The fire had dimmed to slow embers, but no one moved to stoke it. The room was quiet, the kind of quiet that asked to be broken but never dared.
Kael sat close to the hearth, arms folded over his knees, blanket draped around his shoulders. The chill outside hadn't reached him, but something colder still lingered under his skin. The remnants of shadow stirred, soft and constant. Like a second heartbeat that refused to fade.
Across from him, Edran unrolled a weathered scroll onto the wooden table. His fingers were steady. Lira stepped in beside him, her arms crossed but her gaze locked on Kael.
"You asked where to start," Edran said, his voice level.
The map looked worn, scarred by age and use. Edges curled. Ink faded in places. The continent's features were sketched in uneven strokes, coastlines jagged, forests darkened with shading, mountains rising like rows of broken teeth.
But it wasn't the Empire's version. No gold trim. No rewritten borders.
"This is what the land looked like before the Empire began redrawing names," Edran continued. "Before they covered truth in titles and war banners."
Kael stood and approached. His eyes scanned the regions. Names flickered in his memory, Sharpthorn Forest, Wud Choppa Camp, Mount Bloodhorn. The last made him pause.
Edran's finger tapped it once. "That mountain. The one they call Bloodhorn."
Kael frowned. "I've heard of it. A battlefield. The Empire claimed a great victory there centuries ago."
Edran's lips pulled into something between a smile and a grimace. "A lie. There was no battle. That place was never about conquest. It was about silence."
He reached beneath the table and brought out a second, smaller scroll, torn, stained, nearly unreadable. He spread it out beside the first.
There, drawn in older, angular script, the same mountain had another name.
Veyr'Khall. The Hollowed Peak.
Kael stared.
"It was once a convergence site," Edran said. "A place where divine memory, fragments, were sealed. One of Aelthar's last."
Kael's throat tightened. He thought of the first fragment. The void. The shadow knight that rose from him like an echo made flesh.
"The first is already in you," Edran said quietly, reading his silence. "It awakened when the pact formed. But if you want to understand it, control it, you'll need more. The next one lies within Veyr'Khall."
Lira stepped forward and studied the terrain. "It's a hard route. Forest patrols along the southern ridge. Mountains to cross. Empire scouts sweep near the Warboss trail every few weeks."
"We'll go quiet," Kael said, voice firm. "I don't care how long it takes."
Edran watched him closely.
"Then you understand now," he said.
Kael's jaw tightened. "I understand that power alone won't be enough. Not against the Empire. Not anymore."
A beat of silence passed.
Lira rolled up the map with practiced hands. "I'll prepare supplies. We leave in two days."
Kael nodded and turned toward the door, but paused.
His eyes returned once more to the name on the map,Veyr'Khall, and he felt it stir inside him. That slow, cold pull. Not calling him. Drawing him. Like a truth that had been waiting to be remembered.
He whispered the name under his breath.
And somewhere, far to the north, the Hollowed Peak listened.