By the time the storm's edge loosened its grip on the land, the camp was already alive with movement.
Men checked wagon axles and tightened leather straps, smiths hammered final repairs on supply sledges, and the air was thick with the mingled scents of pine pitch, damp wool, and wet earth.
Hiral moved through it all like the eye of the storm—his pace measured, his orders low but precise. Seran matched his stride, the two of them working wordlessly in the way that only comes from years of campaign together.
Within hours, the first convoy was ready to depart. The supplies they carried were not ceremonial gestures but exactly what Eldara would need: preserved grains, salted meats, medicinal herbs for fever and frostbite, woolen blankets thick enough to withstand the bite of the coming months.
The steward of Eldara received them with hands clasped too tightly, the knuckles bloodless, his face a strained weave of relief and shame.
He bowed low, murmuring formal thanks, but his voice wavered when he spoke of the coffins lying in state within the great hall—coffins that carried more than the dead; they carried the kingdom's stability with them.
Hiral inclined his head, accepting the gratitude without ceremony.
"We'll see them delivered where they're needed most," he said simply, and then followed as the steward led him through corridors shrouded in black drapery, deeper into the heart of the palace.
The Crown Prince awaited him in a chamber dim with mourning cloth, the Queen at his side.
The air was heavy—thick with the kind of grief that even smothered the creak of floorboards and the rustle of fabric.
The young man's shoulders were bowed under more than sorrow; the invisible weight of the crown was already settling into his bones, pressing down with the cold truth that the decisions he made now could preserve or doom his people.
Hiral sank to one knee and bowed his head, the gesture formal yet steeped in genuine feeling. "Your Highness. My heart is with you in this hour. Eldara's loss is felt beyond its borders."
The Crown Prince's voice was quiet, unsteady, as though speaking aloud might fracture the thin shell of composure he clung to. "You honor us, General. My father… my brother… they spoke well of you."
Hiral rose and turned to the Queen with a respectful incline of his head. "Your Majesty, with your leave, I must speak with the Crown Prince alone. The tides are shifting, and his course must be set now."
The Queen's hesitation was brief but telling. She touched her son's arm—an unspoken plea to endure—before withdrawing from the chamber.
When the door closed, Hiral stepped closer, his voice lowering, steady as stone. "You carry the crown now, whether you feel ready or not. Grief will take its share, but you must not let it take the kingdom with it. Winter is already upon us. War is not far behind."
The Crown Prince's gaze slid to the floor, shadows pooling in his eyes.
He was silent, not out of defiance, but because his mind was a battlefield—loyalty to his people on one side, the raw ache of loss on the other.
Hiral began to lay out his counsel with the precision of a man who understood the cost of hesitation.
"Secure your borders. Fill the granaries to the rafters. Pull your garrisons inward to hold the cities, not just the frontiers. Double the watch along the river passes. And when the court cries for vengeance, you must stand firm against it. Rash bloodshed will bleed Eldara dry before your enemy ever crosses the gates."
The Prince listened without interruption, but the stillness in him was not agreement—it was the stillness of a man turning over every stone in his mind, searching for another path, and finding none that did not lead to ruin.
Hiral's tone softened, though his words struck like frost. "If Eldara becomes a vassal under Her Majesty, Empress Shana, I can move without delay. Your people will not starve. Your walls will hold."
The choice was not between pride and surrender—it was between survival and the slow death of his people through winter and war. The Prince's chest rose and fell in a quiet, final sigh. "What else can I do but agree?"
There was no triumph in Hiral's eyes—only the faint shadow of a man who understood too well the cost of such agreements.
He studied the Prince's face, noting the grief and resignation etched deep, and for a brief moment allowed himself the smallest offering of comfort.
"You are holding up well, Highness. That matters more than you know. And for now, the Kingdom of Ro will not harm you."
He did not speak the thought that followed—cold, certain, and inevitable:
At least not until spring.
The doors of the audience chamber shut behind him with a muffled thud, leaving only the hushed murmur of servants in the distance.
Hiral's boots carried him down the long, carpeted corridor until he paused before a high-arched window.
Beyond the glass, Eldara lay swathed in white—snow draped over rooftops, frosting the barren trees, swallowing the roads in a seamless, unbroken plain.
His gaze tracked the distant hills and the thin gray smudge of smoke curling from scattered villages.
Every line of that horizon whispered war to him—how the frozen rivers would become barriers, how the mountain passes would choke with ice, how desperate men would break sooner under hunger than under steel.
Already, he was dividing his strength in his mind. He would leave a portion of his troops here, enough to protect Eldara's heartland.
But men could not live long in a place so bitter without their spirit fraying. He would have to speak to them—not as a commander giving orders, but as a man who valued their sacrifice.
He needed them to feel seen, to remember why they endured. Without that, winter itself would become the enemy.
He turned from the window and kept walking, his mind a storm of plans, contingencies, countermeasures.
The map of the north stretched itself across his thoughts, each imagined enemy movement sparking a counterstroke, each supply route drawn and redrawn until it bled into the next.
And then—he stopped.
He knew this spot.
The stone arch overhead, the tall iron candleholder by the wall.
It was here, in this very stretch of corridor, that he had once looked up and found Alexis standing at the far end.
The memory was sharp, almost painfully so: the locked gaze, the unspoken pull between them, the way the air had felt impossibly still.
Hiral's breath slipped out in a quiet exhale. The cold clarity of war faded for a heartbeat, replaced by a single, stubborn thought—Alexis.
A smile ghosted over his lips, thin and hollow, never touching his eyes. He shook his head, almost in self-rebuke, and forced his attention forward again.
Passing the next set of heavy doors, he paused only long enough to bow his head in respect toward the hall where the late King and his son lay in state. The weight of their absence pressed against him, but he did not linger.
He could not.
He knew too well the danger of a grieving heart—especially his own. To dwell on what he had left behind would be to loosen the bindings on something he could not afford to let free.
That road led only to folly, and folly had no place in the days to come.
With his composure restored, he continued on toward the war room where Seran awaited him, the plans already forming in his mind like pieces moving into place on a cold, unyielding board.