Location: The Hidden City of Kürdiala, Black Peaks Region | Evening, Year 7002 A.A.
Kürdiala unfolded before them like a secret remembered—yet one they had never seen before.
It rose from the Black Peaks not as a fortress to defy the desert, nor as a palace to boast of power, but as something far older and far more deliberate: a sanctuary that chose to breathe in silence until the weary, desperate, or faithful stumbled upon it.
The city lived at the edge of the impossible, a jewel carved from cruelty's own crown. Around it, the desert stretched endlessly in hostile indifference, the dunes shifting with moods older than memory. But here, pressed into a basin of stone, life had chosen not only to endure but to flourish. It was as though the bones of the earth themselves had conspired to cradle this place, protecting it from both storm and shadow.
The sandstone walls glowed faintly beneath the dying sun, blushing amber as if alive with some private joy. Their surfaces bore the careful etchings of centuries—lines of geometry that were more prayer than pattern, their curves and angles joining in impossible symmetries. Even the stone seemed to remember the hands that had cut and carved it, hands which had believed that survival was not enough, that beauty itself was a shield against despair.
Above the walls, domes curved like heaven's own lanterns, glazed in mosaics of gold and turquoise. The final light of day gathered there, broke itself apart into a thousand scattered halos, and spilled them freely over the streets. To look up was to feel as though one stood under a canopy not of stone, but of stars.
Bridges arched like ribs across narrow alleyways, clothed in desert ivy whose tendrils wound themselves around every edge and gap. They seemed almost to drink in the city's heartbeats, carrying them from quarter to quarter, so that no home, no square, no sanctuary was left outside the rhythm of communal breath. Kürdiala was not merely a place—it pulsed. It was a living body, and those who walked within it belonged to its pulse or found themselves rejected.
And the air—
The air itself testified.
It shimmered with scents that promised nourishment, not in lavish abundance but in honest sufficiency: saffron sharp enough to sting memory awake, cinnamon carried like a hymn upon the evening breeze, toasted grains that evoked hearth-fires and bowls held out to children. It was the smell of a people who had not forgotten how to live, even when every grain of sand beyond the basin told them to die.
The voices of Kürdiala rose in counterpoint to the desert's silence.
Merchants cried out with rehearsed bravado, their words carrying both barter and banter. Children, untamed by hunger, darted barefoot through the crowd, their shrieks of laughter carrying farther than any cry of lamentation. The click of hooves and the shuffle of padded paws joined in unplanned rhythm with tambourines struck by idle musicians sitting at the corners of streets. Here there was noise—not the cruel, meaningless howl of the desert wind, but the deliberate noise of life.
For the Archenlanders, it was a revelation too sudden to carry easily.
Behind them stretched fourteen days of merciless desert: days when sand peeled away the last dignity of warriors, when silence was so deep it rang in the skull like a drum, when thirst became less a suffering and more a companion one no longer fought but merely carried. Those days clung to them still, stitched into their sweat-caked fur and blistered feet.
And so, when Kürdiala opened before them, there was no rush of joy at first—only disbelief. Hearts conditioned by grief and suspicion could not unclench quickly enough to receive hope. The mothers who had buried lullabies in dry throats dared not lift their voices now. The children, too tired to cry, simply stared.
The ArchenLand survivors did not walk into Kürdiala as conquerors, nor even as guests. They drifted into it like shadows stumbling out of firelight—hollowed, hesitant, unfit to believe in what their eyes declared.
Their bodies, stiffened by sun and sand, moved with disbelief. They passed beneath the amber arches, feet dragging as though chained still to the dunes they had crossed. Some wept silently, as though unwilling to trust tears in case the city dissolved into mirage. Others held their children tighter, whispering fragments of lullabies they had forgotten for weeks. It was not joy that clutched them first, but suspicion: suspicion that life could not possibly bloom here without cruelty demanding its price.
Yet Kürdiala was no illusion. Its pulse did not falter. Its streets ran steady with the rhythm of a people who had chosen to endure not only the desert's malice but the world's silence.
Trevor's quick eyes were the first to catch the sight, and with his restless tongue he leaned toward Kon.
"Looks like your clan's been thriving," he murmured, jerking his chin toward a cluster of Kaplan Tracients.
The spotted folk stood radiant in their ordinary living. Some haggled fiercely with jewelers, bracelets of beaten bronze clinking on their wrists. Others laughed loud and free around a spit-roast stall, the scent of lamb fat mingling with saffron. Their shoulders were draped in artisan's garb—cloth dyed indigo and copper, patterned with the old Kaplan knots that once told stories around the fire.
Trevor's half-smile was meant to tease, but also to soothe. He had walked beside Kon long enough to know when silence pressed too heavily against him.
But Kon did not return the smile.
His single amber eye lingered on the leopards, but there was no warmth in his gaze. Their ease mocked him. Their earrings glittered, their laughter rose, their bodies bore no scars of the night the skies cracked over ArchenLand. These were his people by blood, perhaps, but not by fire.
'Where were you?' The thought struck him unbidden, harsher than he wished. 'Where were you when the walls burned? When the rivers boiled? When the Shadow tore the heavens apart?'
The claws of memory sank deep. He remembered—not in fragments but in floods—the blood, the screams, the helpless press of kin torn from him. He remembered how the old songs had fallen silent, how the Kaplan name had been reduced to ash, how even hope had seemed an indulgence unfit for the dying. And he was just a child back then.
And these leopards—these kin—had lived elsewhere, apart, thriving while his world drowned. Their fire was not his fire. Their peace was not his peace. Their blood meant little when it had not been spilled beside his own.
His jaw tightened until his teeth ground. He turned his gaze away before bitterness could consume the fragile stirrings that Kürdiala's walls had kindled in him.
Trevor, wise enough to sense it, said no more. His smirk softened into silence, and he walked on.
It was Adam who stopped next.
A child's toy—a simple ball of woven reeds—rolled across the stone street and tapped gently against his foot. Adam paused, his blue fur still faintly gleaming with its otherworldly shimmer. He looked down at the toy, tilting his head as though it belonged to a language only children knew.
Not far away, a badger cub stood frozen. His small hands curled tight into fists, his wide eyes locked onto the figure before him. He knew, even in childish instinct, that this was no ordinary stranger.
Adam crouched, his cloak folding like the shadow of twilight. His long fingers turned the ball over, studying its weave as though it carried secrets written in grass and twine. Then he looked up, and for the briefest of moments, something softened in his glacial eyes.
"Don't lose it again," he said quietly, his voice more breath than command. It was cold still, but the cold of fresh water drawn from a spring, not the frost of death.
The child blinked, then giggled with relief. He snatched the ball back and scampered off, the echoes of his laughter clattering down the street.
Trevor watched, his staff resting lightly against his shoulder. A strange tenderness touched his brow, one rarely allowed to linger there. He had always believed Kurt—the warrior Adam had been, the friend Adam had lost inside himself—was gone forever, smothered beneath duty and cold power. And yet… in that fleeting act with the child, he had glimpsed him again.
'Still in there, Kurt', he thought, the words warming him like a secret he dared not speak aloud.
Kon, too, had seen. He had watched Adam with the same vigilance he gave to all things, but this time something stirred in him. His grief, his bitterness, his loneliness—all of it paused for one fragile instant. Hope had not returned, not fully, but something adjacent to hope brushed against him. Something he did not yet have the courage to name.
And if one had stood apart from them all, and looked upon the caravan from a hill, they might have thought it strange—how slowly hope works its way into the bones of those who have lived too long in despair. For hope is not a feast one devours; it is a seed that trembles in the hand, and must be buried in trust before it grows.
Thus, the Archenlanders did not rush forward with shouts of victory. They crept, step by step, their eyes wide and fearful, as though even now some cruel jest might strip the vision away. And yet they moved. And yet they came.
For Kürdiala breathed.
And the weary, even against their will, were beginning to breathe with it.
______________________________________
Ekene Çelik walked ahead with the stride of one accustomed to obedience. His spotted shoulders bore no armor, yet the silence he carried was heavier than plate. The survivors had seen warriors before, but this one moved as though the air itself recognized his rank and parted respectfully before him.
Behind him, the Narn Lords followed—Kon limping but unbroken, Darius steady and regal despite the wear of the desert, Trevor flicking his staff with habitual restlessness, Jeth muttering to himself, Kopa silent and tall, and Adam drifting like dusk itself. Their eyes traced every stone, every flicker of strange light, half in awe, half in suspicion.
The raccoon general Johan, loyal and worn, had remained outside, corralling the ArchenLand folk with calm hands and sharp command. But the Lords pressed on, their steps echoing against walls that seemed too ancient to belong to mortal hands.
The air cooled as they descended into Kürdiala's heart. What had been dry desert heat above gave way to a breath of stone, a stillness older than the memory of sand. Indigo runes pulsed faintly along the corridor walls, as though veins of some buried creature glowed beneath the fortress' skin.
The runes did not burn like flame nor radiate like stars; they throbbed, steady and unsettling, each pulse too deliberate to be called chance. To walk among them was to feel that the stones remembered more than any living witness could tell.
The Narn Lords were not easily unnerved. They had faced storms that spoke in voices, beasts that bled shadows, and skies that rained fire. Yet still, the whispering light set their furs prickling.
The walls spoke—though not in words. They carried weight. They pressed memories against the mind: oaths bound in crimson, monsters chained beneath mountains, names so heavy they had been sealed with silence after being uttered once.
And always, beneath it all, the panther.
Jeth's claws clicked against the stone as he walked, his tail lashing with the agitation of a soldier forced into mysteries he did not understand. He squinted at the glyphs and spat the words that came easiest to him:
"Ain't natural," he muttered, the gravel in his voice echoing in the chamber. "Light with no flame… heat with no sun… cursed desert sorcery, if you ask me."
To Jeth, the world was simple when it bled. A blade either cut or it didn't. A foe either lived or lay dead. But here, where stones pulsed like living veins and silence felt scripted, he could not find the edge of the blade. That unsettled him far more than fire or fang.
He flexed his blistered claws, more to remind himself of what was real than anything else.
Trevor smirked faintly at his brother's discomfort, though even he kept his voice low. Humor was his armor, but there are depths where even laughter fears to echo.
Kon walked nearer the wall, his single amber eye lingering on the carvings. For a time, he said nothing. His paw brushed lightly across a particular stone—an image etched deep, worn smooth by centuries of reverent touch.
There it was: a panther coiled eternally around a serpent, jaws locked, tails entwined. Neither overcoming the other, neither yielding, an endless stalemate frozen in stone.
Kon's voice was hushed when he finally spoke, not to Ekene nor to his companions, but as though to the wall itself:
"These aren't decorations. Kaplan wards. Lines of protection drawn in the Old Purge."
The words stirred silence behind him. Even Jeth's muttering ceased.
Kon's mind stretched back—farther even than his own life, into the lore drilled into Kaplan cubs before ArchenLand fell. The Old Purge had been spoken of rarely, in half-shadows and warnings, a time before the Great Narn War when darkness of another breed had risen and nearly torn the clans apart. The panthers had been the keepers then, carving their wards into stone, standing watch when others faltered.
He felt the weight of that inheritance now—unbroken lines stretching from ancient ward-carvers down to himself. Yet he was no keeper. He was a remnant. A survivor. And he wondered, with bitterness edged by awe, whether such protection had been meant for him at all, or only for the ones who had not burned with him in ArchenLand's ruin.
Ekene, still striding at the front, had not slowed nor spoken. The glow of the glyphs lit the sharp lines of his leopard features, but his expression was carved from the same stone as the walls.
He heard Jeth's muttering. He felt Kon's recognition. But he offered no words. His silence was not ignorance—it was mastery. The kind of silence that ruled conversations, that told you all you needed to know: This is not yours to question. This is ours to guard.
The Lords understood then, in different measures, that they were not walking through a mere fortress but through a covenant preserved in stone.
The throne room stole their breath.
It was not grand in the way of empires—no towering pillars painted in gold leaf, no marble floors polished to blind the eye. Its grandeur was quieter, deeper, like the steady drum of a heart one only notices when silence makes it thunder.
Water fell from three of the four walls in sheets of silver, cascading in endless curtains. Yet this was no ordinary water. Each stream shimmered with its own inner light, as though the very stars had been melted and poured down stone. Behind the veils of liquid starlight, faint runes flickered, ancient sigils etched by hands long gone, their words now lost but their authority undiminished.
The air itself shimmered—not heavy, as in the Shadow's fortress, not choking, but alert. It did not suffocate; it observed. As though the room itself leaned forward to watch who dared enter.
And then there were the crystals.
Two of them, flanking the throne like twin sentinels. Monoliths of violet mana, each three men tall, carved not by chisel but by the deliberate breath of creation itself. Their edges were too clean for nature, too flawless for craft. They pulsed. Not with color alone, nor with sound, but with presence. Each throb seemed to echo within bone and vein, forcing every creature present to remember their smallness.
Kon felt the weight of it first. His single eye widened, his body tense with an instinct older than thought. His paw drifted to the hilt of his blade, not in threat, but in reverence. For once, words slipped unbidden from his mouth.
"Incredible…"
Beside him, Trevor's tail flicked in agitation, a restless metronome marking his unease. He had never trusted silence, nor things that did not laugh when they should. And these monoliths… they mocked him with their calmness.
"What are those?" he breathed, though part of him did not wish to know. Questions, after all, sometimes chained the asker to answers they could not bear.
Darius's voice broke through, low and reverent. The bull's mane, dulled from desert dust, seemed almost to lift in the crystal light, like a torch reluctantly finding flame again.
"Mana crystals," he said, his tone hushed, as though pronouncing the title of a king. "Unrefined. Untapped. One this size holds more power than a city's leyline. To destroy one, you would need just as much power as it contains. To melt it…" His throat tightened. "…you'd need the sun itself at war with its own heart, and this is not an exaggeration"
He paused, staring up at the monoliths as though they might answer him. "They are ultimate sources of pure energy. Wells too deep for most mortal hand. Even when Narn was still intact, we didn't have huge deposits like this."
Kopa stepped closer, his great antlers casting fractured shadows across the floor. His breath moved slow, deliberate, as if syncing with the pulsing rhythm of the crystals. He had always been attuned to the deeper songs of the earth, hearing the harmony where others heard only noise.
"The resonance…" His voice was calm but lined with tension. "…it is too stable. Too… balanced. These are not merely weapons of defense."
Adam stirred.
The blue-furred one stood still as dusk itself, His eyes narrowed—not with skepticism, but with memory. A thin line drew itself across his brow, as if pain had cut its way through thought.
"They're alive," he said, his voice flat and cold, yet carrying the weight of something known too well.
For a moment, silence pressed in. Alive? Stones? Crystals? Even Jeth's usual mutterings failed him here. But Adam's eyes had turned inward, away from the room, away from his companions.
He saw flashes—too sharp, too raw. A battlefield where the air screamed, not with wind, but with will. The Children of Shadow: Arajhan and Drakkel, their forms shifting like broken mirrors, their power not wielded but breathed. He remembered the blur of claws, the weight of thin threads, and those same pulses—steady, resonant, undeniable.
He remembered, but imperfectly. As though memory itself feared to let him see too much. His thoughts blurred at the edges, resisting form, as if even recalling was a trespass against forces that still watched him.
Then the voice came—low, unhurried, final.
"You like my throne room?"
It was not asked as a question, though shaped like one. The sound carried no sharpness, no arrogance. It was deeper than both—finality given tongue.
They turned.
Upon the throne sat a feline Tracient, cloaked not in jewels or iron, but in inevitability. His fur was a storm given shape—a swirling tapestry of midnight and frost, as though night itself had swallowed snowfall and refused to release it. As if that night had gained vertigo from devouring the frost. His eyes, indigo and unwavering, glowed faintly. Not with force, but with restraint.
No crown. No scepter. No ornaments to shout what the air already knew. He wore only a robe of midnight-blue, loose upon his shoulders, bound by a sash of braided silver thread.
He did not rise. He did not need to.
Adam's stomach tightened, his pulse hammering despite the stillness. 'I can't sense his mana.'
He probed again, silently, instinct straining for the familiar tug of presence that always betrayed a wielder of mana. Nothing. Not even the faint ripple of concealment. Not suppression. Not masking. Erasure.
It was the same hollow void he had felt before: first in the mocking presence of Jarik, the pink-furred trickster whose power coiled around emptiness itself, and then when the hooded one had ripped ArchenLand from beneath their feet. But this was different.
Beside the throne, Ekene Çelik stepped forward, his voice carrying the weight of reverence. He bowed deeply—deep enough that his shoulders trembled, though whether from respect or burden was unclear.
"My Lords," he announced, "I present to you King Azubuike Toran, the Black Panther, ruler of Kürdiala."
The words resounded in the crystal-lit chamber, but none doubted that the king's name needed no herald. Even without introduction, every stone, every rune, every breath of the room already bent toward him.
Ekene turned then, his hand sweeping to indicate the guests who had crossed desert and death to stand in this hall. "Your Majesty, I present: El Kopa Boga, Hand of King Darius Boga, Lord Jeth Fare, Lord Kon Kaplan, Lord Trevor Maymum, His Majesty Adam Kurt of Narn, and His Majesty Darius Boga of ArchenLand."
King Toran did not nod, nor speak, nor shift. He simply looked.
And the weight of that gaze was heavier than any crown.
His eyes, dim indigo coals, found Adam first. They locked, unblinking, glacial blue against sovereign amethyst. The silence that followed was not empty—it hummed, charged, as though the very air recoiled from the meeting.
Then the King spoke.
"What do they want?"
His tone was neither welcoming nor hostile. It was a summons for truth, a stripping question, a demand without ornament.
It was Darius who stepped forward. Always Darius. The weight of ArchenLand still clung to his broad shoulders, cream mane dulled with dust, hooves cracked from desert miles. He looked every inch a king who had been battered but not bowed.
"I invoke the Pact of the Narn Lords," he said, each word pulled from a place deeper than his lungs. "Our home is lost. Our people scattered. We ask for sanctuary."
The words carried, but not gently. They scraped through the chamber, fragile beside the rush of the waterfalls and the steady throb of the crystals.
Toran's gaze darkened. His eyes narrowed with the weight of centuries.
"On what grounds?"
The question struck like a hammer.
Darius hesitated. His throat tightened. He could hear his people outside the walls, their voices ragged with thirst, their children clinging to robes. He thought of the long road behind them, of the sun that had stripped them of all but resolve. He had nothing left to offer but truth.
"Kinship," he began.
The air broke.
It was as though the ceiling of the world collapsed upon them.
Not a strike. Not a spell. Not even force. But presence.
The weight of authority made manifest.
It crushed the breath from lungs, drove knees to stone. All six Lords dropped as though the mountain itself had chosen to kneel upon their backs.
Darius collapsed, his hooves buckling, pain shooting up through his legs as the marble bit into him. He gasped, shoulders trembling, pride forced into submission.
Kon's hand flew out, claws scraping the floor to steady himself. His chest heaved. He had known the roar of collapsing palaces, the shriek of fire and steel—but this was heavier. His one good eye burned with the humiliation of bowing not by will, but by inevitability.
Trevor hit hard, staff clattering uselessly beside him, its wood echoing against the stone. The monkey lord's breath came ragged, his spirit always restless, now pressed down as though unseen hands smothered his defiance.
Jeth's hat tumbled from his head. The rat lord's ears flattened, his whiskers twitching wildly with panic. His sharp tongue, always ready, found no purchase. He could not speak. He could barely swallow.
Kopa crumpled with a low grunt, antlers tilting as he lowered his head to keep from breaking them against the force. A stag was made for standing tall, for holding ground, but even he felt the ancient weight of a will older than pride.
Adam did not cry out, but the collapse was no less brutal. His knees struck stone, his blue fur matted with dust. His mind screamed at the humiliation, at the familiarity of this crushing silence.
Then came the voice.
"Do not speak to me of kinship," Toran thundered.
The waterfalls seemed to falter at his roar. The mana crystals thrummed, answering like struck bells.
"Where was your kinship when my ancestors fled the burning coast? When Kürdiala hadn't even existed? Did ArchenLand come then? Did Narn open its gates? Was it not Narn that banished us for disagreeing with an unjust order, or have your people already forgotten?"
The indigo of his eyes flared, not in anger, but in truth. Each word carved itself into the marrow of the hall.
"No. ArchenLand gave us nothing. Narn gave us silence."
The Lords winced beneath the weight of it. Darius's breath hitched in his throat, the words stabbing deeper than the pressure on his knees. Kon's claws curled against the stone. Trevor shut his eyes tight, as if that might lessen the force. Even Jeth, whose defiance was legend, felt shame curdle in his gut.
Toran's voice dropped, yet the drop was more terrible than the thunder.
"No Lords came. Not one—" his gaze cut across them like a blade—"save the Last First Grand Lord."
And his eyes fixed, at last, upon Adam.
"Abel Kurt."
The name struck Adam like a spear. His breath caught. He felt the world sway beneath him, not from the crushing authority but from memory itself. His father's name, spoken here in judgment, carried a weight heavier than any throne.
Abel Kurt. The Grand Lord. The shadow he had never stepped out of. The man whose blood was his, but whose mantle he had never worn.
Adam felt it too—not weight, not mana—but something more insidious. A terror so total it seemed to originate from nowhere and everywhere.
It was not his body that rebelled. His body had faced war, storms, and shadow. No—it was his soul. It was as if something beyond flesh was being scrutinized, dismantled, measured. He felt watched—not by eyes of fur and bone—but by eternity itself, peering into marrow, thought, and memory.
His knees wanted to buckle. His throat wanted to close. Even his fur betrayed him, every hair stiff, his blue pelt bristling with a life of its own. His breath caught like stone in his chest.
And yet…
He rose.
Slowly. First one foot, dragged upward against the leaden air. Then the other, finding purchase on the rune-lit floor. His hands trembled at his sides, fingers curling in uneven spasms. But he stood.
The silence in the hall deepened.
Ekene twitched. His golden eyes widened in something dangerously close to awe. The Hand of the King knew well the weight of Toran's presence. He had seen battle-hardened generals collapse under less. Yet here, the blue-furred wolf—ragged from desert exile—rose.
Even Toran, who had not moved when kings declared themselves and warriors knelt, let his brow lift slightly. It was not surprise, not entirely, but… acknowledgment.
The other Lords gasped silently, each registering what Adam had dared. Jeth's ears folded back, his whiskers twitching madly. "He's gone mad," the rat thought, but he dared not breathe it aloud. Trevor's tail went stiff as iron. He felt the rising, not as madness, but as something far older—the kind of madness that rewrites the world.
Adam's voice came at last. It shook, fragile as glass under strain. Yet each word struck the air like stone dropped into still water, sending tremors outward.
"You said one Lord came," he breathed. "Only one. The Last First Grand Lord of Narn. That was my father. That was Lord Abel Kurt."
The words cracked the silence like old stone splitting.
Adam's eyes, clear and burning blue, locked onto Toran. "You knew him," he said. "So I ask—not as King of Narn—but as his son. On that ground, I invoke the Pact."
For one heartbeat, nothing. Toran's gaze did not shift. The silence grew unbearable. The weight pressed harder still, bending the Lords' knees, choking their breath. It felt as though the very room would split in two, that even the mana crystals would shatter from the strain of what had been spoken.
And then—
Toran exhaled.
The sound was simple. Mortal. Yet the release it carried was titanic.
The suffocating pressure fell away as though it had never been. The air returned. Breath returned. The Lords stumbled in relief. Kon gasped, one knee nearly buckling before he righted himself. Jeth coughed harshly, his throat ragged. Trevor pressed his hand to his chest, drawing long, desperate breaths. Kopa closed his eyes, steadying his spirit with practiced patience. Even Darius blinked in disbelief, the fur along his shoulders slowly settling.
The hall no longer bore the presence of an ocean crushing down. It was simply… a hall.
At last, Toran rose. His motion was fluid, effortless, yet it carried the weight of declaration. The runes behind the waterfalls seemed to brighten faintly, as though they too recognized movement in the storm.
"Ekene," the king said, his voice even once more, neither harsh nor kind, but immutable. "See them to their quarters. Treat them as Lords."
The words rang, not merely as command, but as law.
Ekene bowed instantly. "Yes, Majesty." His eyes lingered on Adam for the briefest flicker of a moment—still wide, still shaken.
Toran's gaze returned, indigo fires narrowing again upon Adam. The others were already forgotten.
"You," he said. The word was not invitation but summons. A tether that allowed no denial.
"With me."
The king turned, stepping toward the rear of the chamber. There, behind the throne, water fell in a ceaseless curtain, cascading in glittering sheets of mana-kissed purity. Toran passed through it, and the cascade parted—not splashing, not touching—simply bending away, as though water itself refused to profane him.
Without hesitation, the veil closed behind him.
For a long breath, Adam did not move. His body was stiff, his breath uneven. Around him, the other Lords whispered without words. Their gazes clung to him—some in fear, some in awe, all in disbelief.
But Adam said nothing. He did not look to them. His thoughts were too loud.
'Father… Abel Kurt… Did you stand here once, where I stand now? Did he know you as I do not? Did you walk behind that same veil, unafraid?'
His paws felt heavy, yet they carried him forward. He did not run, nor stumble, but stepped with measured resolve.
He entered the cascade.
The water parted, obedient, leaving him untouched. And like a shadow cleaved from light, Adam vanished into the mist.
____________________________________
As Ekene led them through Kürdiala's winding halls, silence clung to them like smoke that refused to disperse. The polished stone swallowed the sound of their footfalls, turning every step into something heavy, deliberate, unwelcome. None dared speak at first; words felt like trespass against the presence they had just survived.
Trevor was the one who broke it. He exhaled with a shudder, shoulders sagging.
"What just happened…?"
The question was not truly meant for answer, but it hung in the hall nonetheless.
Jeth's whiskers twitched, his face drawn into a grimace. "He didn't use mana," he muttered. It was not accusation—it was disbelief. His rat eyes darted to the runes on the walls, to the shadows that did not stir, as though still hunting for a trick that wasn't there.
Jeth had seen sorcery enough to grow sour at it, had watched magic twist wars into slaughter. Yet here there had been nothing. No chant, no glow, no strike. And still his heart had felt crushed in his chest, as though the king had pressed down upon them all without even lifting a paw.
Darius nodded once, his great frame taut, his eyes distant. "He never raised a hand," he said slowly. His deep voice carried the weight of someone who did not speak unless truth compelled him. "But none of us could breathe. I have seen the Shadow instill fear, but this…"
"He didn't even flinch," Kon murmured.
"Toran may be the strongest Tracient in existence."
The words were not boast, nor fear. They were acknowledgment, spoken with the solemnity of one who had walked many seasons and seen many kings. To Kopa, strength was not proven in the roar of war, but in the stillness of command. And what they had felt in that hall had been strength distilled to its quietest form.
_________________________________________
The corridors of Kürdiala twisted like thought—long veins of stone pulsing with ancestral light. Their walls bore fractal symbols, etched so deeply they seemed to grow out of the rock rather than be carved into it. Some flared dimly as the company passed, like old memories stirred awake by new presence. The air was cool, almost damp, carrying with it the hollow echo of dripping water. Somewhere far ahead, hidden wind chimes shivered, their thin silver tones folding into the silence like prayer.
Ekene Çelik led without looking back. His stride was unhurried but not lax—measured, precise, as though he knew not just the path but the meaning of every step upon it. The Narn Lords followed, their own footfalls softened by the strange geometry of the halls. For a time, none spoke. The silence itself seemed to request it.
At last, Ekene's shoulders rose and fell with something like decision. He slowed, turned his head, and spoke into the stillness.
"I owe you all an apology."
The Lords glanced at one another, surprised. Words of contrition had not been expected from the Black Panther's Hand.
His tone was steady, but beneath it was a density of steel—humility borne not of weakness, but of duty. "I recognized you from the beginning. I knew the son of Thanon Boga when I saw him. And I had read Lord Kurt's name in the Watcher Codex, long ago."
Trevor's brow furrowed, his tail flicking with restless disbelief. "Then why the play at the gates? Why reject us at the threshold if you knew who we were?" His voice was not cruel, only confused, wounded on behalf of the weary souls who had nearly collapsed in sight of hope.
Ekene halted at a narrow archway. Two mirrored lanterns flanked it, their glass polished to such a sheen that the Lords saw not just their faces, but their fatigue written plain upon them. The reflections trembled faintly as if alive, capturing more than surface.
He turned fully then, and his eyes carried the gravity of someone who had held a city together too long, under too much strain. "Because Kürdiala survives," he said quietly, "only because we are strict. Our strength is not only stone and ward, but discipline. Our protection rests on protocols—hard ones. Protocols we do not bend, no matter who knocks at our gates. When outsiders test them, even those we admire, even those we would wish to shelter… we push back."
His gaze swept them, unwavering. "It is not disrespect. It is survival."
The words lingered, sharp and soft all at once, until they settled like dust.
Darius inclined his head, the gesture small but deeply meant. "No apology needed, El Ekene. You were protecting your own. A king understands such burdens." Yet behind his voice was the ache of memory—the thought of his own gates breached, of his own walls crumbling, of his own protocols that had failed to save ArchenLand. 'If I had been as strict… would more of my people have lived?'
The corridor's hush pressed around them, a silence so deep it seemed to lean close and listen. Their boots struck softly against stone that had been walked by countless generations, each step folded into the bones of the fortress. Above them, lines of script spiraled across the ceilings, words too ancient to be read yet strangely felt—like the echo of a forgotten prayer still humming after the worshippers were gone.
It was Trevor who broke that hush, his voice carrying the restless lilt of a young mind unwilling to let mystery sit unsolved. His paw scratched idly behind his ear as he glanced toward the others.
"Okay," he said, ears flicking. "I've heard it twice now… the Pact of the Narn Lords. What is it, exactly? Some royal handshake?"
The sound of his words cracked lightly against the solemn air, like a boy skipping stones across a still lake. For a moment, no one answered. The elders seemed to weigh whether the question deserved to be spoken of here, beneath these heavy walls.
At last, Jeth exhaled through his nose, his breath puffing like a dragon who had grown tired of fire. His hand shifted the brim of his worn hat, a gesture as habitual as prayer.
"Ain't quite that simple," he muttered, eyes narrowing on the floor as if the answer were carved in its grooves. "The Pact was formed long ago—'fore most of us were breathin'. Built on somethin' secret. Asalan's hidden name."
Trevor's brow creased. He stopped mid-step, the word striking him oddly, like a bell rung at the wrong hour.
"Asalan?" he echoed, tasting it aloud. The name seemed heavier than he expected, a stone laid in his mouth.
Jeth's nod was slow, deliberate, like an old man recalling a ghost. "Yeah. His real name's buried so deep not even the stars speak it aloud. The Name, Argon. The One. Myself. The Narn Lords bound themselves to it. Pact makes sure we don't betray each other… or the world. Makes sure some truths stay hidden."
The company's steps faltered. Each of them felt the gravity of his words, as though the air had thickened, weighted with something eternal. The hidden Name. The thought of it pressed differently on each soul.
Kopa's ears flicked back, his great antlers brushing faintly against the warded ceiling. His voice was low, like wind through bare branches. "You make it sound like a burden."
Jeth's answer was blunt, the soldier's truth. "It is. Exclusive. Silent. Last meetin'? Long time back. Only two current Lords were there—Darius, and Lord Thrax."
Darius's name hung in the air like a torch catching sudden light. Trevor's eyes darted to him, curiosity snapping alive.
"Then how the hell did Adam—?" Trevor began, his voice half incredulous, half defensive, for Adam was more than a companion now. He was tangled into their fate.
Jeth cut him off with a shake of his head. "That's the strange part. Pact's meant to be just for Lords. At least that's what I thought…"
There was a pause. Then Darius's voice entered the silence, deep and resonant, yet wearied, like a king who carried too many tombs behind his words.
"Forgive me for the lack of communication, Lord Jeth," he said, his tone the very picture of dignity tempered by regret. "It's true. The Pact is for Lords… but each Lord is permitted a Hand. A chosen successor or companion, bound by a Mana Vow, who can attend the summit."
His words fell heavy. The mention of the Mana Vow brought with it the sharp memory of vows unbreakable, of the invisible chains that bound blood to duty.
He hesitated, eyes unfocusing for a heartbeat, as if seeing through the stone walls into some faraway hall of memory.
"At the last meeting," he continued softly, "I wasn't a Lord. I was my father's Hand."
His confession settled over them like dust shaken loose from an ancient tapestry.
Kon's lone eye shifted toward him, sharp but not unkind. "Then you were heirs at that table?"
Darius inclined his head with slow gravity. "Yes. We weren't exactly permitted to speak—but we were allowed to witness. To remember." His voice dimmed, and his gaze drifted downward, as though staring into the abyss of memory itself. "However… for Adam, I think it's a bit more complex. He didn't even exist back then. I suspect there was something between Lord Abel and King Toran that is beyond brotherhood."
The statement hung like a door half-open, offering a glimpse into some chamber too vast to see in full. The notion of ties deeper than blood stirred in the company's hearts. What bond could transcend lineage, law, and time?
Trevor whistled low, the sound soft and sharp all at once, like a blade sliding back into its sheath. "And now the past's catchin' up."
Jeth snorted, the sound rough with resignation. "Ain't it always?"
His words carried the weight of someone who had lived long enough to know: the past never stays buried. It curls around the present, binding it like ivy, until one cannot tell where yesterday ends and today begins.
The company walked on, their footsteps swallowed by the ancient stone, yet each carried the conversation within them like a fire smoldering under ash. The Pact was no longer just an old tale whispered in passing; it was a living tether, binding them all in ways they scarcely yet understood.