The wolfswood was a different beast when you walked through it to leave forever. The familiar shadows of the ancient trees no longer felt like a childhood playground but like grasping fingers trying to hold us back. Every league we covered was a league further from the life we were supposed to live, and the weight of that choice settled deeper into our bones with every step.
The journey was a grueling, monotonous cycle of walking and resting, fueled by a grim resolve. The initial, sharp grief of our departure had been worn down by the harsh reality of survival, leaving a cold, hollow ache in its place. The glowing mark on my chest was a constant presence—not a painful brand, but a quiet, persistent tether, reminding me of the limits the curse imposed.
On the third night, huddled under a crude shelter Torren had fashioned from a fallen log, he watched me stare into the flames of our small, carefully concealed fire.
"You're quiet," he stated, pushing a strip of dried meat into my hand. It was an order.
I took it, my appetite long since vanished. "Just thinking," I said, my voice hoarse. "The tether… it feels stronger out here. Like we're close to its edge."
Torren nodded, his gaze unwavering. He didn't understand the 'how' of it all—the dimension, the curse, the power buzzing beneath my skin—but he understood the 'why'. He understood the necessity of it. "The coast, then," he said. It wasn't a question.
He was right. A few days later, the dense forest thinned, the scent of pine replaced by the sharp tang of salt and decay. We emerged onto a desolate stretch of coastline under a perpetually grey sky. Miles of black sand were littered with driftwood bleached white like the bones of long-dead leviathans. It was a place of profound emptiness, a fitting shore from which to launch an exile.
We stood there for a long moment, the endless, mournful sigh of the waves the only sound. I looked back at the dark line of the forest, the last bastion of the North, the last piece of my home. The ache in my chest was a physical thing, a crushing weight of loss for the father I would disappoint and the mother I would grieve. This was real. This was the point of no return.
"It's time," I said, my voice barely a whisper.
I turned to the sea and took a deep breath, pushing the sorrow down and pulling a different energy up. I pressed my hand to my chest, and the mark beneath my tunic pulsed with a soft, internal light. It wasn't a curse flaring to life; it was a key turning in a lock. I focused my will, pouring a silent command through it—a beacon sent out across the waves.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then, the horizon shifted.
Out of the thick bank of mist, a silhouette emerged, one that defied every law of this world. It was long and impossibly sleek, forged from a metal as dark and seamless as a starless night sky. There were no sails, no oars, no visible means of propulsion. It moved with an unnatural grace and a terrifying silence, cutting through the grey waves like a predator. Windows, made of a clear, crystalline material, glowed with a warm, steady light from within.
Torren gasped, his hand flying to the hilt of his dagger before falling away, his face a mask of pure, unadulterated awe. "By the gods, old and new… Rudr, what is that?"
But I felt no fear of the vessel. A familiar thrum of energy resonated from it, a faint echo of my own power. It was my creation, a marvel born from a dimension of infinite possibility. Seeing it here, in this bleak world, brought a bitter sort of pride, immediately overshadowed by the profound sorrow of why it had to be here at all.
I looked from the magnificent ship to my friend's awestruck face. "That is our transport," I said, my voice steady despite the storm in my heart. "It will take us to our new home."
The chariot for our self-imposed exile had arrived. Home was behind us; a chosen sanctuary lay somewhere across that grey, unforgiving sea.