Dawn had barely begun to tint Dara's battered walls gray when, inside an improvised pavilion beside the northern wall, Laurence Douglas rested surrounded by his men.
Shadow captains.
Dark knights.
Heirs of vassal houses.
Warriors who had returned from the night.
The atmosphere was strange.
Exhaustion, dried blood, and an euphoria that no one dared contain for too long.
One of the captains, with half his armor destroyed, drank water from a metal bowl.
—By the gods, my lord! They say the Fifth Legion nearly pissed themselves when they found out they would have to face us.
Laughter erupted.
—They also say some recruits believe our shadows can swallow entire soldiers!
More laughter.
Laurence watched them in silence.
He did not mind listening to them.
In fact, he was glad.
After that night, his men had every right to laugh.
But as he looked at their faces...
he counted those who were missing.
Two counts.
A knight who had served his family for twenty years.
Young men who had barely begun wearing the Douglas emblem.
And others who had died without anyone having time to speak their names.
Laurence lowered his gaze.
He could still remember the night.
Three imperial generals.
Steel.
Darkness.
And the men who had stepped between him and their swords.
One of them had died before his eyes.
Another had taken the blow meant for his chest.
The third had lost the arm with which he had wielded a sword his entire life.
They had bought his life with theirs.
Laurence slowly closed his eyes.
And, as always happened after surviving something like that, a face appeared in his mind that did not belong on the battlefield.
Caleb.
His son.
For a moment, he saw him as he had once been.
Dark hair.
Eyes full of life.
That mischievous smile that reminded him so much of Martha.
Laurence clenched his jaw.
If I had followed my father's plan...
The thought came on its own.
If he had accepted from the beginning what the duchy demanded.
If he had allowed Sophia to fulfill her duty.
If he had not tried to decide for himself what his family should become...
Caleb would still be alive.
Perhaps Martha would have hated him.
Perhaps she would never have forgiven him for giving up his son.
But he would be alive.
Laurence opened his eyes.
Sophia had never asked for love.
She never had.
Only once had she stood before him and spoken with the calm that had always characterized her.
—I am not asking you for myself.
A pause.
—I am demanding it for the duchy.
Laurence remembered that conversation more times than he wanted to admit.
And then he remembered something much simpler.
Sophia holding Lusian for the first time.
The smile on her face.
A smile Laurence had never managed to bring to her lips.
A smile that was not for him.
It was for the child.
Lusian.
The son who had been born to inherit.
The child who had been protected from the cradle.
The child whom the duchy had surrounded with beasts, knights, and shadows before he could even walk.
Lusian had never truly been alone.
Caleb had.
And that difference had ultimately cost him his life.
Laurence clenched his fists.
Around him, his men continued laughing.
They talked about the battle.
They imitated the Imperials.
They celebrated having survived.
Laurence let them.
They needed it.
Perhaps he would have wanted to do the same once.
But he couldn't.
Not after watching so many die.
Not after Caleb.
He raised his gaze.
The men before him were still alive.
Some thanks to others who were no longer there.
And as long as he continued breathing, that would remain true.
I must keep going.
His gaze swept across their faces.
For them.
He thought of Martha.
Of Sophia.
Of Caleb.
And finally, of Lusian.
For my son.
Laurence took a deep breath.
The burden of the duchy weighed upon his shoulders.
The darkness of his bloodline weighed upon them as well.
But he did not lower his head.
Not yet.
A shadow crossed his eyes.
And when he looked at his men again, his expression was already that of the duke they all knew.
The man who could not afford to fall.
The capital of the Kingdom, Acropolis, was buzzing with activity.
Since dawn, the palace bells had announced the beginning of a new phase of the defensive plan. Inside the Royal Palace of Atrium, Queen Adelaine directed every movement as if it were another battle.
—Recruitment? —she asked without taking her eyes off the reports.
—Completed, Mother —the crown prince Andrew replied, maintaining a firm posture—. The units have already been deployed. The new fortress can be deployed at any moment. Its defensive capabilities will surpass those of Dara.
He paused briefly.
—Even if we surrender territory, the Kingdom will not fall.
Adelaine slowly exhaled.
For the first time in days, she seemed to allow herself to breathe.
—Then give the order. Have Keitaro leave immediately. Your father must know that the second line is ready to receive the Empire.
Andrew nodded and left the room.
When the doors closed, Adelaine's expression wavered for barely an instant.
She was a queen.
She was a wife.
And she was also a mother.
Each of those responsibilities pulled her in a different direction.
But she could not afford to stop.
—Send in the next minister.
The reports continued to arrive.
In another wing of the palace, Princess Elizabeth was finishing her review of the day's final documents.
Since the king had gone to war, she, her mother, and Andrew had taken on much of the Kingdom's administration.
And the problems kept piling up.
Monsters appearing in abnormal numbers.
Food that had to be sent to isolated villages.
Crops affected by the movement of troops.
Refugees arriving from the northern border.
Elizabeth rubbed her temples.
No matter how well educated she was, she was still human.
She became tired too.
She worried too.
And, above all...
she missed someone too.
She set the reports aside and picked up a letter she had left half-written.
Her expression changed instantly.
The princess's stiffness disappeared.
In its place appeared a warm smile.
It was for Lusian Douglas.
My beloved Lusian...
She continued writing with little sighs, telling him about the problems of her day, a few anecdotes, and, as always, letting a little jealousy slip between the lines that she would never admit aloud.
...and if I hear even a rumor that another woman is trying to get close to you, I will personally punish you when you return. Don't provoke me.
Elizabeth finished the letter and stamped it with the royal seal.
She smiled with satisfaction.
She had no idea what was happening at that very moment, hundreds of kilometers away.
While imagining her noble and righteous Lusian replying with words full of affection and loyalty...
Lusian was fighting an entirely different kind of battle.
One without swords.
Or armor.
Or generals.
And, unfortunately for him...
he didn't seem to be winning.
—Hah... I give up...
Lusian collapsed onto the bed, exhausted.
Beside him, Isabella collapsed as well, breathing heavily before settling beside him with a satisfied smile.
—Defeated... for the third time —she murmured, clearly proud of herself.
It had taken her a long time to achieve it.
Isabella had watched Lusian for months, gradually learning what he could and could not do.
Her beauty had not been enough.
Neither had her devotion.
Lusian was too disciplined.
Too proper.
And above all, he was a Douglas.
But Isabella was patient.
The opportunity had finally come after a small accident that she had carefully taken advantage of.
Since then, she had stopped being satisfied with simply being near him.
She wanted to become indispensable.
Under these circumstances, the highest position she could aspire to now that she was no longer a noble was to become the Douglas heir's concubine.
The next five days were a brutal repetition of the same routine.
Dara held during the day.
The Empire applied pressure.
And when night came, its soldiers withdrew from the forward positions.
The massacre of the mages had changed more than their tactics.
It had changed their fear.
They no longer wanted to fight in the darkness.
The massacre of the mages had left a wound that no commander could close.
They were afraid of the darkness.
It was not superstition.
It was military fear.
When the sun began to disappear, the legions abandoned their forward positions and returned to their camps.
They lit thousands of torches.
They raised barriers of light around the tents.
And no one approached the walls of Dara too closely again.
The fortress could remain silent for hours.
It did not matter.
The soldiers preferred to wait for dawn.
And it was precisely that fear that the Kingdom decided to use.
On the fifth day, when another day of fighting came to an end, King Felipe Erkhan summoned his principal nobles.
—It is time.
The men raised their eyes.
—We march tonight.
One of them hesitated.
—At dawn, my lord? The army is exhausted.
Felipe looked at the faces before him.
—Hope gives strength that exhaustion cannot steal.
Then he pointed toward the imperial camp.
—And they do not watch the night.
No one argued again.
The soldiers began leaving through the rear gates of Dara.
They did not leave all at once.
The units advanced in groups, using secondary roads and routes prepared during the previous days.
The Douglas had studied the imperial patrols night after night.
And it had not been difficult.
The first patrols that approached the walls had disappeared into the darkness.
The next ones stopped coming so close.
Then they simply stopped coming altogether.
When night fell, the imperial soldiers withdrew toward their camps and lit their torches, leaving Dara's perimeter practically abandoned.
The Douglas knew.
They knew when the patrols withdrew.
They knew which routes were clear.
And, above all, they knew that no one would dare approach the walls after nightfall.
The fear that had protected Dara during those nights now opened the way for them to leave.
Without noise.
Without pursuit.
Without the Empire even realizing they were gone.
They marched for hours with broken armor, bloodstained bandages, and legs pushed to their limits.
They did not advance because they still had strength.
They advanced because they knew a new fortress awaited them in the north.
Albaterra.
And when the sun appeared again...
The Empire had seen nothing.
The next morning, the attacks began as usual.
The war had settled into a macabre routine.
The deaths of thousands of men no longer provoked screams.
It was simply another dawn.
One of the imperial formations received an order before advancing.
—Your mission: eliminate the Douglas.
Silence was immediate.
Many soldiers turned pale. Others tightened their grip on their weapons.
Even the newcomers knew that name.
Douglas.
To them, it meant death.
They were not marching toward a battle.
They were marching toward an enemy from whom few had returned.
The formation advanced in silence, resigned to the possibility that they might never return.
But when they reached Dara's perimeter, something did not feel right.
There were no arrows.
No magic.
No shouts from the walls.
Only silence.
The veterans stopped.
—Where are the sentries?
—Why is there no movement?
A captain raised a hand.
—Archer. Forward.
A scout climbed over the remains of a collapsed wall.
He looked.
He waited.
Several seconds passed.
Then he shouted:
—There's no one here!
—What?
—The fortress is empty!
Confusion spread through the ranks.
The soldiers looked toward the towers.
The mages began searching for signs of magic.
Nothing.
No soldiers.
No officers.
No personnel.
No recent corpses.
Dara had been completely abandoned.
—Inform Her Highness Naira! —one of the generals ordered—. Now!
Naira received the report a few minutes later.
She was surrounded by maps, her face hardened by five days of siege.
—Repeat that.
The messenger swallowed.
—Dara is empty, Your Highness.
Naira slowly raised her eyes.
—Empty?
—Completely.
Silence.
—When did it happen?
—During the night, we believe.
Naira remained motionless.
Then she asked a question.
—Was there surveillance around the fortress?
The generals exchanged glances.
Naira understood the answer before hearing it.
—Your Highness...
One of them lowered his head.
—Since the massacre of the mages, our troops have withdrawn from the forward positions before nightfall.
Naira tightened her fingers against the table.
—And during the night?
—We did not watch the walls closely.
Naira's expression hardened.
—Then they escaped...
—Yes, Your Highness.
—And none of you saw them?
No one answered.
Naira closed her eyes for a moment.
Anger slowly rose through her chest.
They had not defeated the imperial army.
They had not even needed to fight it.
They had simply waited.
Waited for fear to do its work.
Naira opened her eyes.
—The night...
She slammed her fist onto the table.
—Damn the night!
The generals lowered their heads.
Naira took a deep breath.
—We march.
—Your Highness?
—I want to see it with my own eyes.
When Naira crossed Dara's southern gate, her footsteps echoed through the ruins.
She had imagined that moment many times.
Her first great conquest.
Entering the legendary fortress with imperial banners behind her.
Soldiers cheering.
The Empire's flag flying over the walls.
Glory.
But she found none of that.
Only ruins.
Empty corridors.
Half-collapsed towers.
Abandoned courtyards.
The corpse of a fortress that had stopped breathing during the night.
Naira advanced slowly.
There were no fresh corpses.
No abandoned armor.
No signs of a hurried retreat.
The people of Dara had simply left.
—Where is the royal army? —she asked.
—We believe they fled north, Your Highness.
Naira slowly turned her head.
—And why didn't you see them?
The general lowered his gaze.
—Our men do not approach the fortress at night.
Naira stared at him.
—Since that night.
—Yes.
Naira let out a short laugh.
Without humor.
—Since the massacre.
She looked at the walls.
Now she understood.
The Douglas had not needed to defeat them.
They had done something much simpler.
They had made the Empire afraid to look into the darkness.
And while everyone waited for dawn...
the enemy had disappeared.
Naira slowly clenched her fists.
—I will not let them escape.
No one answered.
The princess turned her gaze toward the road leading north.
For the first time since the campaign had begun, she did not feel as though she were pursuing an enemy.
She felt as though she were being dragged behind one.
The Douglas had turned the Empire's fear into a weapon.
And now that same weapon had just stolen her first victory.
Naira stared at the ruins of Dara.
Her voice came out low.
—This is not a victory.
She paused.
—It is a humiliation.
And for the first time, the soldiers surrounding her did not know what to say.