The thunderous applause from the walls of Frostfall faded behind Elysia Raizen like a forgotten echo. She walked through the newly unsealed city gates with the same measured, unhurried pace with which she had approached the battlefield. The citizens who had witnessed her one-woman stand against the horde watched her pass with a mixture of awe and terror, parting before her like water before a ship's prow. She offered no smiles, no words of reassurance. The mission was complete. The threat was neutralized.
In the spartan command quarters assigned to her, she was methodically cleaning the immaculate blade of her sword when a subordinate, a young lieutenant whose hands still trembled slightly from what he had witnessed, entered and saluted sharply.
"Lady Elysia," he began, his voice tight with a new, different kind of tension. "An urgent communication from the main family. It's about... your brother."
