Two weeks in Father Silas's adjoining cottage proved to be a harsher torment for Alistair than a forced march under the winter rain. The air in the room stank of mouldy parchment, pomace brandy, and candle soot. While his bastard sword rested in a corner beside his shield, the mercenary waged an inglorious war against the goose quill and oak gall ink. For his hands, calloused by the hilt of his sword and the weight of iron, holding a delicate quill was as clumsy as trying to skin a rabbit with a battleaxe.
Lucius, on the other hand, turned out to be a true prodigy. The boy, who until a few moons ago didn't even have shoes to wear, devoured the consonants and vowels with the hunger of someone who had gone days without bread. In no time, his handwriting became clean, elegant, and fluid, whereas Alistair's papers looked like a battlefield wrecked by fury and carnage, covered in black stains, illegible scrawls, and spatters of frustration.
– It seems the 'Silver Sword' is sharper than the mind of the man wielding it – commented Lucius, with a sly smile lurking at the corner of his mouth as he drew a perfect curve across his practice sheet.
Alistair shot him a murderous look, wiping a dark stain off his cheek with the back of his ink-stained thumb.
– This fucking ink is too thin – the mercenary grumbled, throwing the quill onto the oak table with an irritated thud. – It runs across the page like goose blood on a chopping block. A man wasn't made to hold this rubbish; writing is an invention of cowards who are scared of settling things with three feet of steel.
Yet stubbornness and the hours burned by the light of worn candles eventually paid off. One night, while Silas slept off his usual drunken stupor in a corner of the room, Alistair and Lucius bent over the metal box handed to them by the figure in black. Combining Silas's lessons with the boy's sharp mind, the lines on the map fragment finally began to make sense. It was no mere regional chart: the fragment belonged to an ancient relic known as The Twilight and Dawn Scroll.
Lucius unfolded the accompanying letter and began to spell out the message aloud, his voice losing its usual irony and turning grave as he went on. Alistair listened in silence, feeling a cold knot form in his stomach.
The context of the text froze the blood in their veins. It was no merchant's message nor an extortion threat; it was a solemn, dark summons addressed to the 'true believers', ordering them to gather, within a strict deadline of two months, in the ruins of a forgotten temple hidden deep in the woods south of Riberaguarda.
Lucius stumbled over the final words, his voice failing him as if the air in the room had suddenly become too thick to breathe. In the flickering light of the candle stub, the metal of the box cast a long, warped shadow across the parchment.
'... so that blood may purify the land and herald the birth of the eclipse god, he who shall devour the world...' the boy read, his fingers trembling slightly against the rough margin of the paper, '... bring the collected fragments of the Scroll for the celebration of the ritual at the precise moment spoken by the Weaver of Shadows.'
Alistair remained motionless, his hand resting on the hilt of his dagger. For years, his life had been governed by simple, tangible things: the weight of coins, the malt of beer, the art of dodging his problems and loan sharks. Recently, his troubles came down to Viscount Lorenzo, the Aureliana garrison, and the political manoeuvring in the palace of the absent King Alaric II. Though he now lived in a world of ruthless rules, it was a world Alistair understood. This, however... this wasn't parlour politics, border disputes, or noble feuds, it was something far older and hungrier – a rot born in the shadows of faith that threatened to swallow not just the throne, but the very existence of the realm.
– I'll keep those damned words stuffed in the bottom of my doublet – Alistair murmured, his voice sounding raspy in the gloom. – The world already has enough monsters made of flesh and bone.
The uneasy peace and the study routine in Campofiorito did not last. Three days after discovering the contents of the letter, the quiet of the oak clearing was shattered by the arrival of Hector Duvall and Orlan. They did not come alone. Behind them, winding through the barley hills like a serpent of iron and raw linen, marched an army of roughly a hundred mercenaries – men with rope scars around their necks, shift-eyed deserters, veterans of ten campaigns, and swords-for-hire scraped from the gutters and thickets of Verdejante.
The Brigade had returned.
The smell of sweaty horses, meat roasting on makeshift spits, and rancid sheepskin swallowed the aroma of damp earth. Between dawn and dusk, the secluded hideout had transformed into a bustling, full-blown military base. The relentless clatter of hammers against iron, the scrape of blades against whetstones, and the guttural murmur of nearly a hundred armed men warned that the time for lies and charades was at an end – war was marching straight towards them all.
Inside Hector's tent, where the smell of green wood smoke mingled with the stench of cheap wine, Alistair placed the metal box and the fragment of the Twilight and Dawn Scroll on the unpolished ashwood table. Beside him, Lucius laid out their discoveries concerning the eclipse conspiracy, the world-devouring god, and the summons from the mysterious Weaver of Shadows. Hector didn't wait for the end of the tale; he let out a booming laugh that rattled the pewter mugs and slammed his heavy hand down on the table.
– That's the blather of someone who spends too much time eating rotten mushrooms in the woods! – Hector rumbled, wiping a tear from the corner of his eye. – I've cleared dozens of those tunic-wearing, dagger-toting zealots from the surroundings of my fortress! A bunch of lunatics who think they can put out the sun if they spill blood on an old rock. The only thing those idiots devour is proper fighting men's time!
Orlan, however, did not join in the laughter. His austere, analytical gaze remained fixed on the black wax of the seal and the torn outlines of the map. He ran his dry fingers over the handwriting and looked at Alistair with restrained gravity.
– Zealotry can be a more lethal weapon than a bronze bombard if wielded properly, Hector – Orlan warned, his voice low and serene against the din of the camp. – We need to verify the authenticity of this letter before throwing it into the embers. Alistair, leave the letter and the fragment with me. I wish to examine the clergy's markings and the cartography.
Alistair nodded without hesitation, shoving the parchment and the cold iron towards Orlan, feeling genuine relief at riddling himself of the weight of that curse under his skin. Hector rapped his knuckles on the table, cutting short the mystical concerns with his usual lack of patience for the unseen.
– Enough of fairy tales and shadows! – he declared, his eyes flashing with fierce ambition. – The Brigade is finally complete. We have a hundred blades, the ashwood wagons, and horses for the charge. The time has come to strike at the financial heart of our enemy.
He leaned over the map of the province, jamming his calloused thumb down on the region of Verdejante.
– Viscount Lorenzo Verdegrande thinks his gold makes him untouchable, but those coins piled in the vaults of his fortress are the blood that feeds his army. We are going to march on Verdejante and steal all of Lorenzo's gold. If he has no silver to pay the Aureliana garrison and his mercenaries, his army will collapse like a mud wall in the rain.
Hector plunged the tip of his dagger into the map, stabbing it into the table's wood with such force that the blade quivered. A predatory grin split across his face.
– Lorenzo loves that gold more than his own blood or the honour of his coat of arms – Hector continued, his voice sounding like stones tumbling down a cliff. – That treasure in Verdejante is the leash he uses to hold onto his power and the poison with which he buys Aurelian nobles. If we take the coins from his chests, the man will be blind with rage, but he won't send his captains after us, no, no, his pride and greed will tear him out from behind his high walls to hunt down the trail of his fortune in person, and it's there, out in the open, that we'll catch him like a heavy boar straying from the pack. We don't just want his silver and gold, lads; we want the Viscount himself chained in one of our wagons. Once we kidnap him, his power in the province will collapse at the snap of a finger.
– And what shall we do with the gold and silver? – asked Orlan, raising an eyebrow. – A hundred men hauling metal chests along the royal roads are an easy target for anyone wishing to try their luck.
– The gold won't stay piled up with us – Hector interjected, with a glint of mocking cunning. – The wagons Alistair bought will take every single coin straight to Ponteverde, to the stone catacombs of Count Valerius of Monte-Claro. Under the official protection of his banner and his knights, neither the Viscount nor the King's officers will be able to touch a single copper without declaring war on a Lord of the Province. Valerius will keep the treasure, and we get Lorenzo's neck and command of these lands.
In the corner of the tent, where the smoke from the fire gathered under the canvas, Alistair exchanged a long, heavy look with Lucius. The boy huddled into his cloak, his pale face reflecting the same suffocating uncertainty that rested on the mercenary's shoulders.
The scale of Hector's plan wasn't just audacious; it was monumental madness, a blind men's dance on the edge of a sharp blade. Stealing a viscount's treasure, kidnapping a high noble in his own domain, and entrusting the fortune of a campaign to the word of an ambitious count was the kind of game where the slightest slip ended with dozens of bodies dangling from trees by the roadside.
Alistair tightened his grip on the hilt of his bastard sword, feeling the cold, familiar grip beneath his fingers. As Hector's booming laughter echoed through the tent, Alistair looked at his leader and wondered, in the silence of his mind, whether the captain of the Mad Dog Brigade was a brilliant strategist or just another lucky fool on his way to the gallows.