Under the boughs of trees that rose like cathedral spires, where light filtered down in golden sheets and the forest floor glowed with amber and rust, the glades of Sylvarion stirred with slow, reverent breath. It was Longfall — the one day held in Autumn’s grasp where song softened and memory ruled.

All around, the forest changed into ceremony. Leaves drifted in wide, spiralling arcs and settling on cloaks and shoulders. The lantern-vines had begun to bloom in soft hues of copper and garnet with their tendrils gently illuminating winding paths toward the Vigil glade.

Elaren, one of the younger fire-tenders, knelt beside a half-built stone ring while arranging bundles of memory root and whispermoss. His hands were steady, but his brow was tight with focus. It was his first Vigil outside apprentice robes.

“Start with the cinderrind bark,” said a woman behind him. She held a bowl of dried thorns in one hand and a twig of hawthorn in the other.

Elaren turned slightly. “Not the root first?”

She stepped closer with her boots quiet in the leaves. “No. You lay the root too early and it burns off the echoes before they rise. The bark burns slow and gives the memories a path.”

He nodded, adjusting the order silently.

The glade around them filled with slow movement. Eladrin walked in pairs or alone, some draped in woven mantles of leafcloth while others were bare-footed and their faces painted with silver ash. No voices rose above a hush. Even laughter, when it came, curved inward like it feared to interrupt.

High on a woven branch-bridge, a chorus began to hum.

Just long, breath-drawn tones, in the key of Autumn.

At the heart of the glade, where nine low fires waited unlit in concentric circles, the Chroniclers of Bloom arrived. Clad in their armour of etched leafsteel, they moved like wind in a still house. Each held a single vial, its glass catching firelight in shivering glints. The memory water inside pulsed with faint iridescence, water which was drawn from the Pools that never froze.

When they stepped into the center, silence spread outward like ripples in a mirrored pond.

Not one word was spoken.

Only the scuff of boots in leaf.

One by one, the vials were poured into carved bowls set beside each firepit. The water hissed against the stones. Each flame rose in its own colour. One was green, another violet, and another deep indigo. The glade responded in kind. Branches changed hue. Petals curled open. Moss brightened along the roots.

Then the stories began.

A young girl placed a string of frostberries at the base of the first fire. Her hands shook, but she said nothing. The fire turned blue, it looked almost as soft as evening.

An old man laid down a rusted clasp. An old brooch of Eladrin-make and began to hum a melody. One of the Chroniclers picked up the tune, and the others followed.

A woman stood near the second fire. “My father danced here,” she said, “Not in reverence. In joy. After his last spring.” She dropped a ribbon into the flame. It burned gold, then let out a scent like cider and old rain.

On the outskirts, some Eladrin watched but did not join. One pair of twins carried a small wooden tray between them. On it, three smooth stones and a pinch of memory moss tied in silk. They bowed, offered it near the flame, and stepped back.

Even the forest listened.

A gust stirred the leaves above but did not disrupt the flame. The wind moved in a spiral, brushing faces and tugging softly at robes.

A Chronicler raised a hand and began to sing. Her voice was low and almost half-formed. The glade joined her, one voice at a time. Words were few. The music carried them better.

An older Eladrin touched her chest and murmured, “Leave a bloom for me,” before stepping forward. She held nothing in her hands. The fire at her feet changed to a faint crimson, and stayed there.

The night came slowly, draped in the rustle of branches and the pulse of remembered things.

“It’s time,” the Chroniclers sang.

They didn’t raise their voices or summon silence. They simply sang, and that was enough. All across the glade, movement of Eladrin slowed. Conversations dwindled. Laughter paused. Children were pulled gently closer to knees and cloaks. The fires remained low.

Chronicler Veril stepped forward first. His armour was etched in curling vinework and was clearly polished with old care. In both hands he held a vial of memory water which was pale blue at the top and darker at the base, the colours swirling like breath caught in a bottle. He knelt by the first firepit, the flame was no higher than his palm, and then slowly lowered the vial into the heat.

“Is it really them?” whispered a girl from the back row with her voice too loud in the quiet.

“Hush,” her brother said, pulling her hand into his. “You’ll see.”

The other Chroniclers followed Veril, one after another. Nine fires with nine vials. Each one dipped into flame, raised, and lowered again. There was no chanting or grand spell. Just the same measured motion, one breath after the next.

The water began to shimmer but the vials did not boil like pots. They pulsed. With every pass through the fire, the memory inside grew clearer. Tiny bubbles rose and collapsed. The glass sang faintly and was barely heard almost like a hum that sat on the edge of the ribs.

The Eladrin began to sing.

It wasn’t a song for show. There were no flourishes. No melody meant to impress. It was a line of tones both old and familiar. Always the same words. Always the same time of year. Some sang with tears in their throats. Others kept their mouths shut and listened. It didn’t matter.

The first figure appeared near the fourth fire.

He stepped out slowly, wearing the longcoat of a night watchman with one hand resting on the hilt of a sword that no longer had a blade. A woman in the front row gasped and covered her mouth. Her hands shook. She didn’t call out. She just stood. He looked at her. Smiled. And nodded once, as if to say he was only passing through.

By the sixth fire, three children emerged. They were laughing though not loudly or playfully. Just… gently. Their clothes shimmered faintly, like they were stitched from cloud and honeylight. An older Eladrin woman dropped to her knees when she saw them. She didn’t speak either. Just pressed her hands into the earth and closed her eyes.

Not all memories came in joy.

Near the second fire, a figure formed with a slow stiffness. Their face was hollow-eyed and their mouth set in grief. Someone behind Eldrel, a tradesman with soot still on his sleeves, took a step back. He looked pale, like he might faint. “That’s—” he started, but his wife reached up and pressed her hand over his heart.

“Let it pass,” she said. “He’s not here to blame.”

A Chronicler moved to stand nearby, just in case.

Every figure walked among them but not all spoke. Some looked around like they were confused and unsure if this was dream or ritual. Some reached out a hand and brushed a branch, or touched the stone they once carved their name into as children. One sat beside a fire and warmed his hands even though he wasn’t cold. He turned and whispered something to the man beside him, and that man broke down sobbing.

The figures didn’t last long.

The first to appear were already fading. One step. Then two. Then they were gone, all of them dissolving at the edges until nothing was left but heat and scent and memory. The scent lingered most of all. Some fires smelled like home. Others like war. One glade filled with the smell of wet leaves after frost.

No one told anyone to move. They just did.

The children, who were once quiet, began laughing again. A drum started up in the far trees, it was slow at first before rising with each beat like it was remembering how to be joyful. Someone passed through the crowd carrying a tray lined with crystal thimbles, each one filled with a golden liquid that shimmered.

Amberthrum.

No one asked or refused. It was simply passed hand to hand, voice to voice, until nearly everyone held one. Eldrel took his cup and stared at the surface of it for a moment. It caught the firelight like it remembered every Vigil that came before. He lifted it, but didn’t speak, and then drank.

Two elders nearby stepped forward and took each other’s hands. They danced without ceremony in slow, hesitant steps with their feet brushing through fallen leaves. They didn’t smile right away. It took time. But the rhythm came back. And when it did, the circle widened. Others joined and the laughter grew.

Maellen, one of the scouts, took a deep breath and smiled at the sky.

“They always come,” she said.

Her cousin leaned into her shoulder. “And they always leave.”

“They don’t need to stay,” Maellen replied. “We just need to remember.”

Someone shouted from across the glade, “Petals, now!”

A wave of flowerblossoms rained from the branches above. Dozens of children shrieked with joy and bolted into the falling petals while chasing each other between the fire circles. No one stopped them. This part belonged to the living.

The Vigil had ended.

The celebration had begun.