The clearing held its breath.
Behind me, the soldiers crashed through the undergrowth, swearing and snapping branches.In front of me, the figure under the twisted roots remained perfectly still.
Not human.
Not a beast I recognized.
It was half-shadow, half-shape—its outline blurred, like the forest had tried to remember how to make a creature and given up halfway. Long, branch-like antlers curled from a narrow skull, eyes hollow yet gleaming with a faint, pale light. Its body was lean, too lean, with legs that seemed more like bundled roots than flesh.
The forest around it bent, ever so slightly, as if leaning away.
My fractured core pulsed once.
The creature's head tilted.
It saw me.
Wonderful.
"Spread out!" a soldier barked behind me. "He can't have gone far!"
Too close.
I stepped sideways, slowly, putting a thicker tree between myself and the line of sight from behind. The creature's gaze tracked the movement, unblinking.
It didn't advance.
It didn't retreat.
It just… waited.
Like a test.
The undergrowth rustled. One of the soldiers broke through a moment later, armor scraping bark. He saw me and grinned, visor lifting just enough to show teeth.
"There you are," he said.
He didn't see the thing in front of me.
Not yet.
"Turn around," he ordered. "Hands where I can see them. The captain wants survivors."
Survivors, I thought. How generous.
My fingers brushed my belt out of habit.
They found leather.
A small, familiar weight.
My hand closed around it.
For a heartbeat, the chaos of burning houses and screaming people blurred, replaced by a memory that hadn't had time to settle yet.
Just before Elian had stepped out into the firelit street—sword at his side, jaw set—he'd paused.
"Wait," he'd said suddenly.
I'd turned, confused.
He'd gone to the corner of the room, reached beneath an old cloak hanging from a peg, and pulled something from a hidden sheath nailed to the wall.
A knife.
Not ornate. Not the weapon of a noble or a knight.
A hunter's tool.
The blade was straight, just longer than my hand, its edge maintained with care. The handle was leather-wrapped, worn smooth by years of use.
He'd held it out to me, hilt first.
"I used this before I ever held a soldier's sword," Elian had said. His voice hadn't shaken. His eyes had been steady. "Kept food on the table. Kept wolves off our backs."
I'd stared at it, not reaching.
"Why now?" I'd asked.
"Because running doesn't always work," he'd replied quietly. "Sometimes something gets in front of you instead of behind. When that happens—"
He had taken my hand, pressed the hilt into my palm, and closed my fingers around it.
"A blade only cuts where you decide," he'd said. "Remember that, Elias. The world will try to make you swing it for the wrong reasons."
Our eyes had met.
He'd held my gaze for a moment, then let go.
"Get your mother out," he'd said.
Then he'd turned away.
And walked into the fire.
Now, in the darkness of Duskwood, the leather felt warm against my palm.
The soldier took a step closer. "I said, hands where I—"
The creature behind me shifted.
Its head dipped. Antlers scraped softly against the roots above.
The soldier's eyes finally cut past me.
He froze.
"What in the—"
The creature moved.
Roots flexed. The air pressed down, thick and heavy. Every instinct in my body screamed at me to drop flat, so I did, hitting the ground just as something like a gust of silent wind slammed outward from the creature's chest.
It wasn't air.
It was… absence.
The soldier's shout turned into a strangled gasp as the darkness between him and the creature shuddered, then snapped inward. For a heartbeat his body blurred—stretched, then compressed, like the world itself had hiccuped around him.
Then the sound hit.
A dull, wet crack.
His armor folded in on itself, ribs twisting with it. He hit the ground in a boneless heap, limbs at wrong angles.
Behind him, the other two soldiers stumbled into the clearing, weapons raised.
They saw the corpse.
They saw the creature.
Their confidence wavered.
"Back!" one hissed. "That's not part of the mission—"
The creature's hollow gaze turned toward them.
I didn't wait.
I scrambled backward on hands and feet, then turned and ran, keeping low. I wove between roots and bushes, using the creature as an unwilling distraction.
Behind me, more muffled cracks echoed. Someone screamed. Someone else didn't get the chance.
The forest swallowed the noises quickly.
I am not ready to deal with that, I thought, my breath coming in ragged pulls. Not now.
Right now, there was only one objective:
Find Maeve. Keep her alive.
Everything else could burn.
It took longer than I liked to catch up to her.
Even terrified, even half-blind in a forest that didn't want her, she had followed my instructions: north, hugging the slope, staying away from open ground. For someone who had lived her whole life in a small village, she moved better than some mercenaries I'd known.
I found her crouched behind a fallen log, clutching her bundle so tightly her knuckles were white. Her head snapped up at the sound of my approach.
"Elias!" she breathed. "Thank the— Are you hurt?"
"Not enough to matter," I said.
The lie felt thick on my tongue.
Every breath scraped against the inside of my ribs. My core ached with a deep, pulsing pain that radiated outward, turning my limbs heavy. Using the fracture twice in one night—once near the village, once to tug at Duskwood's roots—had not been wise.
Necessary, but not wise.
Maeve reached for my face, fingertips trembling as she checked for injuries. Her hands smelled of herbs and smoke and fear.
"You shouldn't have stayed behind," she whispered. "You're just a boy—"
No, I thought.
But I didn't correct her.
"Can you still run?" I asked instead.
Her jaw clenched. She nodded. "Where?"
"Deeper," I said. "Past the old hunting ridge, if we can reach it. The soldiers are hesitant to come too deep. The forest doesn't favor metal and arrogance."
At least, not the kind they brought.
We moved again.
The sounds of the burning village faded behind us, replaced by the layered murmurs of the forest at night: rustling leaves, distant calls, the low creak of old branches shifting. Somewhere far off, something howled—long and low.
I made note of the direction.Not near.
Not yet a problem.
Branches scraped my arms. Roots lurked like traps under the leaves. More than once, Maeve stumbled, and I grabbed her elbow, steadying her.
"Elias," she said once, voice strained, "what was that thing? The… the shadow creature?"
"I don't know," I said honestly. "Something old. Something bound to the forest. It didn't like the soldiers."
She shuddered. "I don't like it, either."
"Good," I said. "You shouldn't."
She gave a breathless laugh that was closer to a sob.
"You really are your father's son," she murmured.
The words hit something in me I didn't have time to examine.
We climbed a steep section of rocky ground, then descended into a hollow where the trees grew denser. The air here felt different—heavier, richer, saturated with old Arcanum. The hair on my arms rose.
This was deeper than I'd ever brought myself before.
But tonight wasn't about careful, incremental exploration.
Tonight was about survival.
"Rest," I said finally. "Just for a moment."
Maeve sank onto a low, mossy stone, chest rising and falling quickly. Her face was pale in the dim light, but her eyes were clear.
"How far do you think your father—" She stopped herself, swallowed. "How far do you think they'll chase us?"
"They won't want to lose men in the dark to beasts and formations they don't understand," I said. "They came to burn a village, not cleanse a forest."
"And if their orders say otherwise?" she asked quietly.
Then they'll die in here, I thought. Or I will.
Before I could answer, the forest made the decision for me.
A branch snapped to our right.
Not the light crack of a small animal.
The heavy, deliberate break of something large stepping where it didn't care to be quiet.
I stiffened.
Maeve's hand found my sleeve.
Voices followed—low, clipped, familiar in their cadence.
"…tracks here. Smaller feet and larger. They split from the group before the circle formed."
"Captain wants anyone who ran either dead or on their knees. Forest or no forest."
Arcanum brushed the air, faint but present.
They'd brought a mage with this patrol.
Of course they have.
"Up," I whispered. "Now."
Maeve pushed herself to her feet, eyes wide.
"We can't keep running," she said. "Not if they can track us like this."
She was right.
Running had bought us distance.
It wouldn't buy us safety.
I glanced around the hollow. The ground dipped slightly, ringed by thick roots and boulders. Not ideal. Not terrible.
"I'll hold them," I said.
"No," she snapped instantly. "You're not—"
"It's not a choice," I cut in. "If we both run, we slow each other down. They'll catch us tired. If one of us stays, draws them in, the other can go deeper, find somewhere to hide."
Her eyes flashed. "You are not throwing your life away for me."
"I'm not planning to die," I said calmly. "Just to make them regret coming this far."
She stared at me, chest heaving.
"You sound like him," she whispered. "Like Elian."
The ache in my chest shifted.
"Good," I said. "He's the only man in Blackstone whose opinion I cared about."
Her eyes filled with tears.
"I—" She swallowed hard. "I don't want to lose you too."
You already did, I almost said. The boy you raised never existed.
But the words felt cruel, and cruelty right now was pointless.
Instead, I took her hand and pressed it around the bundle she still carried.
"North," I said. "Always north. Look for a ravine with three crooked pines at its edge. If you find it, stay there until the firelight disappears and the night returns to normal."
"And if you don't come?" she asked.
"If I don't come," I said, "then you keep going until you find someone who isn't wearing metal with a hammer on their chest."
"That's not an answer," she said.
"It's the only one I have."
Footsteps approached—closer now, no attempt at silence.
We were out of time.
"I'm not leaving you," she said suddenly.
I opened my mouth to argue.
She grabbed my face, fingers firm despite their shake.
"You listen to me, Elias Vale," Maeve said, voice rough. "You are not the only one allowed to make choices. I am your mother. If something is going to cut you down, it will go through me first."
The words lodged somewhere deep in my ribcage.
Something in me wanted to reject them violently.
Something else wanted to cling to them.
Maeve stepped away, wiping at her face. "We stand together. Or we fall together."
"I don't want you to fall," I said quietly.
She smiled—a small, trembling thing.
"Then we stand," she replied.
Armor clinked beyond the trees.
Too late to argue.
I exhaled.
"Stay behind me," I said. "If an opening appears—run. Don't hesitate."
She didn't agree.
She didn't need to.
We both knew she would hesitate anyway.
Humans were like that.
The first soldier stepped into the hollow a moment later, sword drawn. Two others followed, one with a spear, the third with no visible weapon but a faint, swirling glow around his hands.
The mage.
Their eyes landed on us.
No pretense. No negotiation.
"There," the spearman said. "The boy and the woman."
"Orders are clear," the leader replied. "Take them alive if they kneel. Kill them if they don't."
His gaze settled on me.
"Kneel," he said. "Now."
My hand tightened around the hunter's knife at my belt.
I thought of Elian standing in the burning street.
I thought of the monolith and its fractured laws.
I thought of Maeve's fingers shaking as she held my face.
I have bowed enough for one lifetime.
"No," I said.
The soldier's eyes cooled.
"So be it."
He moved first—predictable, efficient.
Step forward. Sword slash, meant to cripple rather than kill, a warning to force surrender.
I stepped into the swing, not away from it.
His eyes widened as my dagger flashed, shorter but faster. I angled it low, letting his sword pass over my shoulder while I twisted my torso just enough. The knife kissed the joint between plates at his hip, a quick, sharp strike.
Not deep enough to kill.
Deep enough to hurt.
He grunted, staggered, balance broken.
I followed through with a pivot, using my smaller size to stay inside his guard. The hunter's knife bit again, this time along the soft gap under his arm.
Warmth splashed my hand.
He choked.
The mage raised his hand.
Arcanum flared.
My core screamed.
I grabbed the swordsman's shoulder and wrenched him between us, using his body as a shield.
The spell hit.
It wasn't fire or lightning—no, this was a concussive force, a compressed wave that hammered forward like an invisible battering ram.
It slammed into the soldier's back, armor buckling inward.
Bone snapped. Air exploded from his lungs in a bloody cough.
The impact still shuddered through him into me, but muted.
I rode the force, turning the stagger into a roll that carried me and the dying man to the side.
"Idiot!" the spearman yelled. "You hit—"
The mage cut him off. "He shouldn't have been in the way."
Cold.
Even I could appreciate the efficiency.
The spearman lunged, perhaps more angry than tactical now.
He aimed not at me, but at Maeve.
She froze.
"Move!" I shouted.
She did—but instincts are slower than steel.
The spear thrust came too fast, too direct.
I started toward her, knowing I wouldn't make it in time.
Her eyes went wide.
At the last heartbeat, something in her shifted.
She didn't run.
She moved forward.
She slammed her hands against the spear shaft, pushing it aside with all the strength her small body could muster.
The point veered.
Instead of piercing her heart, it plunged into her side.
She gasped, the sound small and shocked.
Time slowed.
My mind calculated angles, force, blood loss.
My heart did something else.
I don't remember crossing the space between us.
One moment she was standing, staring down at the shaft protruding from her ribs.
The next, I was on the spearman, knife in hand, shadows clawing up my arm like hungry smoke.
He tried to yank the spear free, but my attack forced him to release it.
The hunter's knife plunged into his thigh, then his wrist, then his throat—three strikes, precise and brutal. Arcanum surged, met the fracture inside me, and twisted.
I didn't bother with fancy patterns.
I let the shadow bite.
For a second, his eyes went black, swallowing the torchless gloom. His muscles convulsed. The sound he made didn't quite resemble a human scream.
Then he went still.
The mage took a step back, expression finally shifting from cold indifference to wary attention.
"You're not just some village brat," he said softly.
Maeve collapsed to her knees behind me.
Blood soaked her dress, dark in the low light.
"Elias…" she whispered.
I turned.
The spear still jutted from her side at an ugly angle.
My training screamed options, methods, triage.
My core screamed something louder.
I dropped to my knees beside her.
"Don't pull it out," I said automatically. "Not yet. It'll bleed faster."
She laughed, a wet, broken sound. "Still… giving orders…"
Her hand fumbled for mine.
I let her take it.
"Listen to me," I said, voice tighter than I wanted it to be. "We're not done. Not yet. I can get you deeper into the forest. There are old formations—healing springs, maybe, or—"
"Elias," she interrupted. "Look at me."
I did.
Her eyes were clear.
Afraid, but clear.
"Sometimes," she whispered, "you can't… fix things. Not with herbs, or runes, or… clever words."
Her fingers tightened weakly around mine.
"You were always… too quiet," she said. "Too serious. I used to worry… you would grow up angry at the world."
Too late for that, I thought.
"But you're still here," she continued, "and that means… you still have choices."
Behind us, the mage shifted, Arcanum stirring.
I felt it like a prickle in the back of my skull.
No time.
No safe words left.
"A mother shouldn't… ask this of a child," Maeve whispered. "But you… you're not just a child, are you?"
I didn't answer.
She smiled faintly.
"Live, Elias," she said. "Even if it means walking a path I don't understand. Live long enough that this night becomes… just one page in your story."
Her eyes fluttered.
The grip on my hand weakened.
"I'm… glad," she whispered, voice barely audible, "that it was… you."
Her chest rose once more.
Then didn't.
A strange quiet fell over the hollow.
Not the peace of a forest at rest.
The silence after a struck bell, vibrations still humming in unseen places.
For a heartbeat, everything inside me went very still.
Then something broke.
Not loudly.
Not dramatically.
Just… cleanly.
A fracture in whatever part of me had tried to hold onto softness.
Footsteps approached.
The mage stood a cautious distance away, hands still wreathed in dim light.
"Step away from the body," he said. "Come quietly, and your death will be quick."
I looked down at Maeve's face one last time.
Then I gently closed her eyes.
When I stood, the hunter's knife hung loose at my side.
The mage watched me closely. "Killing two of my men was impressive. Reckless, but impressive. The Order will want answers. Who trained you? Where you learned to tug at the forest."
I met his eyes.
No fear. No rage left visible.
Just a quiet calculation.
"Nobody trained me," I said. "And no one taught me that the forest hates people like you."
His lips thinned. "So be it."
He raised his hands.
Arcanum coiled, heavier than before.
This time, he meant it.
I didn't reach for the fracture.
I stepped backward instead.
The forest was not my ally.
But tonight, we had a common enemy.
The mage released his spell.
The world tilted.
For a second, I was sure the force would hit me full-on, crush bones, rupture organs.
Instead—
Something moved between us.
The air shuddered.
The spell detonated early, a blossom of compressed force exploding against … something I couldn't see.
The shockwave knocked me backward. I hit the ground hard, breath ripped from my lungs.
When my vision cleared, the mage was gone.
So were the bodies of his men.
So was Maeve's.
The clearing was empty.
Only shallow depressions in the earth hinted that anyone had stood here at all.
My heart pounded.
Slowly, I pushed myself to my knees.
The forest around me was utterly silent.
Too silent.
A faint glow flickered in the corner of my vision.
I turned my head.
At the edge of the hollow, half-hidden behind a curtain of hanging moss, two pale lights floated at eye level.
Not lights.
Eyes.
The creature from before watched me.
The roots around it had shifted, just enough to suggest movement, just enough to hint that the earlier "disappearance" of bodies was not an accident.
I stared back.
Neither of us moved for a long time.
Finally, the creature inclined its head.
Not in threat.
Not in kindness.
Recognition, perhaps.
Then it stepped backward.
The shadows folded around it.
And it was gone.
My hand tightened around the hunter's knife until my knuckles ached.
The world I'd known—the illusion of safety, of warmth, of simple lives lived in simple villages—had burned with Blackstone.
Elian was gone.
Maeve was gone.
Only their last gifts remained.
A blade.
A choice.
A path.
"I'll live," I whispered into the dark, voice hoarse.
For once, the forest did not answer.
So I did the only thing left that made sense.
I stood.
I turned away from the ruins of where my life had ended.
And I walked deeper into Duskwood, alone.