The recruits packed hastily, fueled by grim urgency. Most of the instructors joined them without question — it was their duty, and their hearts burned with the same need to help.

After a day of grueling travel, broken only by brief, restless pauses, they reached Forlon three hours before nightfall.

It was a scene from a nightmare.

Houses stood in blackened husks or lay smoldering, collapsed into heaps of ash and ruin. Work crews toiled amidst the wreckage, carrying the dead in battered wheelbarrows toward a makeshift morgue near the cemetery. Most of those left behind were older men and women; Boaz saw almost no youth among them.

Chaim emerged from the chaos, limping heavily, his hair slick with sweat despite the chill in the air. Blood seeped through bandages on his leg and arm. His face was hollow, stripped of hope.

Master Syrna called out to him. “What is the toll?“

Chaim looked up with a bleak, hollow gaze. “Many of the young are gone,“ he said hoarsely. “Taken by those foul creatures. Women, children, lads barely grown. There’s no hope for them.“ He looked past the recruits, to the Familiars. His eyes grew big and he backed away.

“Familiars. Magical creatures bound to the recruits. They’re all safe,” Master Syrna said, answering the expression in his eyes.

Meanwhile, the village rang with the raw sounds of human agony — screams, sobs, broken cries. Survivors clawed through the ruins, searching for anyone still breathing. Others bore their loved ones’ bodies to the rows of waiting graves.

There was no containing the recruits.

The instructors tried, briefly, but could not find it in their hearts to stop them. Each deputy needed to find their family — to know who lived, who was lost. They needed something to do, even if there was no saving to be done. They needed space to grieve.

Cayden, helping among the villagers, spotted the deputies’ arrival. When Master Syrna explained, nodding toward Boaz — already jogging away — Cayden understood at once, although he too glanced at the Familiars with wonder.

“I’ll follow Boaz,“ he said, and set off.

Boaz jogged, as fast as his battered body would allow after the hard day’s march, heart pounding with dread. Thorne trotted next to him, keeping pace. Boaz barely registered the ruined streets blurring past. One thought beat against his skull: Had his father survived? Surely Truan would have been out helping others … surely he hadn’t stayed behind. But a darker voice whispered otherwise.

After Boaz passed the outskirts of the village, his heart plummeted. Their home was a ruin. The roof had caved in; the walls gaped with jagged holes. The front door hung shattered on one hinge.

Bodies lay strewn around the yard — Fallen, Boaz presumed. It didn’t take much guesswork. Heads severed cleanly, lying in the cold mud. Their forms twisted and wrong: some like men, others taller and sinewy, with skin flaps stretched from arms to sides. Some were squat and wide, too broad for any human frame. Boaz staggered, bile rising.

He stepped across the threshold into the ruined house — and found his father.

Truan lay face down amid the corpses, his broken sword still clutched in one hand. Blood stained the floor. Around him, more Fallen — their heads severed by blows fierce and true.

The sight broke something in Boaz.

He fell to his knees, sobs racking his body. He reached out a trembling hand to touch his father’s shoulder — and the world tilted around him. The last thing he felt was the rough wood of the floor against his cheek, and the cold pull of grief and bone-deep weariness dragging him into darkness. Boaz woke slowly, the world a blur of smoke and shadow. Pain throbbed behind his eyes, and his throat was dry. The broken roof gaped overhead, showing a sliver of darkening sky.

Someone was beside him — silent, unmoving. Cayden.

The older man sat cross-legged on the ruined floor, hands resting loosely on his knees. He made no move to speak or touch him, only waited. Boaz closed his eyes again. The weight of it all pressed down harder than stone — the house, the village, his father. Gone.

Minutes passed. Maybe hours. Time had no meaning anymore. Finally, hoarsely, he whispered, “I wasn’t here.“

Cayden’s voice was low, rough-edged. “And it wouldn’t have changed the end.“

Boaz shook his head, a bitter, small gesture.

“He fought,“ Cayden said. “Hard. Killed more than his share. A Handler too.“

Boaz stared at the broken sword still clutched in Truan’s hand.

“He died alone,“ he said.

“No,“ Cayden answered. “He died fighting for his son.“

The words cracked something deeper inside Boaz. He bit down on a sob, fists clenched so tightly his nails bit into his palms.

Then — a flash of memory, sharp and urgent. The floorboard. Boaz lurched upright so suddenly Cayden started to rise too, ready to steady him.

“In his room,“ Boaz said, breathless. “The floorboard — he kept it there. The Sigil.“

For a moment, Cayden was silent. Then he nodded, grim. “They may have been after it all along.“

Boaz stumbled to his feet, swaying. His body protested every movement, but he shoved through it. He crossed the wreckage of the house to what had been his father’s sleeping room.

The bed was half-crushed under fallen beams. Boaz dropped to his knees, scrabbling at the cracked floorboards with his bare hands.

Cayden knelt beside him without a word, pulling aside debris.

After frantic minutes, Boaz found the loose board — broken but intact. He pried it up, fingers bleeding now, and reached inside.

The box and the Triune Sigil were still there. A simple thing — a medallion of dark metal, etched with three interlocking leaves. It was warm to the touch, almost pulsing against his skin.

Boaz sagged back on his heels, the Sigil clutched tightly in his hand. Tears ran down his face, but he did not sob now. He simply wept — silent, exhausted, hollowed out.

Cayden placed a steadying hand on his shoulder. “Come on, lad,“ he said quietly. “Let’s not let him down.“

This time, Boaz nodded without speaking. He slipped the Sigil into the pouch at his belt and rose. He would need to add it to the clasp at his neck where the Familiar medallion was, but later. Not now.

His grief was still there — a weight he would carry — but something else settled alongside it.

Resolve.

They would pay for this. And he would see it done.

Boaz stood over his father’s body for a long moment, the Triune Sigil heavy in his pouch, the ruined house groaning around him with the chill evening wind.

He knew he couldn’t leave Truan here — not like this. Not in this place defiled by death. He knelt once more and, with hands still trembling, began the grim work of preparing the body.

Cayden said nothing, only moved quietly through the wreckage, gathering the corpses of the Fallen. There were eight scattered through the house and yard — some barely recognizable as human or other races. Cayden dragged them into a heap near the broken hearth, his movements methodical.

When Boaz finished binding his father in blankets pulled from his bedroom, he rose and found Cayden waiting with a shovel — scavenged from the wreckage outside.

“You’ll want to bury him,“ Cayden said, voice low. “Properly. Away from … this.“

Boaz nodded mutely and followed him outside the house, across the yard to a patch of earth near a stand of old oaks. As good a place as any. He dug. Hands blistering, arms aching, tears blurring his vision — he dug.

When the grave was ready, Boaz laid his father to rest with painful slowness. He placed the broken sword atop Truan’s chest, the hilt resting against folded hands. A token of the fight he had waged, and won, even in death. He had guarded the Sigil with his life.

Boaz stood there for a long while after the last clod of dirt fell, his head bowed. He would never forget. Then Cayden spoke from behind him.

“We need to burn the house,“ he said. “The bodies inside — they can’t be left to rot.“

Boaz turned, confused at first. “But… they’re dead. He killed them.“

Cayden stepped closer, his face grim. “Not dead enough,“ he said. “Fallen don’t die like we do. Some wounds’ll slow them, cripple them. But cut off the head, then burn the remains … “ He jerked his chin toward the ruined cabin. “That’s final.“

Boaz shuddered, remembering the clean, brutal cuts — the severed heads scattered like broken dolls. “He knew,“ Boaz said quietly. “My father. He knew how to kill them.“

Cayden nodded once. “Aye. He knew.“

Together, they returned to the house. Cayden doused the heap of bodies with lamp oil scavenged from a wrecked lantern. Boaz struck the flint with shaking hands until the spark caught. Flames roared up, consuming the grotesque pile. Smoke billowed into the darkening sky, thick and choking.

Boaz watched until the house was fully aflame, until there was nothing left to save or mourn. Only then did Cayden lay a hand on his shoulder and gently steer him away.

They had more battles ahead. And Boaz had promises to keep.

The fire still smoldered behind them as Boaz and Cayden made their way back toward the village. Smoke clung to Boaz’s clothes, and every part of him ached — not just from the digging, but from the pain of losing his father.

When they reached the square, darkness had settled in. Shadows stretched across the cobbled stones from the lanterns left burning. All the fires were out now. A quiet crowd had gathered — instructors, deputies, and village elders — the hollow-eyed remnants of Forlon.

Chaim met them first. His bandages were darker now, and a limp had settled into his stride, but he nodded at their approach. “They’re inside,” he said, jerking his head toward the Traveler’s Rest. “Trying to plan something, I think.”

Boaz barely nodded. Around him, his friends murmured greetings, some hesitant, others respectful. He caught a few sidelong glances — grief recognizes grief.

One figure paced alone, shoulders rigid, fists clenched. Jaxson.

He turned as Boaz approached, jaw tight, voice low and sharp. “They took her,” he spat. “My sister. Tessa.”

Boaz stopped. “Tessa … I remember her. She used to wait for you by the road when we went off to play in the woods. She’d bring you apples.”

Jaxson’s expression twisted, somewhere between anguish and fury. “She’s twelve. She can’t fight. She can’t run fast enough.” He stared at the ground, voice cracking. “She’s just a kid.”

Boaz didn’t speak. There was nothing to say that would matter.

“I’ll get her back,” Jaxson said after a moment, louder now. “Whatever it takes.”

Cayden moved beside him. “And you won’t go alone. That’s not how we do things.”

From the doorway of the Traveler’s Rest, Master Syrna emerged, wiping her hands on a soot-stained cloth. She placed her hand on Cayden’s shoulder. “You’ll take them,” she said. “We’ll stay behind — see to the wounded, and hold the borders. If the Fallen, or anything else, returns, Forlon must still stand.”

Cayden hesitated. Then nodded. “Understood.”

Boaz glanced at the building. Traveler’s Rest. Once a waystation, now a ruin like everything else in Forlon. Its roof sagged, and moss curled through the cracks in its stonework. But it was ancient, formed even before Forlon.

And yet, as Boaz stepped toward it, something stirred.

The air grew still. He felt it — like a hush that wasn’t silence, but “listening.” The archway glowed faintly, just for an instant. Carvings long faded shimmered like breath caught in moonlight.

Boaz raised his hand and touched the stone beside the doorway. It was warm. Not from fire — from within. A heartbeat. A memory waking up.

Behind him, someone whispered, “Did you see that?”

The light receded, but the feeling lingered. Boaz’s fingers tingled as he lowered his hand.

Cayden’s brow furrowed. “This place hasn’t stirred in living memory,” he said. “Not for anyone.”

Boaz didn’t answer. He stepped through the doorway. He had no time for mysteries right now. Not when there was clear work to do ahead.

Inside, the station was still worn — moldy wood, broken benches — but something had shifted. Lanterns caught flame with ease. The old hearth, once stubborn and dead, now held a low, steady fire.

Recruits gathered around tables. Maps were unrolled. Supplies inventoried. The room breathed again, as if memory had returned to stone and timber.

Boaz stood at the center, quiet, watching the others prepare. Something had awakened. And it was drawing them forward.

Night settled over Forlon like a heavy shroud. Inside the Traveler’s Rest, firelight flickered against stone walls that hadn’t held warmth in decades. Though the roof still sagged and the floor creaked, the old station had become something else — a place of shelter, and something more.

Maps lay spread across a broad table near the hearth, weighted by stones and cracked mugs. Around it, Cayden stood with Master Syrna, Chaim, and several of the instructors. A few villagers lingered, offering what knowledge they had of the woods or the captors’ trail.

Cayden had taken command the moment they entered — not with bravado, but clarity. His voice was firm, his eyes sharp, and no one questioned it.

“We move at first light,” he said, tracing a line through the map. “They headed east by north, into Dimlaith. Those woods are far more ancient than the village, and they’ll turn you around if you don’t keep your wits. We’ll travel in pairs. No one goes off alone.”

Cayden turned to Chaim. “We’ll need torches, food, and water — enough for three days’ travel, maybe more.”

“I’ll see to it,” Chaim said, already turning for the door. “We’ve got stores of food and supplies for winter that have not been touched. I’ll wake the others.”

Nearby, Jaxson stood with arms folded, eyes flicking constantly to the door as if he might run into the forest now. Others — Theo, Kiera, and the rest of the deputies — sat near the fire, watching Cayden, some with fear, others with grim focus. Boaz stood slightly apart, watching the map. His eyes were sunken, but alert.

Cayden glanced at him, gave a nod — not of deference, not yet — but of inclusion. Then he clapped his hands once. “That’s enough for tonight. Rest while you can. We’ll need every scrap of strength tomorrow.”

The recruits began spreading out — some curled near the hearth, others found corners with blankets or cloaks. Someone passed out strips of dried meat and a few half-burnt loaves from what remained of the kitchens.

The villagers worked quietly in the background, moving like ghosts, but with purpose. Blankets were gathered. Waterskins filled. Oil for lanterns. Anything they thought might help on their quest.

And then … the wonder began.

It started with a young boy — maybe nine — who crept in through the open door, wide-eyed. He stared at the fire, then at the great, sleek lynx lying near Boaz. Thorne.

The boy gasped and took a step back, only to find a second set of glowing eyes — Kestel, perched on the broken crossbeam above, her feathers ruffling with quiet watchfulness.

He ran out of the Traveler’s Rest. A few minutes later, he came back in, dragging his mother by the hand. He pointed with his other hand, “are those…?” he whispered, tugging at his mother’s hand.

“They’re wild animals, but … tame?” she said softly. “God preserve us.”

Soon others filtered in — children, elders, even the wounded — drawn not by fire or food, but by word of the animals. They came quietly, cautiously, forming a half-circle near the recruits.

Mika lolled on her side, tail twitching with amusement. Eira preened herself with slow dignity. Tink snuck a chunk of bread from a distracted villager’s satchel and offered it to Boaz with a mischievous glint in her masked face.

No one spoke loudly. No one dared.

“These are Familiars,” Master Syrna said at last, rising to stand beside the hearth. Her voice was gentle. “Magical creatures, gifts, bound to our new deputies, as once they were long ago. They are protectors. And more.”

A murmur rippled through the crowd. Awe. Hope. Maybe even like faith, reverence.

Boaz knelt beside Thorne and ran a hand through his fur. The lynx didn’t purr — he never did — but his tail wrapped once around Boaz’s arm before falling still.

Cayden leaned against a beam, arms crossed. His eyes swept over the room — wounded villagers, grieving elders, wide-eyed children — and then to Boaz, lit in firelight, his Familiar beside him, the Sigil hidden at his belt.

He exhaled through his nose. “Not yet,” he thought, “but soon.”

The eastern sky was just beginning to pale when Cayden roused the group.

The deputies woke stiff-limbed and groggy, blankets heavy with night mist. The fire in the Traveler’s Rest had burned low, leaving only glowing coals in its stone hearth. Outside, villagers moved quietly, offering bundles of food, waterskins, spare boots. A few murmured words of blessing. None tried to stop them.

Boaz cinched his cloak tighter and stepped into the chill morning air. Thorne padded silently beside him, tail low, ears flicking at every sound. Around him, the others emerged — Jaxson grim-faced, Lyra yawning and stretching, Kiera braiding her hair with trembling fingers, Theo mumbling to Tink as he packed.

No one had much to say. Words would come later. Cayden stood near the edge of the village, arms crossed, eyes fixed toward the forest that loomed in the distance — a jagged silhouette of black-green against the slowly brightening sky.

“North and east,” he said as they gathered. “Straight into the Dimlaith. If we move steady, we can cover a third of the way to the old stone fork before nightfall.”

He looked to the Familiars — then to their humans. “We’ll need eyes ahead. Thorne. Kestel.”

The lynx raised his head, unblinking. The red-tailed hawk circled down from the thatch of a nearby roof and landed on Jaxson’s shoulder, talons light as breath.

“I think you’ll find that they won’t just look,” Cayden said. “They’ll feel. And you’ll feel it, too — if the bond is strong enough.”

Jaxson blinked. “Wait — you mean we’ll see what they see?”

“Not quite,” Syrna said from behind them. “But you’ll know. Shapes. Motion. Danger. Like an echo in your mind, if your mind’s open.”

No one spoke. Boaz glanced at Thorne, who gazed up at him with those uncanny eyes. As if he had always known this, and had simply waited for Boaz to catch up.

Then, without a sound, Thorne turned and darted into the brush. Kestel launched from Jaxson’s arm, wings beating silently as she soared ahead into the dim forest sky.

They set off.

Dimlaith rose around them like a living wall.

The trees were enormous — gnarled and ancient, with bark like scaled armor and roots like writhing stone. Mist clung low to the ground, curling around ankles and paws. The undergrowth was dense but not impassable, and the trail they followed twisted more than it climbed, snaking through gullies and long-dry streambeds.

Bird calls echoed oddly — distant, warped. Sunlight filtered through the branches in patches, but never quite touched the forest floor.

Boaz found himself glancing upward often, toward the shifting canopy, then toward the direction Thorne had vanished.

Then it hit him. A sudden jolt in his chest — not pain, but pressure. A sense of motion. Something watching. Something ahead.

He stopped mid-step.

A shape formed in his mind — the outline of a small figure crouched behind a fallen log. Not clear, but there. Intent. Waiting. He looked up sharply — and locked eyes with Thorne, fifty yards ahead, half-hidden in shadow.

The image vanished. Boaz exhaled.

“What was that?” Jaxson asked nearby, clutching his head with one hand. “Did you — did you ‘see’ something?”

“Not see,” Boaz murmured. “Felt.”

“It was like — like something was crawling behind my eyes,” Jaxson swore. From above, Kestel shrieked once and wheeled away to the east.

“They’re showing us the way,” Boaz said.

“Or warning us,” Cayden added grimly.

The party pressed on, quieter now, eyes scanning every shadow, every branch.

Dimlaith was no longer just a forest. It was a threshold. And they had crossed it.

By midday, the forest had changed.

Where once the trail had been clear — broken branches, scuffed earth, streaks of dark blood — now the signs were fewer, more subtle. A discarded shoe. A length of torn fabric caught on brambles. A smear of something that might have been soot … or ash.

Boaz felt it in his chest — a mounting pressure. Not quite fear. Not quite pain. More like a thread being drawn tighter with every step.

Thorne moved like a ghost through the brush ahead, never far from sight, but never still. From time to time, Boaz caught flickers — brief impressions, like half-remembered dreams: a sudden lurch, like a predator waiting in stillness. A burst of cold. The hint of a cry swallowed by trees.

Behind him, Jaxson muttered and rubbed his temples. “She’s not saying anything,” he whispered, glancing up as Kestel soared overhead. “But I can feel her pulling away. Like she’s trying to find a way around something.”

The others felt it too.

Theo had stopped cracking jokes. His brow furrowed, and even Tink was quiet, riding his shoulder with her ears flattened. Lyra kept flexing her hands like they itched for something — action, or release.

Kiera walked near the center of the group, silent but alert, her owl Familiar swooping silently from branch to branch above. Eira made no sound, but every so often her great horned head swiveled back behind them, watching the path.

Darkness grew in the forest, even though the sun hadn’t yet set.

Vines curled like fingers across the trail. Trees leaned closer together. Moss thickened on every surface. The wind had stilled entirely — even birdsong had ceased.

“What time is it?” Theo asked, barely above a whisper.

“Close to dusk,” Cayden replied. He hadn’t looked at the sun once.

They reached a clearing with a half-fallen tree arching overhead like a gate. Thorne stopped. Boaz stopped too — his breath caught. This time, the sensation was unmistakable. Not a flicker. Not a whisper.

A surge. Danger. Close. Watching. Waiting.

He staggered back half a step, and Thorne turned to face him, ears pinned, tail low. Not afraid — but ready.

Above, Kestel gave a sharp cry and banked hard eastward, then disappeared behind the trees.

Boaz looked to Cayden. “They’re close,” he said. “Not ahead. Around us.”

Jaxson swore softly. Cayden didn’t hesitate. “Then we make our stand here.” He looked around at the recruits and familiars. “No more hiding. They know we’re here — and I’d rather fight with light than stumble in the dark.”

He knelt beside the fallen tree and began clearing a circle in the leaf-matted soil. “We build a fire,” he said. “A big one. Circle formation, weapons ready. Eyes open.”

Boaz blinked. “But won’t that draw them in faster?”

Cayden stood, gaze hard. “If it does, let them come. Better that we have a fire and are prepared, than surprised and in the dark.”

It was a calculated risk — and they all felt it. But there was something reassuring in the firelight when it caught, fed by resinous pine and dried bark. Flames snapped and hissed like a challenge.

Thorne padded close to Boaz’s side, and the lynx’s fur gleamed oddly in the firelight — shadows rippling through it like smoke.

Warmth from the fire licked at Boaz’s skin, but didn’t comfort. It stirred something instead. A hum beneath his ribs. A tightness behind his eyes. Like the flame “knew” him. He didn’t speak of it. Not yet.

The others arranged themselves around the edge of the clearing. Jaxson checked his arrows. Lyra sharpened a blade that already gleamed. Kiera sat cross-legged, eyes closed, Eira perched silently behind her. Theo muttered to Tink about angles and distractions, half-scheming, half-nervous.

Above them, the dark trees watched. And just beyond them, something moved.

They had just taken their positions, fire crackling in defiance of the dark — when the sound came.

At first, it was distant. A single note, thin and reedy, like wind howling through a broken flute.

Then it swelled.

Other voices joined it — not in harmony, but in dissonant discord. Low groans. Screeches. A rising wail that curled into the soul like smoke into lungs.

Boaz froze.

The sound was everywhere and nowhere — seeping through trees, rising from the earth. It wasn’t just heard. It was felt. Bones vibrated with it. Teeth ached from it. Courage drained in the face of it.

Theo covered his ears. “What is that?”

Cayden was moving. “Positions! Stand fast!”

The recruits scrambled, forming a circle around the fire. Weapons drawn. Familiars bristling with tension.

Then — silence. A breath. A rustle. And they appeared.

Figures slipped from the woods like shadows given flesh — ten, but maybe more. Their movements were wrong — jerky, twitching, yet purposeful, and quick. Their eyes glowed faintly with a cold, internal light. Armor hung in shreds. Limbs were twisted, but strong. Their mouths were slack, but their hands held weapons with cruel precision.

Among them strode a taller figure, robed and hooded, its face hidden behind a mask of bone and thorns. The Handler.

“Hold,” Cayden said, blade raised. “Wait for them to—”

But they didn’t wait. The Handler raised one hand and clenched it into a fist.

The Fallen charged.

The battle was chaos.

Boaz barely had time to raise his blade before a Terran Fallen — short but stocky, with shattered teeth and broken plate armor — came barreling toward him. He dodged, slashed, felt resistance, then spray. Not blood — something darker. Thicker.

Thorne was a blur beside him, fangs bared, claws flashing, a hideous yowl coming from his throat.

To his left, Jaxson loosed arrow after arrow, each one striking true, but not always stopping his targets. Kestel shrieked above, raking talons across a creature’s eyes, trying to blind it.

Kiera stood her ground, a Fallen lunging at her only to be intercepted by Eira, who collided midair in a whirl of feathers and fury.

Theo stood too far forward. He was shouting — “I know you! Darnel, it’s me!“ — and for one fatal heartbeat, he didn’t raise his weapon.

The Huma Fallen surged forward and struck.

Theo screamed and went down, blood blooming across his thigh.

“No!” he cried. Tink leapt from his shoulder, flinging dirt and tools in a desperate effort to distract the attacker. Lyra was already sprinting to him, dragging him backward behind the fire.

Boaz turned — and locked eyes with the attacker.

It was Darnel. Or had been.

The young man’s face was half-rotted, jaw broken, but something in the eyes … Boaz hesitated.

Then he struck — hard and true, blade slicing across the neck. The body fell. The head rolled. Boaz dropped to his knees, gasping. The fire roared beside him, and his hand brushed a fallen ember.

Flame flared up his arm — not burning him, not yet, but … responding. He pulled away with a gasp. The flames had twisted toward him, bending unnaturally.

Thorne was at his side in an instant, shielding him from another charge. They fought on, but the Handler was not retreating. He stood at the edge of the clearing, arms raised, voice rising in a harsh, rasping chant that didn’t belong to any tongue the group had ever heard.

Cayden charged him, sword flashing — but the Handler swept one arm forward, and a wave of unseen force knocked him aside like a child’s doll. He hit a tree trunk with a sickening thud.

“Cayden!” Kiera shouted, starting toward him, but Eira pulled her back just in time to avoid a javelin thrown by one of the remaining Fallen.

The Handler stepped forward slowly, robes smoldering, shadow coiling around his hands like ink in water.

Boaz’s heart pounded. Thorne was beside him, growling low — but Boaz knew. Steel wouldn’t be fast enough.

The Handler raised one hand toward the fire, as Boaz recoiled in fear at him. Boaz backed away instinctively, stumbled and fell toward the fire. He landed on his left arm, his right still clutching his sword. Boaz saw the flames obey the Handler, rising, twisting. The bonfire turned black at the edges, beginning to fold inward.

Boaz pulled up from the fire, realizing how close he was to it, but then reached toward the fire with his left hand — he was drawn to it. He felt it. The warmth. The hunger. The truth of the flame.

He didn’t think.

He shouted a word he didn’t know, and something pulled from his chest like a breath he’d been holding all his life.

The fire answered.

It surged outward, not wild but aimed — a tongue of flame that leapt from the pit and struck the Handler full in the chest. The Handler staggered, screamed — not in pain, but in surprise. His shadows twisted against the flame, fought it, tried to hold it back.

Boaz leaned forward, still on the ground, and the fire followed.

The Handler raised his arms again, trying to call on the dark — but it faltered. The spell collapsed in his mouth. The flame had found a crack, and now it poured in.

With a final, shrieking wail, the Handler burst into flame — not like kindling, but like dry rot, crumbling from the inside. He fell to his knees, and then collapsed, his mask shattering against the stones.

Silence fell.

Only the fire remained, flickering now, innocent again.

Boaz stood frozen, breath ragged, his palm still glowing faintly. Sparks curled around his fingertips before vanishing. Thorne stared up at him, ears back — not in fear, but something close to reverence.

“Boaz…” Jaxson breathed. “What did you just do?”

Boaz shook his head, still staring at the ashes where the Handler had stood. “I don’t know.”

Theo lay pale, sweating, a ragged gash in his leg. Kiera knelt beside him, whispering, hands glowing faintly with a soft warmth as she pressed against the wound. It slowed the bleeding, resealed, but would leave a scar. The magical healing came as no surprise to anyone, since she had been practicing. Theo was much relieved however.

Boaz sat staring at the corpse he had felled. The face that had once been Darnel stared blankly back, frozen in twisted agony.

“By Elyndor,” Jaxson muttered, turning aside in disgust. “They were people.”

“No,” Lyra snapped, panting, “They were monsters.”

Boaz didn’t speak. He looked around at the bodies. The warped limbs. The broken armor. The vacant, glowing eyes. And he felt … not just horror.

He felt grief. “They didn’t ask for this,” he said softly.

Cayden, limping now, crouched beside him. “No,” he agreed. “But it’s them or us.”

Boaz didn’t look away from the corpse.

“There has to be more than that.”

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