Chapter 12 The Silent Prophecy

Chapter 12 The Silent Prophecy
The morning after the tomb’s discovery was restless as the clouds moved across Crescent skies and the air carried a tension that settled deep in my bones. Every step I took back felt heavier, as though the valley itself was whispering some warnings that I couldn’t yet understand.

Mira hadn’t spoken since we sealed the tomb.
We had all agreed to meet at Crescent Hall that morning. By the time we got to Crescent Hall, words of what we found had already spread. Elders gathered near the courtyard, their faces drawn with fear and fascination. I could feel their stares of half reverence and half suspicion. Theron was already waiting at the steps, his gaze sharp but unpredictable.

“You found something,” he said simply.

“Not something,” Mira replied, “Someone. A queen who burned before the world forgot her.”

Theron’s jaw tightened. “And what did it say?”

I hesitated. “It spoke of division… of two flames. One to destroy and one to restore.”

Upon hearing this, a murmur began from the courtyard. One of the councilors crossed himself with a trembling hand. “Old myths,” he muttered. “Stories for pups.”

But Theron didn’t move. His gaze turned to me like an unresolved puzzle then he said, “Old myths,” he said quietly, “are often born from truth.”

That night, Theron summoned the Oracle.

Elara had lived at the edge of Crescent lands for nearly a decade. Elara is a blind seer who rarely spoke, ate a little but saw too much. The sound of the rhythmic tapping of her staff on the ground announced that she had arrived. When she entered the Hall, all the light dimmed as as if everything in the room bowed to her presence.

Elara’s eyes were like a milky fog and her long hair solver-white. Yet when she turned her head towards me, her face felt like an immortal one.

“You seek the truth of what you’ve awakened,” Elara murmured, her voice thin but piercing. “The flame that burns too brightly to belong to one world.”

I exchanged a glance with Theron, unsure if I should speak. “We found a tomb,” I finally said. “And a prophecy that I need to know it's meaning, if it's reall.”

Elara smiled faintly. “All prophecies are real, child. The question is when they choose to reveal themselves.”

Theron stepped forward. “Can you see the bloodline of the Ember Queen?”

Elara nodded slowly, then put her hands into her cloak and withdrew a small container filled with red ash. “Her bloodline was written on fire,” she whispered. “To read it, I must walk its flame.”

Elara poured the ash into her palm and rubbed it between her fingers. The fire increased, wind blew through the hall, and the temperature dropped.

Then Elara spoke but not in words I could understand. She spoke in a language older than moonlight. Her voice echoed through the stone, layered and inhuman, as if two or three other people spoke through her.

“The Queen’s bloodline was divided.
The second fire walks cloaked in a frost.
When flame meets frost, the world shall burn anew or fall into eternal night.”

There was a tremble in the hall. A few elders dropped to their knees. Rae drew closer to me instinctively with his hands resting near his blade.

That moment, it was as if my heart swallows my chest. “What does that mean?” I demanded. “Who is the second fire?”

Elara’s lips trembled as she tilted her head, like listening to something far away, and whispered hoarsely, “One flame was hidden in shadow… the other, born to wander. The frost will not remember warmth until the fire calls her name.”

Then her body stiffened, her eyes rolled white, and she collapsed to the floor.

I rushed forward, but the Oracle was already gone. My heart skipped and my hands froze mid-gesture as if reaching for something unseen.

Then suddenly, the hall became silent.
\---

Later that night, I stood on the balcony outside my room, staring into the stormy clouds that was gathering over the mountains. My mind replayed the Oracle’s words again and again, divided bloodline, second fire, frost.

A sister! Culd that be what it meant?

The thought made me more unsettled than I cared to admit. I had always believed myself to be alone, cursed and rejected. The only one born with flames no pack could control. But if there truly was another… then every choice I had made, every moment of exile and pain, might not have been mine alone to carry.

Behind me, the door creaked open. Rae stepped out quietly, his presence as steady as ever. “You should rest,” he said softly. “You haven’t closed your eyes since we returned.”

“I can’t,” I responded, gripping the railing. “she said the second fire walks cloaked in frost. What does that even mean? How can fire be frost?”

Rae shrugged slightly. “Maybe it’s not about what it is, but who. Maybe she meant someone who carries the same blood as you, but walks a different path.”

I turned to face him. “Then where is she, Rae? If she’s real, why haven’t I felt her before now?”

He hesitated as he turned his face to the skies. “Maybe you weren’t ready to.”

I looked back into the night. The storm had thickened, lightning cracking through the clouds like it was about to rain. My mark – the ember sigil on my wrist pulsed faintly, responding to something I couldn't see.

“She said the frost won’t remember warmth until the fire calls her name,” I murmured. “What if that means I have to find her?”

Rae frowned. “You don’t even know if she exists.”

“Neither did they believe I did,” I said, “Until I burned their certainty to ash.”

Rae stared at me for a moment, at the stubborn set of my jaw, the flicker of firelight in my eyes, then sighed. “You’re going to chase this, aren’t you?”

“I have to.”

That night, when the storm began to rage, I fell into a restless sleep.

I found myself standing in a world white with endless snow stretching out straight in silence so deep but it hurts. I created out pale plumes, vanishing into the cold.

Then I saw a girl about my age, with silver hair, her eyes gleaming like frozen stars. The air around her shined with frost, yet her expression was calm, almost sorrowful.

I took a step forward. “Who are you?”

The girl tilted her head. “You already know.”

Her voice was a whisper carried by wind, both near and far. As she spoke, snow began to swirl between them, forming shapes and flames that flickered blue instead of orange.

“Why do you have my mark?” I asked with my heart pounding.

The girl smiled faintly. “Because it doesn't belong to you.”

“Sister,” the girl said softly, and her silver eyes glowed like moonlight on ice.

I tried to reach for her, but the ground split beneath my feet. Frost climbed up my arms, burning colder than fire. The last thing I heard before darkness took her me was a voice that was both mine and not mine – “When we meet again, one of us will burn the other.”

I jolted awake, my feet was wet with sweat and my heart was racing speedily. It was as if the air around me still carried a trace of frost, shining faintly under the moonlight.

I stared at my trembling hands and for the first time since the Hollow Flame’s attack, I wasn’t afraid of my fire but of what
might mirror it.

And somewhere deep, beneath the warmth of my ember-mark, something cold answered back.