village was far behind him.
The purple energy around his arms began to flicker.
He noticed.
“No.”
It faded again.
Kaelor lost several feet of height.
He forced himself upward.
The energy returned weakly.
Then disappeared.
Kaelor dropped.
He fell through the treetops.
Branches slammed against his arms and face. He struck the top of a large tree hard enough to break several limbs, rolled along one thick branch, then crashed through another. Each impact slowed him slightly.
Then there was nothing beneath him.
Kaelor fell the final distance and hit the ground.
Leaves and dirt exploded around him.
He remained there.
For a long time he did not move.
Eventually he opened his eyes.
Trees surrounded him.
His entire body hurt.
Again.
Kaelor rolled onto his back and stared through the branches at the sky.
The stranger’s face returned to his mind.
The calm way he had walked through the destroyed village.
The way he had said purple.
The way he had known exactly who Kaelor was.
Kaelor clenched one fist.
He had thought the purple roots had simply thrown him somewhere else.
He had thought whatever happened on his home world was over.
He knew better now.
The village had been destroyed because someone had followed the power.
Kaelor did not know if that man had been alone.
He hoped he had.
He did not believe it.
Kaelor slowly sat up.
His ribs hurt.
Blood ran from one side of his forehead.
He wiped it away and looked at the unfamiliar forest around him.
Somewhere behind him was the village.
Somewhere ahead was the rest of this world.
And somewhere beyond everything he could see were answers.
Kaelor stood.
Then he started walking.