Chapter 3 – Kael Arrives
By late afternoon, the stillness of the day began to break. A wind rose from the south, warm at first, then cooler as it gathered strength, carrying with it dust, distant rain, and the sharp scent of wet stone not yet fallen. The sky shifted from open blue to layered grey, clouds piling against the ridges like unspoken promises.
Aeloria stood at the gate where the river track joined the main road, one hand resting on the weathered wood. This was a place of crossings—where cattle passed, where traders sometimes stopped, where news arrived before it reached the farmhouse. The land felt restless beneath her boots, as though waiting.
The horizon shimmered.
At first, she thought it was another trick of heat and wind. Then the shape separated itself from the wavering air—a lone rider, distant and dark against the pale land. He moved slowly, steadily, neither rushing nor hesitating, as if he had learned the patience of long roads. With each step of the horse, he grew clearer, more real.
A man on a grey horse.
Dust clung to both of them. The animal's head hung low, its gait tired but sure, the way of a creature that trusted its rider completely. Aeloria straightened, her senses sharpening. Strangers were rare this deep into the Highlands, and they never arrived without reason.
The rider reached the gate and reined in his horse. Up close, she saw the lines of exhaustion etched into his face, the kind earned, not pitied. His eyes met hers—storm-grey, distant yet alert, like thunder waiting beyond the hills. A rifle was slung across his back, worn but well cared for.
"I'm looking for work," he said.
His voice was roughened by dust and travel, carrying the cadence of the northern borderlands, where the desert gnawed at the edge of the sea and nothing survived without learning how to bend.
"Name's Kael."
Aeloria did not answer immediately. She took him in fully—the faded coat patched at the elbows, the boots cracked with age, the old scar running from his jaw down to his throat, pale against sun-darkened skin. There was a quiet gentleness in the way he held the reins, in the way he waited, that did not match the presence of the rifle.
"The Highlands don't welcome strangers easily," she said at last.
His mouth curved into a half-smile, tired but genuine. "Then maybe they'll learn to."
Before she could respond, thunder grumbled above the ridges, low and restless. The sound rolled across the land without rain to follow, as if the sky itself were clearing its throat. Somewhere in the veld, a startled Struthio camelus burst into motion, long legs kicking up dust as lightning flashed far off, striking nothing at all.
The wind shifted again, cooler now, heavy with the promise of rain. It carried the scent of stone after heat, the same scent she had followed earlier that day.
Aeloria's pulse quickened.
She glanced past Kael, toward the mountains. The memory of the morning's warning pressed against her ribs. A shadow moves. King Motharu's words echoed just as clearly: Not all of them are men.
She looked back at the stranger.
"What kind of work?" she asked.
"Whatever needs doing," Kael replied. "I can fix fences, track game, guard cattle. I don't stay where I'm not wanted."
There was something in his tone—not pleading, not prideful. Simply honest.
The wind tugged at her hair, urging, insistent. For a fleeting moment, the world seemed to narrow to the space between them, the gate, and the waiting road. Then the land shifted.
It was subtle—a pressure, a deep internal turning, like roots adjusting beneath soil. Aeloria felt it in her bones, in the same place where the earth's voice had settled earlier that day. The Highlands were listening.
She reached for the gate latch.
As she swung it open, Kael guided his horse forward. The instant he crossed the threshold, the world tilted—just slightly, just long enough for her breath to catch. Somewhere deep within the mountains, something stirred, ancient and aware, as though recognizing a long-lost echo.
Kael glanced up sharply, as if he too had felt it.
Then the moment passed.
The gate closed behind him with a soft thud. Thunder murmured again, closer now, and the first drop of rain darkened the dust at their feet.
Whatever Kael carried with him—past, secrets, or storm—it had stepped into Monte Highlands.
And the land had noticed.