Prologue
Halford burned.
The town was a ruin of collapsed stone and smoke-choked air. Cobblestones ran slick with blood and ash. Fires climbed across rooftops, casting flickering shadows over shattered walls and broken homes. The sky itself seemed scorched. Smoke curled into the heavens, smothering the stars.
And above it all, the Night Warden roared.
The sound struck deeper than hearing. It cracked windows. Shook stone from the bones of buildings. Birds scattered into the void. With each step, the world trembled beneath its weight. A towering figure of rusted metal and fractured stone, moving with unnatural precision. Miasma clung to it like a second skin, pulsing with light too sickly to be magic. Its runes burned like veins of fire, shifting with intent. Wrong. Ancient. Awake.
Ash lay half-buried beneath rubble, gasping through bloodied teeth. His sword was gone. His arm, numb and limp. Every breath felt like he was breathing in fire.
A warm hand steadied his chest.
“Stay still,” Sylri Silver murmured, kneeling beside him. Her voice was frayed at the edges, but calm. Healing light flared between her trembling fingers. “You’ve got a puncture near your lung. If you move, it’ll tear wider.”
Ash winced. “But… they need me.”
Her hands didn’t falter. “They need you to live.”
A deafening clang echoed through the plaza. Ash twisted, vision swimming, just in time to see Onyx Clear slam his battered shield into the Night Warden’s clawed arm. Sparks burst. The impact sent a shockwave through the stone. And still, Onyx stood—his shield holding firm as he forced the creature back a step. One precious step.
The Warden hissed, low and mechanical.
Kael Mercer charged past Onyx, his greatsword dragging trails of fire as it struck the Warden’s leg joint. Blood, his own, soaked his ruined armor. One arm hung useless at his side. Still, he roared with laughter. “Come on! Hit me like you mean it!”
Above, perched on the lip of a crumbling balcony, Lysara Duskwhisper notched another arrow. One eye swollen shut. Blood streaked her cheek. Her quiver nearly empty.
“Guess I’ll have to make these last shots count,” she muttered, loosing another shaft into the dark.
At the center of the plaza, Sorin Nightbloom knelt within a ritual circle crumbling beneath his bloodied hands. One leg was crushed beneath fallen stone, but his fingers still etched sigils into the air. The glyphs sparked, resisting the miasma’s encroachment as long as they could.
Ash pushed up to his knees.
“No,” Sylri said, firmer now. Her face was pale, her body swaying. “You don’t understand. The others—they’re staying so you can leave.”
He looked into her eyes.
“I’m not worth—”
She pressed her hand to his chest. “You are. You’re one of us. That’s all that matters.”
Another shockwave. The Night Warden’s runes pulsed faster. Its limbs coiled, preparing to strike again.
Onyx’s voice cut through the storm. “Ash. Go.”
Ash staggered to his feet, half-limping toward the plaza’s edge. His gaze swept the battlefield—the blood, the fire, the final stand.
Kael caught his eye. “Run, kid,” he barked, dragging his greatsword through a pool of miasma. “This one’s ours.”
Then he grinned. “Buy us a drink when we come back. And none of that sour garbage you like.”
Lysara fired again, the arrow hissing past Ash’s head. “Really wish I had more time to make fun of you,” she said, voice tight with effort. “But… you’ve come a long way, Deadweight.”
Sorin never looked up. His hands moved in perfect rhythm. “Go west,” he said, his voice eerily calm. “Past the orchard. The leyline should still be strong there. If you can’t find the road, follow the birds—they don’t linger in the miasma.”
And Sylri, swaying but standing, placed her hand over his heart one last time.
“You’re the one who lives.”
Ash turned to flee—then stopped.
Something caught the light in the rubble at his feet.
A black arrow shaft, half-burned. Violet and white feathers still clung to the end, somehow, impossibly, untouched by fire.
He knelt down and picked it up.
Above, Lysara saw and smirked.
“I’ve got a hundred of those,” she called down. “But that one’s lucky. Or cursed. You pick.”
Then another crash split the square.
“Move it, Deadweight!” she snapped. “Live long enough to return it!”
The Night Warden roared, and Ash ran, arrow clutched tight, breath ragged, heart breaking.
Behind him, Brighthollow stood their ground.
And their voices faded into the fire.
