The air hung thick with the metallic tang of blood and the acrid stench of charred magic. Ren stood at the edge of the village's shattered palisade, his breath ragged, hands trembling as they clutched a notched sword. The mark on his chest pulsed like a second heartbeat, its whispers slithering through his mind.
"Fight," it hissed. "They are weak. We are not."
Ren's knees buckled. Fatigue had carved itself into his bones, a relentless weight after days of fleeing, fighting, surviving. The villagers—those still alive—scurried behind him, herding children and the elderly into the labyrinth of tunnels beneath Velispire's Maw. Their whispers carried desperation:
"The hounds—!"
"They smell the blood—"
"Gods, there's so many…"
Ren turned. The forest trembled. Not from wind. Not from beasts.
From marching feet.
They emerged from the tree line like a plague—stray hounds, their forms twisted by the Ascendancy's experiments. Some loped on mismatched limbs, joints bending backward. Others had jaws unhinged to their chests, teeth dripping black saliva. Their eyes glowed crimson, pupils slit like serpents'.
The first hound lunged. Ren parried on instinct, his blade biting into its neck. The creature collapsed, gurgling, but three more took its place. Behind him, the village fighters—a ragged band of six—formed a brittle line.
"Hold the gate!" roared Tarek, a broad-shouldered smith wielding a hammer still stained with his brother's blood. "Buy the others time!"
Ren's sword arm burned. The mark seethed.
"Pathetic. Let me in."
"No," Ren gritted out.
A hound slammed into his side. Claws raked his ribs. He stumbled, swiping blindly, and its head rolled into the mud.
"You'll die here," the mark laughed. "Your pride will kill them all."
The hounds came in waves.
First wave: Feral and starved, their attacks wild. Ren and the fighters carved through them, but not without cost. A villager—Lysa, the weaver—fell screaming as a hound tore out her throat.
Second wave: Larger, armored hounds, their hides studded with jagged iron plates. Tarek's hammer crumpled one's skull, but another clamped its jaws on his leg. He went down, and Ren barely dragged him back before the hounds ripped him apart.
Third wave: Silent. Intelligent. These hounds circled, herding the fighters into a tightening ring. Their leader—a hulking beast with a human face grafted onto its skull—snarled commands in guttural tongues.
Ren's vision blurred. Blood dripped from a gash on his brow. The mark's voice crescendoed.
"You're out of time. Let me save your wretched life."
"I don't need your help!" Ren spat, cleaving a hound's spine.
"Liar."
The human-faced hound lunged. Ren raised his sword—
—and froze.
Fatigue, deeper than bone, deeper than soul, locked his muscles.
The hound's jaws snapped inches from his face.
"Fine. Die stubborn. But they die with you."
The mark erupted.
Ren's scream was drowned by the roar of shadows. His veins turned black, branching across his skin like cracks in glass. His left arm twisted, elongating into a clawed limb studded with hooked barbs. The hound recoiled—too late. Ren's mutated arm speared through its chest, tearing out a pulsing heart.
The villagers stared in horror.
"What is he?!"
"Monster—!"
The mark laughed with Ren's voice. "Better a monster than a corpse."
What followed was not a battle.
It was a slaughter.
Ren—or the thing he'd become—moved like a storm. Shadows lashed, severing limbs, melting flesh. He grabbed a hound by the jaw, ripping its head clean off, and hurled the skull into the pack. Another pounced; he caught its throat mid-air and crushed it, black blood spraying his face.
But the mark's power was a wildfire in kindling. Ren's body frayed.
His ribs cracked, reforming into a jagged exoskeleton. His right eye burst, replaced by a void that leaked smoke. The villagers retreated, some retching, others praying.
Tarek limped forward, hammer raised. "Ren! Fight it!"
The mark turned. "You first."
A shadow tendril whipped out, aiming for Tarek's chest—
—and veered, slamming into a hound instead.
Ren's voice, strained and raw, broke through. "Run…!"
The hounds faltered. Their leader barked orders, but fear had infected the pack. Ren's monstrous form staggered, his body failing.
"Weak. Pathetic. You can't even hold me for five minutes."
"Shut… up…" Ren gasped, collapsing to one knee.
The mark relinquished control, retreating with a sneer. Ren's mutations reverted—slowly, agonizingly—leaving him human again, curled in the mud.
The surviving hounds fled.
Silence fell, broken only by the moans of the wounded. The villagers emerged, wide-eyed. A child—Lira, the winged girl—crept forward and pressed a hand to Ren's bloodied cheek.
"You're still you," she whispered.
Ren didn't answer.
Dawn crept over the battlefield. Corpses littered the ground, human and hound alike. The fighters counted losses: eight dead, twelve wounded. Tarek's leg would never heal right.
Kaela found Ren at the edge of the forest, vomiting bile into the roots.
"You let it in," she said flatly.
"I had no choice."
"There's always a choice." She tossed him a waterskin. "Garrel says the mark's spreading. Next time, it might not give you back."
Ren drank, his hands shaking. "Next time, I might not care."
As the villagers burned the dead, a low hum vibrated through the earth. Lira froze, her wings twitching.
"Do you hear that?"
Ren frowned. "Hear what?"
The hum deepened, rhythmic. Marching. Thousands of feet.
On the horizon, a banner pierced the treeline—a black tower wrapped in chains.
The Ascendancy's main force had arrived.
The survivors stumbled through the forest, their breath ragged, their faces streaked with ash and blood. Ren lay slung between Tarek and a wiry hunter named Jarek, his body limp, his head lolling like a broken puppet. The mark on his chest had dulled to a faint glow, its whispers reduced to a hollow echo. "Weak… useless…"
Lira flitted ahead, her moth-like wings trembling as she scanned for threats. "The river," she urged. "There's a cave system—Garrel mapped it. We can lose them there."
Behind them, Velispire's Maw burned. Flames clawed at the sky, staining the clouds blood-red. The villagers didn't look back. They couldn't.
The army arrived at dusk, their black banners emblazoned with the Tower's sigil blotting out the sun. Five hundred strong, their armor clanked in grim unison as they fanned across the scorched battlefield. At their helm rode Commander Veyra, her face a mask of cold precision, and her lieutenant, Dren, a hulking man with a voice like grinding stone.
"Nothing but corpses," Dren spat, kicking a charred hound skull. "Scourge's incompetence let the rabble escape."
Veyra dismounted, her boots sinking into the mud. "Search for survivors. The Witch-King wants confirmation of Vorath's host."
A soldier knelt, inspecting a claw mark torn into a tree. "Commander—this wasn't blades. Something… else did this."
Before Veyra could respond, a guttural laugh rasped from the rubble.
"Too late, as always."
Scourge emerged, her once-polished armor now a mangled shell. Her right eye was a ruined socket, her left hand severed at the wrist. Yet she stood, swaying but defiant, her remaining eye blazing.
Veyra's lip curled. "You look like gutter trash, Scourge."
"And you smell like fear," Scourge shot back. "Three days I held them here. Three days, while you pranced around the hinterlands."
Dren stepped forward, his hand on his axe. "You lost the host. And your squad."
"Your scouts misfired the flares. The hounds were supposed to corner them at the ravine." Scourge limped closer, her voice a venomous hiss. "Or did the Witch-King finally realize you're better at polishing boots than leading men?"
Veyra's blade was at Scourge's throat in a heartbeat. "Careful, cripple. The only reason you're breathing is because the Emperor finds your failures… amusing."
Scourge grinned, blood trickling from her teeth. "Tell me, Commander—did you weep when they exiled your brother to the mines? Or did you sign the order yourself?"
The soldiers froze. Veyra's composure cracked—a flicker of rage—before she sheathed her sword. "Burn the village. Salt the earth. Dren, take twenty men and hunt the survivors. The rest return to the Tower."
Scourge barred her path. "The host is mine. Vorath's power belongs to the Emperor—"
"You'll crawl back to him on your knees," Veyra interrupted, "and beg forgiveness. Or I'll feed what's left of you to the hounds."
The command hung in the air, brittle and final. Scourge stared at the flames, her fists clenched, before turning away.
The soldiers worked with methodical cruelty. They doused the Maw's remains in oil, tossed torches into the thatch, and watched as fire consumed decades of refuge. Scrolls, herbs, children's toys—all turned to ash.
From a ridge half a mile away, the survivors watched.
"Bastards," Tarek muttered, his leg wrapped in bloody linen. "They'll pay. I'll forge a blade so sharp it severs their damned souls."
Lira perched on a rock, her wings curled tight. "They're leaving soldiers behind. We need to move."
Ren stirred, his voice a raw scrape. "…How many?"
"Twenty. Maybe thirty."
He tried to stand, crumpling instantly. Jarek caught him. "You're not dying today, idiot. Save it for the fight that matters."
Ren's gaze stayed fixed on the flames. "It's my fault. The mark… I brought them here."
Kaela emerged from the cave mouth, her sword unsheathed. "Self-pity won't bury the dead. Up. Now."
As the main army retreated, Scourge lingered in the forest's shadow. She crouched, pressing her palm to the soil, and whispered an incantation. Blood dripped from her stump, sizzling as it hit the ground.
A shadow detached itself from the trees—a lithe figure in a scout's cloak.
"You're late," Scourge snarled.
The scout lowered her hood, revealing piercing green eyes and a smirk. "You're uglier. What happened?"
"The host happened. Track them. The cripple, the scholar, the girl—all die. But the host… bring him to me alive."
The scout tilted her head. "And if Veyra's men interfere?"
Scourge stood, her gaze on the distant caves. "Kill them too."
Deep in the earth, the survivors huddled in the cavern's belly. Garrel lit a makeshift brazier, its flame casting grotesque shadows. As Lira bandaged Ren's wounds, she paused.
"Your mark… it's moving."
Ren looked down. The sigil had crept past his collarbone, thorn-like tendrils now brushing his throat.
Garrel paled. "Vorath isn't done with you."
Outside, the howl of hounds echoed through the tunnels. Closer this time.
Ren closed his eyes. The mark pulsed, eager.
"Let me save you," it whispered.
And for the first time, he wanted to say yes.