Chapter 133:
The Farewells Before the Long Path
It began not with trumpet nor toll, but with stillness.
Stillness like the hush before a storm.
Stillness like breath held before a leap.
Stillness as the child, An'narel—born of divine vessel and mortal love—stood before the edge of the Valley, where the mists grew thick and the world beyond blinked into half-truths.
He was to leave.
Not for exile. Not for conquest.
But for understanding—a pilgrimage into the very question of what he was, and why the heavens feared him before he'd drawn breath.
But before he stepped past the veil, the Valley stirred for him once more.
And they came to say goodbye.
---
Ka'il'a was the first.
Her armor, once battle-scarred and bloodstained, now bore symbols etched in flowing vine-script, a record of all her wounds that became victories. She stood before her son—taller now, his eyes no longer childlike but ancient and uncertain.
She pressed her palm to his chest, above his heart.
> "When I was a weapon," she said, "I feared becoming a mother. Now that I have become both, I no longer fear being broken. You gave me that. Take this…"
She pulled a fragment from her own shoulder—a bone shard, ivory white, once lodged there during a war she no longer spoke of. She tied it on a leather string and placed it around his neck.
> "This is proof that even a wound can become strength."
An'narel bowed.
> "Thank you, mother."
> "No," Ka'il'a said. "Thank you, warrior."
---
Echo followed in silence, her footsteps barely brushing the grass, her robes swirling like water under moonlight.
She did not speak immediately. Instead, she lifted her hands, and light gathered between her palms—a rhythm, a soundless melody, the essence of a lullaby once sung to her when she herself was small.
> "This is my voice," she whispered. "Not the one that speaks, but the one that lives in the spaces between words."
She placed her fingertips on his temples and the sound entered him like memory, like dream.
> "In the places where truth fades and illusion wears crowns, let this song remind you: you were born of love."
An'narel's lips trembled.
> "Will I remember you?" he asked.
> "Always," Echo said. "Even in the realms where memory decays."
---
The Elders of the Fifth Root came next, offering blessings not in form of gifts, but seeds—tiny, glowing specks encased in crystal.
> "Each holds a truth that cannot be spoken, only grown," said Elder Toma. "Plant them when your path grows silent, and see what answers bloom."
---
Then came the Valley's people.
One by one, they arrived.
Children who once followed him through the streambeds now offered painted stones.
Old weavers brought him cloaks spun from lightning beetle thread.
Even the trees bowed as he passed.
From the lowest stonecutter to the eldest herbalist, each left something small, insignificant by heavenly measure—yet soaked in meaning.
And last came Lauren.
Goddess in disguise, she had walked barefoot in the Valley when the stars had long forgotten it. The weaver of unnamed fates, she had tethered Errin when he first fell, her gaze ever-present but never loud.
She stood beside the Worldfruit Tree, her hands holding no gift.
Only eyes.
Only truth.
> "You were never mine," she said. "And yet I held you in my arms the first moment you stirred. You were never a prophecy, and yet you fulfilled them all. You are not a god—not yet—but you are something the heavens have not accounted for."
She stepped forward, touching his brow with her thumb.
> "There will be many who will try to name you. Some will crown you. Some will crucify you. But only one name matters."
An'narel looked up.
> "What name?"
Lauren leaned close, her lips to his ear.
> "The name you choose when you know who you truly are."
Then she smiled.
And in that moment, it was not a goddess who stood before him—but a woman who once chose love over immortality.
---
The mists at the edge of the Valley pulsed.
The Emissary waited beyond, her form a silhouette, still and timeless.
An'narel turned one last time.
The sun caught his skin, casting no shadow—only light.
He looked at Ka'il'a.
He looked at Echo.
He looked at the Valley, alive and whispering.
And he smiled—not as a boy leaving home, but as something new leaving origin.
> "Thank you for making me," he said.
Then he stepped into the mists.
---
As he vanished, the mists did not close behind him.
They shimmered—like the skin of a dream peeled open.
And from deep within the Valley, the Worldfruit Tree bloomed once more, bearing a single golden blossom that pulsed with slow, immense power.
Ka'il'a touched her lips to her blade and sheathed it.
Echo whispered to the soil and sank into the wind.
Lauren, eyes closed, traced invisible threads into the sky.
And the Valley waited—not in sorrow, but in readiness.
Because what had once been born was now becoming.
And the heavens... were not ready.
---
Shall we journey with An'narel to the Court of the Unnamed next, or shall we explore the ancient factions preparing their pieces on the cosmic board?