Elias
Pain.
It was the first thing I felt, a deep, throbbing ache that pulsed through my skull, my ribs, my arms—every part of me.
My body was stiff, limbs heavy as though weighed down by iron. I blinked, my vision swimming, the world around me a dark blur.
Cold, uneven stone beneath me. The sharp stench of damp rot, rusted iron, and old blood clung to the air, thick and suffocating.
Chains rattled somewhere in the darkness. Above, a lone iron candelabrum dangled from the vaulted ceiling, its flickering flames casting jagged, shifting shadows against the damp, blackened walls.
I tried to move, but a thick rope bit into my wrists. My shoulders screamed in protest as I shifted, feeling the coarse fibers cut into raw skin. My breath came heavy, uneven. Slowly, my senses returned.
Then I saw it—the sigil.
A black raven stretched its wings across a blood-red banner, the fabric hanging like a silent omen against the dungeon wall.
Drakewall.
I exhaled sharply, my chest tightening.
Captured, huh?
The memories came rushing back—Kael running, the fight in the cabin, Thom's empty eyes staring into nothing. Mikael.
Where was Kael?
Panic twisted through me. If they had taken me, had they found him? Was he still running, or had he already been dragged away in chains? The thought struck like a knife to the gut.
I should have done more. I should have trained him harder, taught him how to survive without me.
The regret coiled around my ribs, suffocating. If he was dead, if they had gotten to him before he had the chance to fight—
No. I refused to believe it.
I wrestled against the ropes, forcing my hands to twist, to find any slack. My muscles screamed, but I kept going, gritting my teeth against the pain.
Then footsteps. Slow. Confident.
The heavy iron door groaned open, and a figure stepped into the light.
Mikael.
His dark hair was tied back, his face shadowed by the flickering light.
That smirk—sharp, smug—curled at the corners of his lips as he took his time closing the door behind him. His uniform was pristine, every thread in place, the red-and-black of Drakewall draped over him like a second skin.
The sight of it made my stomach turn.
This wasn't the man I had fought beside, the one I thought was lost to the war. That Mikael had bled beside me, had laughed in the face of death.
But the man before me now couldn't be my old friend. That Mikael would risk his life for me, and I for his.
Now, there was something hollow in his gaze, something twisted in the way he carried himself. As if something had crawled inside him and made a home beneath his skin.
His eyes met mine, and for a moment, neither of us spoke.
Then he let out a soft chuckle. "You always were a stubborn bastard, Elias."
I glared, saying nothing.
His boots echoed against the stone floor as he stepped closer. "You really thought you could keep him safe?" His voice was smooth, almost amused. "You made a mistake, old friend. A very big mistake."
I clenched my jaw. "Where is he?"
The smirk vanished.
Faster than I could react, his fist collided with my face. My head snapped sideways, pain exploding in my skull. Blood filled my mouth, the coppery taste thick on my tongue.
Mikael exhaled sharply through his nose, shaking out his hand like he was shaking off an annoyance. "Do you even hear yourself?" he muttered, his voice laced with something between anger and disbelief. "Risking everything—for him? A Veyrn?"
I spit blood onto the floor, lifting my gaze. "Where. Is. He?"
His nostrils flared. His next blow struck my ribs, hard enough to steal my breath. I choked on the pain, but I didn't fall. I wouldn't.
"I thought you were better than this," he said, his voice quieter now, but no less dangerous. "You fought for years against them. You killed them. Hell, we fought them together. We almost died countless times to them. And yet you threw all of that away for a single boy?"
I refused to break under his gaze.
Mikael's lips curled in frustration. He hit me again, then again. My vision blurred, my body screaming in agony. But I didn't speak.
As I drifted in and out of consciousness, I managed to rasp one last time, "Where... is he?"
Mikael sighed, wiping the blood off his knuckles. Then he crouched down, leveling his gaze with mine.
"He's on his way to Lord Desivynir's castle," he murmured. "Locked in the back of an army carriage. And when he gets there, they'll burn him at the stake."
The words sank into my skull like ice.
"For your treason," Mikael added, his voice tinged with something unreadable, "you'll burn right after him."
Fear gripped me, deeper than any pain I had endured so far. But before I could react, Mikael's fist crashed into my temple, and everything went black.
—--------
Kael
I woke to the lurch of wood and the distant clatter of hooves on stone. My body jerked with the motion, every muscle stiff, every limb leaden.
A dull, throbbing pain pulsed at the base of my skull, each heartbeat sending sharp waves through my head. My throat burned, dry as dust, my breath rasping against the cloth biting into the corners of my mouth.
I shifted, or tried to—rough fibers dug into my wrists, cinching tighter as I strained. My ankles, too, bound.
The more I pulled, the more the ropes bit into my skin. Panic flared in my chest, burning with every second. I twisted harder, breath quickening, but the knots held fast.
The wooden walls of the carriage loomed around me, dimly lit by slivers of moonlight cutting through the cracks. The air was thick with the scent of damp wood, sweat, and something else—something metallic. Blood.
A muffled sound pulled my attention, and I turned my head. Across from me, a small figure sat curled in on herself, wrists bound, shoulders shaking. Karin.
Her brown eyes met mine, wide with guilt, fear, maybe both. Strands of dark hair clung to her tear-streaked cheeks, her lower lip split and swollen.
But it wasn't the bruises that made my breath catch. It was the way her gaze flickered, lingering on my hair, white as fresh-fallen snow.
She was crying, but when she spoke, her voice—bright yellow, always yellow—never wavered.
"I—I told them," she whispered.
The words sank into me like a blade.
She sucked in a shuddering breath. "They took my father. They said they'd hurt him if I didn't tell them where Elias was. I—" She swallowed hard, her voice shaking. "I tried to lie. I swear, I tried. But they knew. They beat him anyway."
Something twisted inside my chest, sharp and tight.
She shook her head, blinking away fresh tears. "Thom... I think Thom was the one who told them. I don't know how, but they already knew something was happening. They just needed me to lead them to the cabin."
Thom.
His name struck me like a hammer, knocking the breath from my lungs.
You're a monster. A demon. A devil.
The memory of his final words burned through me, mixing with the horror of what I had done.
My stomach turned. I had killed him.
I had killed him, and now Elias could be dead—because of me.
A sharp pressure built behind my eyes. My hands curled into fists, nails digging into my palms.
My breathing turned ragged. I tried to force it down, the fear, the grief, the guilt, but it swelled and swelled until it was too much, and before I could stop it—
—the glow came.
A dark, inky light seeped from my fingers, curling through the air like smoke. That dark purple, familiar glow. My whole body pulsed with it, tendrils of shadow unfurling like the creeping arms of something alive.
Karin gasped, shrinking back.
I squeezed my eyes shut, biting down on the gag, trying to force it away—but it was inside me. It was me.
Suddenly, the carriage lurched to a violent stop, hurling me sideways into the wooden walls. Karin yelped as she slammed into me, our bound limbs useless to break the fall.
Outside, the horses screamed—high, panicked. Then came the sounds of chaos.
Shouts. The metallic clang of swords meeting. A wet, gurgling cry. Heavy thuds.
Then—silence.
My heartbeat roared in my ears. Karin gripped my sleeve, her breath sharp and trembling.
The carriage door burst open.
A figure stood in the doorway, framed by the moonlight—a woman, cloaked in deep blue, the fur on her shoulders thick and pale as winter frost.
Silver hair spilled down her chest in long braids, the weight of age and power etched into her sharp features. But it wasn't what she wore that caught me.
Her eyes glowed. Golden.
The moment I saw them, something inside me twisted.
A flash of metal. A battlefield soaked in blood.
I gasped.
A vision rushed through me in fractured pieces.
This woman, standing in a storm of fire, her hands raised to the sky. Lightning cracking from her palms, striking down men in black armor. Their screams.
My head throbbed.
Another glimpse—her face, streaked with blood, eyes just as sharp, just as terrible.
I knew her.
I had seen her before.
But…how could that be? I had never seen her before.
I struggled to breathe, barely noticing the way the air shifted around us, the way the ropes around Karin's wrists snapped apart as if they had never been tied.
Karin let out a sharp gasp, rubbing at her wrists in shock. But my body was frozen. My breath felt thin.
The woman turned her gaze on me.
Something unseen pressed down on my chest, an invisible weight squeezing the air from my lungs. My fingers curled, the remnants of that terrible shadow still flickering at my fingertips.
Her gaze flicked to the darkness coiling around my hands.
And for just a second—just the briefest moment—her lips pressed into a thin line..
I opened my mouth, throat dry, the question escaping before I could stop myself.
"Are you—" My voice cracked as I dared to speak. "Are you the witch Marwen?"
A pause.
The woman studied me for a long, suffocating moment. Her expression did not change.
Then, with a voice like the sky before a storm, she said:
"Get up."
The color of her voice surprised me. Golden with brown and red edges.
She turned, stepping back into the night, her cloak billowing behind her like shadows come alive.
Karin's fingers clamped around my wrist, her grip tight, urgent. "Kael—come on! We need to run before the soldiers wake up!"
She yanked me forward, and as I stumbled out of the carriage, my breath caught.
At the edge of the forest, just beyond where the carriage had stopped, the witch stared at us in silence, studying us like a snake would study its prey.
Her golden eyes glowed in the darkness, locked onto mine—steady, unreadable, silently commanding me to follow.
Then my gaze dropped. Bodies lay sprawled across the ground by the carriage. Soldiers in black and red, their weapons flung from their hands, their armor dented and smeared with dirt.
The horses were gone, their reins slashed.
I swallowed hard. What kind of power had done this?
When I looked back up, the witch was gone—but no, not gone. She had drifted deeper into the forest, her form barely a shadow between the trees.
Karin didn't hesitate. She bolted ahead, her dark hair flying, her breath ragged.
I forced my feet to move, chasing after her.
Into the dark.
Into the unknown.
—-------
The forest swallowed us whole, its towering shadows stretching like grasping fingers under the sliver of moonlight.
The ground was uneven, treacherous, the thick underbrush clawing at our legs. Karin's grip on my wrist was tight, her nails digging into my skin as she dragged me forward, breathless, desperate.
But ahead of us, the witch did not run.
She moved, yes, but not like we did. Not with frantic, stumbling panic. She glided.
Her cloak billowed behind her like a phantom's veil, untouched by the tangled roots and jagged stones that threatened to trip us.
And then, she looked back.
Her glowing golden eyes locked onto mine, and I felt it again. That terrible, aching pull, the fragments of memories just beyond reach.
The battlefield. The storm. Her.
Are you really the village witch Elias and I caught boar for? The words burned at the tip of my tongue, but I couldn't force them out.
I stumbled, nearly falling, and for a heartbeat, her expression changed.
A flicker of something I couldn't name.
Then she turned away, moving faster, disappearing deeper into the dark.
A cold shiver ran down my spine.
And I knew, with a certainty that made my blood freeze—
I had followed this woman before.