Twelve hours earlier
The river ran slow beneath the dusk.
It was said that the River Nareth never stopped moving, even when the world did.
Its waters wound like veins through the kingdom — carrying fish, silt, whispers, and war.
At the ferry outpost of Branmeadow, dusk settled thick as ash. The air smelled of wet reed and iron. A few barges rocked lazily by the docks, their ropes creaking against wooden posts.
A man named Korran Hale, ferryman and part-time watchman, sat upon the edge of the pier with his boots in the water. He watched the current ripple around his feet and spat into it, watching the spit drift like a tiny ghost.
"They say the king's gone half-mad," came a voice behind him.
It was Willem, one of the dock guards — younger, red-haired, his cloak too big for him. He leaned on a pike that had never tasted blood.
Korran didn't turn. "You'll want to keep your voice lower than that, boy."
"Lower than the frogs?" Willem asked, smirking. "The whole river croaks it now. They say he bleeds the princess to wake old gods."
Korran's jaw tightened. "You say that again, and the next boat that drifts down this river will have you in it."
The boy shrugged, half amused, half afraid.
"Still," he muttered, "folk are uneasy. The tides've gone strange. The Nareth runs higher every night, even with no rain. The old woman from the mill says she saw a ship's light on the southern bend — no sails, no sound, just drifting against the current."
Korran finally looked up. His eyes were the color of the water — dull and deep. "Ships don't drift upriver."
"That's what she said."
The ferryman rose, wiping his hands on his tunic. Across the dark expanse, the far bank lay hidden beneath fog. The reeds swayed as though something moved among them.
He listened. Only the night — the chirring of crickets, the faint rush of water.
But the river had a different sound tonight, a low hum beneath the surface, like breath caught in a giant throat.
"You hear that?" Willem whispered.
Korran frowned. "I hear the river."
"No," the boy said. "The river's listening."
Korran chuckled — a dry sound that didn't hide the tremor beneath. "You've been drinking the brewer's ale again."
Yet even as he said it, he felt the air change. A wind crept in from the south, carrying the scent of salt — something that should not have reached this far inland.
Both men turned toward the horizon.
Through the dusk, far down the curve of the Nareth, a faint flicker appeared — not torchlight, but something colder, steadier, like a reflection that refused to fade.
It lingered for a heartbeat. Then another joined it. Then a third.
Korran's throat went dry. "Fetch the horn," he said softly.
Willem stared, frozen. "It's just—"
"Now."
The boy scrambled away. Korran stayed by the water's edge, his eyes never leaving the dark ribbon of river stretching southward. The lights were still there — moving slowly, deliberately, as though drawn by the current itself.
He whispered to no one, voice almost drowned by the wind:
"Storms don't come from the sky no more… they come sailing."
The river gave no answer — only the long sigh of its current, carrying secrets toward the heart of the realm.
WAR'S END
When the heavens quarreled, it was men who burned.
And when men grew weary, the gods fell silent.
— The Oaths of Old Wars, Hermsbrone Archives
The river carried its whispers west.
Past reed-choked bends and hollow mills, it wound through fields turned to ghostlight, through valleys where only wind dared remember.
By dawn, the current had gathered what men left unsaid—the taste of fear, the scent of salt, the hush before the storm—and bore it toward the dying lands.
Beyond the reach of the Nareth, where soil hardened to stone and the sky forgot its color, the land rose into the ashen highlands of Hermsbrone.
The wind there had the sound of memory—slow, mournful, and eternal.
And upon its crown stood the fortress called War's End.
Its black walls loomed through the morning fog, each stone a scar of battles past. The mists coiled around its towers like spirits too weary to wander further. For a thousand years it had watched the western horizon, silent and steadfast—a monument not to victory, but to endurance.
The axe broke the hush with a slow, deliberate rhythm.
Each strike sank deep into the trunk, dull thuds rolling across the fog-laden hills. The air hung thick with mist, tasting faintly of salt from the western sea.
The man's breath came white; his beard rimed with frost. Around him, the forest stood still—not lifeless, but listening.
When the final blow split the wood, the tree groaned and fell, its weight shaking the sodden earth. The man paused, scarred hands resting upon the axe haft. For a moment he looked upon the fallen trunk as one might look upon a slain beast—without triumph, without regret.
He gathered the firewood in his arms and made his way down the narrow path, his boots crunching upon the frost-hardened ground.
The climb back toward the fortress was long; the air thinned as he ascended.
Above him, the horns of the watchtower sounded through the fog—deep, solemn notes that told the land its guardians still endured.
Through a break in the mist, the fortress revealed itself upon the hill's crown: black stone walls, stark against the pale horizon.
War's End.
It rose as though carved by gods long forgotten—its battlements veiled in cloud, its windows dim with the red glow of forge-fire. Even from afar, it seemed less built than remembered.
Erwin of the Seven rode his horse the last stretch toward the gate.
The sentinels upon the tower saw him approach and called aloud:
"Horse!"
"Open the gate!"
The iron doors groaned apart. He passed through without a word, hooves clattering upon the cobblestones, the sound swallowed swiftly by the fortress's silence.
Within, the yard thrummed with quiet purpose—the hiss of steel upon whetstone, the clank of armor, the crackle of forges that never slept.
Erwin dismounted, the old horse blowing steam into the dusk. He led it to the stables beneath the northern wall, the smell of hay and iron thick in the cooling air.
The yard was empty now—training had ended hours ago—but the echoes of it lingered: roars of instructors, the ring of blades, the breath of young men trying to outlast the day. All that remained was the stillness that follows noise, the kind that makes silence feel alive.
A raven perched upon the thatch, watching him with the patience of something that had seen men come and go too often to care.
Inside the yard, the fortress breathed its usual rhythm — hammer against anvil, steel against stone, the murmur of fires dying low. War's End never truly slept; it merely waited between storms.
He had just set the firewood by the storehouse when he heard the noise — voices gathering near the post-yard. Curious, he followed. A small crowd had formed beneath the high balcony where the Lord Commander often spoke. At its center stood a boy, pale and trembling, his voice breaking through the air like a wound that refused to close.
"I saw it!" the boy cried. "By the realm, I swear it true! They're all dead!"
Erwin slowed. The lad's cloak was torn, his eyes hollow. His hair was still matted with ash, his face pale with sleeplessness. Something in him looked scorched from the inside.
"What killed them?" someone demanded.
"And where are the bodies, boy?"
The question seemed to unravel him further. His words stumbled out like stones tripping over one another.
"I—I couldn't bring them back… not all of them. The road was long, the horses wouldn't move. They were gone before I—" His voice faltered. "There was… nothing left. Not a sound. Not even blood."
A ripple went through the men — uneasy, mocking, fearful.
"Gone? Gone where?" one called. "The wind take them?"
Erik's lips quivered. "It wasn't wind. It was like the air itself went still — like it was waiting. Then everything was… quiet."
Laughter broke through the crowd like a cruel wind.
"Hear that? The boy left his ghosts behind!"
"Maybe the shadows chased him home!"
But not everyone laughed. A few older men watched in silence, eyes narrowing. Even Erwin felt the cold crawl up his spine. The boy was trembling, but not lying. He had the look of someone who had seen something the world was not built to hold.
The crowd fell still when the heavy steps of the Lord Commander crossed the courtyard. His voice carried like iron drawn from the forge.
"Enough."
He stopped before the boy, the light of the setting sun turning the steel on his breastplate to fire.
"What is your name?"
"Erik, Lord Commander."
The Commander studied him. "You say your regiment is gone?"
"Yes," Erik whispered. "Gone... All gone."
"How?"
He hesitated. "I don't know, my lord. There was a sound — like thunder without sky — then silence. I called to them, but no one answered. I… I rode back alone."
A murmur spread, uneasy, low as thunder.
The Commander's tone hardened.
"You'll rest. At dawn, you'll speak before my scribe. Until then, hold your tongue. We deal in truth here, not fever dreams."
Erik bowed his head, the shame in him too raw to hide.
The Commander turned and strode off, leaving silence in his wake—silence that no man wanted to fill.
The soldiers dispersed in uneasy clusters. Erwin lingered. He had seen boys break before, seen them tremble after their first blood. But this was different. Whatever Erik had seen had hollowed him.
He turned back toward the stables, the weight of the evening pressing upon him. Even as he walked, the boy's words clung to him like smoke: "They're gone… all gone."
War's End was old—older than the crowns it served. It had heard too many such words in its time. The forge-fire hissed as if in answer, and the wind shifted through the courtyard with a voice that almost sounded like memory.
Behind him, the boy still stood alone, the fading sun painting him in red. Somewhere in the distance, a hammer struck three times—slow, heavy, deliberate.
Erwin paused, glancing back once more. "The gods help you, lad," he murmured.
But the gods, as all in War's End knew, had been silent for a very long time.
The yard had emptied, leaving only the soft rasp of wind against the walls.
Erik stood where the others had left him, alone beneath the dying light, staring at the place where laughter had mocked him moments before.
Then a voice came from behind — low, certain.
"I've seen it too."