The Nightingale didn't fly into the Ashmirror.
It was pulled.
Like the realm knew Kaelen was aboard — like it had been waiting.
Flames bled sideways across the edges of reality as the ship entered the fracture. No stars, no gravity wells, no space. Just shifting reflections of moments long dead, memories suspended in glasslike fire.
The Ashmirror wasn't a prison in the conventional sense.
It was a realm of regret.
A place where broken flamebearers were sealed — not because they were evil, but because their burns never healed.
Kaelen stood on the docking ramp before it opened.
He'd said nothing for hours.
Lyra joined him, her hand briefly brushing his.
"You don't have to do this alone."
He didn't look at her "I should."
"But you won't."
The ramp lowered.
And hell greeted them.
The ground was made of molten obsidian, glassy and unstable beneath their boots. Above, the sky cracked open in repeating flashes — scenes from Kaelen's past, playing in jagged, inconsistent loops.
One showed a younger Kaelen training under an old man with a hollow eye socket.
Another showed him in the Cradle's trial chamber — a burning blade at his neck, flame coiling around his arms, as the High Flamebearers watched with cold stares.
The past was alive here.
And it was watching.
They walked in silence, past a field of flame-flowers that bloomed and whispered in Kaelen's voice.
"Don't follow me."
"You'll regret trusting me."
"I wasn't meant to protect anyone."
Each step deeper sent Kaelen's flame dimmer, smaller.
Until he stopped.
"She's near."
They reached the Mirror Pyre — a monolithic spire of glass and ash, cracked open like a broken rib. It pulsed with raw flame. From within stepped the woman he feared most.
Kaela.
His twin.
Once revered among the Cradle as the Flame-Blessed, her flame had burned too brightly, too fast. When she lost control, half a city vanished in white fire.
Instead of execution, she was sealed.
By Kaelen.
And now she stood there, eyes glowing silver, her smile wrong.
"You came," she whispered.
"You sent the letter," Kaelen said.
"No," she replied "The flame did."
Lyra stepped forward, Prime Flame flaring, "You're corrupted."
Kaela tilted her head "Not corrupted. Refined. I am what you'll become when your fire burns through your name, your memory, your soul."
Kaelen drew his blade, a wreathe of embersteel "You don't have to be this."
Kaela laughed, soft and shattered, "You made me this."
With a flick of her fingers, flames erupted in the sky. From the ash rose the Wraithbound — failed bearers turned to flame-beasts, all flickering with echoes of Kaelen's face.
Each a version of him that made a different choice.
Each a piece of the fire he left behind.
The battle erupted in silence.
No screams.
Only fire.
Lyra fought beside Kaelen, weaving her flame into shields and spears, pushing back the wraiths with bursts of the Prime Spark. But the Ashmirror fed off memory. Every strike came with a flash of the past — Kaelen as a boy, crying before the Cradle gates; Kaela smiling with scorched hands; the High Flamebearers chanting, "Too bright to be born."
Kaelen broke through to his sister.
He didn't strike.
He dropped his blade.
"Let it go, Kaela."
"You first."
"I'm sorry."
And for a moment — a heartbeat of stillness — the fire hesitated.
Then Kaela screamed.
Not in rage.
But in pain.
Because in that moment… she remembered.
Not the sealing.
Not the betrayal.
But the look on Kaelen's face as he did it — not a soldier. A brother, Weeping.
The fire died.
The wraiths dissolved.
And Kaela collapsed into his arms, sobbing flame.
"I didn't want to forget you."
"You never did."
The Ashmirror groaned.
The realm couldn't contain forgiveness.
It began to crumble.
The Nightingale raced toward them as fire and glass collapsed inward. Lyra held the ship steady as Kaelen carried his unconscious sister aboard.
The door closed.
And behind them, the Mirror Pyre collapsed into itself — a scar finally closed.
Later, Kaelen sat in the medbay beside Kaela.
She breathed shallowly, flickers of stable flame returning to her skin.
Riven entered, quietly.
"You okay?"
Kaelen didn't look up "No."
Riven nodded "Good, Means you're still in there."
Kaelen finally looked up.
"Why didn't she die?"
Riven shrugged "Same reason you didn't. Your fire wasn't finished."
In the deepest vault of the Nightingale, Lyra sat alone, staring at the Ember Key in her chest.
It pulsed again.
Only this time, it formed a new path.
A second Key…
… in a Realm where light never touches the ground.
The Duskroot.