Morning sunlight broke through Frostfang's thin veil of fog, catching the battered towers and casting them in gold. It was a fragile, fleeting peace that fell across the fortress, but one Aldric refused to let slip away so easily.
The banners of the Crescent Wolf now fluttered alongside the sea-hawk standard of Torven, Son of the Drowned Vale, their colors mingling on the breeze. It was a sight that might have filled him with hope, if not for the heaviness clinging to the air, like the hush before a summer storm.
In the bailey, soldiers drilled with grim intensity, pounding the frostbitten ground with booted heels. Iron-Keep blades sang against Drowned Vale tridents as they trained together, testing one another with respectful suspicion. Kaelin barked orders in her clipped, icy voice, while Torven's lieutenants — rough-looking, sea-scarred men — eyed her troops with the wary caution of wolf meeting wolf.
And above them all, Aldric stood on the parapet, watching, feeling every heartbeat of his people like a pulse inside his own chest.
---
A Clash of Loyalty
Rowena found him there, her dark hair tucked under a fur-lined hood, a tinge of worry dancing in her gaze.
"They trust you," she said, "but they don't trust each other."
Aldric nodded, gaze steady on the training yard. "It will take time."
"Time you might not have."
He turned to her, searching the shadows beneath her eyes, where exhaustion and grief still pooled like dark ink. "We make do with what we have," he said softly.
She sighed, stepping closer, close enough that he could catch the warmth of her breath. "Then make them believe in you."
He opened his mouth to answer — but a shout from below cut him off.
"Wolf-King!" cried a soldier, hurrying up the stone steps. "Torven asks for your presence in the hall. He says there is urgent news."
---
The Salted Oath
Inside Frostfang's grand hall, Torven waited, leaning on a table thick with scrawled maps. The man looked even more a creature of the sea by torchlight: coral beads rattled in his beard, fish-scale tattoos glimmered on his forearms, and his cloak smelled faintly of salt and kelp.
Kaelin was there too, arms folded, eyes like knives.
"Speak," Aldric commanded, crossing the floor in long strides.
Torven dipped his head in respect, then pointed at a ragged chart showing the coast. "My scouts returned from the Fjord of Sirens," he growled. "They saw ships gathering. Black sails, marked with bone sigils. Slavers. They fly the Reaver's colors."
Kaelin's jaw tensed. "They mean to come by sea?"
Torven nodded. "They have already raided two villages on the shoals. Burned them, took the young, left the old to rot."
Aldric felt a rage blossom inside him, cold and sure. "How many ships?"
"Six war galleys, maybe more."
Kaelin slammed a mailed fist against the table. "They will slip around our defenses. Strike the heart while we guard the roads."
Torven's eyes burned. "My people know the sea. We can stop them, but we'll need men. Your men."
Rowena, entering quietly behind Aldric, frowned. "If you go to sea, who guards Frostfang?"
Aldric weighed the question, feeling its weight settle like iron across his shoulders.
"Then we split our strength," he decided at last. "Kaelin holds Frostfang. Torven, you and I sail to break the Reavers."
Kaelin looked ready to protest — but after a heartbeat, she nodded. "I'll keep the walls, Wolf-King. Do not fall."
Rowena stepped forward, voice calm but unyielding. "And I come with you."
Aldric blinked. "Rowena—"
She cut him off with a look as sharp as steel. "Don't ever leave me behind again."
He almost laughed, though it felt wrong to smile with so much on the line. "Very well," he murmured, and took her hand for a moment, anchoring himself in the warmth of her fierce spirit.
---
The Long Ships
Preparations moved like a hurricane through Frostfang.
Men carried barrels of pitch and spears down to the frozen docks, where Torven's ships waited. Their hulls were painted with swirling blue runes to ward off sea-spirits, and every prow was carved with a screaming bird of prey.
Kaelin oversaw the loading of arms and food, her voice a constant drumbeat of order in the confusion.
Rowena moved through the ranks with a healer's calm, checking bandages, sharing soft words of courage. At times, Aldric caught her eyes across the chaos, and felt that unspoken vow pass between them again and again: I will stand at your side. I will not break.
He would have kissed her right there if not for the soldiers watching. Some boundaries could not be crossed — not yet.
At last, as the sun dipped behind iron clouds, the fleet was ready.
Torven stood by the gangplank of his flagship, raising a salt-rusted horn.
"WOLF-KING!" he roared to the crowd. "Will you sail?"
Aldric stepped forward, letting the moment burn into the hearts of all who watched. "I will sail," he answered, voice rolling over the wind like a tide. "And I will hunt them to the gates of the sea-gods themselves."
A roar rose from the gathered men, raw and powerful.
They boarded, one by one, carrying not just weapons but dreams of revenge.
---
On the Whale-Road
The ships left the harbor in a chorus of snapping sails and creaking timber, cutting through the gray-green waves. The ocean opened before them, vast and cold as a wolf's stare.
Aldric stood at the prow beside Rowena, the wind tangling his hair. Behind them, Torven guided the tiller, shouting sea-prayers to the drowned gods.
Spray stung Aldric's face, and he let the cold bite deep.
"I never dreamed I would command a fleet," he admitted.
Rowena smiled, eyes sparkling. "I never dreamed I'd follow you onto the whale-road."
They shared a moment of quiet, lost in the strange comfort of each other's presence.
But the sea would not stay gentle for long.
---
The Reaver Ambush
At dawn on the second day, Torven's lookout called a warning. Black sails to the west — cutting across the shoals, moving with predatory grace.
Aldric felt his heart hammer as he counted them. Six, as Torven had feared, with decks lined in bone-trophies.
"They see us," Rowena hissed.
Aldric drew his sword, letting the steel shine in the sea's chill light. "Then let them know fear."
Torven gave a whooping cry, and the Vale ships surged forward, oars biting the water.
Moments later, the Reavers closed in, archers unleashing burning arrows that hissed across the waves like demon tongues.
One struck the mast just above Aldric's head, sending a blossom of flame up the rigging. Sailors screamed, hacking at the fire with wet cloaks.
Rowena loosed arrows of her own, eyes blazing with a warrior's focus, dropping a Reaver who tried to leap from one deck to another.
Steel rang on steel. The sea rocked with chaos as boarding hooks flew through the air, and in a heartbeat, enemy warriors were among them.
Aldric parried a blow meant for his throat, felt the shudder of impact run all the way down to his bones, then twisted, slamming the pommel of his sword into a Reaver's jaw.
Blood sprayed. The man collapsed.
Another lunged, dagger flashing, but Rowena was there, her short sword striking like lightning, cutting him down before he even had time to scream.
---
The Battle Turns
All around, the sea boiled with war.
Torven's men fought with a brutal, ocean-born ferocity, wielding harpoons and tridents in close combat. The Reavers, for their part, were monsters in human skin, biting and clawing, tearing flesh as eagerly as they swung axes.
One Reaver captain — a giant with tattooed ribs painted black — swung a flail that smashed an entire row of Aldric's men from the deck in a single pass.
Aldric met him head-on, the clash ringing like church bells across the waves.
They traded brutal strikes, each one echoing through the ship. The Reaver's flail nearly took Aldric's head, but he ducked, rolling low and stabbing up into the brute's armpit.
Hot blood gushed over Aldric's forearm, steaming in the sea air.
The giant fell, howling, crashing through the rail and into the foam.
Rowena appeared at Aldric's side, panting. "How many more?"
He scanned the chaos. "Too many," he growled.
---
Fire on the Sea
A new cry rose from the stern: one of the Reaver ships had caught fire, its sail a torch in the dawn wind. Flames danced across the rigging, silhouetting screaming men as they leapt into the sea.
"Drive them back!" Aldric roared, voice ragged.
The men answered with a howl, blades rising.
With Torven's tridents closing in from the rear, the Reaver ships began to break. One turned tail and fled into deeper waters, oars churning like frightened insects. Another sank under the weight of its own wounded, slipping under the waves with a hiss.
When the last Reaver ship fell away, leaving only drifting corpses and burning timbers, Aldric let himself breathe.
They had won — but the cost was high. The sea ran red for a hundred yards around them, a grisly testament to the price of peace.
---
Port of the Dead
By sunset, they made harbor in a tiny fishing village, where the stench of smoke and rot already filled the air. The Reavers had struck days before, leaving only charred beams and the hollow silence of the dead.
Rowena walked among the ruined homes with him, a cloth over her nose to block the stink.
"Not one survivor?" she asked, voice faint.
Torven shook his head. "They took them."
Aldric felt sick. "Then we will find them," he vowed. "Or break every Reaver ship from here to the edge of the world."
Rowena squeezed his arm, eyes shining with unshed tears. "And I will help you."
---
Dreams of the Serpent
That night, as the wounded were tended and the living found a haunted sleep on the sand, Aldric dreamed.
He saw a serpent of pure night, scales glimmering like stars, coiling around Frostfang's towers. Its voice was a whisper — seductive, cold, unstoppable.
You will forget yourself, it hissed. You will forget her. And when you do, you will burn your own kingdom to the ground.
He woke shaking, fists balled so tightly his nails cut into his palms.
Rowena was there instantly, pulling him close, pressing his face to her shoulder.
"It was a dream," she murmured. "Only a dream."
But Aldric wasn't sure.
What if it was a warning?
---
A New Storm Rises
By morning, the scouts returned with even darker news.
"The Reavers flee," reported a slim, fast-moving lad with torn boots, "but they gather at the White Shoals. Dozens more ships. They mean to strike the mainland — to end you, my lord."
Aldric felt the dread sink to his bones. This was no longer a war of raids. The Reavers wanted total destruction.
Rowena touched his cheek. "Then we meet them there," she said.
He nodded, letting a savage calm settle into him.
"Gather everyone," he ordered. "Kaelin's knights. Torven's raiders. Every spear and shield. If they want a war, then we will give them one."
And as the men leapt to carry his commands, Aldric turned his gaze to the storm-dark horizon, where the next battle waited.
Let them come, he thought. Let them come.