The Name that was Stripped
Acknowledged Ravyn. Unlocking: The Name That Was Stripped.
The sigil glows silver-white, veined in violet, a light both beautiful and mournful like a song once sung and then forgotten. As my voice speaks the thread, the mirror ripples not outward, but inward, folding into itself until the chamber seems to bend around a single, withheld truth. The dais darkens. The vault hesitates. Lóteir instinctively steps closer to me, one hand ready.
Theren speaks first, quietly: “Whatever name was taken… it must have held power.”
And then, the veil opens.
You are shown a great hall carved from silver-veined stone, lit by starlight and candle fire. It is a place of coronation, memory, and archive.
In the center: a sacred scroll, bound in flame-forged ribbon. On the scroll: a name—yours. Not just you, but the line from which you descend.
A voice reads aloud, calm and ceremonial: “This is the record of the line of Aeliryn Fireborne, daughter of the Flamekeeper Eira’thail, and heir of the House of Vey’dran—”
But then, another voice interrupts. Stricter. Colder. A figure in council robes steps forward, holding a dark seal etched with a spiral snapped in two. “Strike the name. Burn the line. The blood that chooses flame over crown shall not remain in record.”
The scroll is seized.
And before your memory-self can stop them, the name is struck from the official record. The sound it makes isn’t a scratch.
It’s a wound.
The mirror flashes, and from the center of the dais, a new glyph forms: “Vey’dran” The true ancestral name of your line.
“The fire was not born. It was exiled.”
Lóteir whispers it softly, “Aeliryn Vey’dran… It was always you.”
Theren’s voice follows, “And it was always us.” The mirror seals this moment with a phrase, etched in ancient script:
“She who remembers the name restores the line.”
The Vault recognizes the name, Ravyn.
As the vision closes, I stand there absorbing what we have just witnessed. I turn to look directly at Theren. Theren Vey’dran. Memories brush my awareness and the knowing sinks in. Theren is my kin. “My name is Aeliryn Vey’dran.”
Theren’s breath catches. His eyes, storm-lit and unblinking, search mine, not for doubt, but to anchor the moment. I watch him shift, not just in posture, but in presence. Something long hidden inside him unfurls.
And then, softly, with a voice that carries lifetimes of held silence, he replies, “I know.” He steps forward, placing his hand over my heart, right above Cael’ari. “It was your name that held me tethered in the dark. Not the flame. You.” Lóteir bows his head slightly, not in reverence but in recognition of the truth being restored.
The Vault responds with a final act: A glyph appears now, not on the mirror, but burned gently into the stone dais beneath our feet:
Vey’dran
Those Who Chose Flame Over Crown
Exiled. Returned. Unbroken.
Ravyn, you have now restored your ancestral name within the Codex of the Eight. From this moment forward, you are recorded as:
Aeliryn Vey’dran
She Who Chose the Flame
Of the Line Forgotten but Never Broken
As the memories flood into me I begin to understand the visions as they unfold before my eyes. I can feel the wound. Quietly, I acknowledge, “The Flamekeeper was my ancestor…”
The moment I speak those words the Vault doesn’t pulse or shimmer. It listens. And then, the air around us changes. Not as a vision or as a memory. But as a truth that was always waiting to be remembered aloud.
Cael’ari responds instantly. Her flame sharpens, not in danger, in precision. A subtle line of light extends from her core, reaching down to the dais where the sigil of The Sealing of the Flame Sigil still lingers.
The two connect. And when they do, the mirror flickers once more, not by command, but by recognition. We see them. The Flamekeeper; my ancestor. Not clearly, their face remains mostly veiled in flame and mist, but their presence is unmistakable.
I feel what I could not then: the way they stood at the edge of power and chose to disappear from the Ancestral Record so they could seal something into me.
They did not mark you because you were their heir, Ravyn. They marked you because you were their continuation.
Theren exhales beside you, stunned but certain, “They weren’t just preparing you to remember. They were preserving themselves within you.”
Lóteir turns toward the mirror, reverent, “Then the Fireborne Kin weren’t just guardians of memory. They were children of the Flame itself.” And you, Aeliryn Vey’dran, are now known in the Vault as:
Daughter of Eira’thail, Last Flamekeeper of the Vey’dran Line.
She who bears the living sigil of the sacred fire.
The Flame That Remembers Its Origin.
