Braith
Three days later, the bone crow perches on the war room windowsill, its message tube gleaming red in the morning light. I watch Kiakoa break the wax seal, his face changing as he reads the parchment inside.
“What is it?”
“Border breach at the eastern pass.” He crumples the message, jaw tightening. “Three scouts dead. Enemy forces moving toward the Valajoki settlements.”
My stomach drops. “Civilians?”
“Hundreds. Families, children, elders who can't flee fast enough.” His hands curl into fists. “The message says they have maybe hours before the attack reaches them.”
Captain Morris appears in the doorway, armor clattering as he hurries into the war room. “My lord, the patrol reports—”
“I've seen it.” Kiakoa moves to the weapon rack, selecting a sword that's seen recent use. “Ready twenty for immediate departure. Full combat gear.”
“All twenty, sir? That leaves castle defenses thin—”
“Children are dying while we debate numbers.” He straps on armor designed for speed rather than ceremony. “The remaining guards maintain full alertness. No one enters or leaves without challenge.”
Morris nods and disappears to rally the men. I watch Kiakoa finish his preparations, unease crawling up my spine.
“Something feels wrong about this,” I say.
“Everything feels wrong about it. The timing, the target, the convenient arrival just as we planned our next moves.” He crosses to me, hands framing my face. “But I can't let innocents die while we wonder if it's a trap.”
“How long will you be gone?”
“Four hours to reach them. Maybe six if we have to chase stragglers through the forest.” His thumb traces my cheekbone.
“Lock the doors behind me. Stay in the inner chambers. The old portal network has been dead for decades, so no one can simply appear inside our walls. If anything feels wrong—anything at all—retreat to my chamber and wait.”
“I will.”
But the promise tastes bitter in my mouth.
His kiss carries desperation and copper, as if he's already expecting violence. “I love you,” he says against my mouth.
The words stop my breath. He's never said them before.
“I love you too.”
He holds me for another heartbeat, then forces himself to step back. “I'll return by sunset.”
I watch from the highest tower as his party rides out. Twenty guards in formation, weapons ready, moving fast across the twisted landscape. When they disappear beyond the ridge, the castle feels suddenly vast around me.
The shadow servants cluster closer than usual, their forms flickering between solid and translucent. One actually manages to touch my shoulder, offering comfort through smoky fingers that maintain substance for several seconds.
“Keep watch,” I tell them. “All approaches, all entrances. Alert me to anything unusual.”
They scatter throughout the castle, drifting through walls to take up positions at every possible entry point. The remaining guards—maybe eight total—maintain their posts at gates and strategic corridors.
The first hour passes quietly. I review defensive protocols with the skeleton crew, check supplies, coordinate patrol routes for the reduced manpower. Normal activities that fail to ease the knot in my chest.
The second hour brings wrongness.
The servants in the eastern wing start losing coherence. Not their usual shift between solid and translucent, but something else. Their forms destabilize, becoming wisps of smoke that can barely maintain awareness.
“What's happening?” I ask the nearest one, but it can't hold together long enough to respond. Its attempt at communication comes out as whispered static before it dissolves entirely.
A blind spot. Someone is creating interference in our supernatural defenses.
I move toward the eastern wing, two guards falling into formation around me—all we can spare from essential positions. The corridors feel different here. Too quiet, too still. The air tastes metallic, sharp on my tongue.
“My lady,” one guard says. “Should we sound the alarm?”
“Not yet. If this is an attack, noise might accelerate whatever they're planning.” I test the air, trying to identify the metallic tang. “Do you smell that?”
“Yes. Sharp. Wrong.”
The scent thickens as we approach the main eastern chamber. When we reach the door, it stands open. I know I locked it this morning.
Inside, reality bends.
The chamber looks normal at first glance—stone walls, tall windows, familiar tapestries. But the shadows move independently of light sources, pooling in corners and flowing across the floor. When I blink, the room's proportions seem to shift.
Vasek steps from behind a pillar.
The pillar wasn't there moments ago. I know every stone of this chamber, every architectural detail. But now it stands between us and the far wall, carved from black marble that reflects images that aren't in the room.
“Lady Braith.” His voice carries harmonics that make my teeth ache. “More perceptive than most humans. You detected the disturbance before my illusions could fully establish themselves.”
My guards draw swords, steel ringing in the strange air. Vasek glances at the weapons and makes a dismissive gesture. The blades crumble to rust-colored dust, metal aging decades in seconds.
“Run,” I tell the men. “Get to the alarm horn. Alert everyone.”
They turn toward the doorway we entered through, but solid stone greets them instead of an open corridor. The exit has simply ceased to exist.
Scratch materializes beside me, his multiple eyes blazing. “Forty-eight years, sixty-nine days until my service ends!” he snarls, his form gaining substance as desperation fuels his power. He lunges at Vasek.
But Vasek's reality-warping magic catches him mid-leap, slamming the demon against the stone wall hard enough to crack his form. “Miserable bound creature,” Vasek sneers. “Know your place.”
Scratch hits the floor, form flickering.
Before he destabilizes completely, he scrambles toward me, ignoring the damage to his own body.
As Vasek turns back to me, Scratch presses something cold and thin—a silver band—into my palm.
His mouth forms a single word: “Tracking.” Then he collapses, form flickering dangerously.
“Your mate received urgent intelligence about civilian casualties,” Vasek says conversationally. “Tragic reports. Women and children fleeing burning homes, defenseless families crying for help.”
The trap. The timing, the convenient bone crow just as we planned our next moves. “The Valajoki settlements,” I say slowly. “They're empty, aren't they?”
His smile shows teeth that are slightly too sharp. “Since autumn. I cleared them myself after the harvest. But the testimonies and casualty lists I crafted? So authentic. Your mate rides toward ghosts while I claim the real prize.”
I slip the silver band onto my wrist, squeezing the jewel that I pray activates the beacon. “How long have you been planning this?”
“Since I heard about that display in the Orchard. Since you demonstrated what you truly are in front of witnesses, yet still chose to remain with him.” His eyes burn like winter fire. “I'm here to correct your error.”
“I made no error.”
“You chose a frenzy-mad youngling over established power. Resources. Ancient knowledge.” The air ripples around him as he speaks, space becoming unstable. “I offer partnership between equals, not the desperate hunger of a beast who will drain you dry.”
The air around me thickens. Not physical restraints, but atmosphere itself becoming dense and resistant. I can breathe, but my limbs move as if underwater.
“Clever,” Vasek says, apparently sensing the charm's activation. “But your mate is hours away, chasing phantoms through empty forests. You're coming with me now.”
The reality distortion intensifies. The stone walls begin fading, replaced by swirling darkness punctuated by flashes of alien landscape. Portal magic, but unlike the simple transport circles I've seen before.
“Where are we going?”
“My personal stronghold. Somewhere your misguided mate can't follow quickly enough to matter.” Carved stone begins materializing around us, growing from nothing into towering spires of black marble and iron. “Somewhere you'll have time to understand what you've been missing.”
The transportation begins, that nauseating sensation of space folding around us. The world dissolves into marble and shadow, and I'm gone.