Rain fell in ash.
Not a storm. Not water. Just the soft hiss of char settling over the southern trench as the vents cooled for the first time in days. The forge still burned, but the wind no longer carried heat with it. The sky looked like it was holding its breath.
Riku stood at the southern rampart, arms resting against the stone as the mist rolled in. The Blood Moon still hovered, pale behind the clouds. The silence of it gnawed at him more than noise ever could.
Footsteps approached. Light, but purposeful. Sira.
"They're back," she said. "The Pale Flame emissary. Not the usual one."
Riku didn't move. "Where?"
"Outer gate. They didn't cross the trench. They're waiting for you."
He exhaled through his nose, straightened, and followed.
The emissary was younger, slighter, his ember-glass mask less polished than the previous envoy's. His robes were ash-dulled, travel-worn. Still, the heat that followed him pulsed faintly, steady and warm.
He bowed as Riku approached. "Ash Veil," he said softly. "We come not in protest, but in need."
Riku waited. The younger emissaries always came with more words than sense.
"There are beasts," the envoy continued, "larger than the ones before. They are breaking through the cracked stone near our flame groves. We cannot hold them. We have not your walls."
"And you've brought this to my gate because?"
"Because we remember the pact." The voice wavered slightly. "We gave you saplings. Fire-root veins. We shared warmth."
Riku's gaze narrowed. "And in return, we kept your name off the stones." He folded his arms. "That pact wasn't meant for battles."
The emissary hesitated. "Then—perhaps something more can be arranged. My elders… they would offer more. Maps. Alloy root. Perhaps… other truths. But only if you come."
That struck him as too rehearsed. Too clean.
He studied the man's posture. He was nervous, but not scared. And his robes—new stitching down the sides, uneven, like they'd been repurposed. Not Pale Flame standard.
"You're not Pale Flame," Riku said finally. "Not truly."
The emissary froze. Then—slowly—he removed the mask.
The face beneath was hard. Too hard for his age. A fighter's face, not a tribesman's.
Riku's hand hovered near his belt.
"Who sent you?" he asked.
The boy didn't speak. He only gave the faintest shrug. An admission without words.
Sira was at Riku's side in an instant, her blade half-drawn.
"Was it Nightforge?" she asked.
No answer. But it didn't matter.
Riku turned to her. "Send a flare. Quiet light. I want Kael at the western tunnel within the hour."
Then, to the false emissary: "You're not dying today. But the others might."
By dusk, the plan was ready.
Sira led a small detachment into the shallow southern ridgeline under the false pretense of escort. Kael took the glaive unit through the old obsidian vent lines. Riku moved last—silent and unmarked, traveling light through the ash undercloak path.
When they reached the Pale Flame grove, it was already too late.
The grove was gone.
Burned. Not by beasts. The fires were too clean. Controlled. The soil scorched in measured arcs around the root veins—sabotage by those who understood how flame-root fed.
Bodies lay scattered. Real Pale Flame dead. Children, elders, protectors—none armed. All collapsed near the grove center, backs turned.
And in the distance, faint torchlight moved across the stone, circling like wolves around a carcass.
Kael's voice crackled through the comm bead. "That's not Pale Flame. That's a sovereign's detachment. Crest looks like Iron Veil's secondary."
Riku stared at the carnage. His voice was quiet.
"Let them burn the ashes. Pull back. We don't strike here."
"But they'll—"
"I said no."
He stayed long enough to mark the grove's center with a shard of obsidian.
Then they disappeared back into the mist.
Back at Blackridge, silence reigned in the forge chamber.
Kael leaned against the workbench, bloody gloves discarded beside the heat sink. "So that's it? We let them play the game, and we stay behind the wall?"
Riku sat at the war table, eyes on the map. "No. We watched them use trust like a lever. We learned how they bait sovereigns into exposure."
"And?"
"We make sure we never need to trust anyone again."
Kael didn't respond. Just nodded once, and left.
That night, Riku walked the outer wall alone.
The traps along the perimeter glowed faintly—lit by newly sprouted root veins. He hadn't ordered that.
He crouched beside one of the defensive nodes. It had doubled. Thin roots spreading from the original cluster. Buried, quiet, hidden.
He whispered into the dark. "Good."
They would try again.
But this time, the bait wouldn't be him.