We saw the sea before we saw the gates.
It came into view all at once, spilling wide and gray beneath the cliffs—cold and endless, stretching to the far line of the world. The fort sat above it like a stone in the Lord's palm. Heavy. Unmoved. Watching.
"Saints," Leo whispered, clutching the side of the wagon. "That's the ocean."
"No kidding," Tomas muttered. "Thought it was a puddle."
But even he sounded off. A little hushed.
The wind shifted as we turned along the cliff path—salt-heavy, sharp. The air felt older here. Hungrier.
We rounded a bend, and there it was.
Fort Vesper.
Carved into the mountainside above the sea, its towers jagged and solemn, spears of stone rising toward a sky that had no warmth in it. Crosses crowned the spires, crooked and rust-dark. No banners flew. No colors marked it.
"Looks like a tomb," Farid said, his voice flat.
"Better than the orphanage in Estros," Milo offered, but no one laughed.
The wagon creaked down the slope. The cliffs fell off just a few feet from the wheel—no railing, no warning, just drop and sea and death.
Leo made a noise in his throat. "They built this on purpose?"
"It's a fortress," I said, quietly. "They don't build those where people want to be."
The gates were open, barely. Two slabs of blackened oak and iron, carved with scenes I didn't recognize—saints in chains, angels turned away, flames licking at robes and eyes and altars. Rain had blurred the faces into smudges.
We passed through.
Inside: a wide courtyard of cracked stone and old scorch marks. Rows of boys like us already stood at attention. Some in borrowed boots. Some still bandaged. All of them quiet.
Above them hung a great bell—green with age, taller than a man. It didn't move.
The wagon stopped.
A man stepped forward. Not young. Not old. Worn leather gloves, a gray cloak with the Dominion seal. Cross pinned to his collar. Sword at his hip.
"Off," he said. Voice like granite. "Now."
We moved. Some jumped down. Some climbed. Tomas landed with a grunt. Milo wheezed. Leo clung to his pack like it might float him home.
I felt the wind at my back—the sea behind us. The fortress ahead.
The cold wasn't in the air. It was in the stone. In the silence. In the weight of the walls, like something watching.
The officer paced once before us, boots clicking.
"You are at Vesper now," he said. "Holy ground. Not because you were invited. Because you were called."
He looked at us like he was measuring something. Not height. Not strength. Something deeper.
"This fortress watches the coast of the Dominion. It has stood for two hundred years. It has seen wars and demons. It will not flinch for you."
No one breathed.
"You will be broken here. Sharpened. You will sleep in cells older than your lineages. You will march the cliff roads. You will wake to bells, bleed on stone, and learn to serve in silence."
He stopped, glancing toward the sea.
"Should you run, there is nowhere to go. The cliffs will not catch you. The waves will not return you."
Farid muttered something under his breath—maybe a prayer. I did the same.
"You are nothing until we say otherwise," the officer said. "By sundown, you'll be assigned to companies. Training begins before light. The ones who fail will be sent back to the sea."
He let that sit.
Then the bell tolled once.
A low, final sound.
"Welcome to Fort Vesper," the man said. "Your lives belong to the Dominion. Make them worthy."
They didn't let us wander.
Two soldiers barked orders and waved us into line—shoulder to shoulder, packs clutched, backs straight. A third led the way through the courtyard and deeper into the stone heart of Fort Vesper.
"This place feels like it was built for ghosts," Leo whispered.
"Built by them too," Tomas muttered. "Look at the walls."
The stone was old, older than I could place. Dark and worn smooth in some places, scorched in others. Holy marks had been carved into the corners—symbols I half-recognized from old scriptures. Some had been scratched out.
Farid walked near the front, eyes always scanning.
Milo leaned in close behind me. "Do you think they keep us in cells? Like prison cells?"
"I think they keep us where they can hear us scream," Tomas said.
Milo didn't laugh this time.
We passed through a narrow corridor into what the soldier called the Cloister—a long hall with high arched windows, no glass, just cold air and the sound of gulls somewhere outside. Along the walls, iron sconces still dripped wax. Below them were painted scenes—old, flaking murals of saints and soldiers and something darker. Always a sword. Always fire.
"They say every trainee walks through this hall their first day," the soldier said, not turning. "So you remember what was lost."
"What was lost?" Leo asked.
The soldier didn't answer.
Farid paused at one of the paintings. It showed a man on his knees in a circle of blood, raising a rifle like it was a cross. The angels around him had their faces veiled. One held a chain. Another, a candle.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Milo asked.
Farid murmured, "Martyrdom."
They led us through another gate into the lower training yard, carved right into the cliff rock. It sloped downward slightly, ending at a sheer drop. No fence. No wall. Just wind and death.
"Here's where you'll drill. Run. Fight. Bleed," the soldier said.
"Bleed?" Leo asked.
"Yes," the soldier replied.
They pointed toward a massive bell set into the cliff wall. "That rings when the enemy's sighted. You hear that, you drop everything. You climb. You fight. You pray after."
We kept moving—up narrow stairs, past cold barracks carved directly into stone. The ceilings were low. The bunks just planks with thin rolls of cloth. Crosses were nailed above every door, and a bucket sat outside each room, blackened from old coals.
"No fire inside," the soldier said. "You want heat, you earn it."
Farid asked, "What's this level called?"
"The Cells," came the reply.
He wasn't joking.
We passed a locked iron door. Someone behind it coughed.
Tomas muttered under his breath, "Vesper's hospitality."
After that came the Chapel, carved directly into the cliffside—no stained glass, no gilded altar, just a dark room with a stone slab and a hanging crucifix carved from driftwood. The chapel walls were damp. Salt crusted the corners.
"Morning prayers at third bell," the soldier said. "Mandatory. Even if you've lost your faith."
"Some of us haven't," I said.
He looked at me for a moment. Then nodded once. "Then pray hard. You'll need it."
Outside again, the tour ended back in the upper yard, where the flag of the Dominion hung limp in the gray wind.
"You'll get your unit assignments at dusk," the soldier went on. "Until then, stay where you're told. No wandering. No questions. No crying for home. You're not sons anymore. You're soldiers."
He turned—then froze.
A man was walking toward us across the yard.
Long coat, black gloves. Dominion cross stitched in red thread over his chest. His gait was slow. Unbothered. Like the weight of the place bent for him.
Not a uniform we'd seen before.
The soldier stepped aside.
No introduction. Just a statement.
"This cohort is being rerouted."
The soldier blinked. "Sir?"
"Heaven's Gate," the man said.
The words dropped like a sword.
Leo froze. Milo stopped breathing. Farid's eyes narrowed, like he'd been waiting for this.
Even Tomas, who'd mocked everything up to now, went still.
The name was old. Heavy. Every boy knew it. Not from sermons. From whispers.
Heaven's Gate.
Where the sky ran red. Where the saints bled dry. Where the line between martyr and corpse vanished under shellfire and song.
"Why?" Tomas asked. "Why us?"
The man didn't answer. Just turned and walked off like he'd delivered a prophecy.
We stood there a while. The wind scraped the silence raw.
Then slowly, breath returned. Like surf sucking back from the rocks.
Tomas let out a short, humorless breath. "Well," he said, "that was cheerful."
Leo looked paler than ever. He kept glancing back toward the cliff like he was measuring it.
Milo hugged his arms. "Feels like the mountain wants to swallow us."
Farid didn't say anything. He just stared toward the chapel—stone-faced, unmoved. Like he'd already seen this future and was just waiting for the pieces to catch up.
I looked up at the towers. The sea beyond. The crosses nailed into shadowed walls. The sky above had no warmth in it. Just gray.
And Heaven's Gate in our future.