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The boy was dying.

Not from sword or sickness—but from something quieter. Something worse.

Being forgotten.

Twelve winters old. Too thin. Too quiet. Too strange to be wanted.

Elias Reign sat curled against the stone wall behind the orphanage kitchen, his knees drawn to his chest, arms wrapped tight to hold the warmth in. The rain had soaked through his threadbare shirt hours ago, but he hadn’t moved. Not when the wind started howling. Not when the cook shouted for someone to sweep the hallway. Not even when the others had taken the last of the stew and pretended not to see him.

He didn’t cry.

He hadn’t cried in months.

Only breathed. In. Out.

Each inhale shallow. Each exhale colder than the last.

Lightning flashed—and for a single breath, the world held still.

Then… it came.

A tremor beneath his ribs. A pulse.

Not his heartbeat. Not fear.

Something deeper.

Thud.

His fingers twitched.

He blinked and stared down at his chest. Nothing visible. But it was there—moving. A pressure. A hum. Not in the skin… but beneath it.

Then again—harder.

A second pulse. Like thunder rolling under the surface of his bones.

His back arched without meaning to, breath hitching in his throat.

He didn’t scream. Couldn’t.

Inside the orphanage, laughter echoed off crumbling walls. Someone dropped a spoon. A door slammed. Life went on.

But outside, in that rain-soaked alley, Elias Reign trembled—not from cold, but from the light that suddenly sparked beneath his skin.

Thin lines of silver flickered across his arms and neck. Faint. Fleeting. But real.

It felt like lightning waking up inside him.

He pressed a palm to his chest, heart pounding now—not from fear, but from knowing.

Something inside him had waited.

And now…

It had stirred.

“Who are you?”

The voice came not from behind him, but within.

It wasn’t his own voice.

Deeper. Measured. Ancient. Like thunder with a mind.

He shot to his feet, stumbling backward until he hit the wall, scanning the shadows of the alley. His breath fogged in front of him—except the air wasn’t that cold anymore. Not around him.

The rain had stopped falling directly on his skin. It parted around him in gentle arcs, as if unwilling to touch whatever he was becoming.

Then—movement.

At the far end of the alley, beneath the crooked arch where the gate used to be, stood a figure.

Shrouded in dark robes that didn’t ripple in the wind.

Still as the stones beneath it.

He couldn’t see a face. Only a pair of eyes—glowing faintly silver. Calm. Cold. Mirroring.

Elias froze. Not from fear, but recognition.

He’d never seen the figure before.

And yet, some part of him remembered.

The figure raised a hand, fingers like carved bone.

“You’ve been chosen,” it said.

The voice was like rain on stone. Like a bell rung beneath the sea.

“But the storm will not wait forever.”

Then it vanished. Not walked away. Not dissolved.

Just… gone.

Elias sank to his knees.

Rain returned—hammering down around him again.

But it still didn’t touch his skin.

The alley was empty. Silent. Except for the storm building inside him.

He placed a hand over his heart. Felt nothing unusual.

But the pulse was still there.

Faint. Waiting.

He didn’t remember falling asleep. Only the heat in his spine, and the way the thunder settled in his ears like a lullaby.

When he woke, the rain had stopped.

His shirt was dry. The stones beneath him weren’t.

A mark—barely visible—glowed faintly along his forearm. A striking, silver lightning bolt.

He tried to rub it away.

It didn’t move.

Didn’t fade.

And somewhere in the distance…

a voice whispered again.

“Move, child. The storm is waking.”

The Next Morning

The orphanage was as gray as ever.

Cracked roof. Crooked shutters. Children shuffled out in silence, dragging buckets or brooms or broken shoes.

No one noticed Elias.

They never did.

He moved differently that morning.

Not faster. Not louder.

But lighter. As if something had lifted from his spine and given him the right to stand taller.

One of the older boys stepped into his path, sneering. “You sleep out with the rats again, freak?”

Elias didn’t answer. He just stared.

And for the briefest moment, the older boy’s grin faltered.

He stepped aside without another word.

By the time noon struck, Elias had already finished his chores and vanished behind the shed.

He stared at the mark on his arm. It pulsed faintly under the sunlight. He closed his eyes—and for a second, felt everything.

The wind brushing the edge of the roof.

The ants climbing a nearby root.

The breath of the world.

It wasn’t his imagination.

Something had awakened.

And it was waiting for him to move.

Somewhere far beyond the veil of clouds above, something ancient stirred in response.

The storm had found its vessel.

And the boy no one remembered… would soon be remembered by everyone.

And that was the feeling the boy had when the visitor came.

The city never sent visitors.

Not to the orphanage.

Not to this part of town.

So when the iron-banded gate creaked open the next day and a stranger stepped through—tall, cloaked, and silent—the matron nearly dropped her tea.

Elias felt it before he saw it.

A pressure in the air.

Not heavy—intentional.

Like the stranger was carrying a storm behind his back and choosing not to let it loose.

He walked with grace. Not the soft grace of nobility, but the practiced calm of someone who’d walked through fire and never flinched.

Dust clung to the hem of his cloak. A single carved pendant hung from a black cord at his throat—shaped like a lightning bolt, but etched with spiraling lines Elias couldn’t make sense of.

The children stopped what they were doing. No one spoke.

The man’s gaze swept across the courtyard, unreadable.

Then it stopped—on Elias.

He didn’t say a word. Just looked.

And somehow… that was worse.

The matron stepped forward quickly, wringing her hands.

“Can I help you, traveler? We don’t get many—”

“I’m not here for them,” the man said.

His voice was low. Measured. The kind that didn’t need volume to cut through noise.

“I’m here for him.”

He pointed—right at Elias.

Every head turned.

The air changed.

Elias stood frozen, a broom still in his hand. His pulse jumped—matching the strange hum beneath his ribs.

The mark on his arm began to burn faintly.

He swallowed. “Me?”

The man nodded once. “Your name.”

“…Elias.”

The stranger’s eyes narrowed, as if tasting the truth in the name. Then he turned to the matron.

“I’ll be taking him now.”

“You can’t just—he’s under the city’s care!”

The man didn’t look at her. He reached into his cloak and tossed a small pouch onto the nearby bench.

It clinked. Loudly.

The sound of coin.

But it wasn’t gold. Elias saw the glint—metal not from this region. Hexagonal, polished like glass, etched with runes that shimmered.

The matron stared at it. Then at Elias. Then back at the stranger.

“…What is he?”

The man finally looked her in the eye.

“Not yours.”

Ten minutes later, Elias stood at the edge of the courtyard, a threadbare satchel slung over his shoulder, his heart hammering like war drums.

No one had spoken to him.

No one had said goodbye.

The stranger walked ahead without slowing. Elias had to jog to catch up.

They didn’t speak for the first hundred steps.

Then:

“You felt it, didn’t you?” the man asked without turning.

Elias hesitated. “The… pulse?”

“Yes.”

A pause.

“It’s waking.”

They passed through alleys Elias had never seen. Past shrines long abandoned. Walls etched with spirals and glyphs he didn’t recognize.

“Who are you?” he finally asked.

The man stopped.

He turned, slowly. Pulled back his hood.

His face was weathered but sharp. Eyes like cracked glass—silver threaded with stormlight. Hair tied back in a dark braid, streaked with white.

He looked both ancient and ageless.

“I am Kairo,” he said. “And I’m the one who was sent to bring you to the Gate.”

Elias blinked. “What gate?”

Kairo studied him.

“The one between worlds.”

That night, they camped just beyond the old eastern ridge—past the walls of the city, where the grass grew wild and the wind no longer smelled of smoke.

Elias couldn’t sleep. Not with everything burning inside him.

The mark on his arm was brighter now. Faintly pulsing with his breath.

Kairo sat cross-legged by the fire, silent.

Eventually, Elias broke.

“Why me?”

Kairo stirred the embers with a stick, watching the sparks dance.

“The storm chooses. We don’t.”

“That doesn’t answer anything.”

Kairo looked at him.

“You were dying,” he said. “Not in body. In soul. The Stormheart doesn’t awaken in those who are content. It stirs in those who are breaking—but refuse to fall.”

He let that hang in the air.

“And it’s not done with you.”

Elias stared into the fire, eyes wide.

Stormheart.

The word settled into his bones like truth. Like something old being remembered.

“What is it?”

Kairo’s voice dropped lower.

“It’s not a weapon. It’s not a gift. It’s a force. A current beneath the world, older than the skies and deeper than the sea.”

He pointed to Elias’s chest.

“And now it lives in you.”

Lightning flashed in the far distance. No thunder followed.

Elias watched the horizon.

For the first time in his life, he didn’t feel small.

He felt… connected.

To something bigger.

To something rising.

The fire crackled softly beside him.

Kairo hadn’t moved.

“You won’t survive what’s coming,” the man said, voice quiet, “unless you learn to move before the storm does.”

Elias swallowed.

“Then teach me.”

Kairo smiled. Just barely.

“Good.”

He turned and pointed east—toward the mountains hidden in mist.

“Let’s see if the storm was right about you.”