The hallway leading to the Quartermaster’s sanctum was narrow, sloped downward, and lit by long, narrow slits of molten-orange light in the walls. No torches. No runes. Just heat and the soft, rhythmic pulse of hidden forges.

  Rodan sniffed the air and grunted. “Smells like home.”

  Lusei raised an eyebrow. “Sulfur and steel?”

  Rodan grinned. “And permanence.”

  At the end of the passage, a thick iron door stood half-open, heat radiating from within. Ketta pushed it wide and stepped aside.

  “He doesn’t like ceremony,” she said quietly. “Just answer straight and don’t touch anything unless told.”

  Inside, the chamber was part forge, part archive.

  Weapons lined the far wall — not displayed, but hung, used, many still bearing the marks of their last kill. On the left, shelves of bound scrolls, steel-plated ledgers, and open ink-stained maps. In the center stood a wide obsidian table, half-covered in sigil-burnt etchings and carving tools.

  Behind it stood the Quartermaster.

  He was old, thick-necked, with a rough black beard gone mostly white. One arm was missing from the elbow down — in its place, a fitted prosthetic of iron and darkwood runes, each segment faintly steaming with enchantment. He was fitting a new sigil into a bracer when they entered. He didn’t look up.

  “Close the door, Ketta.”

  She did. The sound echoed like a vault locking.

  The Quartermaster finally raised his eyes — one hazel, the other cloudy with some old wound that hadn’t healed right. He stared at Lusei and Rodan for a moment. Not sizing them up.

  Weighing them.

  “Names,” he said.

  “Rodan Vharn,” Rodan answered.

  “Lusei,” said Lusei.

  The Quartermaster nodded once. Then turned.

  He took two iron bands from the forge table — Veylan bracers, flat and unadorned. But the metal beneath them shifted, like heat shimmer on steel.

  He placed one before each of them.

  “Crest binding is simple,” he said. “You wear this. You bleed on it. Then you swear.”

  Rodan reached out first, picking his up with a heavy hand. “Sounds straightforward.”

  The Quartermaster gestured to the small dagger laid beside it. “Mark your palm.”

  Rodan did so without flinching. Blood welled, then he pressed the cut hand to the inside of the bracer.

  The metal drank it in.

  Not soaked — drawn. Pulled like ink into a seal. The glyph etched into the surface flared for half a second with orange heat. Then it set.

  He handed Lusei his.

  Lusei followed suit. The blade cut clean. The blood touched metal.

  His mark pulsed white.

  Not bright.

  But deliberate.

  The Quartermaster looked at both of them now. His voice was low, slow — like iron being struck once, not twice.

  “Repeat after me.

  I swear no oath to crown or coin,

  But to contract kept, and purpose chosen.

  I fight not for glory, but for balance.

  I carry the brand of the Veylans —

  Not as burden.

  But as bond.”

  They repeated it in sync.

  The moment the last word left their mouths, the bracers flared again — orange for Rodan, faint silver for Lusei. Then they settled.

  Bound.

  The Quartermaster gave the faintest nod.

  “You're Veylans now. Official. Until you break faith, or fall.”

  He turned back to the table. “Ketta will show you the wall. Don’t take jobs above your teeth.”

  Rodan smirked. “What if we like chewing?”

  The Quartermaster didn’t look up.

  “Then hope you brought a second jaw.”

  As the doors creaked shut behind them and the cooler air of the hall returned, Ketta glanced over.

  “You’re Initiates now. First of eight.”

  Lusei looked over. “Eight?”

  Ketta nodded. “Ranks. The higher you climb, the more you’re trusted. And the more it costs.”

  She held up her fingers, ticking each off with crisp precision.

  “Initiate. Crestbearer. Freelancer. Sigilbound. Oathcaller. Brandwarden. Writmarked. Veylan Prime.”

  “Each one unlocks more privileges — contracts, authority, independence. But most of all? Eyes on you.”

  Rodan grunted. “What’s that last one?”

  “Prime?” Ketta’s voice lowered slightly. “Only seven at a time. They don’t wear titles. They become them.”

  She gestured toward the archway ahead. Faint glyph-light from deeper chambers spilled across the stones.

  “You’re barely past the door. The Guild hasn’t noticed you yet. But after what you did in the pit...”

  She didn’t finish.

  She just walked.

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  And they followed.

  The main hall of the Veylan Order felt different now.

  Not quieter. Not louder. Just... aimed.

  Where before the movement of warriors had seemed chaotic — a forge that never cooled — now it felt like a tide that had noticed them.

  Lusei and Rodan walked shoulder to shoulder behind Ketta, back under the high, arched ceilings lit by sigil-lanterns and flame-fed braziers.

  But this time, they weren’t invisible.

  Veylans watched them.

  Some subtly — a glance over the shoulder, a murmur exchanged mid-drill. Others less so.

  One woman leaned against a stone pillar, arms crossed, gear slung in easy readiness. Her black cloak was pinned by a silver fang — the mark of a Crestbearer.

  “Durnathi,” she called, nodding at Rodan. “You ever throw that Earthsplitter in formation?”

  Rodan didn’t slow. “Only if the formation needs a crater.”

  She barked a short laugh. “If you’re taking contracts, look for the Black String. We take hard fights and harder hits.”

  Before he could respond, another voice cut in — calm, cool, almost scholarly.

  “Lusei, yes?” A woman approached from his other side, her steps soft, cloak hemmed in blue. Her crest shimmered faintly with embedded runes. “You fought precisely. Moonborne magic? Rare to see it wielded with control.”

  Lusei nodded warily. “I try not to waste what I don’t understand yet.”

  She smiled. “Good answer. If you’re interested in furthering your arcwork — training, theory, structure — come find us. We’re called the Spiral. We don’t just cast. We craft.”

  Lusei inclined his head. “I’ll remember that.”

  The Spiral mage gave him a slight bow and faded back into the traffic of the hall.

  Rodan grinned. “Popular already.”

  “You too,” Lusei muttered.

  Ketta led them toward a raised section of the hall, where a low circular platform pulsed faintly with light — like a flattened well rimmed in brass. Above it floated glyphs — transparent and glowing, drifting in columns that twisted and shimmered like pages of light.

  The platform was ringed with a low railing. Several Veylans stood nearby, some watching, others reaching in to tap glyphs and pull them down into their hands — contracts.

  Ketta gestured at it.

  “That’s the Board of Fate. You’ve earned access now.”

  Rodan raised a brow. “It’s not... physical?”

  Ketta shook her head. “It’s alive — enchanted interface. Only responds to those with bound crests. It displays missions matched to your current rank and creed.”

  Lusei watched one glyph lower into a woman’s hand. It blinked, shifted color, then solidified into a rolled scroll.

  “You’ll see contracts color-coded,” Ketta continued. “White and blue are routine. Gold’s specialty work. Red’s dangerous. Red-silver?” She glanced at them both. “Rare. High risk. Magical in nature. Often flagged.”

  Rodan’s eyes narrowed. “Let me guess — those are the interesting ones.”

  “Or the ones that get you buried.”

  Ketta stepped toward the glyph wheel. “Pick one. Doesn’t have to be now. But once you take a glyph, it’s bound to you. You don’t finish it — the Order marks it. You finish it well?” She nodded. “You rise.”

  Lusei stared at the swirling glyphs for a long beat.

  One flickered red-silver near the edge. It hovered like it was waiting for them.

  Rodan followed his gaze. “That one?”

  Lusei nodded slowly. “Maybe.”

  “It’s called Echoes Beneath the Stone,” Ketta said, reading the sigil data aloud. “Origin: Echohold Ruins. Class: Recon and Report. Symptoms: missing patrols, magical disturbances, unearthed artifacts. Last known note: ‘singing beneath the earth.’”

  Rodan gave a low chuckle. “Sounds cursed already.”

  Ketta looked at them both. “You want it?”

  Lusei looked at Rodan.

  Rodan shrugged. “We’re new. Let’s do something stupid.”

  Lusei reached forward.

  The glyph glowed — then lowered into his hand.

  Bound.

  The others stepped back slightly.

  Even Ketta.

  “Then that’s your path now,” she said. “Rest tonight. You leave at first light.”

  The sky outside the Veylan hall had turned soft with color — not quite night, not quite day. That breathless space between.

  Lusei and Rodan stood just beyond the gate, where the city slope overlooked the far plains. The bustle behind them was muted now — muffled by stone and distance. The glyph-scroll in Lusei’s hand pulsed faintly with bound light, cool against his palm.

  They hadn’t said much since taking the contract.

  Not because there was nothing to say.

  Just… because it didn’t need saying yet.

  Rodan cracked his neck, looking up at the sky.

  “They say dusk’s when most scouts go missing,” he muttered.

  Lusei arched a brow. “Encouraging.”

  Rodan smirked. “Better than dawn. At least you get one last meal.”

  A breeze passed between them, quiet and cool.

  And then—

  Lusei blinked.

  The air around him warped. Just slightly.

  Not a shimmer. Not a chill. Just a pressure, like space tightening in the corner of his vision.

  And then a voice.

  Soft. Familiar. Not spoken aloud.

  “You’re walking the right path...”

  It wasn’t loud.

  It didn’t echo.

  But it struck him like a memory that hadn’t happened yet.

  “...but you are not the only one who remembers.”

  Lusei turned sharply, scanning the slope. No one. No sound.

  Rodan caught the movement. “What?”

  Lusei’s eyes searched the edges of the nearby rooftops, the alleyway, the dusk-hued sky.

  Nothing.

  “Thought I heard something,” he said.

  Rodan watched him for a beat, then nodded slowly. He didn’t press.

  Lusei turned back toward the horizon.

  His hand closed tighter around the scroll.

  And above them, the last light of day slipped beneath the edge of the world.

  The night didn’t last long.

  By the time the moons had risen — silver arcs hanging over the city’s towers — Lusei and Rodan were already moving.

  They traveled light.

  Ketta had supplied them with basic Veylan field kits: dried rations, two flares, a hand-drawn map marked with a red-silver crest, and a pair of small iron tokens — their proof of bond.

  They left before sunrise.

  No fanfare. No ceremony.

  Just two new Veylans walking through the southern gate, boots steady on cold stone, cloaks tugged close in the chill air.

  The guards at the threshold gave them a glance, then a nod.

  Not curiosity.

  Recognition.

  Outside the walls, the fields stretched east in long quiet waves — golden green under a sky just beginning to warm. A few birds stirred. Wind carried the scent of loam and old ash.

  They walked in silence until the road narrowed between uneven hills.

  Then Rodan spoke.

  “You ever hear of Echohold before the glyph flagged it?”

  Lusei shook his head. “Name doesn’t mean much to me.”

  Rodan gave a grunt. “Didn’t think it would. Place goes back centuries — maybe more. Used to be a keep. One of the old surface halls before the first kingdoms rose. Built by exile clans. Fell during the Age of Ash.”

  Lusei looked over. “You studied it?”

  Rodan smirked. “No. I grew up hearing about it. Durnathi campfire stories. My father said the stone there never cools. And that the wind sings names if you stay too long.”

  “Sings?” Lusei raised a brow.

  Rodan nodded, eyes forward.

  “People say the ruin’s hollow. Not just broken — empty in a way that pulls things inward. Sounds bounce strange down there. Voices echo like they don’t want to stop. Last team that went out didn’t report back. Some say they never even lit their campfire.”

  Lusei glanced ahead.

  The road was beginning to twist now, coiling between rising stone. Far off in the distance — barely visible — were jagged black shapes poking through the hills like bones.

  The ruins.

  “You think it’s cursed?” Lusei asked.

  Rodan snorted.

  “It’s always cursed.”

  They kept walking.

  Wind stirred the tall grass. A fox darted between rocks and vanished into shadow.

  Rodan tapped the scroll tucked at his belt.

  “Still sure you want this one for your first?”

  Lusei didn’t answer at first. He looked up at the sky — pale, wide, endless.

  Then he glanced at Rodan.

  “I’d rather start with something honest.”

  Rodan chuckled. “Then a ruin that eats patrols is perfect.”

  They reached the first ridge — and beyond it, the jagged edge of Echohold loomed like a cracked mouth in the hills.

  Stone and silence.

  And something beneath both.

  Lusei breathed out slowly. The Moonbrand beneath his sleeve gave a soft, slow pulse.

  He stepped forward.

  “Let’s see what sings.”

  By midday, the road was gone.

  What passed for a path now was little more than uneven dirt and half-buried stone slabs, cracked and softened by time. The hills had grown taller, steeper — pressing in like watching shoulders. Even the grass thinned out, replaced by patches of gray lichen and weather-worn bones of forgotten trees.

  Rodan led the way now, slower than before.

  Not cautious — just alert.

  They crested a ridge.

  And there it was.

  Echohold.

  Black stone jutted from the slope like a broken crown. Dozens of jagged arches half-buried in the hillside, tilted at strange angles. Stairwells led to nowhere. Crumbled towers leaned against cliffs. The main structure — or what remained of it — sat like a wound in the center of it all. A fractured hall, its archway collapsed but its door intact.

  A faint humming — not music, not wind — threaded through the air.

  Almost imperceptible.

  Almost imagined.

  The brand beneath his sleeve tingled. Not magic. Not alarm. Just… resonance.

  He looked at Rodan.

  Rodan didn’t speak. Just nodded once, slow.

  “This is where the echoes start.”