The shapes of people clustered at the edge of a dry streambed. Emaciated. Dust-smeared. Their backs pressed to trees, eyes wide, some clutching others as though death still hunted behind them. When they saw the group arrive, they stirred—but didn’t relax. Didn’t breathe. Not yet.

  Until their eyes landed on Sol. And Dal.

  Relief bloomed across tired faces. Still cloaked by fear, but there.

  Caelus scanned the group.

  No obvious combatants. Some limping. Others smeared in blood dried black. Children nestled into older arms. Twenty-four in total.

  Dalimor stepped forward without a word.

  He slipped a smooth, moon-glass stone from his belt. It pulsed faint turquoise—nothing more than a breath of light in the dusk.

  He knelt by a woman slumped near the edge of the streambed. Her arm was wrapped in stained fabric, bone showing just beneath the folds.

  She didn’t flinch.

  She just watched him. As if he wasn’t real.

  When his hand touched her skin, the magic stirred.

  It didn’t blaze.

  It unfolded.

  Like the petals of a flower drawn toward the moon. Like soft water weaving through broken earth.

  Her skin knotted closed under his palm. The bone tucked itself back into the flesh. The bruising melted.

  She exhaled—not a scream. Not a gasp.

  A moan. Not the one you expect from pain.

  It was intimate.

  Caelus felt it like a shiver under his ribs. He took a step back without realizing.

  Dal moved to the next wounded soul.

  And the next. Each one receiving a single touch—no words, no ritual—just that light. That terrible, beautiful light, and his other hand hovering over one stone after another.

  Pale Elf.

  A race cloaked in secrecy and tradition.

  They didn’t heal strangers.

  They never healed humans.

  He remembered the teachings. The tomes. The whispers.

  Healing magic was a sacred art—rare even among their own. And never given to outsiders.

  And yet here it was.

  Before him.

  Undeniable.

  The refugees murmured, reverent. Words like “angel” and “blessing” drifted between them. One woman pressed her hands together and wept just watching the light spill from Dal’s palm, all but deifying him.

  Caelus stood very still.

  They never heal humans.

  It echoed in his mind. A truth taught to him in ink and blood.

  They guard that magic like it was sacred.

  His stomach twisted. His chest too heavy.

  Something about the air—it was different.

  Thicker. Charged. Sweet.

  He didn’t realize he was staring until Solferen moved beside him.

  “Breathe,” he murmured low, not unkindly. “You’re forgetting.”

  Caelus blinked.

  His mouth was dry. His throat tight. His pulse—wrong. Too loud. Too deep.

  “What… what is that?” He asked, voice barely above a whisper.

  “That,” Sol said, “is a thing your god never gave you.”

  And walked forward to help carry the newly healed.

  Caelus remained frozen.

  Something deep in his chest burned—and he didn’t know if it was awe.

  Or envy.

  More words were exchanged—panicked ones now.

  Sol knelt beside an older man, hand on his shoulder. “What village?”

  “Dawnmere,” came the shaky answer. “South slope. Below the cliff.”

  Exactly where they'd feared.

  The man shook. “It followed us. Through the trees. We couldn’t see it—but we felt it.”

  “Eyes,” another whispered. “No face. Just eyes in the dark.”

  “Shadows that scream.”

  Right on que.

  It screamed.

  A piercing wail split the forest like a whip, and the air bent to carry the sound faster.

  Sol didn’t flinch.

  “Shriekers.” He rose to his feet with a sigh.

  “Rish, Killeon,” he said, almost lazily. “Go make art.”

  “Yes!” Rish beamed, cracking her neck and unsheathing her oversized sword in one fluid motion.

  Killeon, ever reserved, actually smiled. Just barely.

  That alone was terrifying.

  Sol turned toward Caelus. “You’re on villager duty, Saintshine. Try not to let anyone die this time.”

  The nerve. The gall.

  “Do you have to insult me every time you open your mouth?!” Cael snapped, voice rising.

  Sol’s teeth flashed in a grin. “You forget to be afraid when you’re flustered.”

  Bastard.

  The air twisted.

  It smelled sour. Thick with rot and magic and wrongness.

  The first shrieker emerged.

  It stepped between the trees with jerking, erratic motion. A puppet held up by tangled strings.

  Once a person—no longer.

  Its body warped. Its mouth gone. A hole where sound bled out—magic wailing from deep within the corpse. Its eyes glowed like a stolen life, flickering with a dead man’s soul.

  Then another.

  And another.

  They came. A herd of the broken.

  Dalimor perked up with all the delight of someone handed a plate of his favorite cake.

  “Wonderful!” he said politely. “Chop them up as you wish, but leave them as ‘alive’ as possible, will you.”

  And then—wholesale slaughter.

  Rish leaped in like a beast with a blade, laughing mid-slash.

  “Oh they scream! That’s cute. I scream too when I’m having fun!” Her blade cleaved through one creature cleanly.

  Killeon followed.

  They matched. Not in style—but in weight.

  Killeon was a storm contained. Controlled, but merciless. Precise, lethal, brutal.

  His blade didn’t slash—it executed.

  One shrieker leapt. He sidestepped, pivoted, and drove the glaive clean through its chest. Another lunged, and he parried with his whole body, knocking it to the ground and pinning it with brutal force.

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  His face didn’t change. Not once. Not even as blood splattered his leathers and the ground trembled under their feet.

  Rish, on the other hand, fought like war incarnate. A grinder of flesh and bone.

  She was laughing. Always laughing. She shouldn't have been, but she was—untamed, delighted, blade flashing in an endless maneuver like dancing fireflies.

  She darted through the fray, slicing at a shrieker's legs while yelling, “That all you got, ugly? I’ve had hangovers meaner than you!”

  One got close. Too close.

  Rish swung wide, caught one in the chest—but its hand still reached her shoulder. She snarled, shoved it back, twisted free.

  “Persistent bastard, aren’t you!?” She complained, almost chopping it in half.

  Varg, meanwhile, fought like he had nothing left to lose.

  A shrieker darted toward a fleeing child—he was already there, intercepting it with a roar that shook the trees.

  His arrows weren’t just accurate—they were cruel. One pierced through a jaw and pinned the thing to a tree. Another nailed two limbs in one shot.

  He moved fast.

  A shrieker nearly got behind Killeon, but Varg’s arrow was faster—silent and sudden—cutting it down mid-lunge.

  “Watch your back, big guy,” he muttered without a glance, then disappeared into the trees again.

  Cael and Sol stayed near the villagers.

  Dal remained too, posture perfect, conducting siphoned magic with a flick of his hand. The stones at his waist glowed bright now. Almost blinding.

  His hand behind his back. His other outstretched. His eyes focused, mouth curved in something too polite to be joy, too sharp to be calm.

  Cael held his ground. Shield up. Blade ready.

  He struck. Blocked. Moved. Defended.

  Until—

  He faltered.

  One of the shriekers lurched into view.

  And it wore a face.

  A familiar one.

  A templar. His templar.

  One of the knights who had followed him into the forest on that first cursed mission. The one impaled on the beast’s horns.

  Still bent. Still wrong. Still here.

  Caelus staggered.

  Then—another. Twisted, half-flattened. Still moving.

  “No,” he whispered like a plea, shaking his head slowly.

  Too slow.

  The creature lunged at him—he saw the teeth, the gaping scream—

  A blur of motion. Solferen slammed into it like a meteor. His chakram arced—sang—and the creature’s head rolled to Dal’s feet like a bowling gift.

  Sol turned, eyes burning.

  “Don’t make me babysit you, Moraine.” His grumble cut through the air.

  Cael didn’t speak. Couldn’t.

  The battle finished soon after. Too soon.

  What remained of the forest… didn’t look real.

  Limbs hung from branches like meat garlands. Blood painted the moss in uneven strokes. Bone shards glistened as though someone shattered porcelain.

  The villagers trembled in their circle. Shell-shocked.

  Rish twirled her blade and grinned. Covered in blood, glowing with pride.

  “That was beautiful.”

  Killeon, for once, agreed.

  Cael just stood there.

  Blood on his face.

  Staring at the corpses.

  Not again.

  He recognized too many faces. Faces that were supposed to be buried. At peace.

  Dying an awful death once just wasn’t enough for them.

  Sol wiped blood from his wrist, turned. “Off to the camp we go.”

  Cael snapped. “Are you just going to leave—this?!”

  He gestured wildly. Limbs. Blood. Mangled bodies hanging like trophies.

  “At least give them a proper burial!”

  He expected mockery. Dismissal. Something cruel.

  Instead—

  Solferen turned slowly. His face was serious. Sorrowful. Quiet.

  “We can’t,” he said. Voice low. Almost gentle.

  “They’ll come back again.”

  Cael opened his mouth—but nothing came out.

  Sol glanced away. A moment of consideration. Normally he would simply send Ysilla and Bella for cleanup duty. But with how hollow Caelus’ eyes looked that moment is didn’t sit right with him.

  “The best we can do is burn them.” He exhaled. “I’ll send the others to collect… what’s left.”

  Cael’s shoulders dropped, weight of guilt lifting, just a little.

  And with that, they walked.

  Back toward the camp.

  Through ash. Through blood. Through ghosts.

  The journey back was quiet.

  The refugees—frayed at the seams, exhausted—walked in slow lines between the mercenaries. Those too weak were carried. Rish helped one woman, balancing her son on her shoulders, surprising everyone. Killeon walked beside a man too dazed to speak, offering nothing but presence.

  Caelus didn’t say a word.

  When the camp came into view, it looked like something out of a story—fires glowing low, tents dappled in shade, children peeking from cave entrances.

  The silence cracked.

  Gasps. Cries.

  The villagers stumbled forward, recognizing faces among the so-called not-cultists. Tears burst like floodgates. People ran into each other’s arms, clutching loved ones thought lost. Names were shouted. Knees buckled.

  Sol said nothing. Just gave Varg a nod.

  “Bodies,” he ordered. “Bring them here. All of them.”

  Varg moved without hesitation. Half the party followed, many others joined.

  “Ysi,” Sol called. His voice was low, but it carried. “We’ll need the fire. Ceremonial.”

  The witch blinked. Her gaze flicked to Caelus—then back to Sol.

  No mockery. No teasing.

  “Understood.”

  She rolled up her sleeves. Began carving runes into the earth with her knife. A circle. A second. Layered, like ripples on the water.

  Then the bodies arrived.

  Wrapped in torn cloth. Some still bleeding. Bits of moss, broken branches clinging to what was left.

  And with them—recognition.

  A woman screamed. Collapsed.

  A boy stared, eyes wide and glassy, until he let out a wail sharp enough to silence even the wind. The name he cried was not one of the villagers.

  It was his father’s.

  The air didn’t breathe. The camp stood in vigil.

  And Caelus stood frozen.

  There they lay. Once proud, once upright, armored in purpose and certainty—now wrapped in bloodstained cloth, their faces slack with indignity, broken, unrecognizable. The ones he led. The ones he failed.

  They lay there, piled together, anonymous in death.

  This wasn’t right.

  He knew the rites. The steps. The way it should be.

  Cloth of gold. Vows recited. Blessings spoken over every soul before flame could touch it.

  There would be no clerics. No gilded banners. No final vow beneath golden archways.

  Instead, they would be burned.

  By a witch.

  By a woman the Church had once condemned to flames herself.

  And he—he—would just watch.

  He clenched his fists so tightly it hurt. Not to stop the tears—they didn’t even come. Soldiers died all the time.

  Just shame. Burning, sickening shame. It roared in his chest, too big for his body. He felt... small. Like a traitor. Like a boy again. A failure, staring through cathedral glass while the rest of the world moved on without him.

  Then—

  Warmth.

  Soft. Human. Real.

  A hand on his shoulder.

  Caelus flinched, half-turning—and froze again.

  Solferen.

  No smirk. No barb on his tongue. No teeth bared for effect.

  Just… stillness.

  And in his hand, he held a bundle. Wrapped in dark leather, bound with thin red twine.

  He didn’t say a word.

  Just met Caelus’ eyes—and placed it gently into his hands.

  Then he left.

  No explanation. No lecture. No performance.

  Only trust.

  Caelus looked down. The leather was worn but clean. Old. Kept safe. Revered. His fingers hesitated at the edge of the twine.

  He unwrapped it.

  And the world dropped out beneath him.

  Inside lay what no mercenary should possess.

  A bundle of Ember Pearls, wrapped in red silk. Pure. Untouched. Worth more than gold in warzones—because one couldn’t buy sanctity. Couldn’t forge purity.

  These were offered in high ceremonies only, reserved for archons and chosen dead.

  A half-used vial of Dawnmark Oil. The kind used to draw the Eye of Aurenos. The sun sigil. The passage of light. Most temples locked it away. Few even knew the rite by heart.

  A bouquet of Sunsbreath. Preserved. Untouched. Its petals golden, soft as light through stained glass. It bloomed with warmth when his hand hovered near it.

  This wasn’t just a burial kit.

  Cael’s hands shook. This was sacred. And the last person on this earth who should understand that had handed it to him like it was nothing.

  It was everything.

  The rites. The blessing. The tools to send his dead home. To offer dignity.

  To forgive himself.

  And Sol—Sol—had given it freely.

  The same man who spat Aurenos’ name like poison. Who should have hated Caelus more than anyone alive.

  And still… he gave him this.

  Not because he believed in Aurenos.

  But because Cael did.

  And in that one, unfathomable act—he had honored it.

  Caelus stared. His hands didn’t move. For a moment, he just looked at it like it might vanish if he blinked. His throat locked. Something inside him cracked.

  He looked up, expecting a joke. A smirk. Some insult ready to burn the kindness away.

  But Solferen was already gone, melted into shadow, as if he didn’t want to be seen. As if this wasn't a gesture meant for glory.

  Caelus blinked hard. Once. Twice.

  Then his legs moved.

  He strode to the bodies like a priest possessed, unrolling the silks, unscrewing the oil. He dipped two fingers in the vial and drew the Eye of Aurenos across every forehead he could reach—some cracked open, some only half-human now.

  He lit the incense. The smoke curled gold.

  He placed Sunsbreath beneath their chins.

  Whispers started—soft, at first.

  The villagers noticed.

  One stepped forward, clutching their scarf.

  “Please,” they begged. “He was mine. Will you do the same?”

  Caelus nodded.

  And again. And again.

  Until the log pyre glowed. And Ysilla lit the circle.

  The fire didn’t roar—it sang. Soft, blue at the edges. Controlled by her magic.

  The bodies burned like saints.

  Caelus knelt before the flames and whispered every verse he remembered. Every psalm. Every funeral chant. The words fell from him like rain—so old, so practiced, his lips didn’t even need thought.

  The crowd stood with him.

  Some villagers cried. A woman screamed into her scarf. A man fell to his knees.

  Nolan held a child who refused to look away. He didn’t shush them—just wrapped his arms tight around their shoulders and rested his chin on their hair.

  Gorrath had to hold back another man, shouting, reaching for the fire. “He’s in there! Let me—LET ME—”

  Gorrath didn’t let go.

  Caelus didn’t stop praying.

  And through it all—just on the edge of the trees—

  Someone watched.

  Hidden. Not among them, but not absent.

  Caelus turned for a moment, gaze caught by instinct.

  And he saw him.

  A glint of light on Sol’s forehead. Something familiar in shape.

  Gone when he blinked.

  In that moment—Solferen’s eyes were closed. His lips moved.

  And the melody? It was too close.

  Too close to the Burial Hymn of Aurenos.

  Red fog curled behind his silhouette. Hungry. Silent.

  Cael turned back to the fire, shivering.

  He didn’t want to know.