The following week, Cinder returned to its uneasy rhythm. The smell of char still clung to the air, but hammer blows and the hiss of forges replaced the crackle of fire. People wanted to forget the blaze, yet every blackened tree on the ridge was a reminder that the Ashenwild could wake again.
Kael worked beside the other apprentices repairing the palisade. He kept his sleeve rolled low over his hand. The silver mark had dimmed to a faint shimmer, but sometimes—when he touched raw wood or the feather of an arrow—it pulsed, as though remembering something older than itself.
Riven came and went, a dark flicker in the sky. Fenra stayed near the forest's edge, never venturing too close to the town; the guards already whispered about a pale wolf haunting the fields. Kael visited her at night, bringing scraps of meat and stories of the people she now protected unseen.
Through their bond, he felt her emotions more clearly each day. Calm. Pride. And sometimes a strange flicker of warning that tightened his chest. Each time he asked what troubled her, the wolf's thoughts showed only a single image: strangers moving through the trees.
Three days later, the strangers arrived.
They rode into Cinder at dusk—four riders in dark cloaks trimmed with silver thread, their armor polished but unadorned. The townsfolk stopped what they were doing, bowing their heads as the riders passed. No one had to name them; everyone knew the sigil stitched on their mantles: the Eye of the Warden.
Kael stood frozen near the smithy as the lead rider dismounted. She was tall, her hair white as ash despite her youth, her gaze sharp and pale as frost. Two hounds padded at her heels, their eyes glowing faintly blue.
"By decree of the City of Ardent," she said, her voice carrying like steel on glass, "we seek those who meddle with forbidden magicks. Report any sign of unnatural beasts or markings to Warden Captain Seris."
Whispers rippled through the crowd. Kael kept his face still, but beneath his sleeve his mark burned—softly, warning him.
Seris's gaze swept the square and stopped briefly on him. For an instant, he felt the same pressure he had when the raven first spoke to him: a presence probing his thoughts, searching. Then it passed, and she turned away.
"Search the perimeter," she ordered her riders. "The corruption begins in small places."
They moved off toward the forest road.
That night Kael slipped beyond the fields to where Fenra waited. The moon was thin and cold; the grass shimmered with frost though it was not yet winter.
"They're here for me," he said quietly. "I can feel it."
Fenra's reply came as a low growl that carried both anger and concern. Then we hide. Or we fight.
"Not yet." Kael looked toward the dark ridge of trees. "If they find the Ashenwild's heart, they'll destroy it. Lyra said corruption spreads… maybe that's what they're sensing."
Riven dropped from the sky, landing on his shoulder. North. Smoke again, the raven's thought rasped through him. But no fire—something else.
Kael nodded grimly. "Show me."
They followed Riven through the treeline. The air thickened, heavy with a sour sweetness that stung Kael's nose. The ground glistened with black sap where roots had split open. Fenra sniffed, then recoiled, lips curling.
At the center of a small clearing lay a deer—or what had been one. Its body shimmered faintly with a greenish film, eyes empty. The grass around it was dead.
Kael knelt beside it, heart pounding. "What could do this?"
Fenra's hackles rose. Not natural. Touched by shadow.
A faint hiss came from the body. Kael jerked back as tendrils of mist rose from the carcass, curling like smoke around his boots. His mark flared bright silver, and the mist recoiled as if burned.
Riven screeched. The Wardens come.
Through the trees came the glint of torches and armor.
Kael swallowed hard. "Fenra—go. Hide."
The wolf vanished into the brush. He pressed himself behind a fallen log as the riders entered the clearing. Seris dismounted, crouched by the carcass, and frowned.
"It's spreading faster than reported," she said. "We burn this place and move south."
One of the other Wardens hesitated. "Captain, the villagers—"
"Will learn to obey the fire," she snapped. "Corruption does not negotiate."
Kael's fists clenched. He wanted to shout that there was another way, that the forest wasn't evil—but his mark burned a warning: not yet. He stayed silent as the Wardens poured oil and flame over the clearing. The black sap sizzled, turning to ash.
Only when the last torch faded did Kael crawl out, coughing through the smoke. Riven fluttered down beside him.
"They'll keep burning," Kael said hoarsely. "Until there's nothing left."
The raven tilted its head. Then we must find what feeds the rot.
He looked north, toward where Lyra had vanished into the mist. "And we'll need her help to do it."