The map Alaric unfurled across the table was not the usual battlefield schematic. It pulsed faintly with runes—not magic in the traditional sense, but layered with ancient memory, drawn from the Archivist Circles that Mira had unearthed weeks before. These weren't just routes or terrain markers—they were resonance lines, frequencies that flowed across the world like invisible ley currents.
"This," Alaric said, pointing to the pulsing crimson line, "is where we lost contact with the Raven Spear scouts—near the Calenmoore ridge. The last words they sent described black rain and 'the scent of blood without a body.' That's not just metaphor."
He tapped three other points. "All these places were battlefields in the Old War. Not just land—but memory-deep scars. If Warrick is being transformed by the First, he'll be drawn to these. Not out of strategy—out of instinct."
"Why would a corrupted warlord be driven by instinct?" Caelen asked. "He's still human, isn't he?"
Mira answered, standing now, steadier. "Not anymore. In the dreamwalk, I saw Warrick's essence—twisting. It's not possession, but infiltration. Like watching a fire become sentient. He's not just following orders. He's… becoming an agent of the First. A herald. Something they call the Ember King."
That name dropped through the room like iron.
"I've heard that before," murmured the monk-lord of the Ardent Order. "An ancient myth of fire that remembers the sky it once fell from. A being that burns not to destroy, but to remake the world in the image of its last breath."
"Exactly," Alaric said. "So we intercept him before that transformation completes."
He pointed to a clearing on the map—deep in the ruins of Oathmark Valley.
"We'll make our stand here. He'll come for it—it was once a temple-city, the first place the dreamwalkers bound the veil. Its ruins are soaked in that memory. If he's seeking to break the last seals, he'll pass through here."
General Alessa narrowed her eyes. "What's to stop him from sensing the trap?"
Alaric's gaze was steel. "Nothing. I want him to know. We don't ambush a flame. We become the storm it can't burn through."
---
Later That Night - Ridgefall, Alaric's Command Quarters
Alaric stared at the flickering candlelight, the shadows moving like silent adversaries across the war maps pinned to the walls. He was alone—intentionally. Even Mira had been asked to rest elsewhere.
He had to confront it now—his own memory.
There was something about the name Ember King that stirred too deep, too violent. A piece of his soul clenched whenever Mira spoke of it. Not just because of the threat, but because something in him had once spoken that name in blood.
He sat slowly, exhaling.
Then he whispered, "I remember you."
The candle sputtered.
---
Flashback - The Dreamtime, Alaric's Past Life
He was not Alaric then. He was a wolf-lord, nameless, a creature of fang and oath. Standing on the ashes of a razed kingdom, he faced a figure in golden armor, flame pouring from the sockets of his helm, crowned with fire shaped like a crown of thorns.
The Ember King.
"You are nothing but breath," the fire-being had said, voice like cracking bones. "Your howl won't outlive the wind."
And then they fought.
Not with weapons. With remembrance. Clashing truths. The wolf-lord had thrust the memory of loyalty like a blade, and the King had answered with the memory of betrayal.
In the end, the wolf had died.
But not defeated—bound.
The wolf had whispered one word to the stars as he fell—"Wait."
And now, he was here.
---
Present - Ridgefall's Northern Edge
Mira walked with Caelen near the parapets, her eyes drawn to the distant storms brewing over Oathmark. She could feel it—the cracking of the veil. Not just where they'd be fighting—but across the world. The First were stirring the world's bones.
"I shouldn't be with the army," Mira said quietly. "I should be deep in the beacons. I can weaken them from the inside. Speak through the dreams. Warn those they're corrupting."
Caelen hesitated. "You nearly didn't come back last time."
"And next time I might not," she said. "But we're not just fighting with swords. Not anymore. Alaric said it: this is a war of memory. And the beacon remembers me."
---
The Road to Oathmark - One Week Later
The army marched in silence beneath a haunted sky. Clouds shifted in unnatural ways. Birds flew in confused circles before dropping from the air, their hearts stopped from fright. Trees twisted toward the road as if trying to listen.
Alaric rode at the front, Mira at his side. Behind them, the full coalition forces—Ridgefall guard, Thornkin rangers, Ember Pact siege beasts, and dune-blessed nomads from the sands.
They carried more than weapons.
They carried oaths.
They reached the edge of Oathmark and set camp without speaking. The old stones seemed to weep. Mira swore she heard echoes of singing—from a choir that had burned to death long ago.
---
Night Before Battle
Alaric stood before his commanders.
"Tomorrow, we don't just fight Warrick," he said. "We fight the concept he's becoming. A being who remembers how the world died. And if we let that memory become true again, we all burn with it."
He turned, pacing slowly.
"Focus on the seals. Protect the Veil Markers. Mira will enter the dreamwalk again and weaken the Ember King's grasp from within. My elite will confront Warrick directly. Our goal isn't to kill him—it's to make him remember himself. Because that's the only way he can be saved."
"Can he be?" Caelen asked.
Alaric didn't answer.
Because he didn't know.
---
Dawn - The Battle of Oathmark Begins
The sky was black with red veins.
The first wave came not with sound, but with absence. A silence so complete that soldiers vomited or fell to their knees. Shadows walked the ruins, dripping memory like blood. And then—Warrick appeared.
He no longer wore armor. His skin was ash and gold, his mouth a flame-wound. He didn't speak. He screamed. And the dead screamed with him.
Alaric stepped forward, blade drawn. Not steel, but a blade forged in memory—his own death, reforged into defiance. Around him, the wolfguard howled.
And the last great battle began.