Chapter 27

  The orange glow of the Rift was almost hypnotic. Maira and I still stood at the edge of the abyss, our silhouettes deep black against the pulsating light of the Lower Realms. It was a strange sense of belonging that held us down here, while above our heads, the world was racing toward the brink. Thivan, on the other hand, was the center of an entirely different storm. He stood over the massive map table, his hands deeply immersed in the bluish astral web that represented the Northern Front.

  "That boy... that unteachable fool," Thivan growled softly, visibly struggling to maintain his royal composure. He stared at a flickering point of light representing Sk?ll Wolfsgrund. "He doesn't even listen to his own father's orders. I have signaled him three times to hold the defensive lines, but he prefers to slaughter the enemy ranks alone like a rabid dog. He will get himself encircled just to flatter his own ego."

  In Thivan's voice resonated a mixture of anger and an almost paternal exhaustion. He knew that Sk?ll's ferocity was a double-edged sword: it inspired the men, but it tore holes in a strategy designed for attrition and discipline.

  At the entrance of the vast chamber, where the massive basalt steps led into the darkness of the palace, Castor and Idas stood guard. They had slipped back into their roles as silent, golden fortresses. Around them, a dozen more guardsmen and "standard" Arcane guards were now positioned; their armor looked less magnificent in the sallow light of the facility, but far more threatening. The silence down here was heavy, almost physically tangible, until the impulse arrived.

  It wasn't a massive impact, not a magical earthquake that brought the walls down. It was a gentle, almost tender touch upon the ley lines—a parasitic message eating its way through the network and taking shape directly within Thivan’s communication crystals. The violet signature was unmistakable. It felt cold, like frozen pain.

  "You try to hide in the darkness?" the voice echoed in our heads, mocking and carried by a cruel serenity. "Give your people light again—and lick my boots!"

  Thivan froze for a second, his fingers clenching in the ether-web of the map. Then he exhaled deeply, accepting the defeat with a composure that surprised me almost more than the message itself. Within me, however, two feelings converged simultaneously: a quiet, icy fear because Reyn had seen through us so effortlessly, and an immense sense of relief.

  The game of hide-and-seek was over. The masquerade had fallen, and with it, the nerve-wracking risks of the diversion vanished.

  "Enough of shadows," the King said, straightening up. He suddenly seemed taller, as if he had cast off a heavy burden. "There is no longer any point in letting the city sit in the dark when the hunter already knows where the prey sleeps. Let the energy flow back into our resources and defenses. Let the citizens of Drymon have their old light back, and the other Houses can seal their emergency reserves."

  It was as if someone had opened a valve. The techno-mages, messengers, and commanders who had by now gathered in the chamber—meaning almost the entire palace staff now knew of the Portal's existence—hurried immediately to work. Secrecy had given way to necessity. Everywhere in the giant hall, crystals began to sing as the diversion was reversed.

  I felt it instantly. The deep rumble beneath my feet changed its frequency. The energy of the Rift no longer flowed to the distant southern mines but surged back into the capillaries of the city. Above us, far away on the surface, the towers of Drymon must have flared back into their golden brilliance at that very moment.

  Thivan reported to the other lords via the astral connection. I could practically feel the relief of the Gray Lords and Sk?ll’s father when they were told they no longer had to burn their precious reserves. The secure, if eerie, energy source of the center was available to them once more.

  "Safe isn't exactly what you'd call this thing," Gravor’s voice suddenly rang out in my mind. His psychic presence pointed like a bony finger at the glowing Rift. "This portal won't open fully without help from this side, Luken... but someone on the other side, in the Lower Realms, is tugging at it. The Enemy."

  A cold shiver ran down my spine. The way Gravor pronounced the word "Enemy" was different than usual. It wasn't hate; it was a kind of deep, existential respect mixed with a dread as old as time itself.

  "And who exactly is this Enemy again?" I asked him mentally, trying to suppress my rising panic. "The guy whose shard Reyn fused with, I assume... what do you know about this god?"

  Gravor didn't answer immediately. A chaotic jumble of images and emotions flooded my consciousness. I heard the name Altron, scraps of stories about a celestial war, and the bitter echo of betrayal. Gravor muttered unintelligibly, almost feverishly. Despite my burning curiosity, I decided not to press further. I hated it when he withheld information, but this topic seemed to make him genuinely pensive and—what disturbed me most—sad. Yet amidst this melancholy, something else grew within us both, a dark driving force that had strengthened us since our binding: rage. Pure, cold rage at what Reyn intended to do with this power.

  I shook off the thoughts. Now was not the time for theological debates about fallen gods. Now, the focus was on the war.

  I turned to the now massively enlarged table in the center of the facility. What had previously been a small map table had grown into a monumental theater of war made of mana. A three-dimensional map of Caleon, woven from blue and golden light, filled the room. Floating above the map were dozens of ether crystals like small, glowing moons, projecting astral transmissions directly from the battlefields.

  It was a controlled chaos. Certain projections showed the jagged walls of Wolfsgrund, where the golems fought like tiny toys against the dark flood of the Outcasts. In other sectors, one could hear the distorted voices of sergeants barking orders or relaying status reports. Lining the side walls were roughly thirty mages I hadn't even noticed at first. They maintained the complex connections with outstretched hands, sweat pouring down their foreheads as they supported the realm's information network.

  Advisors in ornate robes scurried around Thivan, pushing tactical markers back and forth and whispering hurried information. Guards patrolled with drawn weapons, as if expecting someone to step out of the shadows at any moment.

  "Status of the Heartfire Legion?" Thivan shouted over the noise.

  An advisor, an older man with a scar over his left eye, shook his head worriedly. "They are holding the eastern flank, Majesty. Pyrax has agreed to send some of his troops. But the reports are... disturbing. Communication with their leaders is becoming fragmented. There are rumors of discontent. They see Reyn's army and they see the darkness we brought over Drymon... they are starting to doubt whether we are the winners of this war."

  Thivan pressed his lips together. "Traitors always hesitate when the light flickers. Now that the energy is flowing again, they should remember who gave them their power. Tell them if they leave the front, I will personally burn their scales from their flesh."

  I stepped closer to the map and watched the movement of the enemy troops. Reyn had not yet overrun Wolfsgrund, but he was massing his forces.

  "Pyrax is waiting for Sk?ll's head on a pike," added Castor, who had approached the table. His golden armor almost outshone the projections. "If Wolfsgrund falls, the Heartfire Legion will sweep over them like an avalanche. We must order Sk?ll to retreat before he is overrun."

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  "He won't budge," Vin said quietly behind me. She had been watching in silence the whole time. "From what I can see, a Wolfsgrund would rather die than turn his back..."

  Thivan looked at her briefly, then back at the map. "Then we must ensure he doesn't die alone. Mages! Amplify the long-range transmission to Eisenfaust. I want their reserve golems set in motion immediately. We cannot wait until the siege of Drymon begins. We must decide the war in the North."

  The hall was filled with the hum of magic, the chatter of advisors, and the rhythmic breathing of the Rift behind us. It was a surreal blend of high-modern warfare and archaic horror. As the mages wove their formulas to maintain communication, the orange light of the Portal shimmered continuously on the faces of everyone present—a constant reminder of what they were actually fighting for.

  I felt Gravor’s rage vibrating within me, a dark heat that strengthened me. We were no longer spectators. We were in the nerve center of power.

  "Luken," Thivan said, without taking his eyes from the map. "You said Reyn wants to set a sign. If he defeats Wolfsgrund and Eisenfaust and the Heartfire Legion defects... what is your next piece of advice then?"

  I looked at the violet glow on the horizon of the map, there where Reyn stood. "Then there is no more advice, Thivan. Then there is only the Portal. Because if the walls fall, this Rift is the only thing he still wants—and we are the last thing standing between him and Hell."

  The mages along the walls struck up a new chant as the energy from the Portal surged with full force into the defense grid. Drymon was alight once more.

  -

  Sk?ll Wolfsgrund felt the grinding gears of the massive golem in his own bones. Sweat ran into his eyes as he tore the machine’s massive plasma claws through the ribcage of an enemy siege troll. The screeching of bursting metal and the wet sound of rending flesh were muffled by the external sensors, but the vibration of destruction was immediate.

  "Sk?ll! Dammit, boy! Fall back to the wall-line! That is the third order from your father!" His general’s voice thundered, distorted, through the intercom, nearly drowned out by the roar of the artillery atop the fortress ramparts.

  Sk?ll bared his teeth, a wild, almost manic grin on his lips. Through the reinforced viewports, he saw the Heartfire Legion hesitating on the flanks; he saw their dragon-man warriors pulling back into defensive formations instead of supporting the decisive push. But the wolves of Wolfsgrund knew no hesitation.

  "Just this one wedge, General!" Sk?ll screamed back, whirling the Night-Howler around and sweeping a group of Shadow-Stalkers off the plain like troublesome insects with the golem’s massive tailpiece.

  But then he saw the signal on his screen. A direct, prioritized impulse from the Throne Council. The power supply had been stabilized. Distant Drymon was feeding the grid once again with the full, inexhaustible power of the Rift. A massive jolt went through his golem as the systems jumped from the meager reserves back to the main line. The displays lit up bright blue, and the Night-Howler’s plasma claws intensified their glow until they shone nearly white.

  "Cowardly dogs in the center," Sk?ll muttered, but he knew he no longer had an excuse. He wrenched the control levers. With a mechanical howl that tore the air, the Night-Howler gave the signal for retreat.

  The formation of the Wolfsgrund golems was a marvel of military discipline in the midst of absolute carnage. Out of the original fifty machines that had begun the sortie, forty-six remained. A bitter loss for any other unit, but for House Wolfsgrund, it was a triumphant stand. The four lost golems lay as smoking wrecks covered in enemies upon the plain, monuments to a cruel trade.

  The remaining forty-six machines formed a seamless iron front. As they retreated step by step toward the fortress's first line of defense, they left a trail of devastation behind. Sk?ll led them, his gaze fixed on the chaos. His golem functioned as a mobile anvil. Every time the Outcasts thought they had found a gap in the retreat, one of the wolves would lunge forward and crush the attackers.

  The destruction on the plain before Wolfsgrund was total. The ground was churned up—a mixture of frozen earth, black blood, and the wreckage of siege engines. Fires burned everywhere, taking on an unnatural, toxic green color due to the leaked energy from destroyed golems. The archers on the ramparts now laid a thick carpet of fire-arrows over the approach to cover the golems' retreat.

  "Defensive positions taken," the General reported as they reached the shadows of the towering stone walls. "Shields are back at maximum capacity. The energy from Drymon is flowing like a torrent."

  Sk?ll positioned the Night-Howler directly in front of the main gate, its metallic paws dug deep into the mud. He panted, adrenaline still pumping through his body like liquid fire. He looked over at the ranks of the Heartfire Legion, who were now manning the ramparts again. Their hesitation burned in his soul, but he had no time for political grudges.

  Suddenly, the atmosphere changed. The noise of battle—the screaming, the thunder of cannons, the clashing of steel—seemed to suffocate for a moment in an eerie pressure wave.

  The sky above the plain tore open. It wasn't a slow gathering of clouds, but a violent rupture in the firmament. A single violet bolt of lightning, so massive that it bathed the night in a sickly lilac light for fractions of a second, struck the plain several hundred meters in front of the fortress.

  The impact left no crater in the conventional sense. Instead, the ground instantly melted into glass. A shockwave raced across the battlefield, hurling friend and foe alike to the ground and making the Arcane Shields of Fortress Wolfsgrund howl dangerously.

  "Status!" Sk?ll roared, trying to recalibrate the Night-Howler’s optical sensors, which were overloaded by the brightness.

  "We are registering a massive energetic anomaly at the impact site!" came the panicked reply from the fortress's command center. "My Lord... the golems' sensors... they're going haywire!"

  Sk?ll stared at his displays. The deep-scans, normally used to detect underground enemies or monsters, flashed a warning red. The golems in the front row emitted acoustic signals—a rhythmic, deep humming that disrupted their internal logic.

  "There is something... beneath the earth," the General whispered over the channel. His voice did not tremble with fear, but with an almost religious awe. "A lifeform. Directly beneath the impact site. But the signatures... they make no sense. It isn't organic mass; it’s as if the earth itself is gaining a soul."

  Beneath the vitrified surface of the impact point, the ground began to rise. Not like an earthquake, but in a controlled, almost organically pulsating manner. Cracks formed in the ground, from which no fire, but a pale, violet light emerged. It was a presence that had nothing to do with the distant portal in Drymon. It was something local, something Reyn had summoned or awakened here.

  Sk?ll felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up. The neural interface transmitted a sense of irrepressible, archaic power. Inside the Night-Howler’s pulpit, it suddenly became ice-cold.

  "My Lord, we should concentrate long-range artillery on that point," an officer suggested. "Before that thing fully emerges."

  "No!" Sk?ll interrupted him. A strange transformation was occurring within him. Where other men would have shrunk back from this unknown threat, he felt his hunting instinct enter a new, darker phase. The exhaustion from the previous fight was wiped away. His pupils dilated, and a wild tremor ran through his hands on the levers.

  He looked at his men, at the forty-six remaining golems. He saw the machines lower their heads, their eye-lenses lighting up in an aggressive red. The threat crawling out of the ground did not seem like an end, but like a challenge that provoked their martial pride to the quick. It was a collective arousal, a bloodlust that seized the entire army of Wolfsgrund.

  "Look at that," Sk?ll whispered, his smile growing wider, almost predatory. "Reyn thinks he can impress us with his parlor tricks. He thinks he can send us a monster so we’ll crawl whimpering behind our walls."

  He wrenched the Night-Howler forward, its metal paws clawing into the stone of the ramp.

  "But he forgot who we are! We are Wolfsgrund! We have the frost and the steel in our blood! Whatever is growing down there, it’s going to find out tonight that there is only one predator on this plain—and that’s us!"

  A deep growl answered him from the throats of the other golems. It wasn't an orderly military salute, but the howl of a pack that had picked up the scent of prey larger and more dangerous than anything before. Fear had evaporated in the heat of their battle-lust.

  The earth before the fortress now bulged further and further upward. Massive chunks of stone and glass were tossed aside as the thing beneath began to break the surface. Sensors were now screaming continuously; warnings of extreme mana pressure and physical displacement flooded the screens.

  The Heartfire Legion on the ramparts instinctively recoiled, their shields dipping slightly in horror. But the men of Wolfsgrund—the golem pilots and the infantry in the trenches—let out a collective cry that drowned out the thunder of the siege cannons. It was a cry of triumph, even before the battle had truly begun.

  Sk?ll felt the Night-Howler vibrate beneath him. He didn't wait for the creature to appear. He didn't wait for the order from his father or the King.

  "Frequencies to attack mode!" he commanded his pack. "When this thing sees the light of day, I want the first thing it sees to be our claws! Let's welcome it!"

  Sk?ll Wolfsgrund laughed, a loud, echoing sound in the confines of his pulpit, while before him the ground finally burst and the shadows of something colossal arose.