The wind came dry and sour, carrying the stink of scorched hay and something worse—char. Not of wood. Not of skin. Something between. Edric slowed at the hilltop, hand pressing instinctively to the warm bracer beneath his sleeve. The valley below held little more than a timber barn and five slumped grain carts—but the smoke that curled from it spoke of design, not accident.
Beside him, Brynn lowered her spyglass. "Geldar's testing response time again."
"They want to see how fast we bleed."
"Or how fast we blink."
Edric crouched. His fingers sank into soil thick with soot, but something oily clung to the grit—too greasy to be wood ash. "They spiked the fire," he said. "Bitterroot oil. Boils into the wind. Makes lungs blister."
"Poison smoke," Brynn muttered. "We'll need to keep windward guards masked." She lifted the spyglass again. "Two riders. No armor, no banners."
"They're softening us," Edric said. He stood slowly, muscles still sore from yesterday's drills. "They want us chasing shadows while they map the keep."
"And every hour we spend on this," Brynn added, "we're not training."
He looked at the ruined field, at the still-smoldering hay bales that had fed a dozen goats last week. No movement. No screaming. But not silence either—just the wrong kind of stillness.
"Anyone alive?"
"If they were, they're not waving."
He didn't ask to go closer. They'd burned four outlying farms in the past fortnight. Never the same angle twice.
"Let's move. Before the ash spreads to the grain stores."
They turned. Behind them, the wind shifted. Edric didn't look back.
—
By dusk, the courtyard reeked of vinegar and steam. Merra's smith apprentices boiled cloaks and boots in vats of water thick with ash. The old goat—Wally, stubborn survivor of three seasons—lay curled in the corner, coughing. A dark streak had spread along his jawline.
Merra frowned over him. "Won't make it through the night," she said softly. "We'll have to burn the hide."
"Do it," Edric said. "We'll call it the first firebreak."
Rafe barked orders from the stone table, scribbling inventory tallies faster than they vanished: vinegar down to one barrel. Salt at half-ration. Blankets scorched. Three recruits showing rash.
Inside the keep's low hall, Fiona crouched beside a crate of bent nails, sorting iron from rust. Edric watched her work, the way her singed glove moved without hesitation.
"They laced the fire with bitterroot," she said. "Slag poison. My father did the same by mistake once. Killed two goats. Nearly blinded himself."
He nodded. "I need you to make something worse."
Her brow lifted.
"Arrowheads," Edric said. "Barbed. Tipped with cooled vinebane sap. Not fatal, but it numbs the fingers for a day. Better if they can't draw back a bowstring."
Fiona's face sharpened. "And if I mess up the distill?"
"Then it'll just be a jagged hunk of metal. Better than nothing."
She stood, already reaching for her chalk and slate. "Barbed it is. Ugly too, right?"
"Ugly as sin."
"Perfect," she muttered, vanishing toward the forge.
—
By the wall, Ronan arrived dragging a snapped shaft and a torn cloak. "Another poisoned dart," he said. "Found it embedded in the livestock pen. No soldiers injured—just the goat. Might be worth checking for rune etching on the tip."
Edric turned the arrow slowly in his fingers. "Carved," he said, pointing to the notch. "Runic ignition. Short spark—enough to light the poison in flight."
"Clever bastards," Ronan muttered.
Edric's voice dropped. "This is more than scouting. They're probing runic defenses. Seeing how we respond to tainted steel."
Ronan didn't argue.
Behind them, Cress sprinted up the steps. "Saw barges, Highness. Three of them. No flags. South bend of the Fen."
"Moving fast?"
"No oars. Letting current do the work."
Edric turned. "We need a second response route. Rafe—maps. The old flood tunnels. If we can get behind them…"
Rafe's face whitened. "Some of those tunnels haven't been opened in years."
"Open them now. Even if they collapse in a week—we only need them to hold once."
Fiona reappeared, already holding a sketch. "And I'll start weaving the water net."
"What net?" Brynn asked.
"The one I'm going to string from spiderroot and rope across the channel. Won't stop the barges, but it'll tangle the rudders. And annoy the hell out of whoever's driving."
Brynn gave a short laugh. "You're dangerously useful."
"I was always dangerous," Fiona muttered.
—
That night, Edric sat on the tower steps, half-empty cup beside him, wind tapping at his cloak. The wood beneath him held the chill of old blood. Ashcoil slithered from the shadows, scales dull in moonlight, and coiled lightly around his leg.
He didn't speak at first. Just stared at the sky.
Then, finally: "I don't want to use the chain rune again."
Ashcoil tilted its head, slit-eyes catching the flicker of forge-light.
"I forget things," Edric said quietly. "Afterward. Small things at first—names, smells. But lately…"
His voice trailed off. He pressed a knuckle to his temple.
"I can't remember my sister's voice."
Ashcoil leaned closer, nuzzling his wrist in silence. The warmth shared between them pulsed—not heat, but recognition.
"If this gets worse," he whispered, "how will I know what I'm fighting for?"
There was no answer. Just the cold, and the whisper of scales.
—
At sunrise, Garrick returned from the ridge with a boy over his shoulder and a blood-soaked cloth wrapped tight around one thigh. "Tob," he grunted. "Arrow in the leg. Poisoned, but no rune on the shaft this time. Just cruelty."
They laid the boy on the barracks table. Fiona fetched the poultice. Merra lit a line of tallow candles.
Edric held the boy's hand as he thrashed, feverish. He murmured words he didn't remember learning. His fingers shook—but his voice didn't.
Afterward, Brynn approached him at the door. "You've hardened."
"I had to," Edric said.
"No. You chose to."
He met her gaze. She didn't flinch.
—
At the southern wall, Wren scrawled watch shifts into the dirt. Cress practiced archery by candlelight. Garrick adjusted Will's footwork. Even the goat's place by the forge remained empty now, a black smear in the dirt. No one spoke of it.
Edric stood with Ronan as fog curled off the marshes.
"You ready?" Ronan asked.
"No. But we're braver than yesterday."
"Does that count?"
"It has to."
Behind them, the keep felt alive—fractured but breathing. Fiona's barbed arrows dried by the coals. The flood tunnels creaked with new ropes. Spiderroot netting stretched thin beneath the moonlight.
Rafe emerged holding a worn ledger. "Highness," he said, hesitating. "Did you ever meet old Brann? Ran the wheat ale still behind the chapel?"
Edric paused. A knot formed in his chest. "…Of course."
But he didn't. Not even the name rang true.
He turned back to the marsh.
Ashcoil coiled tighter around his boot. Its scales glowed faintly—one rune in the pattern was brighter than the rest. Edric traced it with his thumb.
"I'll use it if I must," he said softly. "But not yet."
The serpent didn't move.
They waited until the stars blinked out.
And somewhere in the reeds, someone else was watching back.