Afterlight
When the light faded, they stood once more upon solid ground.
Not the ash-strewn valley. Not the Dreaming Path.
But Elmsworth.
The village lay quiet beneath a bright morning sky. The Tree stood taller than it ever had, its leaves vibrant, its roots deeper. The orb no longer pulsed—it now rested at the Tree's base, translucent, dormant. Balanced.
Mira stood with her companions in the soft grass, the wind warm against her skin. The Between no longer pressed at the edges of the world. The Veil had been resewn.
Caelen was gone.
Whether unmade or transformed, they could not say.
"What now?" Elric asked, shielding his eyes against the sun.
"Now we live," Mira said. "And listen."
Bram sat with his back against the Tree, eyes closed. "It's quieter," he whispered. "The voices... they're resting. Like me."
Lena walked the village's edge, her fingers brushing the air. Magic flowed, but now it moved like water—steady, clean, true.
In the days that followed, they helped rebuild. They told stories. They remembered those lost. And they planted new seeds.
The Keepers' order would not return as it was. Something better would grow.
Mira stood beneath the Tree each dawn, listening. Sometimes the wind whispered, but now it told stories not of warning—but of wonder.
One morning, a child approached her—eyes wide, hands outstretched.
"Is it true you walked the stars?" the child asked.
Mira knelt. "We all do, in our way."
And in that moment, with the sun cresting the hills and the Tree casting long, dappled shadows, she knew:
This was not the end.
Only the afterlight.