The flame didn’t flicker.


It trembled.


Nia’tari stood in the center of the Great Circle in Northern Senegal, surrounded by elders she had never met—each marked by generations of silence. They had gathered not for war, but for something even more dangerous:


Remembrance.


From beneath the sands, ancient glyphs pulsed—symbols of Houses long thought dead. Sigils that hadn’t been seen since before Nyah Sungbo’s fall.


Ayika sat cross-legged, sketching them one by one.


“These don’t match any House,” she said quietly.


“They’re not Houses,” Sanaa whispered. “They’re the ones who refused fire.”


Lucien’s voice was grave. “The forgotten cousins.”


Darius glanced at Nia’tari. “What does it mean?”


She touched the burning sand.


And felt a voice rise up from beneath her feet.


“We did not burn.

We became something else.”