1
MARA
The distant clash of steel against steel carries through the thin walls of our makeshift home, each ring vibrating through the floorboards like a tuning fork struck against bone. I pause mid-stitch on Eira's torn sleeve, needle suspended in air as another wave of war-horns echoes from the valley's edge.
"Mama?" Eira looks up from her pile of scavenged buttons, arranging them into careful patterns on the cracked linoleum. "The noise sounds angry."
The understatement draws a bitter smile to my lips. Angry doesn't begin to cover the symphony of violence bleeding through our walls. Metal screams against metal. Voices roar commands in the guttural tongue I've learned to understand but never speak. The Redmoon warriors are fighting someone—and from the sound of it, they're not winning.
"Just the men being loud, sweet girl." I keep my voice steady, but my fingers betray me, pulling the thread too tight until it snaps. "Keep playing."
The lie tastes like ash. Seven years among the Redmoon clan has taught me to read the rhythms of their battles, since I was bartered from my bunker in exchange for winter rations. Thisisn't a raid or a hunt. This is desperation, the kind that comes when your territory is being carved away piece by piece.
Another horn blast, closer now. Close enough that I can smell the metallic tang of blood on the wind that seeps through our patched windows. The scent mingles with the ever-present smoke from the clan's forge-fires, creating something thick and choking that makes my throat constrict.
Eira abandons her buttons, those gold-flecked eyes turning toward the sound with the same curious intensity she reserves for bird songs and wind patterns. Sometimes I wonder what she hears that I don't. Her father's blood runs strong in her veins—orc mixed with the blood of this earth. Something that has given her more magic than most.
"Mama, the metal-smell is getting thicker." She wrinkles her nose, that tiny gesture so achingly human it makes my chest tight. "Like when Gorthak sharpens his blades, but... more."
My hands still completely. Eira shouldn't be able to detect blood from this distance. Shouldn't be able to parse the difference between weapon-sharpening and battle-spill. But she can, because she's not entirely human, and because the magic that flows thin in this world still recognizes her as something worth awakening for.
The thought should comfort me. Instead, it sends ice crawling up my spine.
A crash thunders through the settlement—wood splintering, someone screaming. Not the controlled violence of sparring or discipline. This is chaos, the kind that swallows small clans whole and leaves nothing but burned-out husks in the morning light.
I drop the sewing and cross to our single window, peering through the gap between the boards we've nailed over the glass. The scene beyond makes my stomach lurch.
Redmoon warriors stream past our door, some limping, others carrying wounded. Their usually pristine armor is dented and blood-streaked. Gorthak stumbles by, clutching his shoulder where something has torn through the metal plating to the flesh beneath. His tusks are chipped, his breathing labored.
These aren't men retreating from a minor skirmish. These are survivors fleeing something that's broken their lines completely.
"Eira." My voice comes out sharper than intended. "Come here. Now."
She responds to the tone immediately, abandoning her buttons to scramble to my side. I scoop her up, feeling the familiar weight of her small body against my chest, the way her arms wind around my neck with complete trust. Her dark curls tickle my chin, and for a moment I allow myself to breathe in the scent of her—woodsmoke and something indefinably sweet, like pine sap warming in sunlight.
"Are we playing hide-and-seek?" Her whisper carries excitement rather than fear. At five, she still sees adventure where I see catastrophe.
"Something like that." I move quickly but quietly, gathering the few possessions that matter—the bag I've kept packed since her birth, the dried meat wrapped in oiled cloth, the water skin that never quite empties thanks to her unconscious magic. "We're going to take a walk."
My fingers find the small bone charm my grandmother gave me, the one I've worn since childhood. The surface is smooth from years of nervous touching, carved with symbols that predate the orcs' arrival. Protection, she'd said. For when the world grows too dark to see.
Another crash, closer now. Glass shatters somewhere nearby, followed by a sound I recognize—the wet thud of bodies hitting the ground and not getting back up.
Eira's grip tightens around my neck. "Mama, why does the air taste like coins?"
Blood. She's tasting blood on the wind, and we're still inside our house.
I don't answer, just hoist the pack onto my shoulders and move toward the back door. The settlement around us is dissolving into chaos—shouts, running footsteps, the acrid smell of something burning. Through the thin walls, I hear Mekha barking orders to the clan-mothers, telling them to gather the children and retreat to the southern caves.
But the southern caves are a day's walk, and whoever is attacking us won't give us a day. They won't give us an hour.
My hand finds the door latch just as something heavy slams into our front wall. The entire structure shudders, dust cascading from the rafters like dirty snow. Eira makes a small sound against my throat, not quite fear but recognition that something has fundamentally changed.
"Hold tight, Eira." I slip the latch and ease the door open, peering into the narrow space between our house and the next. Empty, for now. But I can hear them—heavy footsteps, voices speaking in a dialect I don't recognize. Not Redmoon. Someone else entirely.
We slip outside just as our front door explodes inward.
The cold hits steals my breath and makes Eira gasp against my shoulder. The first snow of the season has begun to fall—fat, lazy flakes that drift down like ash from some distant fire. They cling to my eyelashes, melt on my cheeks, and suddenly I'm seven years old again, listening to Grandmother's voice by lamplight.
