"By blood and silver, we stand as one!
For Haven's light, the battle's won!"
The chant had rolled like thunder across Haven's Outer Gate when the Recovery Team set out, their unified voices rising in practiced cadence. Now, as they trekked deeper into the desolate stretch of land beyond the walls, its echo lingered in the air, faint but steady, as if reluctant to fade.
The morning sun gleamed on their gear, boots thudding lightly over damp earth and broken stone. For a while, no one spoke.
The leather of Joeren's pack creaked as he adjusted the strap. The silence stretched until Boris, still green from his first rites, cleared his throat. He shifted uneasily, kicking at a loose stone along the path. "Hey, Joeren... When we practiced the chant with Renik last week, he never actually explained why we shout it. He just... made us repeat it. Loudly. Over and over."
Joeren glanced at him, a slight smirk playing on his lips. "Ah, that. Yeah, that's intentional."
Boris blinked. "Intentional?"
"Yup," Joeren confirmed. "Renik won't tell you. He wants you to feel it first, live it. Only then do you truly understand what it means. If he explained it straight away, the words wouldn't stick."
Boris frowned, trying to follow the logic. "So... we're supposed to just figure it out ourselves?" He paused, then his eyes cleared as the idea clicked. "Yeah… I guess that makes sense."
"Exactly," Joeren nodded. "But I had a head start. My grandfather Mishal, before he became an elder, taught me and my cousin Renzo the chant years before we joined the hunting team." A grin tugged at his lips. "He made sure we learned the meaning behind the words. Said if we were going to shout something before risking our thick skulls, we'd better know why we were shouting it."
Boris's eyes widened. "Elder Mishal?"
"The very same," Joeren confirmed, his smile softening. "Back then, he was just a hunter with more scars than sense."
Boris hesitated, scuffing his boot in the dirt. "You have experience... and with the recent ordeal, you understand it better than the new hunters," he said, then swallowed. "The chant… 'By blood and silver, we stand as one! For Haven's light, the battle's won!' What does it mean?" The words tumbled out in a rush, as if he'd been holding the question too long.
Joeren's smile faded. He rubbed the scrape on his forearm, his voice quieter. "It's not just words." He met Boris's eyes. "Blood isn't about birth, it's about who you'd bleed for. Silver isn't about strength, it's about what you'll fight to protect."
His thumb traced a fresh nick on his blade. "Didn't used to get that part," he admitted. "But that night…" His jaw tightened. "Some lessons only stick when the steel's wet."
He tapped the hilt of his blade. "Silver's the old warning. Not every threat bleeds. Not every enemy dies easy. The Awakened used it to seal the rifts, metal that remembers what we've forgotten."
Boris's eyes widened. "So 'blood and silver' means…"
"Means we stand together," Joeren cut in. "With our blades and our brains. One without the other gets you killed." He gave a grim smile. "Ask the wolves that learned too late."
"You speak like an elder," Boris said, not in mockery, but with genuine awe.
Joeren barked a soft, embarrassed laugh and rubbed the back of his neck. "Only because my uncle drilled it into me every morning before breakfast. Needed to get it right or no stew." His smile softened, tinged with a quiet pride. "And he's an elder, a proper one, mind you. Last thing I want is to shame his name by being the nephew who knows nothing."
Then he continued, his voice softened as he lifted his chin, repeating the words like an oath: "'By blood and silver, we stand as one.'"
He paused, then added with a crooked grin, "That part's the vow. And the next bit: 'For Haven's light, the battle's won', most folks think that's just the fancy finish."
He shook his head, the humor fading from his eyes.
"No. That's the promise. Not that we're guaranteed to win... but that we'll make it back. So Haven doesn't have to fight what we fight out here."
Boris exhaled slowly, the weight of the actual meaning settling over him. "It means more than I thought."
Joeren turned to continue, his voice low but steady. As he spoke, the older hunters within earshot slowed their pace, listening. A few exchanged knowing glances, the kind shared only by those who have survived the same winters and bled on the same ground.
Joeren chuckled and clapped Boris on the shoulder. "It always does, kiddo, once you survive the story. Now…" he tilted his chin toward the path ahead, "say it with heart next time. A chant's only as strong as the fear you shout over."
From the front of the group, Cugat spun around with a wide, wolfish grin. "Barik!" he called out, loud enough for the trees to hear, "you ever give a stirring speech like that when I joined your team?"
A few hunters snorted; another muttered, "Here we go…"
Barik didn't even turn; he just barked a laugh. "Cugat, you think I had time for speeches? You were too busy falling into a mud pit to listen!"
This earned a loud burst of laughter from the recovery team.
Cugat threw his hands up in exaggerated offense. "That pit ambushed me!"
"Oh?" Barik finally looked back, one eyebrow raised. "So now puddles are laying traps?"
One of the older hunters added, "Better keep an eye out, Cugat. Never know when the mud might declare war."
A chorus of laughter ran through the group. The old hunters' eyes crinkled with fond memory, a silent agreement that Joeren had earned his place among them by passing on the tradition. Even he couldn't hold back a smile. A small swell of pride warmed his chest.
He remembered how foolishly he'd mocked the protective chant on his first mission. But after that nightmarish ordeal, he finally understood. The words didn't just mean something; they were truth burned into his memory.
The tension that had clung to the group since dawn loosened, not vanished, but eased, like a knot beginning to untangle. The road ahead was still uncertain, but laughter, even brief, felt like armor tightening around them.
And Barik, seeing the lift in their spirits, kept walking with a small, approving smirk. The mood had lightened. The wilderness didn't feel quite so heavy anymore.
Above them, the sky stretched clear and brilliant, the first rays of sunlight spilling over the ravaged land. The wet earth, once choked with smoke and fear, seemed almost reborn under the golden light. The wind carried the scent of pine, cold stone, and distant water, a world washed clean of darkness.
A hawk circled overhead, its cry sharp and bright in the morning air. For the first time in a long while, the world felt alive again. Hopeful.
And somewhere behind them, Haven waited, holding its breath for their safe return.
The land they saw ahead had changed.
And so had they.
***
Barik led the recovery team at a swift, steady pace. They were no longer stumbling through smoke and chaos as they had the previous night, but the clarity of morning brought its own distinct weight. Every man walked in silence, each carrying memories of the roaring storm, the encroaching wolves, and the silver blaze that had saved their lives.
"So, tell me, my dear 'Uncle Barik'," Cugat half-jokingly asked, leaning closer and adopting the innocent lilt of the young girl's voice. "What's that about the pet?" he couldn't stop himself from asking, a genuine grin, the first bit of happiness Barik had seen all morning, spreading across his tired, mud-caked face.
Barik felt a flush of good-natured embarrassment, a warm counterpoint to the cold dread of the mission. He offered a weary, exasperated smile in reply. "She caught me at a weak moment," he muttered, shaking his head. He'd blabbered some glorious nonsense to reassure the child last night, promising her wild beasts and better cuts of meat, anything to banish the fear from her eyes. The thought of that little girl's fierce demands brought a much-needed moment of lightness.
Cugat nudged Barik with his elbow. "A mammoth steak, Barik? You promised a mammoth steak and a pet. Knowing her, I hope you specified the animal. We can't have the little terror expecting you to capture that Alpha wolf you saw last night."
Barik laughed, a genuine, short burst of sound that drew curious glances from the men behind them. "I believe I guaranteed her a pet 'suitable for a young lady's room.' Which means a particularly large field mouse, if we can catch one."
"Ah, a wise choice, commander," Cugat agreed, giving a mock salute. "A field mouse is certainly less likely to require an emergency evacuation back to Haven. But you're still on the hook for the steak. If you don't deliver, Little Myrah will have your neck before the glass-backs do."
"That's the risk of command, Cugat," Barik replied, his grin fading slightly as he cast his gaze back to the treacherous path ahead. "At least the children give you clear objectives. Now, enough pleasantries. We have to make sure my little company of protectors is still in that cave."
The brief moment of levity dissolved instantly. The group moved on, but as they crested a low hill, the evidence of the tempest became starkly visible. The air, previously crisp, grew heavy with the scent of damp earth and shattered wood. Giant puddles lay stagnant, the color of rust and stirred mud, and along the path, trees that had stood firm for generations now lay splintered, a desolate testament to the wind's fury.
The path to the gorge wound through the low ridges north of the settlement, a stretch of terrain every seasoned hunter once knew as well as the lines on their palms. But today, that familiarity faltered. The storm had carved new scars across the land: trees split clean down their spines, roots torn loose, and soil scorched in strange spirals where lightning had struck unnaturally deep. Some trunks even glimmered faintly inside their broken hearts, as though threads of light had permanently seeped into the wood.
Even those who had volunteered at dawn, unaware of the full horror their comrades had faced, now felt the heaviness settling into their steps.
The terrain looked even more ruined now than when they trekked the land to hunt the wounded glass-back beast. The soil was dark and sodden, carved by rivulets that glimmered faintly as though the acidic rain itself had traced its path through the land. It would take a long time for fresh water to cleanse this deep foulness.
Barik led the team on foot, his pace steady and grim, his eyes never leaving the terrain ahead. The ruined land was too quiet. Even the wind seemed cautious, whispering through rocks and shrubs still wet with dawn. They had walked for a few hours now, and the oxen pulling the carts were straining hard to trudge through the heavy, sodden mire.
"Look!" An old hunter, one who hadn't been with them before, pointed ahead, his voice hushed and filled with awe at the scale of destruction.
The sight pulled Barik to a dead stop.
The slope of the hill rose before them, its crest jagged with the half-buried edge of a concrete slab, tilted like a broken tooth. Below it, the muddy basin that had churned with rainwater now lay still, a quagmire littered with the dark, twisted shapes of wolf carcasses. The air reeked of wet fur and iron.
And there, crowning the rise, stood the ancient tree… or what remained of it. Split clean down the middle, its core blackened and veined with silver, still smoldering faintly. The scent of ozone clung to the air, sharp and electric, a ghost of the storm's fury.
"Is that where it started?" the hunter murmured, his voice thick with awe
Barik took longer to answer, the memory of the ordeal surging through him. The landmarks of the previous night's battle were etched into his mind: the slope where they'd made their stand, the hollow where the wolves had surged like a living tide, the tree that had burned with unnatural light.
The tree that had saved them.
Barik remembered the storm's overwhelming finale, the chaotic power that had raged around them. His mind, intensely focused on the life-and-death mission of recovering Eris and his company, registered the ruined hill and the lightning-split tree as stark landmarks of the night's savagery. He saw only a massive, ruined piece of nature, its power spent.
The memory of the final moments returned with sharp clarity: Dara's battle-hardened moves, the snarling pack, the circle closing, Thalen shouting, and the rest losing hope. Nobody wanted to die, but they saw no escape from their predicament. (1)
Barik recalled the crushing finality of the pack closing in, the feeling of the slab groaning beneath their feet, the last desperate swing of his axe. But clearest of all was the silver light. Death was already knocking at their door when the blinding, silent radiance tore through the wolves, splitting the ground with a crack like thunder from the heavens.
Barik shook off the memory. He nodded and said, his voice so low that the rest could barely hear, as if he were talking to himself alone. "Yes, that's the place." It took him a bit longer to answer.
He gestured to the split tree. "Lightning struck the ancient tree at the crest of the hill. It gave us hope, and with the fire from its burning branches, we were able to stop the wolf onslaught. Still, we would've been lost there... all of us."
The ground around the place was still littered with wolf limbs, but the tracks were gone, erased by the rain or by something else. Patches of the soil still shimmered faintly with silver under the morning light, as though something beneath the earth was breathing.
Flavian, a seasoned hunter, stood beside Barik and muttered, "I've hunted these lands since I could stand, but I've never seen the earth like this." Their eyes drifted toward the higher ground ahead, at the ridge where Barik's team had been besieged. The landscape was brutalized, stripped bare by the rain and the fight.
"By the gods…" Boris whispered, staring at the split oak. "The strike must've run straight through it."
"It took the whole night to come down," Joeren said, breathing out as he stared at the distant, desolate rise. "We almost died there," he added, his voice flat. "If not for..." He was about to describe Dara's daring feats, but realized that would only invite awkward questions, so he bit his tongue and fell silent.
"Yes, we almost died there," Barik continued for Joeren, his voice strained. "If not for the silver light that struck those wolves. The wind, the mud, the collapse... it was the mountain trying to swallow us, even before the wolves closed in."
"If not for that light..." Barik trailed off, shaking his head, his jaw tightening as he surveyed the ridge. "Our savior," he murmured, "walks in strange ways."
The others fell silent. Even the oxen shifted uneasily, as though sensing the residue of something beyond mortal ken. Others made the sign of a cross; even at this time, some people still believed in God, although many felt God had long forsaken them.
"You think it was the storm?" Flavian continued to press.
Barik shook his head. "No. The storm even halted for a moment, no harrowing wind, no cold rain. Whatever that was, it did not come from heaven."
Cugat nodded, his jaw tight. "I've never seen anything like it...," he trailed off, shaking his head. "Like the earth itself rose to save us."
Barik crouched, running his fingers over a deep gouge in the ground where the silver light, which had almost blinded him, struck a wolf beside him and threw it back. "It wasn't the earth," he said. "It was something else. Something alive."
"Alive?" Flavian echoed. He shifted uncomfortably; his focus entirely consumed by the chilling implication. "Could it be... Celestia?" he asked.
Suddenly, Boris interjected, his eyes wide. "Celestia?" His voice was barely above a whisper. He quickly glanced over his shoulder, as if the entity itself might be listening from the mist-shrouded rocks. The sheer magnitude of the mystery made him momentarily forget he was interrupting the older hunter's question. He'd only ever heard the name whispered by old folks in talks of legends.
Again, Barik sorely missed the Great Elder who could explain similar occurrences in their lore.
Barik stood, brushing the dirt from his hands. "I don't know what it was," he admitted. "But it saved us. And that's enough for now."
Boris reached out, then hesitated, his hand hovering above the still glowing streak in the ground. "It's still warm," he murmured.
"Best not to touch it," Barik said. "The silver runs through it. I've seen what that does to flesh."
They stood for a moment in silence, watching the slow drift of smoke from the tree's sundered heart. It was hard to tell if the faint flickers deep inside the trunk were embers or something else entirely.
"Strange," Boris said softly. "It looks almost alive even now."
"Let it rest," Barik replied. "The storm's done enough."
The men fell silent, each lost in his own thoughts.
Barik turned his gaze toward the cave entrance in the distance. "Alright, let's move," he said, his voice firm, cutting through the heavy atmosphere. "We've got a long day ahead."
He exhaled, finally turning away. He could only look ahead now, where the gorge lay in wait, veiled in mist, humming faintly with the same eerie resonance that had once filled the air before the lightning fell. He prayed that Eris and his company were still safe in the cave.
The hunters fell into step behind him, resuming their difficult journey. The sun shone brightly overhead, but the shadows of the storm and the unknown force that had saved them lingered.
Among the debris, half-buried in the mud, lay several staves: straight, smooth lengths of wood, blasted clean by the lightning's fury. Their surfaces were charred, but within their heartwood, something stirred: quick, silver sparks, flickering like distant stars. Too fast to be seen by careless eyes. This was the storm's own strange alchemy, lightning fused with the silver veins of the Spiral's influence, forging something new. Something alive.
***