By midday, the roofs of Stoneford were long gone, hidden behind the rolling hills and thickening trees. The road had grown narrow, a scar through wild country where the canopy tangled overhead and let little light fall through. The air was damp, the ground soft, and even the birds had gone silent.
Rowan's boots squelched in mud as he shifted the harpoon against his shoulder. His arms still ached from training, but it was the silence that gnawed at him most. He'd grown used to Brennar's easy laughter filling the road, or Ari's clipped warnings whenever she caught a movement in the brush. Now there was nothing. Just their footsteps, and the sound of his own heartbeat.
Brennar finally broke the quiet. "Don't like it," he muttered, tightening the strap of his axe. "Woods this thick, you should hear more than your own breath."
"Too quiet," Ari agreed, her bow already half drawn as her eyes swept the branches above.
Rowan swallowed. The river inside him stirred faintly, an unease he couldn't shake. It was like a current tugging him somewhere he didn't want to go.
They pushed on, the trees closing tighter, the light thinning further. Brennar's boots squelched louder in the mud. Lyra touched Rowan's arm once, steadying him when he stumbled.
That was when the sound came — sudden, sharp, undeniable.
The creak of bowstrings.
"Down!" Ari barked.
The hiss of arrows filled the air. Brennar shoved Rowan aside as shafts slammed into the road, snapping against roots. More whistled from above. Rowan glanced up and saw them — shapes crouched in the trees, bows drawn again.
Figures rushed from the roadside brush, weapons raised. Men in mismatched armor, faces hidden beneath cloth and leather. Mercenaries, not raiders. Someone had paid for this.
Brennar roared and met them head-on, his axe swinging with brutal force. Ari's bow thrummed, arrow after arrow loosed with perfect calm. Lyra dragged Rowan behind a stump, shoving a hand to his chest.
"Breathe," she ordered, already reaching for her satchel.
Rowan tried — but his lungs felt tight. His hands trembled as he raised the harpoon, barely deflecting the first blade that came for him. The clash rattled his arms; the merc snarled and shoved harder. Rowan stumbled, mud slick underfoot.
"Hold him!" another shouted. "Take the boy alive!"
Rowan's stomach dropped. They were after him.
The merc swung again, and Rowan raised the harpoon desperately — too slow, too clumsy. The blade would have found him, if not for Ari's arrow that suddenly sprouted from the man's shoulder, staggering him back.
Rowan's pulse thundered. He splashed his harpoon quickly into the mud where a rivulet ran, water clinging faintly to the prongs. The edge seemed to sharpen in his grip. He thrust forward — not graceful, but desperate — and the weapon bit deeper than it should have. The merc howled and crumpled.
Rowan staggered, horrified at his own success, but alive.
Brennar laughed through the blood, swinging wide. "That's it, boy! Make it count!"
But Rowan barely had time to breathe before a sharper whistle cut through the air. He turned in time to see an archer above, drawing down on him, bowstring taut.
He froze. Too far. No cover.
The arrow never landed.
The archer gasped, eyes wide. A dagger jutted from his neck, black metal glinting in the dim light. He toppled from the branch, silent before he hit the ground.
Rowan blinked. Another archer cried out — and then choked, dragged back into the dark of the branches by something unseen. A shadow flickered, moved, and then was gone.
The mercenaries faltered, shouting in confusion. "Who's there?!"
From the treetops, a figure dropped soundlessly onto a branch, then vanished again as if the shadow itself had swallowed her.
A heartbeat later she reappeared behind another archer, blades flashing. The man didn't even scream. He simply folded, and she was already gone.
Rowan stared, breath caught in his throat.
She moved like no one he had ever seen. Daggers in both hands, her form blurred at the edges, splitting into afterimages that made it impossible to track her. One merc swung wildly at a phantom — only for her to step through his shadow and open his throat in a single, clean strike.
"Behind us!" one cried, but even as he turned, she was already elsewhere.
The ambush unraveled. Archers scrambled, losing their nerve. One dropped his bow and tried to climb down — only for her to appear on the branch above him, a foot on his chest, a blade at his eye. He didn't move again.
On the ground, Brennar cleaved two men at once, roaring. Ari loosed another arrow clean through a helm. Lyra kept Rowan steady while he parried clumsily, the water on his harpoon giving each thrust just enough edge to keep him alive.
Within minutes, the fight was done. Bodies littered the dirt road and slumped from the trees. Only one merc still lived, crawling backward, eyes wide with terror.
Then he froze. A figure stood above him, silent.
She stepped into view at last.
Cloaked in dark leathers that drank the light, daggers still wet in her hands, her presence was cold and unshaken. Her face was half-shadowed beneath her hood, but her eyes gleamed pale, almost silver in the gloom.
The merc tried to beg. She silenced him with one quick flick — not cruel, not angry, just final.
The forest grew still again.
Rowan lowered his harpoon, chest heaving. Brennar spat on the dirt, axe dripping. Ari kept her bow raised a second longer before slowly lowering it. Lyra's hand on Rowan's shoulder was the only thing steady.
"Who in the Hollow's name are you?" Brennar growled.
The woman didn't answer at first. She cleaned her blades on the cloak of the man she'd just killed, then sheathed them with a smooth, practiced motion. Only then did she speak, voice quiet but carrying.
"You'd all be corpses if not for me."
She stepped closer, eyes sweeping over each of them. Calm. Detached. As if none of this mattered to her at all.
"I'll walk with you," she said at last. "For now."
Brennar's face darkened. "We didn't ask you."
"You didn't have to."
Rowan, still shaking, forced his voice to steady. "You saved us. That counts."
Her gaze lingered on him a heartbeat longer, unreadable. Then she turned, already walking toward the shadows at the edge of the road.
"Stay or go," she said without looking back. "It makes no difference to me."
The group exchanged wary looks. Ari's mouth was tight, her bowstring still humming faintly in her grip. Lyra's brow furrowed in thought. Brennar scowled but said nothing.
Rowan's pulse still hammered, but beneath the fear was something else — awe. Whoever she was, whatever she had done, he couldn't let her vanish.
"Wait," he called. His voice cracked, but he didn't stop. "If you're walking this road… then walk with us."
The woman paused. The corner of her mouth curled, just barely.
"Interesting," she murmured.
Then she disappeared into the trees, leaving only the echo of her voice and the silence she carried with her.