Rowan did not freeze.
It was not the first time he had seen a man die.
Not the first time blood had burst too hot, nor the first time eyes had gone dark in surprise, as if death were always unexpected news.
He let Tavin's body slip into the mud with a dry motion, without reverence. War gave no time for ceremony. There was no room for mourning—only for the next strike.
The center was giving way, but it had not broken yet.
Shields crashed like funeral drums. Spears shoved forward. Men screamed the names of gods who had never set foot in this filth. The sound was a living animal, roaring through iron and rain.
Rowan pushed ahead.
His sword found flesh.
Once.
Twice.
A mercenary with a dented helm tried to hack at his leg, but Rowan twisted, felt the blow scrape his mail, and answered with a short cut across the throat. The man fell without a sound, as if the world itself had swallowed his life.
Another came behind him.
And another.
There was no time to count. Only to endure.
To the left, Captain Harlon was doing exactly what Ser Garron had ordered: a wall of bone and discipline. He bellowed commands like thunder, spitting rain and fury.
"CLOSE UP! CLOSE UP, YOU BASTARDS!"
Wagons groaned as they were shoved into place, narrowing the low ground. Mercenaries rushed too fast, too confident, and paid for it when the second squad emerged like hidden teeth.
A trap.
It worked.
For a moment, it almost seemed that maybe… maybe they could hold.
Ser Garron stood at the center, sword in hand, his horse dead at his feet, fighting like a man who had already accepted the end but refused to kneel to it.
"HOLD THE FUCKING LINE!"
The word line was almost a joke.
There was no line.
There was only a mass of men trying not to be swallowed.
Rowan saw Alric Fenn a few yards away, fighting with desperate fury, the contempt from before replaced by pure fear. He was not a coward.
None of them were.
Cowardice implied choice.
This was necessity.
The mud sucked at boots.
Blood made everything slick.
The air stank of iron, sweat, and something else… something that always came when men gathered close enough to die.
Rowan drove his sword into a mercenary's belly and felt the horrible resistance before it gave. The man collapsed against him, and Rowan shoved him away like a sack of meat.
Then he heard it.
A different sound.
Not metal.
Not screaming.
A silence.
Not complete—but sudden, as if the entire field had held its breath for a single instant.
Rowan noticed it first in the horses.
The few still alive began to whinny and back away, eyes wide, foam at their mouths. Animals understood before men.
Men looked around, confused, thinking ambush.
"What was that?"
"What the hell…?"
Ser Garron lifted his head.
And his face changed.
It was not ordinary fear.
It was recognition.
Rowan followed his gaze.
Upward.
The sky was a gray lid, heavy with rain. Low clouds, like dirty wool.
And then…
The shadow passed.
Slow.
Immense.
It was not a cloud.
Clouds did not have such a defined shape.
They did not have intention.
That shadow had wings.
The entire field stopped for one absurd second, as if war itself had forgotten to continue.
A mercenary dropped his sword.
A man made a protective sign across his chest.
Someone whispered, almost childlike:
"No…"
Rowan felt his stomach sink.
Another pass, lower now, and the outline became too clear to deny—wings broad as ship sails, a long tail, a dark body cut against the gray.
The sound came after.
A deep beating.
Heavy.
Flap.
Flap.
Flap.
A captain murmured, hoarse, as if the word were poison:
"Dragon…"
There was no mysticism in it.
No legend-born wonder.
Dragons existed.
Everyone knew that.
But dragons belonged to distant dominions, ancient ones, too expensive for small wars. They were weapons of kings, not of lords angry over marriages.
They should not have been there.
"Marrick…" someone said, voice breaking.
And the name sounded different now.
Not like a rival.
Like a madman.
"He wouldn't do this…"
"That costs fortunes…"
"Only a southern domain has one…"
"He bought it."
The words fell like a sentence.
He bought it.
This was not an omen from the heavens.
It was politics.
It was silver.
It was ambition.
Marrick was not fighting for honor.
He was willing to turn a noble blood dispute into ash.
Ser Garron shouted, but it was not command.
It was bitter disbelief.
"LOWER YOUR WEAPONS!"
No one heard.
Because everyone was looking.
The creature descended slightly, just enough for them to see the dark gleam of scales beneath the rain. It did not breathe fire.
It did not need to.
Its mere presence was a threat.
It was like watching a castle in motion.
A roar came then, tearing through bone, through courage, through faith.
Men fell to their knees.
Others ran.
Human war shattered in that instant.
The mercenaries retreated first. A mercenary fights for silver, not for destiny.
Rowan stood still.
His sword hung forgotten in his hand.
He did not know if he was witnessing the end…
Or only the beginning of something worse.
The dragon passed one last time over the field, slow, like a king watching worms fight in the mud.
Then it flew toward the hills, vanishing into the mist.
But it left something worse than fire.
It left certainty.
This was no longer about marriage.
No longer about pride.
Marrick had escalated the war to a level none of them could control.
Ser Garron turned slowly back to the men.
His face was pale as wet stone.
"You saw," he said, hoarse.
No one answered.
Because there was no answer.
Rowan felt the mud beneath his feet.
Felt the blood on his hands.
And for the first time in many years…
He felt true fear.
Not of dying.
But of what rich, desperate men were capable of buying.