The monastery bells never rang at midnight. In seventeen years, Kael had never heard them toll after dark. Yet tonight they screamed through the mountain air, urgent and desperate, shattering his dreams like glass.
He bolted upright on his straw mat, heart hammering against his ribs. The stone walls of his small chamber flickered with an orange glow that didn't come from his candle. Fire. The acrid smell of smoke clawed at his throat.
"Kael!" Master Eldrin's voice thundered through the wooden door. "Get up! Now!"
Kael scrambled to his feet, pulling on his boots and grabbing the simple staff that leaned against the wall. Before he could reach the door, it burst open. Master Eldrin stood in the doorway, his normally pristine grey robes singed and torn. Blood trickled from a cut above his left eye, and his weathered face was twisted with an expression Kael had never seen before—fear.
"Master, what's happening?"
"No time for questions." Eldrin grabbed Kael's shoulder with surprising strength. "They've come for you. I knew this day would arrive, but I prayed we'd have more time."
"Come for me? Who?" Kael's mind reeled. He was nobody. An orphan left at the monastery gates as an infant. Why would anyone come for him?
An explosion rocked the building. Chunks of stone rained down from the ceiling. Through the narrow window, Kael glimpsed something that froze his blood—massive winged shapes circling against the moon, and below them, dark figures pouring through the monastery gates like a flood of shadows.
"Listen to me carefully." Eldrin pulled a leather satchel from beneath his robes and thrust it into Kael's hands. "Inside are documents, a map, and something that belonged to your mother. Head north through the secret passage behind the meditation hall. Don't stop until you reach the city of Thornhaven. Find the resistance. Find Queen Lyanna. Tell her the son of the unknown has awakened."
"The son of the what? Master, I don't understand any of this!"
Another explosion, closer this time. The screams of the other monks echoed through the corridors. Eldrin gripped both of Kael's shoulders, his grey eyes boring into him with desperate intensity.
"Your parents didn't abandon you, Kael. They died protecting a secret—protecting you. The power in your blood is older than kingdoms, older than recorded history. Lord Venrik the Devourer has searched for you for seventeen years, and tonight, somehow, he's found you."
"Power? I don't have any power!"
"You do. You've always had it. I've been suppressing it with enchantments to hide you." Eldrin pressed his palm against Kael's forehead. The old monk's hand blazed with golden light, and Kael felt something inside him crack open, like a dam breaking. Energy surged through his veins, raw and overwhelming. His vision went white.
When it cleared, the world looked different. He could see currents of magic flowing through the air like invisible rivers. Eldrin's body glowed with intricate patterns of light. And outside, approaching rapidly, he sensed masses of dark, corrupted energy that made his skin crawl.
"What... what did you do to me?"
"I freed what was always yours. Now go!" Eldrin shoved him toward the door. "The passage, Kael. Go now!"
They ran through smoke-filled corridors. Other monks rushed past them, some carrying buckets of water, others wielding staffs and preparing defensive spells. Brother Torin lay motionless near the fountain, his eyes staring at nothing. Kael's stomach lurched.
"Don't look," Eldrin commanded. "Keep moving."
They burst into the meditation hall. The great circular room with its polished floor and ring of stone pillars was in chaos. The massive wooden doors at the far end had been blown apart. Through the opening, Kael saw them—soldiers clad in black armor that seemed to absorb light, their eyes glowing red beneath their helmets. And leading them, two figures wreathed in flames.
"The Crimson Twins," Eldrin whispered. "Venrik's most deadly servants."
The twins moved in perfect synchrony, a man and woman with identical cruel smiles. Fire danced along their arms as they advanced. Raze, the male twin, raised his hand and a whip of flame materialized, cracking through the air and wrapping around a defending monk. The man's screams were mercifully brief.
"Behind the statue of Saint Valor," Eldrin said urgently, pointing to the far wall. "The left eye is a switch. The passage leads down to the mountain base. There's a horse waiting—"
"I'm not leaving you!"
"You don't have a choice!" Eldrin's voice cracked like a whip. Then, softer, "This is my purpose, Kael. I've prepared my whole life to protect you until this moment. Don't let my sacrifice mean nothing."
The twins spotted them. Ember's eyes locked onto Kael, and her smile widened. "There," she purred, her voice somehow carrying over the chaos. "The boy. I can feel it on him—the taint of the old blood."
They moved. Eldrin's hands blazed with golden light, and he thrust them forward. A barrier of pure radiance erupted between them and the twins, buying precious seconds.
"Run!" Eldrin roared.
Kael ran. Tears blurred his vision as he sprinted across the meditation hall, dodging falling debris and pools of fire. Behind him, he heard the sound of Eldrin's magic clashing with the twins' flames, heard his master's defiant shout.
He reached the statue, found the eye-switch, pressed it. A section of wall ground open, revealing darkness and stone steps leading down. Kael hesitated at the threshold, looking back one last time.
Master Eldrin stood alone against the twins and their army, a pillar of golden light against the encroaching darkness. Their eyes met across the burning hall. Eldrin smiled—sad, proud, final—and nodded.
Then a spear of flame pierced through his barrier and struck him in the chest.
"No!" Kael's scream tore from his throat. Something inside him exploded. Power erupted from his body in a shockwave of silver-blue light that sent everyone in the hall flying backward. The stone cracked beneath his feet. The air itself seemed to warp around him.
For a moment, everything stopped. The twins lay sprawled on the ground, their flames extinguished. Their soldiers were scattered like broken dolls. And Kael stood at the center of it all, power coursing through him, wild and terrible and completely beyond his control.
Then the moment passed. The power faded, leaving him gasping and weak. The twins were already rising, their eyes now filled with hunger and excitement.
"Magnificent," Raze breathed. "Lord Venrik will be pleased."
Kael stumbled backward into the passage. His last glimpse of the meditation hall was Master Eldrin's body lying still on the scorched floor, and the twins advancing with flames reigniting along their arms.
The wall ground shut, plunging him into darkness. He stood there for a moment, numb with shock and grief. Then survival instinct kicked in. He fumbled in the blackness until his hand found the wall, and he began to descend the ancient steps, each one taking him further from the only home he'd ever known.
The stairs seemed endless. His legs burned. His mind kept replaying Eldrin's death, the screams of the monks, the terrible power that had erupted from him. What was he? What had his parents been?
After what felt like hours, he saw light ahead—moonlight filtering through a narrow opening. He emerged onto a rocky ledge halfway down the mountain. Below, he could see the forest stretching out in all directions. And there, as Eldrin had promised, a black horse was tethered to a tree, saddlebags already packed.
Kael climbed down to the horse on shaking legs. As he untied the reins, a howl split the night—not a wolf's howl, but something deeper, more primal. He looked up to see the monastery burning like a torch against the dark sky. Winged shapes circled above it, and he knew they'd be searching for him soon.
He mounted the horse, clutching the satchel Eldrin had given him. His hands were still trembling. Everything he'd known was gone. Everyone he'd loved was dead or dying. And he was being hunted by an ancient evil for reasons he didn't understand.
The horse seemed to sense his urgency. It needed no urging to gallop into the forest, carrying Kael away from the burning monastery, away from his childhood, and toward a destiny he never asked for.
As the trees swallowed them and the light of the fire faded behind him, Kael made himself a promise. He would survive this night. He would learn what he was and why his parents had died. And someday, somehow, he would make Lord Venrik and his servants pay for every drop of blood spilled tonight.
The son of the unknown had awakened, and the world would never be the same.