The fires from the distant battle still smoldered like bruises across the valley, but inside Dravenhold's war room, the air was thick with tension and purpose.
Kael Rivenhart stood at the center, his crimson eyes scanning a rough map etched into the stone table. Around him, Lyra and Darric exchanged grim glances.
Kael's voice was steady, but beneath it lay a fierce determination.
"Malrik's forces will come again. Stronger. Smarter."
He clenched his fists, the faint crackle of black lightning dancing along his knuckles.
"We can't just hold the line—we need to strike. Hit their supply routes, break their morale."
Lyra nodded. "Guerrilla tactics. We can use the forest and mountain passes."
Darric slammed his fist down. "And if they try to crush us outright?"
Kael's eyes flashed.
"Then we meet them in the field. I won't let Velaryn burn without a fight."
Lyra studied Kael carefully.
"You carry the Veil inside you now. How do you keep from losing yourself?"
Kael's gaze darkened, haunted.
"By remembering who I am. Who I'm fighting for."
He looked away toward the shattered throne.
"The Veil is a storm, but I am the calm before it breaks."
Outside, the soldiers of Dravenhold readied their weapons, steeling themselves for the coming storm.
Kael stepped from the war room, the weight of the Rivenhart legacy pressing on his shoulders.
With every heartbeat, the crimson flame inside him grew brighter.
And the war for the kingdom's soul was only beginning.
The night was cold, but Kael felt none of it.
He stood alone on the crumbled outer balcony of Dravenhold, cloak pulled tight against the wind, crimson eyes fixed on the stars above. What little starlight pierced the clouds shimmered like pale embers—fragile, flickering, trying to hold their place in a darkening sky.
The war camp behind him was silent. Even Lyra had left him be, sensing the storm boiling beneath his skin.
The Veil stirred within him.
It wasn't violent now. Not loud.
Just present—like a second heart beating in sync with his own, pulsing with forgotten language and half-formed visions.
Every time Kael closed his eyes, he saw them again.
The throne of chains.
The broken crown.
The black figures kneeling in flame.
And the voice.
"You are not its master. You are its vessel."
He gripped the railing until it cracked under his gauntlet.
What if I lose control?
What if I become what I was meant to destroy?
He remembered the look in Lyra's eyes earlier—not fear, but doubt. A quiet question buried behind her loyalty.
He didn't blame her. He asked himself the same thing every time he caught his reflection in the cracked mirrors of the keep.
In the silence, a memory returned.
His mother's voice. Soft. Steady.
"The flame you carry is old, Kael. But it does not define you. You must shape it. Or it will shape you."
He hadn't understood those words as a child.
Now, he lived them.
Kael closed his eyes, breathing deep.
The Veil pulsed within him—tempting, whispering, offering power without price. He held it at bay with sheer will.
Not yet.
Not like this.
Behind him, footsteps approached.
Lyra.
She said nothing at first. Just stood beside him, shoulder to shoulder, looking up at the same sky.
"You don't have to carry it alone," she said at last.
Kael didn't answer, but his hand relaxed slightly from the railing.
A small step.
But the first toward choosing not to become a god.
At dawn, Kael rode out from Dravenhold with a handpicked strike team.
No banners.
No horns.
Just steel and silence.
The scouts had confirmed it: a supply caravan from Malrik's forward encampment was moving through the Greyvale Ravine, guarded by Veil-touched sentinels and war beasts bred in shadow.
It was the artery feeding the siege to come.
Cut it, and the Black Host would bleed.
Kael rode at the front, flanked by Lyra and Darric, followed by twelve trusted warriors—silent, hardened, loyal.
The sky was overcast, the wind sharp.
It smelled like fire waiting to happen.
As they neared the ravine, Darric rode closer.
"You sure about this? They've got veilhounds. Things that smell magic. Smell you."
Kael didn't look at him.
"Let them smell me."
Lyra, riding just behind, spoke low.
"The closer you get to using that power… the harder it is to stop."
Kael's eyes flickered with red light.
"Then I'll stop when the job's done."
They struck at dusk.
The caravan wound slowly through the canyon, unaware of what waited in the rocks above.
Kael signaled.
Arrows flew like lightning. Firebombs ignited the dry grass.
And then he dropped into the chaos like a crimson meteor.
He didn't need to speak to the Veil now.
It moved with him.
Blades bounced off his aura. Arrows melted midair.
He became a storm of shadow and light, cutting through the enemy with brutal precision.
But he never let it fully take him.
Not yet.
Not tonight.
The ravine was soaked in enemy blood, the convoy reduced to smoldering wreckage.
Kael stood among the wreckage, breathing heavy, his gauntlet still crackling with residual energy.
Darric approached, hauling a broken banner from the dirt.
"That's gonna sting. Malrik'll feel this."
Kael nodded, but his expression was unreadable.
"We send a message now," he said quietly.
"We're not just surviving. We're hunting."