Chapter 11 — Training Before the Storm
Auron stepped outside, letting the canvas flap fall shut behind him. The cold morning air brushed his face, carrying the scent of pine and ash.
The camp was alive again but quieter than before. No laughter, no shouting. Only the muted rhythm of survival.
Guards hammered metal fittings into broken wagons, turning them into barricades. Servants hauled sacks of grain and crates of arrows toward the center. Smoke from small fires coiled upward, mixing with the pale sunlight that struggled through the trees.
Auron walked through it all in silence. His eyes moved from face to face some fearful, some determined, all haunted.
He sat on a rock, letting his body rest while his mind refused to. He looked up at the colorless sky.
"Grandfather," he murmured, "if you were here… what would you have done?"
No answer came back. Only wind.
He sat for a while longer, staring into the void. Ten minutes passed before he rose again, brushing the frost from his cloak.
Near the barricades, Garrick's voice cut through the air. "Outward, you fools! Spikes face outward! You want to impale yourselves before the Beastborn arrive?"
The two gaurds scrambled to fix their mistake. Garrick noticed Auron and gave a curt nod reluctant, but respectful.
"You really think that plan of yours will hold?" Garrick asked, voice rough from command.
Auron studied the half-built defenses. "It will hold if courage does. Plans fail when men forget what they're built for."
Garrick grunted. "Courage's a fine word, boy. But steel and strength hold better than speeches."
"Then make sure your steel doesn't tremble when the Beastborn come knocking," Auron said evenly, then walked past. Garrick muttered something under his breath that Auron chose not to hear.
*********
He reached the northern edge of the camp, where the ground dipped toward the forest. The air was colder here, quieter. Beside an old training dummy bundled straw on a wooden post he stopped. Someone had set it up for drills days ago.
Auron unsheathed Vowkeeper. The blade caught a glint of morning light before dulling again, absorbing the gray around it.
He knelt and pulled the small leather-bound book from his cloak: The Sword of Judgment.
He opened to the page he had studied last night. The words seemed almost alive in daylight.
A sword is not forged by metal, but by will. It does not cut through flesh; it cuts through hesitation.
He whispered the line aloud, then rose into stance one foot forward, shoulders loose, eyes steady. The wind brushed his hair across his face. His breath slowed until he could feel each heartbeat. Then he moved.
The first strike was clean and level. The straw shook
The second flowed from the first, guided by rhythm, not strength.
The third sang through air, sharp and precise.
Each motion was a dialogue between instinct and memory. His body remembered Godfrey's lessons; discipline, precision, awareness but this book demanded more. It asked for intent.
"When the sword and the heart beat as one," he murmured, "the first door opens."
The world seemed to slow. For an instant, his heartbeat pulsed through the blade, a faint echo, real and fleeting. Then it vanished.
He exhaled, frustration flickering. "Not yet."
A voice broke the quiet. "I thought you were supposed to be resting."
Lucian approached, cloak loose around his shoulders, fatigue shadowing his eyes but there was light in them now, the kind that comes after breaking.
Auron lowered his sword. "Rest is for those who can afford it."
Lucian's mouth curved. "Then you are poorer than most." His gaze flicked to the dummy, straw torn and frayed. "That book you are reading, does it truly teach something new?"
"It teaches understanding," Auron said. "The sword moves as the soul commands. If your soul is clouded, your blade is blind."
Lucian tilted his head. "That sounds like something a priest would say."
"Maybe the gods wrote it before priests learned to talk."
Lucian gave a quiet laugh, then looked toward camp. "I wish I had your calm. The men are obeying, but they no longer believe in victory."
"They will," Auron said, "when you do."
Lucian's shoulders sank slightly. "Belief is costly. Every order feels like a debt paid in blood."
Auron sheathed his blade. "Then fight for what you can live with, not what you can win."
Lucian blinked, then huffed a breath somewhere between disbelief and admiration. "You are a strange one."
"Strange men tend to survive wars."
Lucian lingered a while longer, watching Auron return to reading, before turning back to oversee the camp.
***********
Evening came, and the camp sought distraction.
Some men sharpened blades. Others told quiet stories by the fire, their laughter brittle but real.
Auron still trained. His muscles burned, each movement slower, more deliberate. He traced the constellations inked across the book's pages, imagining the current of mana described within.
Then he felt it a tremor in the air, subtle as breath.
From the forest's edge, something shifted. A shape half-hidden by mist. Too large for a deer. Too silent for a man.
Auron's hand moved to his sword. The presence lingered, then vanished like smoke.He waited. Nothing. Only the hum of wind through the trees.
"They're watching," he murmured.
He turned back to the book. The next passage drew his eye:
The Astral Stage The blade that sees all. To perceive life's flow is to see where death begins.
He studied the illustration; a figure surrounded by drifting motes of light, each thread connecting one heartbeat to another.
He closed his eyes and tried to feel it. The world thinned. His breath aligned with the pulse of the air. For a moment, the current stirred around him thin, fragile, but there.
It slipped away. But not completely.
He smiled faintly. "So that's what you meant."
When he opened his eyes, the sun had begun to set. Orange light painted the camp in fire and shadow.
Lucian was speaking with Garrick near the center, posture steadier, voice sharper. The men listened not convinced, but less afraid. Auron watched from afar, noting the change. The boy was learning to stand.
Lucian caught his gaze and called out. "You've been at it since morning. I was starting to think you'd turned to stone."
Auron gave a thin smile. "Statues break easily. I don't."
Lucian grinned. "Then prove it."
Auron raised an eyebrow. "How?"
Lucian gestured toward the training ground. "A friendly duel. I've not sparred since we left the palace. If I'm to lead, I must remember what real intent feels like."
"You're serious."
Lucian nodded. "Very."
Auron sighed, unbuckling his cloak. "Then I won't be kind."
"I wouldn't ask you to be."
The camp gathered, forming a loose ring. For the first time in days, tension gave way to anticipation.
Lucian drew a slender practice blade the kind mages used for channeling focus. Its edge shimmered faintly with frost.
Auron drew Vowkeeper. The steel hummed softly, resonating with the air.
They faced each other, the firelight flickering between them.
Lucian said quietly, "Begin when you're ready."
Auron studied him: the set of his shoulders, the small tremor in his hands, the glimmer of frost gathering at his fingertips. Then he moved.
Vowkeeper swept forward in a blur of silver. Lucian's glyphs ignited in an ice-blue circle. A shard of frost shot past Auron's cheek; he twisted aside, cleaving it midair. Shards scattered like glass.
Lucian's breath came out in a white plume. "You said patience was a virtue. Let's test that."
Spears of ice formed and darted toward Auron. He moved through them like a shadow blade flashing left, right, faster, until the air itself seemed to shatter.
Lucian stepped back, gathering mana. Frost spread under his boots. "Too slow," he warned, releasing a surge of ice.
Auron burst forward through the wave. Steam hissed where cold met heat. He closed the distance, blade descending toward Lucian's shoulder.
Lucian reacted instinctively, summoning a wall of ice. Vowkeeper met it with a thunderous crack, fracturing it into shards.
Lucian stumbled back, panting. "You break everything, don't you?"
Auron's tone was calm. "Only what stands in my way."
Lucian drew deeper from his mana well, three glyphs spinning around his wrist. A sheet of frost spread across the ground. Auron's footing slipped a fraction and Lucian struck. A spear of light flew.
It grazed Auron's shoulder, scoring a shallow line.
"You should've dodged fully," Lucian said.
"I did," Auron replied, stepping in close.
His blade traced two silver arcs that stopped inches from Lucian's throat and chest—perfect, controlled. Each stroke carried intent without killing edge.
Lucian raised an ice-armored forearm; Auron's final strike clashed against it, sparks scattering blue and white.
Lucian gritted his teeth, channeling one last burst of frost a pulse of glacial light straight at Auron's chest. The explosion flared white.
When the frost cleared, Auron stood within reach, cloak rimmed with ice, eyes burning steady. He tapped Lucian's chest lightly with the flat of Vowkeeper.
"Your control is strong," he said quietly. "But fear still guides your aim."
Lucian's breath came ragged. "You walked through that?"
"It wasn't meant to kill," Auron said.
Lucian stared, realizing he had indeed held back. "And if I hadn't?"
Auron lowered his blade. "Then I wouldn't be teaching you."
Silence filled the camp. Frost glimmered across the dirt where they stood.
Lucian straightened, exhaustion melting into clarity. "So that's what mastery feels like."
Auron shook his head. "No. That's restraint."
Lucian exhaled, almost smiling. "Then I'll learn both."
The circle of onlookers broke apart, murmuring quietly. Some clapped, others whispered but all had seen it: the young heir who commanded ice, and the stranger who walked through it unbroken.
Lucian stepped close, voice low. "Thank you. Not just for the duel."
Auron met his gaze. "Don't thank me yet." He looked toward the treeline, where the mist thickened like breath. "The real duel begins when they arrive."
Lucian followed his eyes. "Then we'll be ready."
The wind stirred, carrying the faint scent of rain and something darker.
Auron rested his hand on Vowkeeper's hilt. "Let them come.