Chapter 28 — The Temple in the Trees

We walked until the light softened, silver leaves swaying overhead, shafts of violet dusk cutting between the trunks. The forest never went silent, but its sounds were different—calls like flutes, the rustle of something vast moving high in the canopy, the whisper of vines stirring when no wind touched them.

Elira led us along a trail I never would have seen, a dip between roots, a gap through hanging moss. At last the trees opened, and we stood before stone.

Ruins.

The temple had half-collapsed into the earth, roots coiling over its broken arches. A stairway led down into shadow, but the upper walls still held carvings: figures with outstretched hands, circles etched in their palms, lines radiating outward like webs. Above them loomed beasts—some like wolves, some like hawks, some shapes I didn't know.

Merlin padded forward, sniffing the stone. His chest glowed faintly in the twilight, as though answering something old.

Elira set her basket down and sat on a fallen block. "The temples are everywhere, if you know where to look. The old ones built them before the Caller's time. Before even the First Lords, some say."

I crouched, brushing moss from the carvings. The figures seemed less like gods and more like people reaching for something they couldn't grasp.

"What happened to them?" I asked.

Elira shrugged. "Depends who you ask. Some say they tried to weave the world itself, and it broke them. Others that they ascended, left their shells behind. The Caller claims they were false, that only his will keeps order. Convenient, that tale." She plucked at a root, twisting it idly. "What I know is this: the temples are older than him. Older than any throne. And they still hum when the right blood walks their halls."

Her eyes flicked to me, quick, weighing. I kept my face still.

We made camp among the stones. I coaxed a small fire from dried moss and splinters of fallen timber. Merlin curled against me, warmth at my side, while Elira hummed the same careless tune as she laid out herbs to dry.

Above, stars moved slowly, not fixed but drifting like lanterns.

I lay back on cold stone, staring up, and thought: I have slept in deserts, on ships, in alleys and fields and airports. But never in the bones of a world older than memory. Never where the walls themselves whispered of forgotten hands.

Merlin's breathing slowed. Elira's humming faded. The fire cracked soft.

For once, there was no chase. No chains. No caller.

Only ruins, starlight, and the weight of history pressing gently down.

— Eleventh day, night, camping at the ancient temple —