SAGE
I stood in the centre of the hut and refused to sit. This was no ti for chitchats, the ti was long gone for that. I should be in the forbidden library.
"What am I doing here?" I repeated for the third ti. My voice scraped out of thin, stretched tight with irritation.
But it didn’t matter. Makeh was just as bland as she had been then.
She acted like she didn’t hear it. She just stirred the steaming pot in front of her, the exact sa way she had done six years ago, when Diana and I had stumbled into this place half-terrified.
Sa hut.
Sa wooden chairs.
Sa damned sll.
Behind , Darius sank into one of the chairs with an ease that irritated further. The ancient was actually getting comfortable. Comfortable. In Makeh’s presence. In Makeh’s hut. As though we were guests, not captives.
I clenched my jaw and refused to move.
Makeh didn’t turn around. "Sit down, Sage," she said. "If you want answers, sit."
I scowled, but my legs betrayed . Anger wasn’t enough to keep standing when the ground itself thrumd with the low, pulsing magic of the underground pocket realm.
My legs folded stiffly, as if they belonged to soone else, and I sat—grudgingly, stiff-backed, ready to spring up at any second.
Darius glanced at before looking toward Makeh, then to the three Quafars sitting cross-legged on the bare ground near the wall. They weren’t speaking. They simply watched us, their dark eyes glowing faintly in the firelight.
Darius shifted in his seat slightly, probably trying to form questions, but Makeh made no move to answer him.
Before she could even start speaking, soone stepped into the hut.
My breath hitched.
It was the boy. The sa boy from six years ago. He had not aged. Not one bit.
Sa height. Sa brown skin. Sa too-old eyes in a too-young face. Sa quiet presence that felt heavier than mountains.
He didn’t look at .
But then, he never did.
Makeh’s words from years ago slitted into my mind then: "He will find his purpose... if you do the right thing."
Her words curled in my stomach like a cold blade.
If. If I did the right thing.
Judging by the hollow, almost defeated look on his face, I already hadn’t.
I felt nothing.
Or rather—I refused to. I didn’t care about this place, or their expectations, or whatever cosmic role they thought I was supposed to play.
I only wanted to go back—back to the surface, back to my own world, back to the path I had set for myself. My plans. My war. My revenge. Everything Makeh was delaying with her riddles and silence.
But I couldn’t leave unless she released . And Makeh wasn’t known for doing anything quickly.
The boy turned toward the Quafars and beckoned silently. They rose with imdiate obedience. He walked out with them, slipping into the dim tunnels beyond the hut.
And then, just before he vanished, he looked back.
Not at . At Darius.
He smiled—a small, strangely warm smile—and then disappeared into the dark.
I blinked. What?
Bias. It was bias. It had to be.
He had refused to look at years ago, even now, but one glance at Darius—who hadn’t even earned dirt under his nails in this place—and suddenly he could smile?
I scoffed beneath my breath. "Unbelievable."
—
Makeh ladled steaming broth from the pot, her movents slow and deliberate, as though she had all the ti in the world—and I had none. She offered the first wooden bowl to Darius.
He held up a hand politely. "Thank you, but—"
"It is good for ancients too," Makeh said flatly.
That made him pause. I watched the calculation flicker across his face—curiosity, hesitation, and sothing almost boyishly eager. The ancient wanted answers. And Makeh had baited him perfectly.
So he accepted the bowl.
Idiot.
He sniffed it cautiously. The herbal scent rose up, thick and earthy. Then, after another searching glance at Makeh, he drank.
I almost rolled my eyes. "You’re too trusting," I muttered. How could he not wait to get answers first?
He ignored .
Makeh turned to next, offering a bowl of my own.
I didn’t touch it.
Her eyebrow lifted slightly, as though my defiance bored her. With a quiet sigh, she lowered the bowl back into the pot, emptying its contents.
"It was rude of you to refuse hospitality," she murmured, settling herself on the chair opposite us. She wiped her hands on a cloth and folded her arms.
Then her eyes—deep, ageless, cutting—fixed on .
"Sage," she said softly, "do you rember our last conversation?"
I stiffened.
Oh, I rembered. I rembered too well. I rembered what she had asked of . What she had refused to fully explain. The riddles that gave more questions, instead of answers.
The destiny she had claid was mine. Or connected to mine. Or dependent on —not that she had ever been clear about it.
Darius shifted beside . He was paying attention now, interest sharpening in his gaze.
Makeh continued. "I told you, years ago, that darkness seeks to break into the world. I told you it is your destiny to stop it."
I swallowed, gaze tightening on her face. "I didn’t ask for any of this, Makeh."
"But you make use of the powers given to you..." she exhaled slowly. "I also told you that I am here to guide the one who will carry that burden."
Her chin lifted slightly. "Don’t make the mistake that I did, Sage. Don’t fail like I did."
"And what mistake is that?" I pushed aside the guilt trying to sink its claws on my heart. "You never gave the full story on who or what you are..."
"I am a witch, Sage." a pause. "Well, I was that, before things changed."
I said nothing, noting the sorrow that had overtaken her face and voice. Let her talk. She was finally in the mood.
"And like you, I was chosen to stop a darkness on its way..." Another pause, before she looked at Darius. "I am sorry."
Darius frowned. "Why are you apologizing?"
I, too, was curious. Why was she looking so guilty while making the apology? Had she done sothing to the ancients?
Silence cracked open in the hut.
"I ca from a good community. Happy, thriving, progressive..."
Makeh’s voice, when it finally broke the silence, trembled—not weak, not fragile, but full of centuries-buried grief. And nostalgia.
"They were happy too that I bore the mark of the goddess, happy that the goddess had chosen one of theirs... They lived well, trusting that I will protect them whatever darkness the prophecy had co with..."
She shook her head. "They trusted ... and I failed them."
How does that connect to the ancients, woman?
"The darkness, when it ca, didn’t co directly to my village, but to the ancients. And I was tasked with keeping these beings safe... and stopping the evil mage before he rose to power, before he unleashed darkness..."
Darius straightened so fast his chair scraped the floor. "The evil mage? From the old war?"
Makeh nodded.
My breath stalled. I had read of that war. The ancient massacre. Contaminated soils which in turn contaminated ancients as they rested deep within the soil. The almost disappearance of an entire race. But it had all happened thousands of years ago.
Thousands.
Darius’ eyes widened as he looked at Makeh from head to toe, trying to reconcile the youthful woman before him with the catastrophic events she claid to witness. "How old are you?"
Makeh t his gaze without flinching. "I am as old as that war," she said softly. "And an extra eighteen years."
I felt the blood drain from my face. Eighteen. She was eighteen when she had been chosen.
My age, six years ago. Well, if I added a couple of months.
She continued, voice quiet but steady. "The goddess chose through the priest of my community. They told my parents I had been marked. I was ant to rise to the calling."
Her eyes grew more distant—nostalgia, sorrow, regrets that spanned centuries.
"But when I ca of age... I ran." Her throat bobbed. "Why? Once while practicing, my power had surged uncontrollably. I burnt down our hut. I nearly killed my own mother. I was afraid."
She wiped her thumb across her palm absentmindedly, as though recalling old burns.
"So I fled. From one kingdom to another. From one continent to another. I watched civilizations rise. I hid. Always hiding. Always running. Until the day the massacre happened. IAbout seven years later..."
Darius whispered, "The slow death of the ancients."
Makeh nodded painfully. "I knew many of them. They visited our community when I was young. They were kind. Wise. They gave gifts to the children and counselled our leaders."
Her voice cracked.
"When I heard they had been slaughtered, I knew... I knew I could have stopped it. If I had not run."
The room felt smaller. Tighter. Like the air itself clenched with the weight of her confession.
"I tried to kill myself," she said. "But the goddess would not let die."
Really?
"She cursed with eternity," Makeh continued. "So that I would live to see what happens when one defies destiny. So that I would always be there... to guide the next one who would take up the burden."
Her gaze returned to . "Do you understand, Sage? You are running—just as I did."
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