The gates did not hold until morning.
I think that is the first thing I should say.
We had prepared for days.
Reinforced the walls.
Moved food underground.
Set traps along every road leading toward Pylore.
The Keldors knew those roads better than anyone. We had hunted there, trained there, fought beasts there. There were paths through those hills that invading soldiers would never find on a map.
We thought that would matter.
It did.
Just not enough.
The first attack came shortly after sunset.
Arrows crossed the eastern wall in numbers I had never seen before.
Not hundreds fired together in some beautiful formation.
They came unevenly.
Some struck rooftops.
Some shattered against stone.
Some fell harmlessly into the streets.
Others found people.
The first man I saw die was standing twenty steps from me.
A Keldor.
I knew him.
He had argued with me three days earlier because I had moved one of his traps without asking.
The arrow entered beneath his jaw.
He fell without making a sound.
I remember staring at him.
Only for a second.
Someone grabbed my shoulder.
"Jake!"
I turned.
An Aran fighter pointed toward the eastern gate.
"Move!"
Then there wasn't time to know anyone anymore.
There were only positions.
Orders.
Sounds.
I ran.
The first soldiers reached the walls through the northern slope.
Our traps caught dozens.
The ground collapsed beneath one formation, dropping men into pits we had prepared beneath branches and soil.
Another group entered through the forest and walked directly into Keldor wire traps.
For several minutes, it worked exactly as we had planned.
Men screamed beyond the walls.
Our archers fired.
The Sanguis held the eastern gate.
The Aran fighters moved between sections wherever pressure became too great.
The Voran remained closer to the center, protecting civilians and treating the wounded while supporting the fighters wherever they could.
Pylore fought like Pylore.
Not four clans.
One village.
For one hour, I believed we might actually win.
Then the second army arrived.
No one had reported a second army.
Maybe our scouts never saw them.
Maybe they saw them and never came home.
It doesn't matter now.
They came from the south while most of our defenders were concentrated east.
The southern wall fell before anyone could reorganize.
I heard the sound from halfway across the village.
Stone.
Wood.
Then screaming.
I reached the southern road and found soldiers already inside.
Mixed banners.
Some wore colors I recognized from the kingdoms fighting the king.
Others carried no colors at all.
Men who had lost kingdoms.
Men who had changed sides.
Mercenaries.
Soldiers who probably did not even know what Pylore was before that morning.
They poured into streets people had walked safely for generations.
I killed the first one before he noticed me.
The second saw me.
The third almost took my left hand.
After that, I stopped counting.
I wish I could tell you I fought because I wanted to protect everyone.
Maybe part of me did.
But once the fighting started, there was no room for thoughts that clean.
Someone came toward me.
I killed him.
Someone attacked the man beside me.
I killed him too.
Someone shouted from behind.
I turned.
Again.
Again.
Again.
That was war.
A man trying to survive the person in front of him.
At some point, fire reached the eastern houses.
I don't know who started it.
Our people blamed the invading army.
Later, I wondered whether one of our own attacks had struck something it shouldn't have.
By then it no longer mattered.
Pylore burned either way.
I saw the flames above the rooftops while fighting near the central road.
For a few seconds, I couldn't move.
Those were our houses.
I had eaten inside some of them.
Slept inside others after drinking too much with people I thought would always be there.
A burning roof collapsed across the road.
Someone screamed beneath it.
I moved toward the sound.
A soldier intercepted me.
I struck him so hard his helmet split against the stone.
Then another came.
And another.
By the time I reached the house, the screaming had stopped.
That happened repeatedly that night.
You tried to reach someone.
Something stood between you.
By the time you got there, there was no longer anyone to save.
I don't remember when I last saw Liora.
That sounds impossible.
You would think I would remember.
Knowing what happened afterward, I should remember every detail.
Her face.
Her voice.
The direction she ran.
I don't.
There were too many people.
Too much smoke.
Too much blood.
I remember seeing pale Soul Force across the central district.
That must have been her.
A wave of it passed above the rooftops, then disappeared behind the Voran buildings.
I remember thinking:
She's still fighting.
That was enough for me then.
I had no idea what she was actually doing.
The Voran shelters had filled long before the southern wall fell.
Women.
Children.
Wounded fighters.
Families from the settlements we had taken in.
There wasn't enough room.
So Liora moved people.
Again and again.
From one shelter to another.
From burning houses toward the stone chambers beneath the Voran grounds.
Her Soul Force was nearly exhausted before midnight.
And somewhere during all of that, someone placed an infant in her arms.
Her sister's daughter.
Elara.
The fighting reached the Voran district before dawn.
Liora could barely stand by then.
There were bodies in the courtyard.
People she had known since childhood.
Her own clan.
The people whose names she had grown up hearing during ceremonies.
She had no time to mourn them.
She wrapped Elara tightly against her chest and moved deeper into the compound.
One of the remaining Voran fighters tried to stop her.
"Princess, the western passage is still open. Go. We'll hold them."
Liora looked at the man.
He was bleeding through his armor.
"You won't."
His expression tightened.
"No."
There was no reason to lie anymore.
Liora looked toward the passage.
Then toward the civilians still hiding below.
"How many?"
"Maybe thirty."
"And fighters?"
The man said nothing.
That answered her.
Liora closed her eyes for half a second.
Then she handed him her sword.
"Take whoever can still fight and move them west."
His eyes widened.
"What about you?"
"I'll take the lower route."
"That route collapsed years ago."
"Part of it did."
"You can't carry a child through there."
Liora looked down.
Elara had stopped crying.
The baby simply stared up at her through the smoke.
"I can."
"Liora."
She looked at him again.
Not as a princess.
As someone who had already decided.
"Go."
The man wanted to argue.
Then another explosion shook the compound.
Dust fell from the roof.
He gripped the sword.
And left.
Liora carried Elara beneath the Voran estate.
The passage had once connected the clan's ceremonial chambers to an old shrine outside the central village.
Most people considered it useless.
A collapse had blocked the western section long ago.
But the Voran knew something others did not.
The passage continued beneath the collapse.
Narrow.
Broken.
Barely large enough for a person to crawl through.
Liora reached it as the fighting entered the estate above her.
She lowered herself to the ground.
Her arm was injured.
One side of her face was covered in blood.
Soul Force trembled around her body.
Still, she placed Elara beneath herself and crawled.
Stone tore through her clothes.
Dust filled her mouth.
Twice, part of the ceiling shifted.
Once, she thought the entire tunnel would come down.
She kept moving.
Not quickly.
Only forward.
Elara began crying again.
"It's alright," Liora whispered.
Her voice shook.
"I know."
Another stone shifted beneath her hand.
"I know."
She pulled herself forward.
"You can cry."
The tunnel narrowed.
Liora turned partly onto her side, protecting the child with her body as she forced herself between two slabs of stone.
"You're allowed."
Something above them cracked.
Liora froze.
Then the ceiling collapsed.
Her Soul Force erupted on instinct.
Pale light formed above Elara.
Stone struck Liora's back.
Her head hit the ground.
Everything disappeared.
But the barrier remained.
Weak.
Flickering.
Still there.
And beneath Liora's unconscious body, Elara survived.
I knew none of that.
To me, the Voran district simply stopped responding.
By sunrise, half of Pylore was gone.
Not damaged.
Gone.
The eastern houses had burned to foundations.
The southern wall had collapsed inward.
Bodies covered streets where I had walked every day of my life.
Some wore enemy armor.
Most did not.
The survivors had been pushed toward the Keldor grounds.
There weren't many of us left.
Maybe a hundred.
Maybe less.
It was impossible to tell who was alive and who had simply not been found.
An elder grabbed me near the clan hall.
"Jake."
I barely recognized him.
Half his beard had burned away.
"What?"
"The treasury."
I stared at him.
"What about it?"
"If they reach it, everything held by the Keldor is lost."
I almost laughed.
Everything?
I looked behind him.
Our village was burning.
"What exactly do you think we still have?"
His hand tightened around my arm.
"The Beast Stone."
That cut through everything.
For a moment, even the battle sounded farther away.
The Beast Stone.
Our clan had guarded it longer than anyone living could remember.
Most Keldors knew of it.
Few were ever permitted to see it.
A relic tied to stories older than Pylore.
Older than our borders.
Older than the kingdoms killing each other outside.
"You need to move it," the elder said.
"Where?"
"Away."
"That's your plan?"
"Do you have a better one?"
A blast shook the building.
Something struck the outer wall.
The elder looked toward the sound.
Then back at me.
"Take it, Jake."
"Why me?"
"Because I am staying."
I understood.
"No."
His eyes hardened.
"Don't waste my death by arguing with me."
"I can fight."
"Yes."
"I can help here."
"For how long?"
I didn't answer.
He pulled me closer.
"Listen to me. If Pylore falls, someone has to carry something out of it."
My jaw tightened.
"People are still alive."
"Then save whoever you can on the way."
"And you?"
He released me.
"I was born here."
The answer was enough.
I hated him for it.
I think I still do.
The treasury was beneath the oldest Keldor building.
By the time I reached it, nobody guarded the entrance.
One man lay dead beside the stairs.
Another had fallen halfway down.
I stepped over both.
The chamber at the bottom was smaller than I expected.
Weapons.
Records.
Old clan relics.
Boxes containing things elders had spent generations insisting were important.
And at the center, behind a stone enclosure covered in markings I had seen since childhood, rested the Beast Stone.
It wasn't enormous.
That surprised me.
Something capable of shaping a world should have looked larger.
Instead, it fit within two hands.
Dark at first glance.
Then not dark.
Its surface seemed to contain colors that moved beneath each other, like something alive was turning in sleep.
I reached for it.
The moment my fingers touched the stone, Pylore vanished.
I stood beneath a sky I did not recognize.
No smoke.
No war.
No screaming.
Three worlds hung before me.
I knew what they were without being told.
Human.
Beast.
Soul.
Separate.
Incomplete.
Then they moved.
Slowly at first.
The distance between them collapsed.
Borders disappeared.
Land folded into land.
Sky into sky.
What had been three became one.
And I saw people.
Thousands.
Millions.
No armies.
No burning villages.
No children hiding beneath ruined houses.
No kings drawing borders.
No clans trying to expand.
No one taking from anyone else.
Peace.
Then a thought entered me.
Not a voice.
Not exactly.
A possibility.
The Beast Stone could change things.
But alone, it was incomplete.
There were two others.
Life.
Soul.
Bring them together.
Control them.
And the division Kelma had created could be undone.
The worlds could become one again.
And whoever held that power could decide what that world became.
The vision changed.
I saw Pylore.
Whole.
Dominus stood outside the Aran grounds.
Victor was arguing with Liora.
Liora laughed.
People I had watched die were walking through the market.
The man with the arrow beneath his jaw complained about one of my traps.
Children ran through streets untouched by fire.
My chest stopped moving.
I knew it wasn't real.
I knew.
But I still reached for them.
The vision shifted again.
This time I saw the armies outside Pylore.
Then their weapons disappeared.
The violent vanished.
Those who sought domination disappeared with them.
Only people willing to live peacefully remained.
No one strong enough to destroy another person's home because they wanted land.
No ruler allowed to sacrifice villages for ambition.
No clan allowed to become powerful enough to decide everyone else's future.
A world where peace was not something people begged for.
A world where it was enforced.
I could do it.
Not now.
Not with one Stone.
But with all three...
I could make sure this never happened again.
The vision released me.
I fell to one knee.
The Beast Stone remained in my hands.
The chamber shook.
Dust fell from the ceiling.
Above me, Pylore was dying.
I stared at the Stone.
I should have been afraid of what it had shown me.
Maybe part of me was.
But I had spent the entire night watching good people die because someone else's war had finally reached them.
Peace had always depended on people choosing it.
And people kept choosing something else.
I closed my fingers around the Stone.
"Then I'll choose for them."
I don't know if I said it aloud.
I think I did.
When I returned to the surface, the battle was almost finished.
Not because we had won.
Because there was almost no one left to fight.
The invading forces were withdrawing.
Why, I didn't know.
Maybe they had achieved whatever they wanted.
Maybe another army was approaching.
Maybe Pylore had never been their real target at all.
That thought made something inside me worse.
To us, this was the end of everything.
To them, perhaps it had only been one night on the road.
I walked through what remained.
The Beast Stone was wrapped inside my clothes.
No one stopped me.
There was hardly anyone left who could.
I passed the Keldor hall.
Part of it had collapsed.
I didn't search for the elder.
I already knew.
The market was black with ash.
The western well had cracked.
The training ground where Victor, Liora and I had spent so many afternoons was covered in bodies.
I stood there longer than I should have.
I remembered Victor shouting that he would surpass Dominus.
Liora telling him he could do it in his dreams.
Me standing between them because apparently I had been the only person in Pylore capable of getting those two to stop arguing for more than ten seconds.
I almost laughed.
Nothing came out.
I went to the Voran district next.
There was almost nothing left.
The upper buildings had collapsed.
Bodies lay near the courtyard.
Voran.
Aran.
Sanguis.
Enemy soldiers.
I searched until my legs stopped obeying me.
I called Liora's name.
Once.
Then again.
Then louder.
No answer.
I found part of her clothing beneath broken stone.
There was blood on it.
That was enough.
It shouldn't have been.
But by then, I had no strength left to move another piece of rubble.
I sat beside the ruins.
Victor was gone.
Dominus was dead.
Liora was dead.
My clan was gone.
Pylore was gone.
And I was sitting in the middle of it holding a Stone capable of showing me a world where none of it had happened.
I don't know how long I stayed there.
Eventually, smoke began thinning.
Morning light passed through it, turning everything pale and gray.
I stood.
My body hurt everywhere.
There were cuts I didn't remember receiving.
Blood on my clothes that probably wasn't all mine.
I looked across Pylore one last time.
There was no village anymore.
Only places where memories had once happened.
I thought about Victor.
For the first time since he left, I didn't miss him.
I hated him.
Maybe that was unfair.
I knew he hadn't brought the army here.
I knew he had not ordered Pylore destroyed.
But while we burned, he was beside a king fighting to build a future for the entire continent.
He had chosen that future.
And we had paid for it.
That was what I believed.
So I turned away from Pylore.
The Beast Stone rested against my chest.
Behind me, beneath the ruins of the Voran grounds, Liora was still breathing.
I didn't know.
I never heard the faint cry of the child beneath her.
I didn't know that Elara had survived.
I didn't know Victor would return.
I didn't know that this village, this night, and the Stone I carried would decide what kind of man I would eventually become.
All I knew was that Pylore was dead.
And I had no reason left to stay.
So I walked away.