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“Remy! Wake up!”
I blinked hard, dragging myself out of the haze into the dead of night. Only the three of us remained in the blanketed wagon. Lyssa shook me hard. Leaning over us with a jolt of frantic awareness. Hair tangled around her face, tunic half-buttoned, feet bare, as if she’d run out in a hurry. Her chest heaved, panic written in every breath.
“What?” I slurred despite the adrenaline. “What’s going on?”
Val swore under his breath, rubbing at his eyes as Eshlyn stirred beside me, pushing up onto her elbows. “What happened?” she started, but Lyssa cut her off. “It’s Dent. He’s gone.”
The words snapped through me like a whip as my stomach dropped, heavy and cold. “What do you mean, gone?”
Lyssa’s hands shook as she paced. “He wasn’t there when I woke up and… The tomb guards are unconscious.”
“Holy shit.” Val rushed to his feet. “You’re serious?”
I jolted up beside him, bare feet striking the cold dirt. “And the stone?”
She pressed a hand against her mouth, trembling. “It’s rolled open.” She swallowed, eyes wide and wet. “Rem, I think he went in by himself.”
FUCK!
For half a second, I froze. The world paused with me for just a moment before aether surged in my blood like a detonated heartbeat, rising alongside a searing reminder of my rushed recovery. The ghost of Val’s palm brushed my shoulder as if to keep me from running off, but it vanished like a whisper along with their voices. Space folded around me like parchment as I vanished from between them, reappearing at the edge of the tomb in a silent torrent. The jolt immediately sent my breath into ragged chokes as my heart pounded hard in my chest. My dress did nothing to combat the night air biting hard against my skin, but there was no time to linger on how unprepared I was. Whatever was happening, it chose its moment well.
Three guards lay sprawled in the briar outside the tomb's entrance. Breathing, thank the gods, but limp as discarded marionettes. The massive stone slab had been rolled aside, leaving the maw gaping and black, like a throat waiting to swallow the night.
Dent wouldn't do this… Why would he do this? He was in control last night, I know he was.
It took only a moment to study the ground. Fresh tracks scarred the dirt. A chill slid down my spine as I counted over a dozen paths stretching out from the entrance in all directions. Mud and moss tore up in a quick frenzy.
Shit. The parasite’s trying to escape.
No. It might already be gone.
I laced my voice with enough amplification spell to split the air.
“They’ve breached the tomb!”
It cracked through the trees like thunder. Not a drill. Not a mistake.
For a beat, there was nothing, just a silent second echoing before signal horns blasted three short, panicked bursts that sent a thrum of chaos catching like fire across dry grass. The word repeated across the camp as lanterns flared. Shadows leapt across canvas walls as soldiers scrambled into gear.
Then…
A whisper echoed from the mouth of the tomb. Dent's voice, so faint it could’ve been a memory. “Rem…”
My blood turned to ice. “Dent!?” I called out, pushing forward a few steps into the blackness of the tomb before stopping in disbelief.
“Remy, wait!” Val’s voice sounded like a far-off whisper. I turned just long enough to catch a flicker of his tunic bounding in from the edge of camp. Eshlyn’s red dress waved from further behind, followed by Lyssa's white hair flowing like a blur in the dark.
But the whisper came again.
Closer this time. More desperate.
“Help…”
That’s no illusion. He’s down there… Sorry, Val, you’ll just have to catch up.
I rushed in, pulling my daggers as space folded forward, straight into the tomb’s open throat. The spell snapped through me like a live wire as I landed at the base of the stone steps, right at the shattered threshold of that ancient door. My knees buckled at the backlash, bare feet skidding against cold stone as the tang of blood hit my tongue, hot and metallic. The tomb air hit like warm water soaked in rot, wet, stale, and wrong. I choked on it, breath catching in my chest, pulse screaming in my ears. All for the simple reminder that I'm either dumb… or desperate enough to be casting when a day ago I could hardly move. Still, I pushed upright. Lungs heaving.Â
My legs shook as I released a guttural call into the void, “DENT!?”
The tomb swallowed my voice with no response. Too quiet. Too still. Just then, a massive thud split the air behind me like thunder. By the time I spun, it was already too late. The stone door slammed shut with the sound of a sealed coffin… and I was trapped.
Shit.
No time to weigh the consequences, how or why the heavy stone door might have closed from the outside. I only raised my daggers to defend myself, blades blanketed by the crippling darkness ahead.
My vision adjusted quickly, deepened by the spell I picked up for tracking in the woods. It was just enough to outline the massive chamber ahead in shades of silver and blue. That's when I saw someone I’d hoped to never see again.
Durnan.
Looming dead center of the cavernous room like a statue carved from bone and rot. His skeletal frame had grown since I’d last seen it, taller, broader. The coat was still there, but it was worn, torn, and half-fused to his back; stitched into place by root and tendon. Parasitic tendrils coiled up his exposed bone like veins that pulsed faintly with the heartbeat of the tomb. The patches of flesh had rotted, but filled in with infected matter, as if the parasite hadn’t finished giving shape to its favorite toy.
A black greataxe lay clutched in the tendriled meat of his hand, but it was his face that stopped me cold. He wore that same half-smile he used behind the bar. Crooked. Charming. Only now, the eyes above weren’t his. They were hollow, watching, and hungry.
He was flanked by two heavily armored husks. Their clothes and steel looked healthier than I’d seen on the others. Dark hooded fabric stretched under a steel plate, greatswords resting in the ground like sentinels.
Durnan smiled with that arrogant, dead-eyed composure, stalking forward slow as rot. “So predictable,” he said, his voice a grotesque blend of Dent’s, his own, and something that didn’t belong. “But I suppose you were always the idiot of the bunch.”
“Holy shit, Durnan… what the hell are you?”
“We,” he corrected, smiling like a cracked mask. “Have evolved. In fact… we should thank you for that. Keeping Dent’s node alive has done wonders for the collective.”
Anger clawed up my throat like bile. “He’s not one of you’re fucking puppets!”
He laughed at that. A gesture that almost appeared human, but it melted into a sigh, bored and condescending, like a parent humoring a tantrum. “Gods, you’re so naive… A cruel joke it is for nature to pack such power into a vessel so willfully ignorant.”
“So that’s what this is?” I scoffed, edging into the room against every instinct. “Trap me in here so you can what? Assimilate me into your gross… hive mind?”
“As if we’d flatter you in such a way,” he mocked. “First, you’ll have to die. Such should calm that grotesque ego of yours”.
“Cut the bullshit.” My eyes studied his every movement as I sidestepped along the cavern’s edge. “Where the fuck is Dent?”
“Resting… for now… Though he’s got something he’d like to say.” His tone switched gears as if tuning into an alternate personality, before speaking in a perfect imitation of Dent’s voice. “You shouldn’t have come, Rem. I’ve made peace with what I am… I chose this.”
No way. I know Dent. However off-putting that voice is, it's nothing but a bold-faced bluff.Â
“Spew all the bullshit you want, no one's buying it.”
“Surprised, little mouse?” Durnan's mutated voice switched back as he continued the slow march, greataxe in hand. “Who do you think rolled the stone away? Suppose you don’t know him as well as you think you do… but no matter. I’ve said my piece.” He paused a moment before jetting forward in an alien blur of movement and slamming his greataxe down over top of me like an executioner's blade.
I rolled sideways just in time, the axe carved through the pulsing floor, slammed into the stone below, and sent a shockwave tearing outward. If I’d been a breath slower, it would have cut me in half. I barely made it to my feet before the next one came in a sideward arc. I caught it on both daggers, forming an X, but the force blew through me, launching my body like driftwood across the floor.
This was his plan… Use Dent to lure me in. Unprepared. Unrecovered. To cut me off, and it worked. I can hardly cast. I’m not even wearing shoes. I’ll lose, no question, but I only need time. Time for Val and Esh to bust through the door and pummel this prick.
“You’re afraid…” My voice turned to gravel as I forced myself up from one knee in a desperate attempt to hide the hopelessness festering in my gut. “You should be. We’ve beaten you at every turn. Not the parasite. You… Durnan. You wanted to be alive again? Now you’re just a puppet. Dead and hopeless.”
I just need him talking.
“You think killing me will change anything?” I went on, spitting blood to the floor. “This whole place will be rubble and ash before long… and you know it.”
Durnan paused, just long enough. Enough to know the words had hit. The parasite might not care, but Durnan? He was still in there somewhere… and I intended to use that.
A breath passed. A single beat of silence, thick as ash, before he stepped forward, axe lowering just slightly. “You think you know me, you rat?” His tone snapped like bone under pressure, too many voices for one throat.
The greataxe came fast, swinging wide with unnatural force. Uncontrolled but powerful and far too quick to dodge. I parried on instinct, but the weight blasted through me just like before.
“I know the lies you tell,” he snarled, circling. “A shame, Kael threw himself into the maw of death as if you were someone worth saving… He’d turn in his grave if he knew what you were. A fraud. A worthless nobody from the slums!”
My breath shuddered, but I only needed time. “He’s still more alive than you’ll ever be.”
Another swing howled through the air. I barely ducked in time as the axehead cleaved above me, slicing a lock of my hair. I sprang up, aiming both daggers at his ribcage, but they didn’t connect. Cut off by his skeletal knee slamming into my gut. Forcing the air from my lungs in a heave as I struggled to stay on my feet.
“Doesn’t it bother you?” he spat. “The way Dent wept in your arms? Pleading for more time as the infection threatened to take him completely?” He laughed, bitter. “He believed in you. And for what? You’re a waste!”
“You don’t know him.” The words escaped in a rasp.
“I know everything.” Another wicked fast strike echoed through the chamber, then another. The other two husks didn’t even move. Like they were told not to interfere, or knew they didn’t need to. Each blow slammed like a siege weapon, forcing me to dodge out of the way or block with both daggers, just to get thrown by the force of it.Â
Steel screamed against steel. Sparks lit the dark. I only needed time… that’s what I told myself, but sending him into a reckless fury was hardly helping. His hate was honed like a blade. It bought me nothing but growing exhaustion. My legs nearly buckled. My arms burned until finally he paused the relentless assault, if only for a breath. “How many have to die before you accept how worthless you are to all of them?”
“Go fuck yourself,” I muttered, voice low. There was no venom left to spew, just tired truth. “You're a coward, Durnan.”
He only chuckled as the next attack came in an inhuman downward blur, brutal and meant to kill. “I am not him.”Â
I caught it, blades crossed, braced low, but the weight bore down hard. I gritted my teeth, bones straining against the force before his boot crashed into my ribs like a sledgehammer.Â
Pain exploded as I was thrown sideways, air ripped from my lungs. I hit the ground coughing. Eyes opening just in time for me to roll away from another brutal swing. The axe crashed where my head had just been, splitting the floor like a thunderclap.
I tried to stand, but my hands slipped, blades trembling in my grip. I was down, and Durnan didn’t have to rush. He turned slowly, deliberately following my sideways roll until finally, I collided with the cave wall. Nowhere to go.
He looked down at me, silent… And raised his axe again. High and aimed. Deliberate.
I thought making him angry would buy time, take the edge off his attacks… Another mistake.
I looked up, blinking through blood, sweat, and guilt as he loomed over me. Then began pulling whatever raw aether I could, but it was fighting back. Not with pinpricks but sharp shards of glass raking over my skin. Casting now could cripple me and wouldn’t change a thing. For the first time… I believed it. I was going to die. Right here, in this rotting cathedral of flesh and failure.Â
A part of me thought it was a fitting end. That maybe I deserved it in some way.
I failed Dent. Threw Kael’s life away. At least with this, I avoid prison.
“Go ahead,” I spat. “Do it, you soulless fuck.”
A crooked smile curled across his face as he readied his axe.
But then, a blur of ink and teeth lunged from the shadows with a snarl too big for her small frame.
“Nyla!?” I gasped, barely believing it.
She tore in, low and fast, latching onto Durnan’s ankle with a vicious yowl. Fangs sank hard through the shredded hem of his cloak, jaws locked like iron.
Durnan snarled, reaching down to seize her by the scruff, then kicked, hard and brutal, straight into her ribs.
My eyes widened in dismay as the world dropped out from under me. Aether surged, wild and instinctual. Space folded before I could think.
Her body flew, but I was already there, reappearing in a flash, just in time to catch her limp form before she could slam into the cavern floor. My knees scraped the stone in a streak of blood, as I wrapped tight around her, shielding her with my body as we slid. The backlash hit like a lightning strike down my spine. It shredded through my nerves like a thousand dying stars, vision wavering as I collapsed over her, coughing blood straight onto her fur, limbs barely responsive, but I didn’t care.
“Dammit, Nyla… where did you come from?” I whispered, fingers trembling as I rested a palm over her side. Still breathing. Shallow, but there. A broken breath escaped my lips as she let out a faint whimper, unmoving.
I rested my forehead against hers. “Stupid girl,” I breathed. Rage igniting in my gut as I remembered her mother. That quiet shape in the woods. That knowing death. “I swear to the gods… He’ll pay for that.”
                                        ...
Â
VAL - OUTSIDE
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“Remy, wait!”Â
The moment she peered back at me… I knew she wouldn’t. She was already gone, vanishing down into the tomb’s throat in a fit of reckless abandon.Â
Dammit Rem!
“What is she thinking?” Eshlyn called out, scrambling to keep pace. Lyssa nearly tripped on a root not far behind.
“She’s thinking about Dent”, I shot back, ducking under a branch near the entrance to camp. “Get everyone together. We’re going in early.”
“Wait, Val!” Lyssa shouted, breathless. “What do we tell them?”
I hesitated. “Shit… I don’t know.”
“It doesn’t matter.” Eshlyn cut in, already scanning the trees. “We need the soldiers formed up and the ascenders ready.”
“Check Dent’s quarters,” I motioned for Lyssa, already moving again. “Maybe he left us something, and if anyone asks, there’s been a breach. That’s all they need to know.”
Camp erupted around us, horns blaring, soldiers shouting, tents stirring.
Eshlyn veered off. “Where are you going?”
“Where do you think!?”
“You're unarmed!”
“I’ll figure it out!” I called back, rushing for the entrance in a sprint.
My boots pounded the earth as chaos loomed and lanterns flared in all directions. All of it, I cut through like an arrow. Unarmed or not, Remy had run off, and I wasn’t about to let them face whatever was down there alone.
The yawning maw of the tomb came quickly into view, but so did something else.
A figure emerged from the darkness just beyond the threshold. A ripple of movement twisted the air, slow and spectral, like the backdrop was finally remembering it existed. Cloaked in ragged black robes, rotted and sloughing with tendrils, the thing lifted a fleshy, skeletal hand towards the stone.
A groan split the air as the massive slab slammed shut, sliding as if under some invisible pressure. In the same moment, its other hand slithered across the edges. Glowing as if molten steel were fusing it in place.
I knew immediately… this was its plan all along.
They're cutting us off!
“SHIT!” I pushed harder. Faster. “REM!”
Just when I thought I wouldn’t make it in time, a blur of motion rammed into the robed husk from the left, armored shoulder slamming into it with full force.
Gregory.
The seasoned knight crashed into the creature like a warhound, breaking its focus in an instant. The eerie glow ceased mid-fusion, hissing into smoke.
The creature hit the ground hard, rolling off of Gregory’s blow in a contortion of bone and robe, but snapped to its feet with unnatural speed. Its head twisted wrong on its shoulders, eyeless sockets locking on Gregory as the soldier ran in to follow up with his sword.
Before Gregory could close the distance, the creature swiped a hand toward him, palm outward. Without incantation, a plume of force rocketed Gregory backwards, sending him far into the air. Hurled back by a pulse of pure pressure.
He clamored to his back, crashing a moment before righting himself, breath ragged.
Just then, a low drone started rising from the husk. Carved runes, hidden beneath its cloak, hummed as its outline began to shimmer again, light bending as invisibility crept back over its form, but I was there now, and I wasn’t slowing down.
I slammed into the husk like a battering ram, momentum tossing it off the ground in a plume of flesh and bone. It crashed into the dirt with a crunch, but rolled through the landing, quickly coming back to its feet.
I raced in before it could steady itself, fists flying. One. Two. Three. Nose. Jaw. Temple. My knuckles split open on bone as old drills kicked in. Hit hard. Follow up. Keep moving. The strikes weren’t elegant, just savage, close-quarters chaos.
The thing screeched, flailing for balance, its half-formed invisibility cracking like glass.
One arm twisted outward, a burst of raw force erupting with it, but I ducked low beneath the blast, slipped inside its guard, and grabbed both legs with a grunt. I heaved, lifting it over my shoulder and slamming it down into the dirt with a bone-snapping thud. Before it could writhe away, I drove my knee into its sternum and hammered an elbow straight into its jaw.
The husk twitched beneath me, jawbone loose and dangling as pressure built in the air again. I barely twisted aside before it unleashed another burst of force that caught me in the ribs and threw me backwards, rolling like a doll. I slammed hard into an adjacent tree, bark splintering. Breath tore from my body, but there was no time. I pushed off and charged again.
The husk shimmered, trying to vanish, but Gregory was there. In a flash, he slammed his shield into the side of the creature’s skull. The figure reeled, spinning right back into my fists.
Right cross. Left hook. Uppercut.
Crack. Crack. Crack.
We moved in unison, too fast for it to react.
“You move well for an old man.” I breathed with a kick that sent it staggering back onto Gregory’s waiting blade.
“Remind me not to piss you off,” Gregory grinned, stepping in to hack a deep gash through the creature’s torso, tearing the cloak open completely.
That’s when I saw the rest of the runes. Glowing. Sickly. Etched into its bones like molten scars.
It tried to retreat, limping, flickers of invisibility catching in the air, but this was no time to hold back. I wrapped its middle, lifted, and slammed it flat on its back before straddling the thing, driving my fists down like pistons.
Bones broke. Black ichor sprayed.
It raised a hand, but Gregory stomped it flat, driving his sword down straight through the husk’s sternum, pinning it to the ground like a crucifixion.
We both breathed a sigh as it stopped completely, and I rose to my feet. “Remy’s in there. I gotta go.”
He plucked his sword from the limp corpse, handing it off to me. “Take my blade. You may need it.”
That’s when everything stopped. The moment slowed as Eshlyn’s voice pierced the veil. “GET BACK!”
I looked down then. Sickly green runes pulsed. Flashing. Faster. Brighter. Building.
“MOVE!” Gregory’s weight hit me like a wall, shoving me back just as the runes flared, humming with violent, necrotic light.
There was no sound. Just a sudden pull, like the world inhaled… then detonated.
“VAL!” Eshlyn’s voice cracked like a whip as the translucent shimmer of an aether-barrier flashed into place between us and the blast, then another. A second shell layered over the first like a mirrored dome. Then a third and a fourth.
Time slowed into smoke. I could barely make out Eshlyn’s figure. Hands outstretched, aether visibly blazing around her like steam. The light trembled, refracting, one barrier, two, three, four. Each thicker, and more strained than the last.
The first layer held for barely a heartbeat.
The second shattered in the next.
Finally, the third. Then the fourth.
Each falling like broken glass.
The force burst through in a wave, unbridled necrotic energy carving a crater into the ground, splintering trees, and consuming matter. I caught a flash of Gregory’s silhouette, shield up, facing the blast just ahead of me. Then light swallowed him.
A shell of aether flared against my skin, the last whisper of another barrier, before I was thrown sideways through brush and broken wood. I slammed into the earth with bone-snapping force. My vision spun. Ears rang. Blood hot in my mouth. A low buzz crawled inside my skull like hornets.
I blinked, or maybe I didn’t. The world tilted. Cold grass pressed against my face, damp and slick with morning dew.
Then: radiance.
Pale and steady. It shimmered above me, Lyssa’s hands hovering over my chest, glowing a faint green, aether curling from her fingertips like smoke, winding through burnt clothes and torn flesh.
“Don’t move,” she said softly. “You’re hurt… badly.”
“Gregory?” I managed, barely a gurgle.
She paused. Then shook her head. The rest didn’t need saying.
I tried to sit up, but pain tore through me like fire.
“Val, seriously. Stay down.”
I grabbed her wrist, unable to draw a full breath. “Lyssa.”
She met my gaze. Tearful and exhausted. Not from healing, but just… everything.
“Go,” I coughed. “Go get her.”
“What?”
“Remy’s still in there.”
“Val, you need help.” She protested, “The others will be here soon, they can…”
“Dammit, Lyssa, I don’t give a fuck about them!” I practically shouted, pain spiking behind every word. “I swear to the gods.” My voice spat like the blood in my throat, chest heaving. “Go. Fucking. Get her.”
Her lips parted, but no words followed.
“Please…” I softened just enough to repeat it. “Go.”
“Okay,” she whispered, then rose to her feet, pale hair catching the moon's light. “Just… don’t die before I get back.”
                                        ...
Remy - Inside
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I set Nyla down on a cold stone before turning to face him. My limbs were numb, and everything burned, but I latched onto the nearest stream of aether, using the sear of pain to keep me upright.
“Give up, girl.” Durnan snickered, “You can barely stand.”
“Nah.” I spat blood. “You’re the one that’s fucked.”
He grinned long. “Still mouthing off like a child.”
I readied my daggers just before a tremor hit, and stone dust trickled down from the ceiling.
A low rumble reverberated through the tomb, distant, but violent enough to vibrate through the stone. Cracks spiderwebbed down the walls as they groaned. Somewhere far inside, I heard the dull thud of falling stone.
Nyla whimpered again, failing to stand on her own.
Durnan turned his head toward the sound. Just slightly. Like a predator scenting fire on the wind. His crooked smile faded before his eyes found me again, axe gripped and ready. “Seems we’ll have to wrap this up.”
The waiting sentinels stirred then, barely a twitch before halting at his word. “Don’t you dare.” Durnan didn’t raise his voice, but it cracked like a whip all the same. “The bitch is mine.”
A smirk creased my lips. Guess the insults worked.
He stepped forward, dragging the edge of his greataxe along the stone floor. A slow scrape that set my teeth on edge.
I didn’t wait. Couldn’t. It wasn’t strength keeping me upright. Not anymore. It was pain, rage, and the searing-hot glass under my skin that said: Make him pay. I lunged with both daggers, fast and reckless.
Durnan cleaved his axe in a wide arc as I closed the distance, but I was familiar with his movements now. I slipped under the first swing, the axe-head shrieking past my ear close enough to feel the wind of it. My bare legs slid over slick stone as I slashed across his exposed abdomen.
 A skeletal kick quickly rattled against my ribcage as I rose to my feet. It tore the breath from my lungs and sent me skidding sideways, but I didn’t care. I caught it with one arm. Stabbing a dagger into the fleshy tendrils of his inner thigh before he swung his axe down sharply. My dagger ripped up the rotten meat of his leg as I twisted away, narrowly escaping the brunt of it.
He didn’t let up. Shifting into a butt-end strike that caught me in the temple. Stars erupted in my skull, bouncing through my vision, but I wouldn’t go down. I braced against his arm as it swung back at me, stabbing a dagger straight through his forearm, and twisting with a crack of bone. His axe dropped to the floor just before a nauseating punch sent me flying like a log, losing my dagger in his arm.
Pain flared bright behind my eyes as aether continued flowing into me, raw, unstable, biting like wire through my veins. My body screamed, but I forced the current to burn brighter, hotter, sharper, not to cast, just to move.
My vision doubled. My knees buckled, but I forced myself upright again. No time to think. No time to breathe. I threw myself back into the fray, feint left, cut right, twist, strike, speed over power, ferocity over form. He moved with inhuman speed, but his axe was too big, too slow in close quarters. I kept moving. Kept burning.
He swung wide. I ducked under it again, blades flashing, trying to tear through cloak and sinew, trying to bleed something that should’ve stayed dead.
“You little...” he sneered, stepping in fast and catching me with a knee to my ribs as I broke the dagger free from his forearm.
I collapsed, coughing blood as fire erupted through my core, but even as I fell, I caught his leg. Slashing out, instinctual, desperate, dragging a blade across the back of his thigh as I dropped.
He roared and staggered, then cracked the back of his axe into my skull like a bat
I hit the ground hard, blinking through the haze. My limbs were trembling wreckage, lungs torn to ribbons, but gods, I’d hurt him, if only a little. That was something.
He turned back toward me, furious now, that careful calm cracking under the heat of frustration. “Feral pest!” he growled, limping closer, axe dragging. “Just die already.”
I spat blood and forced myself to one knee. “Then come finish it. Useless. Recycled. Bastard."
Durnan didn’t answer. He just moved. Quick as lightning despite the limp. His axe came down again. I flinched away, dodging right… But it was a feint. His real strike was a hand, cold, skeletal fingers locking into my hair. I barely had time to scream before he yanked me upward with brutal force, lifting me clean off the ground by my scalp. My legs kicked uselessly beneath me, vision blurring as pain split across my skull.
“I said die,” he hissed, voice guttural, unhinged.
But then...
CRASH.
A burst of heat and light erupted across his back as a lit lantern shattered against him, oil and flames engulfing his cloak and exposed bone. He roared, dropping me in the craze and spinning to face the new threat, just in time for Lyssa to slam her bare fist into his jawbone.
The blow was raw and angry. The kind that used their hips, shoulder, and momentum. Everything she must have practiced with Dent. It snapped across Durnan’s jaw like a thunderclap and knocked him stumbling back in a streak of fire and chaos.
I crumpled to the stone, coughing and dazed, barely registering Lyssa dropping beside me, eyes wide with fury and panic. “Shit. Remy, you look like hell.”
“Good to see you too,” I wheezed, managing half a laugh through the blood. “Where is everyone?”
“Long story,” she muttered. Her hands were already glowing as they pressed to my ribs. Pain flared, before relief. Slight but present.
“Gods,” she breathed. “Your insides are shredded.”
“I know,” I coughed, stopping her. “There’s no time.”
“The door’s open,” she motioned, arm looping under mine. “Let’s get out of here.”
My head snapped around as a roar split the air. Durnan was rising through the smoke, flames still curling from his tattered cloak, teeth bared like an animal.
Then, movement from our left, sharp and heavy. Two figures surged from the shadows, cloaked in steel and fire. Their greatswords burned green, casting flickering light across the walls.
The sentinels.
“Watch out!” I shoved Lyssa aside just as one of them swung, the slice slamming into the stone where she’d been standing a moment earlier. They came at us like war machines. No words. No hesitation. Just violence.
Lyssa spun with surprising speed, ducking under the second strike as it howled past her head. Confidence burning behind her eyes, like I hadn’t seen before.
“Go for the stairs…” I staggered back, dragging in air through shredded lungs. “I’m getting Nyla!”
“What?” Lyssa snapped. “What’s she doing in here!?” Then rolled under another strike as the second sentinel closed in from behind.
“Saving my life!” I yelled back, already moving. My heart lurched as I sprinted for the stone where Nyla lay limp, barely visible in the low light. I dropped hard into a slide, thigh scraping as momentum carried me forward.Â
She whined faintly as my arm hooked around her small frame, mid-motion, not graceful, just fast. “Shh, it’s okay. I got you.” I twisted, riding the momentum onto my feet, bracing Nyla against me. Her weight wasn’t much, but every step lit new pain across my spine and ribs. Every breath was a blade. Still, I didn’t slow. “Lyssa! Time to go!”
Silence drew my gaze when she didn’t answer. She couldn’t. She was boxed in. Every ounce of focus spent dodging the relentless pursuit of blades as the two sentinels pressed from both sides, green flame casting eerie light off their black cloaks and steel-plated armor.Â
Their greatswords cut wide arcs through the air. She ducked one strike, side-stepped another, but there was no way out. They moved with uncanny coordination, herding her against the tendriled stone.
No time to hesitate. Pain screamed through my joints as I raced across the chamber. Nyla tucked tight under one arm. Adrenaline burning out fast.
Durnan's roar echoed behind me. I didn’t look, didn’t need to. I could feel him closing in, rage-driven, blade dragging, heat rolling off him in waves.
Lyssa turned at the last second, just as I shielded Nyla, and rammed hard into her side, launching us both into the air. In the same moment, I reached with everything I had left, locking onto the closest point I could think of. The stairs, the exit, somewhere. Finally giving direction to the aether searing my veins. It surged like wildfire as the world yanked sideways.
We disappeared from the frey, slamming hard into the stone steps, just beyond the shattered door. The teleport had been short, desperate, and raw, but it worked. Durnan’s howling fury echoed from across the chamber.
Black dots littered my vision, spinning and nauseous from the backlash, but I managed to hold onto Nyla. Conscious… barely.
Lyssa wheezed beside me, wind knocked clean from her lungs, but I felt her push upright. Her hand slid over my ribs, the other bracing my shoulder as she hauled me to my feet. “Gods,” she muttered, one hand glowing with a soothing green. “Don’t you dare pass out on me.”
“I… ” I managed, hardly a whisper. I couldn’t speak. Could barely breathe. But I kept my arm locked around Nyla and forced one foot in front of the other. We half-staggered, half-climbed the stairs. Each step a war.
Behind us, I could feel them closing in. Durnan’s fury. The sentinels’ steel footsteps. The heat of green fire coiling over their blades.
Finally, a flicker of movement resounded from the top of the stairs. An arrow split the dark, hissing past us. A heartbeat later, a blast of condensed flame cracked down the stairwell like thunder, exploding near the base.
Bram and Tovin tore down to meet us, plugging the entire stairwell with a shimmering aether-barrier.
Durnan’s alien roar chased us from below, but he was far off now.Â
We crossed the threshold and sealed it shut.
                                        ...
My back rested against the cold stone, vision still unfocused. Tovin, Bram, Sierra, and Nico stood nearby, quiet, rigid, their faces marked by something grim.
I made Lyssa heal Nyla first.
Her breath came in shallow huffs as Lyssa worked, jaw tight from exhaustion, hands still glowing faintly with that green shimmer. When it was done, Nyla crawled back to me on unsteady limbs and curled up in my lap like a storm-battered shadow. Her head rested against my thigh, and I placed one hand behind her ear without thinking.
She didn’t purr. Just breathed.
We must have looked strange. Or maybe just wrong enough to draw the eye.
My dress was ripped, half-burnt along one edge. Bare feet torn from rock and stone. Scrapes and bruises bloomed down my exposed skin like I’d been clawed out of the earth. I could feel the crust of blood over my face like a second skin.
I didn’t speak or move. Just sat there as more soldiers gathered. Merchants. Cooks. Workers.
Tovin barked orders to reinforce the perimeter and get a handle on the tracks jetting into the forest. Bram hovered just behind him, arms crossed too tightly, watching me like she was waiting for a command, or a confession.
A boy I barely recognized, brown-haired and young, ducked through the chaos and knelt beside me. A medic, probably. He didn’t speak, just dabbed gently at the blood streaking down my temple with a cloth that turned red almost immediately. Another brushed ointment along the worst scrapes at my knee.Â
I didn’t stop them, just kept my eyes down. Locked on the ground. Because if I looked up, I might see their faces. Might have to acknowledge them. Admit how much I knew. How much I ignored. How I let Dent roam free, believing he’d fight it. That we could cure him before something like this ever happened. How he was almost certainly the culprit, and likely still in there.
How I’d go back to get him even if it killed me.
Because they looked to me for leadership. Heeded my judgment. Entrusted me with their safety. The one Kael died for. The one they still called “Your Grace,” even now.
“Where’s Val?” I managed, eying the dirt-filled crater not far off.
A silence loomed before Nico answered, tone flat. “Medical... Still breathing.”
“How bad is he?” I questioned. A bite of panic in my voice.
“Bad enough to pull Eshlyn away,” Bram muttered. “She was, at least, able to stabilize the guy.”
I glanced at Lyssa. Her hands were still on my ribs, glowing faintly. She hadn’t left my side.
“Go help her, please.”
“I will.” She said, then followed up with, “Just as soon as you stop bleeding internally.”
I could’ve pushed harder. Threatened to crawl to Val myself. But I was numb, physically and emotionally drained. So I let it go.
I’ll just have to trust Eshlyn.
“Who else is injured?”
The pause was heavier this time. They all glanced at Tovin.
He met their gaze, then mine, clearing his throat. “Gregory Gradoff… was the first to respond.”
My heart sank at his tone.
“...He didn’t make it.”
My chest caved.
Gregory…
The seasoned vet who snapped his ankle on the hike up. Who lifted me out of the crowd when I collapsed under the weight of my own guilt. The first to respond…Â
I slumped back against the stone, breath knocked from me like a punch.
A silence lingered as the medics continued wiping my face, bandaging me up, one scrape at a time. No one spoke, but I could feel it, the questions thick in the air. The blame forming like smoke.Â
The chaos grew to a whisper before Dagonbord parted the crowd, casual hands clasped behind his back. He eyed me up and down, expression unreadable. “Emergency meeting, thirty minutes.” He said, then turned to leave. Some of the crowd turned with him.
Lyssa finally breathed. Hands letting me go, sweat arching along her brow. “You should be good to walk.” She propped me up over her shoulder. “I’ll take you to Val.”
“Thank you.” I croaked, not breaking the thousand-yard stare that turned every onlooker into a faceless blur.
Tovin spoke up as we stood, citing the question I knew they were all thinking. “Remy.” He paused as if debating whether or not to include your grace. “What the hell happened?”
I didn’t answer. What even was there to say? I ran headfirst into a trap, unarmored and ill-prepared, chasing the whisper of someone who was never there in the first place.
No. I won't give up on him. He wouldn’t do this.
“Dent’s been captured, and I’m going to get him.”
                                        ...
The flap of the medical tent pulled aside with a hiss of canvas and light.
Warm air met us, thick with the bitter tang of herbs and singed fabric. It was a jarring contrast to the cool, dark outside, brighter than it should’ve been, too clean, too still. Instruments lined the tables on either side. A few medics to attend them, voices low, movements precise. Only one cot was occupied, stretched low in the corner.
Val.
He half-sat against a pile of pillows, torso wrapped from collarbone to hip in bandages so fresh they glistened against the violet contusion peaking from underneath. His skin was gray at the edges, lips dry, breath shallow, but he was breathing and awake.
Beside him, Eshlyn knelt on one knee, one hand braced on the bedframe, the other tilting a vial against his lips. Her hair was stringy with sweat. She looked like she fought a battle by herself, dark circles carved under bloodshot eyes, arms trembling lightly from strain.
Val coughed against the potion’s bitterness but swallowed anyway. Eshlyn muttered something I couldn’t hear. Then looked up and saw me.
“Remy!”
She bolted forward so fast I barely had time to brace. Her arms slammed around my shoulders, nearly knocking the air out of me as she clung tight. “You’re alive,” she said into my collar, voice cracked and raw. “Dammit, Remy, how could you be so reckless!?”
I blinked hard, leaning into her warmth even if my arms were slow to return the hug. “I know… but I’m okay. Well… I’m still here.”
She pulled back just enough to see my face, her eyes glossed with tears she refused to shed. “God’s you have to stop scaring me like that.”
“Yeah.” I breathed, almost a smile. “I know.”
Behind her, Val stirred, voice hoarse and weary. “Rem!” He pushed himself upright with a wince. “Don't ever.” He coughed. “Don’t run off like that again.” Then motioned to Lyssa. “And you…” He sighed like a weight lifted from his chest. “Thank you.”
Eshlyn peeled away to give Lyssa a hug as well. “Seriously. We can’t thank you enough.”
Val's gaze swept over me as I limped over and set myself down at the edge of his cot. We only stared at each other for a moment. Eyes longing, smile slowly creasing our lips.
“You look like shit,” He rasped with a grin.
 I took his hand in mine. “So do you.”
                                        ...
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The canvas door flapped shut behind the last medic, leaving a hush in the tent that felt too heavy for the hour. Just the four of us now, me, Val, Lyssa, and Eshlyn. The lantern above cast long shadows across the bed. We could still hear the distant noise of a camp on edge, but muffled now. Like it belonged to someone else.
“Alright,” Val spoke first, voice finally full. “What’d you find out?”
Lyssa didn’t respond right away. She just reached into the pouch at her hip and pulled something free, a folded slip of crumpled paper, nearly falling apart in her hands. She set it gently on the edge of the cot beside Val.
Then, from the same pouch, came the knife.
My throat tightened the second I saw it. Null-aether. Matte black. A blade with no handle. I recognized it like a punch to the gut.
“Damn.” Val’s eyes widened. “Is that…?”
“It is,” I confirmed before Lyssa could speak.
Her voice dropped. “The rest of his things were untouched. But these felt… deliberate.”
Eshlyn’s lips pressed into a line before she took the note, reading aloud despite its jagged, uneven scrawl: “Don’t come after me.” She paused. “I chose this.”
“Well, that’s bullshit,” I said immediately.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, Rem…” Eshlyn muttered. “But, are you sure?”
“What do you mean, am I sure?” I scoffed, eying her briefly before motioning to the group. “I nearly got in a fist fight with him over that stupid knife… He would rather die than lose himself to the parasite. That’s what it meant to him. That is what he chose.” I looked down, softening. “He would never leave it willingly.”
“I guess that confirms it then.” Val exhaled, sharp and slow. “...He’s gone.”
“No,” I snapped, then softened again. “No. I mean… yes, he lost control for a moment. But he’s still in there. Somewhere. I know he is. That… thing didn’t kill him. It’s using him.”
“So he fought until he couldn’t, and we shielded him the whole way.” Eshlyn’s shoulders slumped. “If Dent is behind the attack, then we are partially to blame. So the question remains, what do we do now?”
“And what do we tell everyone?” Lyssa added, glancing between us.
“We tell them the truth,” Eshlyn responded plainly. “He lost control for however long, and now the parasite has him.”
Val winced slightly as he shifted, bandages pulling tight. “That won’t go over well.”
“No, it won’t,” I muttered, staring at the knife.Â
A silence settled until Val broke it, voice rough: “I don’t think we should say anything we can’t prove. The truth is simple… We really don’t know.”
“But we do.” Eshlyn blinked. “And honestly, it’s obvious.”
“Okay, but…” he paused, almost shrugging. “I just mean, we leave room for doubt. No one actually saw what happened. We say the parasite breached the tomb, which is true. We say Dent is missing, also true. We don’t speculate. We don’t confirm.”
“If we do that, they’ll draw their own conclusions.” Eshlyn protested.
“They probably already have.” Lyssa tilted her head. “And what about Remy coming out of the tomb, beat to shit?”
“She was fighting for her life, containing the breach and looking for Dent,” Val shot back, too tired for tact. “We’re not making shit up, we’re choosing our words.”
“Why would she go into the tomb to look for him? Who knocked out the guards?” Eshlyn shot up. “Who opened the door in the first place? Dent losing control is the only explanation that holds up to scrutiny.”
“I get that.” Val’s voice rose, “But we can’t say it was him and we don't actually know!”
“God’s Val.” Eshlyn paced. “He left a note!”
“That note is bullshit!” He shot back, clutching his stomach.
My fists clenched, pulse pounding in my temples. “Enough!” I snapped. “Dent didn’t do this... The parasite did. Maybe it used him, fine… But the plan is the same… We enter at sunrise, scour the tomb for a cure. We find it. We find him.” I paused a beat. “...and if he can’t be helped...” My eyes traced the knife's edge. “...We give him his choice back.”
Val sighed, head in his hands as silence permeated the room.
Eshlyn nodded, weary. “He deserves that much.”
Lyssa’s tearful eyes drifted to the floor. “The Fangs will kill him… You know they will.”
My shoulders slumped low. “I know.”