The Price of Being Heard
Before the flames,
before the vow,
before Solenari’s final scream rang through the air —
there was a life.
A life where I remembered too much,
too soon,
and spoke too freely.
They called me a heretic.
A blasphemer.
A traitor to the Temple.
But I was none of those things.
I was a keeper of truth.
A guardian of ancient memory.
A messenger born to remind the people of their divine inheritance —
not through sacrifice,
but through sovereignty.
I lived on the edge of the old world and the new.
A time when the sacred was being sold,
and the temples that once held wisdom
became prisons for it.
I had walked those temple halls as a child.
Trained. Initiated. Watched.
Marked as “pure” — but never trusted.
They feared me even then.
Because something in me refused to be shaped.
I asked the wrong questions.
I remembered too much.
And I didn’t bow to the silence they demanded.
When I was older, I left.
Not out of rebellion —
but out of devotion.
I wandered for years,
carrying messages between villages,
healing where I could,
teaching those who asked.
I spoke of a fire that lived inside all of us —
not one of destruction,
but of divinity.
A fire that could not be bought.
That needed no priest, no temple, no blood.
Only remembrance.
And for a while…
the people listened.
They remembered.
But so did the system.
They saw my gatherings grow.
They saw the people begin to question.
To awaken.
To ask: Why have we handed over our power?
And that’s when the warnings began.
First whispers.
Then threats.
Then the bounty.
My face on parchments.
My name twisted into something wicked.
A price on my life.
I was hunted.
Dragged through villages by men I had once healed.
Mocked by those too afraid to believe what they had once felt.
They strung me from a tree.
Not to kill me — not yet.
Just to make me visible.
A warning to those who followed me:
“This is what happens when you speak without permission.”
But the real punishment came later.
Not in that lifetime.
Lifetimes later.
I buried the truth.
I swallowed the fire.
I silenced my voice — not out of fear,
but because I remembered what happened when I didn’t.
And I waited.
Waited for the lifetime
when it would finally be safe to speak again.
When the veil would thin
and the system would no longer hold its power through fear.
But I was wrong.
There was a crack in the illusion — yes —
a flicker of remembrance,
a glimpse of the shift…
And I thought it was time.
I broke the silence.
I spoke the truth too soon.
And the curse that had lingered across lifetimes
was activated once more.
The warning was still in effect:
“If you speak again… she will die.”
And so she did.
Solenari burned.
Not for her truth —
but for mine.
Because I remembered…
because I spoke…
because I believed the time had come…
…she paid the price.
And in that moment, the vow was sealed.
The fire I carried became a prison.
The truth became a burden.
I spent lifetimes after that one in silence,
forgetting, then remembering,
then forgetting again.
Until now.
Now, I remember the vow.
The scream.
The silence that followed.
And I remember what I’m here to do.
Not to stay silent.
Not to run.
But to finally finish what we started.
To speak the truth that got us both killed.
To reclaim the fire.
Not as a weapon —
but as a light.
And this time…
no one burns.