✦ CHAPTER ONE
The Stranger Who Refused to Die
Rain hammered the rooftops of Branth, turning the dirt paths into rivers of mud. Torches sputtered in the wind and gutters overflowed, but Eryndor Valen kept his hood low and his pace steady.
Ignore them, he told himself. Ignore the whispers.
The whispers weren't from the living.
They drifted from the edges of his vision — from shapes that stood in the rain yet did not get wet, from pale faces pressed against the windows of abandoned barns.
Help me…
Why can't you hear me…?
Eryndor clenched his jaw and pushed open the door to the stable. The warmth hit him like a soft embrace — the scent of hay and horses, the crackle of fire, the illusion of peace.
But peace never lasted.
"A storm like this," Old Brann, the stable master, muttered, "means the forest is restless."
Restless wasn't the word. The forest was alive with things the living had no language for.
Eryndor brushed mud off his boots. "I'll check the outer paddock. Make sure no animals bolted."
Brann grunted. "If you see any strange figures near the treeline, ignore them. Spirits get bold in storms."
Eryndor froze.
Brann didn't know Eryndor could see them — could hear them. To Brann, they were only stories.
He grabbed a lantern and stepped out again into the downpour.
The paddock was empty. The forest was not.
A man staggered from between the trees — armor scorched, hands shaking, eyes wild. A jagged wound split across his chest. Soul-light flickered around him — faint, sputtering, dying.
"Please," the man rasped. "Don't… let them take me."
Eryndor's blood ran cold. "I'll call for a healer."
"No." The man's fingers shot out and seized Eryndor's wrist with surprising strength. "You can see it, can't you? The black flame."
Eryndor hesitated.
Then the world ripped open.
Shadows poured from the trees like ink spilled into water — Wraithborn. Their bodies were smoke and bone; their mouths were voids of hunger.
The man gasped. "Reaper… save me."
Eryndor's pulse slammed in his ears. "I'm not—"
The mark ignited.
Dark fire crawled up Eryndor's arm, spiraling across his skin and forming a sigil on his palm — a circle split by a jagged line.
The dying man's soul tore free in a silver burst of light.
The Wraithborn shrieked and lunged.
Eryndor didn't think. His body moved before his mind caught up.
The dark sigil burned.
A weapon erupted from the air — a scythe formed of shadow and moonlight — and Eryndor swung with raw instinct.
One stroke.
Silence.
The shadows dissolved to ash.
The man's soul hovered in front of him, shimmering and trembling.
Thank you, it whispered.
The soul collapsed into a silver feather and drifted into Eryndor's hand.
His lantern flickered out.
And in the darkness, a raven of bone landed on the fence. Its hollow eyes glowed with cold violet light.
A scroll materialized in its beak.
YOU ARE SUMMONED.
CITADEL OF THE VEIL.
REPORT BEFORE THE NEXT MOON.
Eryndor stood alone under the storm, scythe fading from his grasp.
He had just taken his first soul.
He wasn't sure he could ever breathe again.