The night in the Ashen Marches was cold and sharp, the kind that gnawed at bone. Kael sat by a dwindling fire, his crimson eyes reflecting the embers as though they themselves burned within him. Lyra dozed against a stone, her blade within arm's reach. Darric paced the camp's edge, restless, as always, while Isryn read from a vellum scrap recovered in the Hollow Spire—her pale fingers tracing the ink like it was alive.
The silence broke when a scout stumbled into their camp, bloodied and wide-eyed.
"They're moving," he rasped, dropping to his knees. "A host—thousands. Branded with fire and ash. They took Darneth. No survivors."
Darric halted mid-step, his hand falling to his axe. "Darneth? That fortress has stood against rebellions for decades. No rabble could take it in a night."
The scout's lips trembled. "It wasn't rabble. It was him. The outcast. The heretic." His gaze found Kael, lingering on the red blaze in his eyes. "They say he wields the same fire as you."
The camp grew still. Even the wind seemed to stop.
Kael leaned forward, his expression unreadable. "A name."
The scout swallowed. "Kaelen."
The fire popped, casting sparks into the air like fleeting stars.
Isryn's head lifted, her eyes narrowing as if she had heard a memory instead of a name. "Kaelen," she whispered, as though tasting the word. "The exile of Velaryn. The man who walked too close to the forbidden flame."
Lyra stirred awake at the sound, her gaze sharpening on Kael. "And now he leads an army of ash? If he carries what you carry, Kael… he will come for you."
Kael stood, his blade sliding free with a whisper of steel. The crimson aura at his shoulders flared, casting long shadows across the camp.
"Then let him," Kael said, voice low, certain. "If he bears fire like mine, I will cut through it. His march will end at my blade."
The companions exchanged looks—fear, determination, doubt—woven together in silence. Darric broke it first, his hand gripping Kael's shoulder with the weight of brotherhood.
"Then we'll face him together. No storm of ash will break us."
Isryn closed her book with a snap, her expression veiled but her eyes burning with quiet resolve. "But understand this, Kael—Kaelen is no common warlord. His knowledge of ancient fire surpasses any living man. To defeat him, you must surpass yourself."
Lyra drew closer, her voice firm. "And you will. Because we'll make sure of it."
Kael looked at each of them—the mercenary bound by loyalty, the priestess with secrets, the warrior who carried light in her steel. His companions. His chosen.
The flames of the campfire guttered, then swelled as the night wind shifted, carrying faint echoes of distant drums.
Kael lifted his blade, pointing it toward the east where smoke and thunder waited. "Then to the Marches we go. His fire meets mine—and only one will remain."
The night swallowed their vow, and the fire burned brighter, as though the Crimson Mark itself answered.