Beren hesitated before answering. "I just... I couldn’t do it anymore. The pressure, the losses, the feeling that every journey could be my last. I’ve lost too many people. The Below takes and takes, and it never gives anything back."

Beren’s jaw tensed. "They wouldn’t have let me go. Ra’ala... she doesn’t stop. She always needs to go deeper, to push past the horizon, no matter the cost. If I stayed, I’d just be another ghost in the dark, another name lost to the Below. I want out. I want the sky."