Before Rodrik Vanhart was a man of curses and conspiracies, he was a man of the battlefield.
Steel had once sung his worth long before whispers of failure had.
On lands where frost bit into armor and beasts howled beneath pale moons, he had stood.
Not as the heir.
Not as the noble.
But as the line that refused to break.
He did not remember all his victories.
He did remember every name lost to them.
The wind screamed through the ruined watchtower's cracks as Rodrik sat alone. Snow rustled softly against the stone, thin flakes glimmering like ghosts drifting across his vision.
He felt the ache in his bones again.
The curse clawing.
But the cold reminded him of something older than pain.
It reminded him of winter campaigns.
Where only movement kept men alive.
Where words froze before reaching mouths.
Where a leader's silence could mean death.
Long before he broke Lysenne Malloren's future, he had saved others.
Long before he crushed reputation, he had held the line.
And as he stared at the dying embers in the brazier, he remembered.
The First Frost Battle – Age 17
It was early winter, the night skies storm-thick. A herd of Fellhorns had broken through the eastern trench. Massive, tusked beasts, apex predators of the north range. One beast could overturn carriages. A pack could wipe out villages.
Rodrik was only seventeen.
His father still lived then, but bedridden with fever.
Elaine buried in administrative repairs.
Rodrik was sent.
Thirty soldiers, two hastily constructed barricades, and a night that smelled like iron and fear.
He remembered standing before the men—just boys, barely older than he was. Cloaks clutched tight against the wind.
"Retreat?" one asked in a trembling whisper.
Rodrik stared ahead at the dark ridge where shadows moved.
"We hold," he replied.
"But if they break the line—"
"They will," Rodrik said.
The soldiers froze.
Rodrik looked at them. His expression did not waver.
"If they break us," he said, "they break the village behind us."
He lifted his spear.
"So we break first."
The Fellhorn pack thundered across the snow.
Rodrik charged.
He never forgot that night.
Not because of victory.
Because of the first scream he heard as one of his men was crushed beneath hooves.
The first time he killed something bigger than a horse, his spear snapping in half inside the creature's chest.
He remembered the metallic taste of blood mixing with frost as he stood above a fallen comrade at dawn.
Only twelve survived.
Rodrik's aura ignition left him coughing ice for days.
But the village was untouched.
And the men who lived began calling him Iron Winter.
He never asked for that name.
The Eight-Day Siege at Sharcrest Pass
Three years later.
Bandits, ex-soldiers from border wars, had taken Sharcrest Pass—a narrow mountain path critical for trade. They held hostages. Demanded Vanhart yield taxes for an entire year.
Rodrik led seventy.
Against two hundred hostiles.
"Withdraw?" his lieutenant suggested. "Wait for reinforcements?"
Rodrik studied the pass. The snow build-up. The avalanche traces.
He shook his head.
"No reinforcements."
"But—"
"We move tonight. And we bring the mountain with us."
That night, he led an attack above the bandit camp instead of through it. Climbing crags with bare hands, frostbitten fingers digging into stone.
They set charges beneath the ridge.
At his signal, they detonated.
The avalanche swallowed half the enemy instantly.
Many hostages died as well.
He ordered a charge into the chaos.
The battle was brutal.
He lost twenty-three men.
One of them, Captain Garon, died shielding him from falling debris.
As he died, Garon smiled faintly.
"You gamble too coldly, Rodrik."
Rodrik's eyes had burned.
"Was it worth it?" Garon asked, voice hoarse.
Rodrik stared down at him.
"It had to be."
Garon nodded once.
"Then win more times than you lose."
He died.
Rodrik never forgot that line.
Or that cost.
The pass was reclaimed.
Empire praised House Vanhart's "strategic brilliance."
Families of the hostages mourned.
Rodrik kept their names.
Every one.
Spring Hunt – Year 24
No battle.
A monster purge.
A lesser ice wyvern nesting near farming routes.
He led a hunt—just fifteen elite rangers.
Among them was Halden—a common-born soldier who believed Rodrik walked too far alone.
Halden pushed past orders and stood beside Rodrik in the final clash.
The wyvern fell.
But so did Halden, pierced through by the creature's tail.
Rodrik caught him.
Blood seeping through the snow.
Halden laughed.
"You… you look confused, sir."
Rodrik did.
Confused.
Halden's smile softened.
"I followed so you'd learn… it's not wrong… to be followed…"
He exhaled.
The snow fell.
Rodrik remained kneeling there for hours.
Until every tear dried in the wind.
Spring Thaw Border Conflict
A neighboring southern house tried claiming river rights.
Rodrik negotiated.
They drew steel.
A brief skirmish.
Rodrik disarmed their commander without killing him.
When asked how, soldiers whispered about his unnaturally still eyes—eyes like someone already mourning something else.
Enemies later called him The Quiet Blade.
They feared him.
But those who fought under him feared more the way he carried their deaths.
Friends Made. Friends Lost.
He remembered each.
Garon – fell to avalanche debris. He used to joke that Rodrik had the soul of a storm.
Halden – died smiling. Said Rodrik walked ahead so much he forgot how to walk with.
Sergeant Maya Arinth – bled out after defending a child in a raid. She once told Rodrik she joined his squad "because you looked like a man who kept promises."
Old Captain Drew – survived three campaigns but died of frost infection later. His last words: "Rodrik… when did you last sleep easy?"
Rodrik had no answer.
Not then.
Not ever.
He made comrades.
Shared harsh victories.
Broke bread beside them.
Then watched them die.
One by one.
Each loss a crack.
Not visible.
Not immediate.
But deep.
Until something else touched that fracture.
And finally split it.
The Last Memory Before Darkness
A winter night, four years ago.
They returned from a successful border defense.
No casualties.
A rare clean win.
The men drank, sang rough songs about winter warriors.
Rodrik sat by the fire.
Their laughter washed over him.
He did not join.
Captain Rhel approached him quietly.
"Commander," he said.
Rodrik looked up.
"You won," Rhel said. "Tonight, you can rest."
Rodrik stared at the flames.
He spoke slowly.
"…How long do you think the house will last?"
Rhel blinked.
Rodrik's eyes did not leave the fire.
"If I win one hundred battles," he murmured, "but lose the estate, was any of it victory?"
Rhel didn't answer immediately.
He looked at Rodrik.
And instead of greeting him as superior, he placed a hand on his shoulder.
"Then fight for both," he said softly. "But not alone."
Rodrik looked at the hand.
Did not remove it.
But when morning came—
he rode back out.
Alone.
Because Rodrik could only lead.
He could not allow himself to be followed.
Not truly.
The wind howled louder now in the present.
Rodrik exhaled slowly, frost rising from his lips.
How many times had he walked back alone?
How many times had the battlefield asked him to threaten death—
while the estate asked him to postpone decay?
He had carried two wars.
Inside and out.
And when the world gave him one moment of bitter chance—
he reached out.
Not for salvation.
But for leverage.
But leverage held by poison does not lift.
It drags.
Rodrik opened his hand slowly.
His palm trembled subtly from the curse.
He stared at that trembling.
He spoke quietly into the cold room.
"I had comrades once."
His breath misted.
"I had victories once."
He traced a finger across an old scar at his collar.
"And I had reasons once."
He lowered his hand.
Eyes dark, empty.
"Somewhere," he whispered to nobody alive,
"between the battlefield and the hall… I stopped fighting for them."
"And started fighting… only to not be forgotten."
He stared out through the cracked window.
Snow fell gently.
Like memories.
Indifferent.