The sun was too bright.
It stabbed through the gauze of Ryon's bandages and the fog of his fever, a blade of gold he could not parry. He sat upright outside his tent, the dawn still clinging to the ground in ribbons of mist, and the camp moved around him like a hive disturbed. Every clatter of steel, every muttered word, every sideways glance carried weight.
He had stood before them at dawn and declared himself unbroken. He had spoken fire into silence. But words were lighter than iron, and now the iron pressed down on him from all sides.
The men were working—sharpening swords, patching armor, tending to horses—but none of it had the rhythm of unity. Every sound was jagged, misaligned, as if each soldier marched to a different drumbeat. And Ryon could feel it in their eyes when they thought he wasn't looking. Some shone with belief, hard and desperate, clinging to his fire as their only light. Others smoldered with fear, suspicion, doubt.
The fracture was real.
