The road to the Black Fen was not a road at all. It was a slow descent into the bowels of the earth's dampest memories—a stretch of sodden marshland where the sky hung low and heavy, swollen with gray clouds that pressed upon the land like a leaden crown.
Mist curled along the waterlogged earth, tendrils of white reaching up from stagnant pools where black reeds swayed in windless air. The stench was thick—rotting vegetation, sulfur from unseen vents, and the faint but unmistakable metallic tang of blood.
Kaelen rode at the head of his contingent, armored in the darkened steel of Valeryn's royal guard, its surface polished to a dull gleam to avoid catching the light. His crimson cloak was weighted with damp, dragging slightly in the mud, but he made no move to hitch it up. His expression was focused, eyes scanning ahead, though in truth there was little to see beyond the constant curtain of mist.
To his right, the Saerath vanguard moved in perfect formation—rows of steel-clad soldiers beneath banners of black silk embroidered with the silver sigil of a rising sun. The sound of their march was muted, boots and hooves sinking into sodden peat with each step. At their center rode Empress Seraphina Drayven, her figure tall and commanding in lacquered black armor chased with silver filigree. Her helm rested at her saddle, allowing her raven-black hair to fall over her pauldrons like strands of midnight.
Their eyes had met only briefly since the war council, but her gaze had been as sharp and cold as a drawn blade. She sat on her horse as if the saddle itself was her throne, her every movement a declaration of sovereignty.
The marsh seemed to sense their presence. The frogs had gone silent. The reeds barely swayed. Somewhere ahead, hidden in the fog, the enemy waited.
They reached the outer edge of the Black Fen by mid-morning.
The terrain shifted subtly but surely—dry soil gave way to black peat that sucked greedily at boots and hooves. Pools of dark water reflected the overcast sky, broken only by the sharp spines of drowned trees. Here and there, the remains of old wooden causeways jutted out from the mire, their beams rotted to brittle husks.
A scout returned from the forward line, his face pale and eyes wide.
"Your Majesties," he bowed to both Kaelen and Seraphina, "there are… shapes in the fog. They are large and moving fast. They're not look live wolves nor men."
Seraphina's voice was like frost on steel. "Everyone take positions and shields forward. Mages, to the flanks."
Kaelen raised his own hand in silent signal, his men forming a tight phalanx. He leaned forward in the saddle, catching the faintest rhythm beneath the stillness—a sound at first like wind in the reeds, then the irregular splash of heavy feet in shallow water.
From the fog, shadows emerged.
They came low at first—twisted beasts, wolf-shaped but wrong. Their spines jutted like broken pikes, fur mottled with bare patches of scaly hide. Eyes glowed a hellish ember-red, and their jaws unhinged far wider than nature intended, revealing rows of needle-like teeth slick with black saliva. Behind them, hulking silhouettes—man-shaped but too tall, too broad—moved with the slow, deliberate gait of hunters who knew their prey had nowhere to run.
The first of the elite warriors stepped forward from the mist.
He stood nearly eight feet tall, his body clad in armor that looked forged from obsidian and bone, jagged edges catching the dim light. A mask of black iron concealed all but the lower half of his face, where gray, cracked skin stretched over a mouth that curved into a smile far too wide. In his hands, he carried a glaive whose blade shimmered with a faint, oily light.
Behind him, three others emerged:
The Ashmaw — a hulking brute with a jaw like a spiked anvil, whose breath carried an ember-glow as if a forge burned inside his chest.
The Shardseer — a lithe figure draped in torn black silk, her mask a smooth porcelain white with no eye holes, her hands wreathed in shards of floating crystal that spun like hunting falcons.
The Spine-Cleaver — gaunt, armored only at the shoulders, carrying twin axes bound with leather strips, the hafts carved with runes that pulsed like heartbeats.
The leader spoke, his voice deep and echoing unnaturally in the damp air.
"Break them and leave their leaders alive."
The beasts surged forward. The clash began not with the sound of steel, but with the wet thunk of arrows sinking into corrupted flesh. Saerath archers loosed volleys into the oncoming beasts, but many of the creatures simply barreled through, their bodies shrugging off wounds that would kill any natural predator.
Kaelen drew his blade—a long, single-edged sword inscribed with faint runes along the fuller. They shimmered faintly in the mist, responding to his grip. He kicked his horse forward, breaking from the line to meet the first charging wolf-thing head-on.
The beast leapt. He sidestepped in the saddle, blade whipping upward in a tight arc. The steel met corrupted flesh with a spray of black ichor, the rune-light searing the wound like molten glass. The creature collapsed mid-leap, but another took its place.
To his left, Seraphina fought like a storm given flesh—precise, lethal, never wasting a movement. Her spear moved in blurs, piercing through armor and bone alike. The black silk of her cloak trailed like a living shadow, and her expression was unshaken, as if this slaughter was merely the execution of a duty.
The leader of the demon vanguard moved with terrifying speed for his size. His glaive swept in wide arcs, each swing hissing through the mist and spraying mud where it struck the ground.
Kaelen met his first blow with both hands on the hilt, the impact reverberating up his arms like a struck bell. The glaive's edge scraped sparks against his runed steel, but he turned the blade aside, stepping into the demon's guard.
A shallow cut across the foe's side should have slowed him—but the wound smoked and sealed over, the flesh knitting with unnatural speed.
The Shardseer targeted Seraphina, her floating crystals darting forward like spearpoints. Each strike hit with the precision of a master marksman, forcing the Empress to spin and parry with her spear's shaft, using the steel butt to shatter incoming shards.
The Ashmaw charged the Saerath shield wall, jaws opening to release a blast of heated air so intense the front rank's armor began to steam. Men screamed as the heat seared flesh beneath plate.
Kaelen adjusted—calling to his men to break the left flank, forcing the Ashmaw into the deeper pools where its heavy frame began to slow.
Kaelen's blade runes flared brighter now, responding to his intent. He carved a sigil into the air with the tip, and when the demon leader's next glaive strike came, the steel met an invisible barrier. The recoil staggered the foe, just long enough for Kaelen to thrust forward, piercing the seam between neck and collar.
The Spine-Cleaver roared and came for him, axes whirling in a mad storm. Kaelen ducked the first swing, caught the haft of the second with his left gauntlet, and drove his knee into the demon's gut. The impact sent the creature stumbling back into the swamp's deeper waters, where it thrashed and sank beneath the surface.
Seraphina finished the Shardseer with a precise spear-thrust through the porcelain mask, shattering it in an explosion of shards that rained like dark snow over the Fen.
The beasts, leaderless, began to scatter into the mist.
The battlefield was silent except for the groan of wounded men and the slow drip of ichor from blades.
Kaelen stood with sword point resting in the mud, chest heaving. The runes along the blade dimmed, returning to their dormant state.
Seraphina approached, her armor spattered black, her breathing steady despite the carnage. She regarded him for a long moment—no smile, no word of thanks, but her gaze lingered as if weighing something unseen.
"You fight… differently," she said at last. That was not an accusation, nor quite praise.
Kaelen only inclined his head. "Differently has kept me alive."
The mist swallowed the last of the retreating shapes but the Black Fen felt no cleaner for their absence—only quieter, and somehow, heavier.
To be continued…