Chapter 9: Ashes on the Wind
Dawn broke brittle, the sky pale as bone. Frosthold's banners hung stiff above the keep, their colors muted under ice. Lord Carrow wasted no time—before the sun cleared the peaks, he rode out with twenty men. Joran and I rode beside him, spears rattling against our saddles, breath steaming in the cold.
Kael did not ride with us. He remained under guard, his warning still echoing in the hall: The storm has begun.
The road wound north along the coast, where the sea clawed endlessly at black stone cliffs. At first, I thought the smoke on the horizon was only the breath of distant hearths. But the closer we rode, the colder that hope became.
Rimeford was dead.
The huts were husks of ash, doors hanging from scorched frames. Snow lay gray with soot, streaked dark where blood had spilled. No voices stirred. Not even the bark of a dog.
We dismounted. The air stank of smoke and something fouler, a rot beneath the frost. Joran nudged aside a splintered shield with his boot. His jaw tightened.
"They didn't even fight," he muttered. He crouched, tracing the churn of footprints pressed into frozen earth. "Dragged away. All of them."
Carrow's face was carved from iron, but his knuckles whitened on the reins.
"Search for survivors."
We scattered through the ruins. Every broken beam seemed a shadow waiting to reveal a body. My steps crunched over blackened snow until I stopped before a scorched wall.
The mark was there.
Scrawled in ash and blood.
The black sun. Cracked. Watching.
My breath froze in my throat. My hand rose—and the visions struck.
Flashes—splintered, searing.
A roof collapsing in firelight. Chains biting into flesh. Screams swallowed by storm winds that clawed the coast to pieces.
And at the storm's heart—a figure crowned in ice, shadow vast as mountains.
Before it stood Kael. His white eye burned. His staff lifted. His voice—warning, or vow—lost in the howl.
I reeled back, gasping against the wall.
Joran's voice snapped sharp. "What is it?"
"They were here," I whispered.
His gaze followed mine. The sigil bled in the firelight. His hand went to his sword. "Damn him… the stranger spoke true."
A horn blast shattered the silence. Carrow stood at the edge of the village, men gathering around him. In his gauntlet, he held something small. He raised it high.
A child's toy. Carved from wood. Snapped in half.
"This was no raid for plunder," Carrow said. His voice carried low and grim. "They take the living."
The men shifted uneasily. Some cursed. Some prayed. The frost in my bones weighed heavier than steel.
We pressed on. The next village told the same story—emptied homes, doors torn from hinges, trails of blood leading into the trees. At one hearth, a meal lay half-eaten, the broth frozen solid in its bowl. At another, shackles still clinked in the wind. And in every place, the black sun stared back at us.
By dusk, we made camp in the ruins of a longhouse. The fire gave little warmth. Joran sat in silence, his usual jests swallowed by the dark. Carrow stood apart, his gaze fixed on the horizon as though daring the night to move.
Sleep did not come. The visions returned—sharper now, burning like brands. Kael stood again before the crowned shadow, storm winds screaming around him. His lips moved, words drowned in the roar, until only one truth rang clear in my skull.
When I woke, the fire was nothing but embers. The sea hissed endlessly in the dark.
And in the silence, the truth remained.
It has begun.
"To Be Continued "
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