Ashes in the North

  The next morning, the path north held no ceremony. Only purpose.

  Villagers lined the dirt road like stones marking a grave—quiet, reverent, and watching. A few reached out to Hiro, brushing his sleeve as he passed. Others handed Elysia wrapped fruit, pressed her hand with thanks, or whispered prayers to Phinx, who soared above in wide, slow circles, embers trailing behind like red snowflakes.

  But their eyes strayed from the three they trusted to the ones they didn’t.

  The Ash Sentinels walked just behind Hiro—steel helms glinting in the pale morning, ash-lined cloaks unmoved by wind. Damaric kept one hand on his shield’s leather strap, his gaze locked forward. Lyessa’s greatblade was sheathed across her back, taller than she was, wrapped in cloth to hide the runes. Cainos moved like a shadow that didn’t belong—hood low, bow across his chest, silent as breath in winter.

  The villagers didn’t nod at them. Didn’t smile. Just stared. Waiting to see what kind of storm Hiro now led.

  ---

  “They don’t look at us the way they look at you,” Cainos said softly, without turning his head.“They cheer for the fire. But they still fear the ash.”

  “They don’t hate you,” Elysia said, walking beside Hiro. “They just haven’t decided who you are yet.”

  Hiro said nothing, but his eyes narrowed—already weighing the burden of being both symbol and sword.

  ---

  The further north they traveled, the quieter the world became.

  Birdsong faded. The trees grew taller, older, their branches clawing into the sky like they’d once reached for something and failed. No wagons passed them. No travelers. Just silence.

  Phinx dipped low once—screeching sharply, circling over a half-shattered tree at the edge of the trail. Hiro raised a fist, stopping the group.

  At the base of the tree was a broken cart. Scorch marks blackened the wood. Arrow shafts lay splintered beside dried blood and hoofprints—deep, wide, and scattered. Elysia knelt beside the wheel and touched the ground. It was cold… but not ancient.

  “This happened recently,” she said.

  Hiro scanned the shadows. His fingertips crackled with faint, controlled lightning.

  “Not beasts,” Damaric muttered, nudging a discarded spear with his boot. “These weapons are forged.”

  “And this one—” Lyessa unsheathed a thin blade embedded in the dirt—“was enchanted.”

  She flicked it. The metal sang unnaturally, then hissed like steam.

  ---

  By the time they reached Velros’ outskirts, even Phinx flew in silence.

  The village was nothing but bones.

  Houses collapsed inward like broken ribs. The chapel’s tower leaned as if it had once cried out and was never heard. Fences burned down to stubs. Fire pits cold. Crops reduced to ash circles that radiated outward, too perfect to be natural.

  Cainos crouched and traced a finger through the soot.

  “This was no accident.”

  From the smoke, something moved.

  Then another. Then ten.

  Figures emerged—faces smudged with ash, eyes wide with exhaustion and madness. Some held pitchforks. Others dragged rusted blades. A child held a hammer too large for his hands.

  They didn’t scream. They didn’t demand.

  They charged.

  ---

  “Take positions!” Lyessa barked, already unwrapping the cloth from her blade.

  The villagers came fast—desperate, wild, eyes filled with something deeper than rage. Terror.

  Elysia's voice cut through the clash. “Hiro—something’s wrong! They’re not possessed. This isn’t corruption. They’re panicking about something.”

  Hiro turned, eyes scanning the chaos—not just the weapons, but the faces.

  He saw it.

  Not bloodlust. Not madness.

  Fear. Pain. Survival.

  Then his voice rang out, fierce and clear—

  “Don’t hurt them! Just disarm!”

  They screamed curses through cracked lips—“Curse the Mage-King!” “Strike down the blood-thieves!”—but it wasn’t a battle cry. It was the howl of people too broken to run.

  One man hurled a bottle of fire with shaking hands. Phinx dove through the smoke, catching it midair in his talon before hurling it skyward, where it exploded with a low, dull bloom.

  "What?” Damaric shouted, stunned. “They’re charging us!"

  Damaric stepped forward like a wall, absorbing the swing of a rusted axe and knocking the attacker back with his shield—not with rage, but control.

  Cainos loosed a flare arrow at the ground—blinding white light burst upward, causing three villagers to recoil, shielding their faces and stumbling back.

  Lyessa danced between them, using her greatblade like a shepherd’s crook—slamming hilts, flipping weapons, always controlled.

  Hiro surged through the chaos like a flash flood of light, bolts cracking from his fingertips—not to destroy, but to control. He struck at wrists, weapons, knees—disabling without wounding, redirecting without rage. Every motion was precise, focused, restrained. Never the heart. Never the kill.

  A woman lunged at him with a kitchen knife, tears streaking her face. He caught her wrist, spun her, and pushed her gently to the ground.

  “Why won’t you kill us?” someone cried in panic. “Aren’t you here to finish what you started?”

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  Phinx let out a cry then—a thunderous, piercing shriek that rolled over the square like a wave of flame. It wasn’t rage. It was warning.

  Everyone froze.

  Villagers. Sentinels. Even the wind seemed to halt, suspended by the weight of something unspoken. Cainos slowly lowered his bow, eyes narrowed. "They were ready to die," he murmured. "And we showed them how to live again."

  Hiro didn’t speak. He lowered his stance, lightning still humming faintly beneath his skin—but he didn’t unleash it. He stepped between a villager and Cainos, hand outstretched. His message was clear.

  He would not be their executioner. Not today.

  He refused to become the fire they feared.

  ---

  It unraveled like a dream pierced by dawn—no final blow, no triumphant end. Just the breathless collapse of people realizing death hadn’t come.

  The villagers fell to their knees one by one, coughing through smoke and sobs. They expected slaughter. Instead, they found mercy—and it broke them.

  Elysia moved among them like light through smoke. Her hands glowed faintly as she touched wounds, whispered comfort, and steadied broken breath.

  She knelt beside an older man, face half-burned, and rested her palm against his temple. “We came to protect,” she said softly, “not to destroy.”

  “We thought you were one of them,” he whispered. “You came in silence. Like they did.”

  “Who?” she asked gently.

  “The ones who burned us. One brought the fire. The other shattered the ground. They fought here. And we were in the way.”

  ---

  Hiro stood at the center of the ruined square. The villagers around him trembled, not from cold—but memory.

  He looked up and saw two banners, burned and hanging from the chapel ruins. One still smoldered, curling in the wind like the war itself—unwilling to die.

  On one, a sigil for intellect—stars etched over an open book.

  On the other, a symbol for strength—a clenched fist wrapped in vine.

  Two cities.Two powers.And a war that didn’t need gods to become divine.

  “This wasn’t Gods,” Hiro said, his voice barely above the wind. “This was something worse.” “This was mortals.”

  Invitations and Intrigue

  Smoke still curled from the chapel ruins, thin and restless. The sun was slipping westward, casting long gold shadows across the battered square of Velros. What remained of the villagers were huddled near hastily lit fires, warming their hands, whispering names of the dead.

  Hiro stood before the broken banners. One had already crumbled. The other still smoldered.

  Elysia joined him in silence.

  “They weren’t trying to kill us,” she said softly. “They thought we were the next wave.”

  Hiro didn’t respond. He traced the line where flame had eaten through the edge of the remaining banner—just shy of the stars. Just shy of the book.

  “We stopped the blaze. But the roots still burn beneath us.”

  ---

  Cainos approached, cloak pulled tight, bow slung lazily across his shoulder. He handed Hiro a weatherworn scroll case.

  “Two cities,” he said. “Both blame each other. Velros was just caught between them.”

  He crouched and scratched a rough map into the dirt with a short, carved stick.

  “Nyrion,” he said, tapping the eastern side. “A city of scholars. Glyph-born mages, divine mathematicians, and power wrapped in robes.”

  He drew a line through the center.

  “Varnokh. Western spine. Trial-born warriors. Faith through blood. Strength is their script.”

  Elysia frowned. “And Velros?”

  “Trade route. Neutral. Or so they thought.”

  ---

  Lyessa arrived next, blade still wrapped but the cloth now dark with soot.

  “Let them bleed each other dry,” she said flatly. “We hold the blade that finishes whoever’s left.”

  “No,” Hiro said without turning. “That’s how the gods ruled—and look what it gave us.”

  Silence.

  Then he knelt beside Cainos’ map and marked a third point—a circle where no city had yet stood.

  “Athens is the answer,” he said. “But we don’t force them to kneel. We invite them to sit.”

  He looked up. Then, quietly, he scratched a second, smaller mark beneath the circle. Not a city. Not a road.

  Cainos noticed—but said nothing.

  “We’ll send envoys.”

  Elysia raised an eyebrow. “To both?”

  Hiro nodded. “To Nyrion, we send wisdom wrapped in reverence. Let them think we seek their guidance. To Varnokh, we send challenge dressed as respect. Let them believe we’re testing their strength.”

  Elysia stepped closer to the map, her voice thoughtful. “Nyrion prides itself on intellect. If we flatter them too much, they'll suspect manipulation. Better to pose a question only they can answer.”

  She tapped Varnokh's side. “And Varnokh? They won’t respect diplomacy. They’ll respect a trial. Offer a challenge, not a gift.”

  Hiro gave a small nod. “Exactly. While they posture, we prepare. Let them believe they’re pulling us closer—when it’s the ground beneath them I’m redrawing.”

  Cainos tilted his head, a faint smirk tugging at one corner. “You’re not building peace,” he murmured. “You’re building pieces.”

  He straightened. “And if they both come?”

  “Then we watch how they move,” Hiro said. “What they show. What they hide.”

  Damaric folded his arms, eyes narrowing toward the west. “You’re wagering with cities like they’re coins. What if the gods don’t like your bet?”

  Hiro turned to him, calm but unwavering. “She gave me her silence so I could speak. I won't waste it asking for permission.”

  Hiro turned back to the map, gaze lingering on the second mark he’d scratched into the dirt.

  ---

  No one spoke. The wind had gone still again.

  Phinx landed softly nearby, wings folding like drawn curtains. In his beak, he held a charred twig from the chapel pyre. He dropped it gently onto the parchment Cainos had unrolled—a clean map of the region.

  The ember hissed where it landed—right in the heart of the hand-drawn circle marked Athens.

  Hiro simply said:

  “Let’s see which of them knows the game they’re in.”

  Embers on the Wind

  The sun rose on a quieter Velros. The fires had died, but ash still clung to rooftops and skin. Smoke no longer choked the sky, but it lingered in breath and memory.

  Elysia moved between the wounded, sleeves rolled to the elbows, hands glowing with quiet green light. She touched a cracked rib, sealed a gash, whispered a prayer that wasn’t in any Olympian tongue. The villagers no longer stared at her like a ghost—they looked at her like hope made real. Now they looked like they believed.

  Nearby, Hiro helped lift the remains of a shattered wall alongside Damaric and two villagers. Cainos paced the outskirts, watching shadows move where no wind touched. Lyessa coordinated supplies, barking orders like she’d always been there.

  A child approached Hiro and offered a small wooden phoenix, its wings scorched black. “You kept the fire from taking us,” she said. “Now it can follow you.”

  Hiro took it without a word and slipped it into his cloak.

  ---

  By midday, the decision had ripened in him. But before he could speak it, an elder of Velros approached him, leaning on a staff carved with trade runes long faded by time.

  “This village was once the thread between two great cities,” the elder said. “Trade, travel, and trust passed through our gates. Then war turned us into ash.”

  The elder looked Hiro in the eye.

  “If you can bring peace to the twins, Velros will not forget. Athens may use this place as a hub, and we will proudly fly your banner.”

  Hiro nodded once. No speech. Just a promise in his silence.

  He stepped up onto the chapel’s crumbled steps and looked out at the Sentinels, at Elysia, at Phinx circling overhead.

  “From here, the plan begins," Hiro said. "These two cities will bow to Athens—whether they want to or not.”

  ---

  They gathered at the northern ridge before departure. The wind had changed—drier, colder. Tension hung like a second sun.

  Athena stood on the hill beyond them, just out of reach, just in sight. Cloaked in blue and silver. Silent.

  Phinx noticed her first. He stilled mid-flight, wings extended, sensing a shift no one else seemed to feel.

  The others moved on, unaware. But Hiro and Elysia saw her, and said nothing.

  She turned and vanished into the trees, like mist remembering where it belonged.

  “Do you think she approves?” Elysia asked quietly.

  “She doesn’t need to,” Hiro said. “She trusts us to act.”

  ---

  At the crossroads, Cainos knelt beside a scattering of tracks.

  “Split at the river fork,” he muttered. “One path east, one west.”

  Hiro stepped forward, already tracing the routes in his mind. “Then we split too. I’ll go to Varnokh with Damaric. Elysia, you’ll take Lyessa and Cainos with you.”

  “We double our reach,” Elysia replied, stepping beside Hiro.

  Hiro turned to Lyessa and Cainos. His voice lowered, but lightning threaded the edges. “If anything happens to her, the storm will be the last thing you’ll see.”

  Above them, Phinx circled once, wings flaring wide—his cry low and pulsing, like thunder warning from the clouds.

  Cainos didn’t flinch. “Then I’ll make sure she never sees a storm.”

  Lyessa met Hiro’s eyes, then turned to Elysia. “You won’t have to look over your shoulder. I’ll be your shadow.”

  Hiro looked between them. Then, finally, nodded. “Good. Then we move.”

  Damaric’s brow furrowed. “Just make sure we’re not marching into a graveyard.”

  ---

  At the final ridge, just before the land dipped into pine-shadowed valleys, Lyessa pointed toward the horizon.

  “Smoke.”

  Cainos followed her gaze. “Too thin for a campfire. Too wide for peace.”

  They all stared.

  Phinx flared his wings, loosing a cry that rumbled low—like a warning echoing through hollow skies.

  “Is it them?” Damaric asked.

  Hiro didn’t answer.

  He watched the smoke rise. Watched the line it drew against the sky.

  “It’s already begun,” he said.

  The wind dragged the smoke west—across rivers, across silence—toward war. Toward them.