The Thornwood Mountains rose before them like the bones of sleeping giants. Ancient pines stretched toward the sky, their branches so thick they blocked out most of the sunlight. The air was cold and thin, making every breath a struggle.
They had been climbing for two days when the attacks began.
First, it was just small things. Shadows that moved when they shouldn't. Rocks that fell without warning. A sense of being watched by unseen eyes. The villagers grew nervous, jumping at every sound.
"We're close," Lyanna said on the morning of the third day. "Gareth's fortress is just over the next ridge."
But as they climbed higher, the feeling of wrongness grew stronger. The trees here were black and twisted, their bark weeping a substance that looked like blood. The ground was soft and spongy, as if something was rotting beneath their feet.
"This isn't right," Ren said, his hand moving instinctively to Dawnbreaker's hilt. "The corruption shouldn't be this strong so far from the Shadow King's base."
"Unless he has something else here," Mira said quietly. "Something powerful."
They created the ridge and looked down into the valley below. Where Gareth's fortress should have been, there was only ruins. The massive stone walls had been torn apart like paper. The proud towers had been reduced to rubble. And everywhere, the black stain of shadow magic covered the ground like spilled ink.
"No," Lyanna whispered. "He was supposed to be safe. The fortress was protected by ancient wards."
In the center of the ruins, something moved. Something huge and dark and terrible.
It was a dragon, but not like any dragon from the old stories. This creature had been touched by shadow magic, corrupted and twisted into something far worse than nature had ever intended. Its scales were black as midnight, and they seemed to absorb light rather than reflect it. Its eyes burned with the same green fire as the undead. When it moved, reality seemed to bend around it.
And it was feeding.
The dragon had found survivors from the fortress. A dozen people, maybe more, huddled together in what had once been the great hall. With casual cruelty, it was picking them off one by one, savoring their terror before ending their lives.
"We have to help them," Master Thorne said.
"We have to run," Lyanna replied. "That's a Shadow Dragon. One of the most powerful servants of the dark. We can't fight it."
"I can," Ren said.
"You can try," Lyanna corrected. "But even at full strength, with all your memories restored, a Shadow Dragon is beyond your current abilities."
Ren looked at the survivors below. Among them, he could see children. Innocent people who had done nothing wrong except be in the path of the Shadow King's fury.
"Then I die trying," he said simply.
"Ren, no." Mira grabbed his arm. "She's right. You're not ready for this."
"I'm the only one who can even attempt it."
"And if you die? What happens to us? What happens to everyone you're supposed to save?"
It was the same argument he had faced a thousand times in his previous life. Save the few, or preserve yourself to save the many. The cold logic of heroism that had driven him to make choices that haunted him still.
But this time felt different. This time, he could see the faces of the people who were about to die. This time, they weren't just numbers in a strategic calculation.
"I have to try," he said.
Before anyone could stop him, Ren was running down the slope toward the ruined fortress. Behind him, he heard Mira calling his name, but he didn't turn back.
The Shadow Dragon sensed his approach before he was halfway down. It raised its massive head from the survivors and fixed its burning gaze on him. When it spoke, its voice was like the sound of breaking glass.
"Kael Brightblade," it hissed. "I was wondering when you would show yourself."
"Let them go," Ren said, drawing Dawnbreaker. The sword blazed with holy light, but it seemed small and weak against the dragon's overwhelming presence.
"Let them go?" The dragon laughed, a sound like thunder and screaming wind. "Why would I do that? They are my message to you. My gift to show you what happens to those who stand in my master's way."
"Your master is a coward who hides in shadows and sends others to do his fighting."
The dragon's eyes narrowed. "Careful, little hero. I am Vorthak the Devourer. I have eaten kings and burned empires. You are nothing to me."
"Maybe. But I'm the nothing that's going to kill you."
Vorthak reared back and breathed shadow. Not fire, but something worse. A stream of pure darkness that ate light and warmth and hope. Ren barely managed to dive aside as the shadow breath turned stone to dust where he had been standing.
The dragon was fast, faster than something that size had any right to be. Its claws raked the ground where Ren had landed, missing him by inches. He rolled away and came up swinging, Dawnbreaker carving a line of light through the air.
The blade struck the dragon's foreleg and bounced off harmlessly. The Shadow Dragon's scales were too strong, too infused with dark magic for even a legendary sword to penetrate easily.
"Is that the best you can do?" Vorthak mocked. "The great Kael Brightblade, reduced to scratching at my ankles?"
The dragon's tail whipped around like a club. Ren tried to dodge, but he wasn't fast enough. The impact sent him flying through the air to crash into a pile of rubble. Pain exploded through his body, and he tasted blood.
He struggled to his feet, using Dawnbreaker to support himself. This wasn't working. He needed more power, more than just sword work and determination.
From his recovered memories came knowledge of spells and techniques he had used in his previous life. Words of power that could shake the earth or call down lightning from the sky. But using that kind of magic required preparation, focus, time he didn't have.
The dragon was advancing on him, taking its time now that it knew he wasn't a real threat. "You disappoint me, hero. I expected more from the man who defeated my master once before."
"The fight's not over yet."
"Oh, but it is." Vorthak's gaze shifted to something behind Ren. "Look who has come to watch you die."
Ren turned and felt his heart stop.
Mira was running toward them. She had left the safety of the ridge, left the other villagers behind, and was racing down the slope with nothing but her healer's bag and a courage that was both magnificent and terrible.
"Mira, no!" Ren shouted. "Get back!"
But she wasn't listening. She was focused on him, on the blood running down his face, on the wounds he had taken. She was thinking like a healer, not seeing the danger until it was too late.
Vorthak's head swiveled toward her like a snake tracking prey. "How touching. The hero has someone he cares about."
"Leave her alone!" Ren tried to put himself between Mira and the dragon, but his injured leg gave out. He fell to one knee, helpless to do anything but watch.
"Do you know what I enjoy most about killing heroes?" the dragon asked conversationally. "It's not the moment when they die. It's the moment when they realize they've failed to protect what matters most to them."
The Shadow Dragon's breath weapon charged, darkness gathering in its throat like a storm cloud.
Time seemed to slow. Ren could see every detail with horrible clarity. Mira's face, determined and unafraid even in the face of death. The dragon's eyes, glowing with malicious pleasure. The shadow breath building to lethal intensity.
And he knew, with the certainty of despair, that he couldn't save her.
"Mira!" he screamed.
She turned toward him at the sound of his voice. For just a moment, their eyes met across the distance. She smiled, that gentle, caring smile he had come to love. Then she mouthed three words he would carry with him forever.
"I forgive you."
The shadow breath struck her.
Mira didn't scream. She didn't have time. The darkness hit her like a physical blow, and she simply... dissolved. Her body turned to dust and shadows, scattered by the wind until nothing remained but the memory of her kindness.
"NO!"
The word tore from Ren's throat with such force that the very air seemed to shatter. Power erupted from him, not the controlled strength of a trained warrior, but raw grief given form. The light from Dawnbreaker blazed brighter than the sun, and the ancient words of power came to his lips without conscious thought.
"By light and fire and righteous fury," he roared, "I call upon the ancient compact! Let justice be done though the heavens fall!"
The sky split open.
Light poured down like a waterfall of stars, pure and terrible and absolute. The Shadow Dragon screamed as the radiance struck it, its dark scales beginning to smoke and crack. But Ren wasn't finished.
He raised Dawnbreaker above his head, and the sword became something more than metal. It became the crystallized essence of every oath he had ever sworn, every promise he had made, every vow to protect the innocent that had ever passed his lips.
"For Mira," he whispered.
Then he brought the sword down.
The blade passed through Vorthak's neck like it was cutting air. For a moment, nothing happened. The dragon stood there, confusion in its burning eyes. Then its head toppled from its shoulders, and its massive body collapsed like a mountain falling.
But victory brought no satisfaction. No sense of accomplishment or relief. There was only emptiness where Mira's presence had been.
Ren fell to his knees beside the spot where she had died. There was nothing left of her. Not even ashes. The shadow breath had consumed her completely, erasing her from existence as if she had never been.
"Mira," he whispered.
He knelt there for a long time, staring at the empty ground. Around him, the survivors from the fortress emerged from their hiding places. They spoke words of gratitude and amazement, calling him a hero, a savior sent by the gods.
He heard none of it.
Lyanna found him there when she arrived with the other villagers. She knelt beside him, her ancient face filled with sorrow.
"I'm sorry," she said quietly. "She died bravely."
"She died because of me." Ren's voice was hollow, empty of everything except pain. "Because I was too weak to protect her."
"You killed a Shadow Dragon. Something that should have been impossible."
"What good is that if I couldn't save the person who mattered most?"
Lyanna had no answer for that. She simply knelt with him in the ruins, sharing his grief in the way that only someone who had loved and lost could understand.
The other villagers gathered around them, their faces shocked and grieving. Mira had been beloved by all of them. She had healed their hurts, eased their fears, brought light to their darkest moments. Now she was gone, and they didn't understand why.
Master Thorne was the first to speak. "What do we do now?"
Ren looked up at the man who had become a leader among the survivors. His eyes were red with unshed tears, but there was something else there too. A hardness that hadn't been there before.
"We continue," Ren said. "We find Elena. We gather what allies we can. And we make the Shadow King pay for every life he's taken."
"But Mira—"
"Mira is dead." The words came out harsher than Ren intended, but he couldn't soften them. "Nothing we do will bring her back. But we can make sure her death wasn't meaningless."
He stood up, Dawnbreaker still glowing faintly in his hand. The sword felt different now. Heavier. As if it too was grieving.
"The woman who died here believed that individual lives mattered," Ren continued. "She believed that every person was worth saving. If we give up now, if we let despair win, then we betray everything she stood for."
Among the survivors from the fortress, an old man stepped forward. He was tall and thin, with a white beard and eyes that held deep wisdom.
"Lord Kael," he said formally. "I am Marcus, last of the scribes of Ironhold. I bring word from Sir Gareth."
"Gareth is alive?"
"He was when the attack began. He led a group of our best warriors deeper into the mountains, seeking an ancient weapon that might turn the tide against the Shadow King. He asked me to give you this if you came."
Marcus handed Ren a small scroll sealed with wax. Inside was a map showing a path through the highest peaks of the Thornwood, leading to a place marked only with the symbol of a sword.
"The Blade of Endings," Lyanna breathed, looking at the symbol. "I thought it was just a legend."
"What is it?" Ren asked.
"A weapon from the dawn of time. Forged by the gods themselves to end things that should not exist. If Gareth has truly found it..."
"Then we might have a chance," Ren finished.
He looked at the map, memorizing the route. It would be dangerous, more dangerous than anything they had faced so far. The path led through the domain of ice giants and worse things. Many of them might not survive the journey.
But they had to try. For Mira. For all the people who had died. For all the people who would die if they failed.
"We leave at first light," Ren announced. "Anyone who wants to come with me is welcome. Anyone who wants to find somewhere safe to wait out the war, I understand."
To his surprise, every single person stepped forward.
"We're with you," Master Thorne said simply. "All of us."
Little Sara, the orphan girl who had lost her parents in the attack on Millbrook, tugged at Ren's cloak. When he knelt down to her level, she whispered in his ear.
"Miss Mira told me to give you a message if something bad happened to her."
"What message?"
"She said to tell you that love doesn't die just because people do. She said you should remember that when things get dark."
The words hit Ren harder than any physical blow. He closed his eyes and for a moment, he could almost feel Mira's presence beside him. Her gentle voice reminding him to stay human, to remember what he was fighting for.
"Thank you," he whispered to Sara.
That night, as they made camp in the ruins of the fortress, Ren found himself unable to sleep. He sat by the cold ashes of their fire, staring up at the stars and thinking about endings.
Mira was gone. The woman who had kept him anchored to his humanity, who had reminded him that individual lives mattered, who had loved him not for what he had been but for what he was becoming.
Without her, it would be so easy to slip back into the cold calculation that had driven his previous life. To become the ruthless hero who sacrificed anything and anyone for the greater good.
But that wasn't what she would have wanted. She had died believing in him, believing that he could find a better way. He couldn't dishonor that faith by becoming the monster his enemies expected him to be.
"I miss her too," Lyanna said softly, settling down beside him.
"Do you?" Ren asked. "Or are you just saying that because it's what I want to hear?"
"I'm saying it because it's true. She was a good woman. Better than either of us deserved."
They sat in silence for a while, two immortal beings mourning a mortal woman who had touched both their lives.
"The old Kael would have used her death," Lyanna said eventually. "He would have turned his grief into rage and used it as a weapon."
"I know."
"Are you going to do that?"
Ren considered the question carefully. There was rage inside him, burning like a coal in his chest. Rage at the Shadow King, at Vorthak, at himself for being too weak to save the woman he loved. It would be easy to feed that rage, to let it consume everything else until nothing remained but the desire for vengeance.
"No," he said finally. "She wouldn't want that. She'd want me to remember why we're fighting. Not just to destroy our enemies, but to protect what's worth protecting."
"Even if that makes you weaker?"
"Especially then."
Lyanna nodded slowly. "She changed you. In just a few days, that mortal woman changed you in ways that a thousand years of experience couldn't."
"Yes."
"Hold onto that change," Lyanna advised. "When the final battle comes, when you're faced with the choice between victory and compassion, remember what she taught you. It might be the only thing that saves us all."
As dawn approached, Ren made himself a promise. He would find Gareth and the Blade of Endings. He would gather what allies he could. He would march on the Shadow King's stronghold and end this war once and for all.
But he would do it Mira's way. With compassion. With mercy when possible. With the understanding that every life mattered, even his enemies'.
It would be harder. It would be more dangerous. It might even be impossible.
But it was what she would have wanted.
And maybe, just maybe, love really was stronger than death.
The sun rose over the ruined fortress, painting the sky in shades of gold and red. A new day was beginning, full of dangers and challenges and the promise of pain to come.
But also full of hope.
Because Mira had believed in him. And as long as he carried that belief forward, a part of her would live on.
The legend continued, scarred now by loss but not broken by it.
And somewhere in the distance, a mountain peak gleamed like a blade in the morning light.