Two days before Solnera's arrival, Grimwald held its breath.
The fog that morning was different—thicker, yellower, carrying the taste of distant storms. Elias stood on his tenement roof watching the city prepare. Guild security forces moved through streets in organized patrols. The Copper Street Collective had already begun their disruption campaigns—carts blocking key intersections, construction projects mysteriously stalling near Solneran properties, messenger services reporting unexplained delays.
It was all subtle enough to seem like Grimwald's usual inefficiency, but coordinated enough to matter.
"They're really doing it," Mira said, joining him at the rooftop edge. "The whole city's mobilizing, even if most people don't realize that's what's happening."
"Only parts of the city. There are still plenty who'll welcome Solnera, or at least not resist." Elias pointed to the Embassy Quarter, where construction continued on what looked like expanded facilities. "They have supporters here. People who think Dominion control means stability and prosperity."
"Are they wrong?"
"I don't know. Maybe Solnera would bring order. Maybe Grimwald would be better off under their management." He looked at his hands—they'd stopped shaking after he started using Doctor Harvin's tincture regularly. "But it wouldn't be Grimwald anymore. It would be Solnera's western outpost."
"And that's worth fighting for? Grimwald's independence?"
Elias considered. The city was corrupt, harsh, filled with poverty and exploitation. But it was also messy and vital and its own thing. Not perfect, but alive in ways that Solnera's ordered empire couldn't replicate.
"Yes," he decided. "It's worth fighting for."
Shade pressed against his leg, agreeing. The shadow had been born here, in Grimwald's fog and desperation. It understood what the city was, flaws and all.
Final Preparations
Lyra arrived mid-morning with updated intelligence and final coordination details.
"Confirmed sightings of all three forces," she reported, spreading maps across Elias's table. "Harbor force is largest—approximately forty operatives plus support personnel. Eastern road has twenty-five. Northern canal has fifteen, but they're specialists. Probably magic-users."
"Total of eighty combatants, give or take." Elias studied the positions. "What's the guild deploying against them?"
"Thirty security personnel at the eastern road, twenty at the northern canal. We're keeping harbor defense minimal—ten guards maximum. That's where you'll be positioned." Lyra traced routes with her finger. "If the harbor force breaks through, they can support the other two positions. Your job is preventing that linkup."
"Forty against me and ten guards. Wonderful odds."
"You defeated a Flamebearer alone. The guild has confidence in your capabilities." Lyra's tone suggested she personally had reservations about those odds but was too professional to voice them. "Also, the Collective's disruptions are working. We intercepted three Solneran messengers yesterday trying to coordinate between forces. All three were delayed by 'accidents'—collapsed bridges, mysterious road closures, bureaucratic mix-ups at checkpoints."
"How much have the disruptions actually slowed them?"
"Estimating six to eight hours of delay across all three forces. Not enough to prevent their arrival, but enough to impact their coordination." She pulled out another document. "Additionally, we've received word that two smaller merchant guilds are declaring neutrality but closing their operations for the next three days—essentially removing resources Solnera might have requisitioned."
Elias nodded. It was all adding up to meaningful resistance, even if no single action was dramatic. Death by a thousand cuts, as Tam had described it.
"What about civilian evacuation? Are people getting out?"
"Some. Families with means are leaving quietly—visiting relatives, sudden business trips, that sort of thing. The City Council hasn't ordered official evacuation because that would constitute admission that we're expecting military action." Lyra's expression was grim. "Which means the poor and powerless stay, as always."
It was brutally unfair, but Elias had no solution. He couldn't evacuate the entire city, couldn't protect everyone equally. He could only try to prevent the worst and hope that was enough.
"Is there anything else I should know before tomorrow?"
"Doctor Harvin wants to see you this afternoon. He says your essence strain is improving but you're still pushing too hard. Madam Ysolde sent a message saying if you don't come for that integration session with Hunger today, she's coming here to do it forcibly. And Marcus Thenn left some kind of charm he says will help Ember maintain balance during combat stress."
"Everyone's very concerned about my wellbeing."
"You're a strategic asset. We want you functional." Lyra's expression softened slightly. "Also, some of us have grown to care about you as a person, though don't let that go to your head."
Despite the tension, Elias smiled. "I'll try to restrain my ego."
After Lyra left, Mira organized the various medical supplies and instructions into something manageable. "You're going to the integration session with Madam Ysolde. That's not negotiable."
"I have training—"
"You have two days before multiple forces try to kill you. Using one afternoon to properly integrate Hunger so it doesn't become a liability is good strategy." She folded her arms. "Don't make me drag you there."
She was right, as usual. Hunger had been functioning better with its reconnaissance purpose, but Madam Ysolde was correct that the shadow needed proper integration rather than constant suppression.
"Fine. I'll go this afternoon."
Integration Session
Madam Ysolde's workshop was located in a basement beneath a curiosity shop, its walls covered with mystical diagrams and shelves lined with incomprehensible artifacts. The air smelled of incense and something metallic.
"Finally," she greeted him. "Sit. We have work to do."
Elias sat on the cushion she indicated. Hunger crouched nearby, chains rattling nervously in the unfamiliar environment.
"Memory-shadows are the most difficult to integrate properly," Ysolde began, circling them both. "They're born from trauma—someone's desperate need to forget. That origin never fully leaves them. Your Hunger was created by a man who couldn't live with what he'd done, so he ripped that knowledge from his own mind and chained it in darkness."
"I know that part."
"But you don't fully understand what it means. The shadow isn't just hungry for memory—it's hungry for resolution. The guilt that created it was never addressed, never processed, just buried. That unresolved trauma is what drives its appetite."
Elias frowned. "How do I resolve trauma that isn't mine? I didn't commit whatever crimes created it."
"You don't resolve the original trauma. You create new purpose that transcends it." Ysolde knelt beside Hunger, her tattooed hands hovering over the shadow's form. "Memory-shadows can become archivists—keepers of forgotten things, preservers of truth that others tried to erase. Give Hunger the purpose of remembering what should be remembered, and the appetite transforms from destruction to preservation."
"That sounds philosophical."
"It's practical. Watch."
She began a ritual—not binding, but restructuring. Her hands moved in complex patterns while she chanted in a language Elias didn't recognize. Hunger trembled, its empty eyes fixed on her movements.
Through his connection with the shadow, Elias felt something shifting. The constant gnawing hunger that had defined Hunger's existence began changing shape—not disappearing, but gaining direction. Instead of simply wanting to consume, it began wanting to preserve. To remember. To archive.
"Now you," Ysolde instructed. "Connect with it. Reinforce this new understanding."
Elias opened himself fully to Hunger's consciousness. It was uncomfortable—the shadow's nature was still alien, still wrong in fundamental ways. But beneath the wrongness, he found something almost noble: the desire to ensure that what had been forgotten would not stay buried forever.
"Good," Ysolde murmured. "You're seeing it. The archivist beneath the appetite. Nurture that. Make it the shadow's primary identity."
They worked for over an hour, gradually reshaping Hunger's self-concept. By the end, the shadow had straightened from its predatory crouch into something more dignified. The chains remained, but they seemed less like restraints and more like tools—methods of organizing and categorizing rather than suppressing and containing.
"It will still hunger," Ysolde warned as Elias prepared to leave. "That's its nature. But now the hunger has purpose. It wants to collect memories not to destroy them, but to preserve them. Feed it that way—let it archive things that should be remembered—and the destructive appetite will quiet."
"How do I do that practically?"
"Bring it to places where important events occurred. Let it absorb the memory residue and preserve those impressions. Battlefields, crime scenes, locations where truth was buried—anywhere that history should be remembered. Give it that purpose, and it will serve you faithfully."
Elias felt the difference immediately. Hunger walked beside him on the way back, no longer skulking but moving with something approaching pride. It had gone from monster to archivist, from curse to tool.
Whisperfang's chains loosened around it, no longer needing to restrain so tightly.
"Thank you," Elias told Ysolde as he left. "That actually helped."
"That's my job. Try not to get killed tomorrow—I hate losing patients."
Evening Gathering
That night, an unexpected group assembled in Elias's tenement: Tam, Mira, Garris, and Lyra. They hadn't planned a meeting, but somehow they'd all arrived, drawn by the same unspoken need to be together before everything changed.
"Last normal evening," Tam observed, accepting the weak tea Mira had brewed. "Tomorrow everything goes to hell."
"Optimistic," Garris said dryly.
"Realistic." The old dockworker settled into a chair. "I've fought in conflicts before, back in my mercenary days. The night before combat always feels like this—like the world's holding its breath before screaming."
They sat in companionable silence for a while, each lost in their own thoughts. Elias's six shadows arranged themselves around the room, their presence somehow comforting rather than ominous.
Finally, Garris spoke. "I want you to know—whatever happens tomorrow, the Collective appreciates what you've done. You didn't have to coordinate with us, didn't have to risk yourself for Grimwald's independence. You chose to."
"I'm not doing it just for Grimwald," Elias admitted. "I'm doing it because if I don't, Solnera will keep pushing until they control everything. Here, other cities, eventually everywhere. Someone has to push back."
"That's the problem with being powerful," Lyra observed. "Eventually you have to decide what you'll use that power for. You've chosen to use it for resistance. That's worth acknowledging."
Mira had been quiet, but now she spoke. "I'm terrified. I want everyone to know that. I'm terrified that tomorrow people I care about will die. That Elias will push too hard and lose himself. That we're all about to pay for resistance with blood and loss."
"That's not inspiring," Tam said gently.
"It's honest. And if tonight's our last normal evening, I want honesty." She looked at each of them. "I care about all of you. I don't want any of you to die. But I also know that what we're doing matters, even if I'm scared."
The words settled over them like benediction. No false bravado, no manufactured courage—just honest fear acknowledged alongside honest commitment.
"To tomorrow," Garris raised his tea cup. "May we survive it with our principles intact."
"To tomorrow," they echoed, drinking weak tea like it was the finest wine.
After the others left, Mira helped Elias check his equipment one last time. Tam's mercenary coat, reinforced and repaired. The medical supplies from the practitioners. The communication tokens from Lyra. The lucky charms from the Collective, probably useless but carried anyway.
"You're as ready as you can be," Mira decided.
"That's what worries me. I still don't feel ready."
"No one ever does. That's the secret they don't tell you—everyone's just doing their best and hoping it's enough."
She kissed his forehead, sisterly and fierce. "Sleep. Tomorrow you save the city. Tonight you rest."
Elias took the essence tincture and lay down, his six shadows positioning themselves protectively. Through the window, Grimwald's fog drifted past, concealing the approaching forces and the future they carried.
The Codex remained closed beside him, silent for once. No warnings, no wisdom, no cryptic pronouncements. Just presence, patient and watchful.
Tomorrow would bring fire and combat and the test of everything he'd built.
Tonight there was only this moment—calm and fragile and precious in its ordinariness.
Elias closed his eyes and, against all expectations, slept dreamlessly until dawn.