Chapter Thirty-Four #3
Orrin sighs an exhale, and he leans in close, eyes darting around the open forges for straying eyes and ears.
“Word has it that she’s the most wicked Venomshade in the history of Thalmyr’s Royal Guard.
Makes deadly alchemy the likes of which have never been seen.
Potions that corrode steel, acids that burn flesh, elixirs that liquify bone from the inside out.
A master of alchemy, they say,” he whispers.
The words echo in his mind.
Corrode steel.
Burn flesh.
Liquify bone.
Orrin sucks his teeth, leaning in to within an inch of Ronyn’s face. “Heard she once liquified a man’s lungs from the inside out and made the rest of his unit watch.”
Ronyn swallows thickly, forcing the bile back down his throat.
He reinforces his mask. “Even more reasons to stay on her good side, then. Better finish these blades—I rather like my lungs solid.”
Orrin only nods, spins on his heel, and starts barking orders across the forge.
Oblivious moron.
Ronyn keeps one eye on the oiled weapon in his hand, and the other on Commander Calira.
She strides slowly along the crates, hands entwined behind her back.
Other guards from her unit remove the cloth covering the weapons, inspecting their edges, their weight, their balance.
But not Calira. She watches everything. She isn’t admiring the forge. She’s mapping it.
Exits.
Sight lines.
Blind spots.
Distance between bodies.
The kind of seeing that comes from expecting violence before it arrives.
She transforms her analysis into relaxed observation, casting it across the forges, the people, the horizon, the township so no one ever questions her motives. She walks with such certainty, such confidence, that no one questions where she’s going, or what she’s doing.
So she just… keeps walking. Beyond the open air forges. Beyond where the eye can see. And around the ash-covered storeroom marking the end of the forge zone.
And just like that—she’s gone.
He needs to follow her. This might be his only chance to uncover what Thalmyr is up to here in Vyrhal.
Ronyn’s mind races, a plan forming before he’s consciously aware of what it is.
“Orrin!” Ronyn calls, gripping his stomach, doubling over like he might drop to the ground in a heartbeat.
Orrin turns, his eyes blowing wide at the sight of Ronyn crippled in agony.
Ronyn approaches, tripping over himself, clutching at his gut.
He’s two steps away.
One.
He lurches.
Dry retching and heaving like a cat trying to dislodge a fur ball.
“What in the holy fuckin’ Stars is wrong with ya?” Orrin snaps, face twisted in disgust, taking a half-step back.
“I’ve got the shits,” Ronyn grumbles, lurching forward again, putting Orrin right in his trajectory.
Orrin stumbles back. “Don’t tell me that!”
Ronyn lurches again. “Thought you should know. Out of respect. Professional courtesy and all that.”
He stumbles closer to Orrin. “Communication is important in the workplace.”
Orrin shields his face in the nook of his elbow.
“Don’t fuckin’ come near me, lad!”
Gullible fool.
“I— I need to finish the order,” Ronyn groans, appearing the devoted, committed smith. He reaches for Orrin who only pulls back, mouth curling in disgust.
“Get outta here! We don’t need the whole forge going down!” He raises his arms to stop Ronyn from moving any closer, and then covers his mouth like he’s evading the plague.
“No, I need to finish—”
“Go! Now!” Orrin snaps, shoving Ronyn away with the thick tread of his boot.
Ronyn nods, groaning like a dying animal.
But he can’t fight the smile sneaking through his expression. He transforms it into a grimace, and stumbles away, down the line of crates, and around the corner of the building where Commander Calira slipped away.
He rounds the corner, ripping a cloak from the nail hooks on the side of the storeroom, and pulls it over his shoulders, and covers his face with the fabric, pulling it low over his eyes.
He stands up straight, dropping the act, and strides forward like a tracker hunting prey.
Fucking idiots.
Ronyn might be clever, but he’s not above using bowel distress to his advantage if the circumstances call for it.
Nothing gets a crowd running quite like a grown man announcing he’s about to shit himself.
Each step is calculated, considered—practiced in a way that only the streets of Virellin can teach. The kind of steps that turn prey into predator, hunted into hunter, slummer into raider.
He slips between shadows.
Darts between alleys.
Crouches behind discarded barrels.
Until the glint of steel in the Vyrhalian sun refracts, catching his eye.
Calira.
Her gait is steady and predictable, but it’s her neck swiveling in a coordinated rhythm that grabs his attention—eyes tracking movement like an outsider who knows she’s going somewhere she shouldn’t.
The scattered townsfolk don’t look up. Don’t pull their eyes away from the mundane rhythm of daily life in the thick, ash-drenched air of Vyrhal.
Calira keeps walking.
So Ronyn catalogs her.
A small dagger tucked in her palm, hidden beneath the sleeve of her cloak.
A vial hanging from a chain around her neck. Venomshade alchemy, no doubt.
A strong, athletic gait. The gait of someone trained in the art of violence. But it’s the helmet his mind loops and snags on. No one else wears them. Why her? She either likes the anonymity for strategic reasons, she’s someone of importance, or… she doesn’t want to be identified.
But why, he has no idea.
Beyond the last line of buildings, Vyrhal gives way to ruin. Not empty land—wounded land.
The earth stretches out in blackened sheets of old lava and ash, cracked open in places where heat still breathes from beneath the surface. Sparse, half-burnt scrub clings stubbornly to life between the fractures, twisted and brittle.
And beyond it all—the volcanoes. Towering. Smoking. Watching.
Ronyn’s gaze tracks the path she’s taken, the direction of her steps unmistakable. She’s not wandering. She’s heading straight for them.
Ronyn doesn’t follow—he lets her head for the volcanoes unhindered.
With the ash settling across the wounded earth, he knows it will hold the imprint of her boots—deep, deliberate. So he lets her go, hiding in the shadows of the town’s outskirts, not daring to risk his position.
But when night falls, and the town turns in, Ronyn will get his answers.
Calira has not returned.
She vanished into hollows carved into the volcano’s feet—some ancient footprint left by fire and molten heat.
Vyrhal’s sun dips below the horizon, giving Ronyn the cover of darkness. He follows the disturbed ash that Calira’s boots left behind. No hesitation in the stride. No deviation in direction.
She knew exactly where she was going.
Ronyn follows, bow raised, arrow nocked. Because whatever Calira is doing out here, she doesn’t want anyone to know, and Ronyn is sick to fucking death of secret agendas.
A hush settles across the earth. Quiet. Exposed. Dangerous.
The land doesn’t rise toward the volcanoes—it breaks open.
The ground splits into blackened ridges and hollowed paths where something molten had once carved its way through the earth. Ronyn follows the trail until the rock gives way entirely. Until the world opens into something else.
A tunnel. Not carved. Not built. Formed.
The walls curve in unnatural, fluid shapes, like the stone itself had once been liquid and then frozen mid-motion.
Ridges run along the sides in long, rippling waves, and the ceiling stretches high above, dark and uneven, with hardened drips of rock hanging like the aftermath of something that had bled fire.
Heat lingers in the air. Not enough to burn, but enough to remind him that this place isn’t dead. It has just… cooled.
Torchlight flickers deeper within, casting long shadows along the warped stone.
And there—footprints.
Fresh.
She didn’t hesitate coming in. Which means she knew exactly what she’d find here.
The air changes the moment Ronyn steps inside.
Hotter. No—worse. Heavier.
Heat clings to the walls in a way that doesn’t belong to the sun—thick, breathing heat that settles into his lungs and stays there. The tunnel curves inward, the stone warped and smoothed like it had once flowed, and then… stopped.
Hushed voices ricochet off the volcanic walls.
Low.
Measured.
Controlled.
Then stop.
Ronyn slows, raising his bow and aiming his arrow, his steps silent against the ash-dusted ground.
He edges closer to the mouth of a wider chamber, and stops.
There are more of them than he expected.
A dozen, maybe less.
They sit in strange, heavy stillness on the cavern floor, their movements sluggish and delayed, as though the air has thickened around them. One stares blankly into the fire’s flames, breathing slow and deep, while another leans heavily against the cavern wall with unfocused eyes.
He knows this look.
Drugged.
Ronyn’s stomach twists.
And it does not stop. Because his eyes drag across the group, and find a solitary figure propped against the far wall.
Jax.
Relief hits first, sharp and immediate.
She’s alive.
Then he sees the bindings.
Fuck.
She sags unnaturally against the iron support beam she’s tied to, dark strands veiling her face as her head lolls forward. Too still. Too quiet. Tarrakai snarls violently beneath Ronyn’s skin in response. And he knows something is wrong before anyone speaks.
He crouches low, training his arrow on the figures, darting his focus across the group.
Someone is in charge here.
He takes a single step across the threshold, and the undeniable cold of a sharp blade presses into his neck.
Fuck again.
“You think I didn’t know you followed me here?” A voice snarls from beyond the blade.
Calira.
Ronyn stills, bow and arrow drifting downward. He knows he’s not in a position of power. Won’t be able to fight his way out of… this.