Prologue
"Hope is a waking dream." — Aristotle
The road near Arelia's border had frozen hard, its deep ruts edged with frost. Fallen leaves lay trapped beneath a skin of ice, and roots pushed through the earth along either verge, narrowing the passage between the trees. Above the bare branches, strips of moonlight showed through a slow-moving bank of cloud.
A carriage labored along the road. Its wheels cracked the ice in the ruts, each jolt setting the leather harnesses creaking. Eight riders accompanied it, their breath rising pale above their collars. Where the branches crowded close, the men rode single file, their stirrups brushing the dead undergrowth.
Inside the carriage, a little oil lamp swung from its hook.
With every turn of the wheels, its light moved across the opposite seat, the curtains, and the maid's hands clasped tightly in her lap. Cold air crept through the seam beside the door. The compartment smelled of lamp oil, damp wool, and the faint sweetness of the baby's hair.
Elena drew the blanket higher around her sleeping son.
His cheek rested against her breast, warm through the thin fabric of her dress. One small hand had worked free of the swaddling and closed around her finger. When the carriage struck a stone, she braced her feet against the floor and steadied his head before the jolt could wake him.
Now and then, her eyes glimmered gold. The light briefly caught in the window glass, bright enough for her to see her own reflection against the passing trees. She lowered her gaze to the child again, a bittersweet smile touching her lips.
Across from her, the maid shifted on the cold seat. She had been watching the door each time a rider drew alongside it.
"My lady," the maid said at last. "We should have stayed at the castle. We were safer there. Your husband's reputation would have—"
Elena looked up.
The maid fell silent beneath her stern gaze.
"My husband cannot change my fate," Elena said. "But he will change this land. For better or worse."
She looked down again and brushed a fingertip across her son's cheek. He stirred beneath his blanket, his tiny mouth opening before he settled back to sleep.
"And my child will play a part in it," she whispered. "They both will."
The maid lowered her eyes. After a moment, she lifted the edge of the curtain with two fingers.
Beyond the glass, the trees began to thin. The carriage rolled out into a clearing where four roads met around an old wooden signpost. Its arms leaned at different angles, the lettering worn too faint to read from the window. One road vanished downhill between close ranks of trees; another curved away beside a ditch choked with leaves.
The horses slowed. Outside, a guard spoke to the driver, his words muffled by the walls of the carriage.
Elena felt the child's grip loosen around her finger.
On the box above her, the driver gathered the reins, preparing to turn.
An arrow struck his neck.
He slumped forward without a cry. The reins slipped from his hands, and the carriage lurched as one of the riders caught the nearest horse's bridle.
Elena struck her shoulder against the wall. She bent over her son, shielding his head as the maid reached across to steady them both. The lamp swung wildly, throwing their shadows up against the ceiling.
Steel scraped against scabbards.
"Ambush! Stand rea—"
A second arrow pierced the shouting guard's breastplate. He toppled from his saddle, and another rider fell before the others could close around the carriage.
Beyond the window, figures in dark cloaks emerged from the trees. More followed from the ditch and the road behind them: seventeen men closing around the carriage.
The maid let the curtain fall. Her hand remained raised beside it for a moment, fingers spread against the fabric.
Inside the carriage, the baby woke and began to cry.
Deeper in the forest, a narrow hunting track followed the bottom of a shallow hollow. Here the ground was softer beneath the leaves. Water trickled between exposed roots, and the thick trunks sheltered the path from the wind moving through the upper branches.
A wagon creaked along the track, its wheels sinking into the wet earth. Two deer lay lashed beneath a hide in the back. The exposed antlers of a buck knocked against the wooden side whenever a wheel dipped into a rut.
Bjorn walked ahead of the wagon, lifting low branches clear of his face. Damp had worked through one of his boots, and an ache had settled between his shoulders where he had carried the buck earlier that day. Five days in the forest had given him an appetite for hot food and a place beside his own hearth.
Behind him, one of the hunters was describing the meal he intended to ask for when they returned. Another told him he would be asleep before he finished eating it. Their laughter was quiet and tired.
Bjorn was smiling to himself when a distant shout reached him through the trees.
"Halt."
The hunters stopped at their chief's command. A man at the wagon caught the harness and brought the horse to a standstill. The wheels made one last wet crunch in the leaves.
Beside him, his younger brother frowned. Though shorter than Bjorn, Soren had kept pace with him all evening without complaint.
"What is it, brother?"
"Listen."
For a moment, there was only the settling creak of the wagon and the breathing of the men around them. Bjorn held still, listening past the water running in the hollow.
Then came another shout. The clash of metal followed it.
Soren turned toward the sound.
Above the fighting, faint but unmistakable, a baby cried.
"Brother," he said quietly. "What do we do?"
Bjorn lifted his gaze beyond the treetops.
The wind had opened a gap in the clouds. Through the interlaced branches, he could see the Castle of the Fallen, its distant towers pale in the moonlight. A low cloud crossed beneath its outer walls and hid them for a moment, leaving the upper spires suspended alone above the forest.
He had looked up at it since childhood. Even now, when he searched for the familiar shape of its tallest tower, the sight made him feel small.
The gods were gone, but their dwelling remained. That was what he had been taught.
The child cried again.
Bjorn tightened his grip on his axe.
"We go."
The hunters drew the wagon beneath the shelter of an overhanging bank and tethered the horse. Bows were unslung, axes drawn. When Bjorn stepped between the trees, his men followed.
They did not know whose battle waited ahead.
Their chief had given the word.
The ground rose sharply out of the hollow. Bjorn climbed over a fallen trunk, the bark slick beneath his palm, and pushed through a tangle of bare saplings. Branches caught at his cloak. With each step, the sounds grew clearer: a horse screaming, a man crying out, the hard impact of a blade against wood.
Near the crest, he slowed and raised a hand. The men behind him spread out among the trees.
Through the last screen of branches, lamplight flickered across a carriage. One wheel stood crooked in a rut. A riderless horse was backing away from a body in the road, its reins caught beneath a boot.
By the time Bjorn reached the edge of the crossroads, the guards were dead.
Bodies lay scattered around the carriage, some in plate armor, others in dark cloaks. Eight of the attackers remained on their feet. One was pulling his blade from a fallen rider. Another stood at the carriage door.
A woman screamed inside.
Bjorn charged.
The man at the door turned just as the axe struck his neck. He collapsed against the carriage step, dragging a bloody hand across the wood.
"Attack!" Bjorn roared.
An arrow flew past his shoulder. Behind him, the hunters rushed into the clearing, their cries breaking the attackers' stunned silence.
A swordsman lunged at Bjorn. He knocked the blade aside with the haft of his axe and drove his shoulder into the man, forcing him back from the carriage.
Across the clearing, another cloaked figure slipped through the open door.
"Soren! The carriage!" Bjorn shouted.
His brother broke away from the trees and ran for it. Bjorn tried to follow, but the swordsman recovered his footing and struck at his face, forcing him to raise his axe.
By the time Soren reached the step, the cloaked man was backing out. Blood shone on his hands.
Soren seized his cloak and hauled him to the ground.
The assassin twisted as he fell. A short blade flashed across Soren's left hand, cutting deep enough to expose bone.
Soren screamed but held on with his other hand. Before the man could strike again, he caught him by the back of the head and slammed his face against the carriage frame.
The assassin crumpled beneath him.
Beside the carriage, Soren staggered upright, clutching his hand against his coat.
Bjorn tore his axe free of the swordsman's shield and struck as the man reached for him. The weight fell away from the blade. He stepped back, breathing hard, and turned to find the next attacker.
There was no one left standing against them.
For a few moments, the clearing seemed strangely quiet. A bowstring creaked as one of the hunters lowered his weapon. Beside the ditch, another hunter sank to one knee, catching his breath. The horses were still stamping and pulling at their reins.
"Soren!"
Bjorn hurried toward him, stepping over the body of the final attacker. He caught his brother's wrist and lifted the wounded hand.
Blood ran between Soren's fingers.
"It's fine," Soren said through clenched teeth. "Just a flesh wound."
Bjorn looked at him.
Soren tried to smile. It did not last.
A thin cry came from inside the carriage.
Bjorn turned. Blood dripped from the open doorway onto the step.
"No," Soren whispered. "I thought… I thought I stopped him."
"Keep pressure on it," Bjorn said. He pressed Soren's good hand over the wound, then released his wrist and approached the door.
The carriage step was slippery beneath his boot. He caught the doorframe and ducked inside, his shoulders nearly filling the opening.
The little lamp was still burning. Its flame had settled, though the hook above it trembled with the movement of the frightened horses. One curtain had been torn loose and lay across the maid's skirts.
She was on the floor, her throat cut. One hand rested near Elena's shoe, as though she had reached for her before falling.
Elena remained seated, her son held against her breast. A knife protruded from her chest. Her arms had fallen still around the child, who squirmed beneath a bloodstained blanket.
Bjorn stopped on the carriage step.
He knew that face.
"Damn it," he breathed. "Elena."
Her eyes were open, turned toward the doorway. A gentle smile rested on her lips.
For an instant, Bjorn had the unsettling impression that she was looking at him.
Or at something beyond him.
He reached for her wrist, though he already knew what he would find.
Nothing.
The baby cried again.
Carefully, Bjorn loosened Elena's arms and lifted her son away. The child was warm. Bjorn checked beneath the blanket with hands that had begun to tremble, searching for a wound.
There was none.
Outside, the cold struck Bjorn's damp face. One of the hunters had taken hold of the horses and was speaking softly to them. Another knelt beside a fallen guard, then sat back on his heels without a word.
Soren stood by the open door, pressing a folded strip of cloth against his injured hand. As Bjorn stepped down, his brother's gaze caught on the crest painted along the carriage door.
"Brother. This is the—"
He stopped when he saw the blood on the child's blanket.
For a moment, neither man spoke.
Then Soren pulled off his fur cloak. With Bjorn's help, he eased away the blood-soaked blanket and wrapped the baby in the dry fur. His wounded hand shook as he tucked the edge beneath the child's chin.
"He must not return," Bjorn said.
Soren looked up.
"If he does, they will try again." Bjorn glanced at the crest. "You recognize it, don't you?"
"…I do."
"Then you know why."
Soren looked toward the open door. Whatever question he had been about to ask remained unspoken.
Bjorn drew the child closer.
"I will raise him as my own."
His brother studied him, then nodded.
"Until he comes of age," Bjorn continued, "he must know nothing of this. Nothing of his past."
Soren adjusted the fur where it had slipped from the baby's shoulder.
"Anna may have a few words about that," he said, attempting a smile.
"She will understand."
Something white settled on Bjorn's sleeve.
He looked up.
Snow drifted through the branches, sparse at first, then thick enough to catch in his beard. The first snowfall of winter.
The baby quieted. His eyes followed a flake as it floated past Bjorn's shoulder, his small face intent with curiosity.
Behind them, one of the hunters crouched beside the man Soren had struck.
"Chief. This one's breathing."
Bjorn looked from the unconscious assassin to the carriage.
Someone would come looking. They would count the dead and search for what was missing.
"Bind him," he said. "We take him with us."
Soren followed his gaze to Elena.
"And them?"
Bjorn was silent for a moment.
"Put the driver and the guards inside. Burn the carriage."
Soren looked at the child in his arms, then back at him.
"The blanket too," Bjorn added quietly. "Leave it with her."
Fire might destroy enough to make the child's fate uncertain. It was the best concealment he could offer before others reached the crossroads.
He gathered his men close enough that he did not need to raise his voice.
"No one beyond our clan is to hear of this child. If anyone asks, we found the carriage burning. There was no one left to save."
One by one, the hunters nodded.
They worked quickly. One hunter bound Soren's hand while another tied the prisoner's wrists. Bjorn waited until both were finished before letting his brother take the baby. Even then, he kept a hand beneath the small bundle until Soren nodded that he had him securely.
Together, the others carried the fallen guards to the carriage. Armor scraped along the step. Bjorn helped lift the driver from the box, then returned the bloodstained blanket to Elena's arms. He could not bring himself to look at her face again.
They freed the horses from their harnesses and led them clear. From the hunters' packs came dry tinder and kindling saved for the evening camp. A man knelt beneath the carriage, sheltering a small flame between his palms until the wood began to catch.
At first, the fire gave off little more than a thin ribbon of smoke. Then it reached the dry boards underneath. Flame spread along the floor, climbed a curtain, and brightened behind the windows.
Bjorn took the child back. The growing heat warmed one side of his face while snow melted against the other.
He watched until smoke obscured the doorway.
"Let's return home!" he called.
The baby startled at his voice and looked up at him with wide eyes.
Bjorn lowered his head.
"Easy, little one," he murmured, drawing the cloak closer around him.
They left the crossroads beneath the falling snow, taking the prisoner back toward the wagon. Soren walked beside his brother, his injured hand bound against his chest.
Bjorn looked back once.
Flames rose between the trees. He could no longer see the crest.
He turned toward home.
Below the treetops, the fire dwindled to a trembling orange glow as the hunters descended into the hollow. Soon the rise in the ground concealed it altogether. Only smoke remained visible, climbing through the falling snow toward the pale shape above the clouds.
Far overhead, moonlight lay across the walls of the Castle of the Fallen.
Its outer galleries stood empty. Snow gathered along the exposed balustrades and sifted through an archway onto a floor untouched by footprints. Beyond the reach of the moon, corridors led inward between closed doors. No fire burned in the chambers. No footsteps disturbed the stillness.
Deep within those walls, a narrow line of light appeared on a smooth, dark surface.
It brightened, held steady, and cast a faint reflection across the floor. A low hum filled the room.
Then a mechanical voice spoke into the darkness.
"A new link has been confirmed..."
.
.
.
"Initiating connection."