Lightning split the horizon, turning the camp silver. We stepped forward, sandals sinking into mud, each pace heavy with judgment.
Turtanu studied us, eyes dark and unreadable, like a butcher sizing up meat before the cut. Then—without warning—he nodded once.
“You’ve fought like wolves in a yard of sheep. You’ve bled. You’ve lasted. And for that—tonight, you rise.”
He stepped closer, his shadow spilling across us, his voice booming until the storm itself seemed to bow.
“You are now ?abum—generals of this host. You will command men. You will drive them, bleed with them, break them. Their lives will hang in the balance on your word. Fail me, and I’ll see your corpses tossed on the pyres, nameless and forgotten.”
The word hit like a blow to the head. ?abum.
General.
The camp erupted—shouts, howls, stamping feet—but not with joy. It was a noise edged with fear, the sound of men marking a shift they could not ignore.
The weight didn’t crush me—it reshaped me. War hadn’t broken us. It had carved us into weapons, sharp enough to cut, and too jagged ever to be made smooth again.
Beside me, Salvatore’s lips curved—not in gratitude, not in pride, but in something darker. Hungrier. The storm light caught his eyes, and I saw the shadow in him deepen.
I, too, bore the weight, but mine was different. Not hunger. Not shadow. Amara’s face burned in my mind, the promise I had made to her. I clenched my fists, not with desire for more blood, but with the vow to survive this war and return to her.
We had risen together, brothers in arms. Even so, in that moment, I felt our paths split—the same fire walking two different roads.
Twilight rolled across the camp like a bruise. I stood at Salvatore’s side—his smile glinting bronze in the half-light, mine tempered into silence. Two boys who had marched into war a year ago now stood as ?abum. But the rank didn’t mean we were the same.
Turtanu’s voice cut the air.
“Tomorrow,” he said, thunder in his words, “we end this—one last stand against the raiders from the western seas.”
The name hung there—the Sea Peoples—raiders of coasts and caravans, a storm of iron and flame. The camp shivered at it.
The firelight carved Turtanu’s features into iron and shadow as he paced. He looked less like an instrument of war—armor dented, scars mapped across him, the burden of every burial under his feet. The sky groaned; no rain came—only his voice, unwavering.
He swept his hand across the yard, taking in the gaunt-eyed, blood-streaked survivors—the last tatters of an army once called thunder. “You will each take ten thousand men,” he said. “All that remains.”
His gaze dropped to me. “Commander James,” he said, clipped, heavy with command. “You will lead the main assault. You hold. You measure. You steady men when the line cracks. Hold the center, and we hold the day.”
His words settled on me like iron rings. I nodded; there was no room for an answer.
Then Turtanu turned his head to Salvatore.
“And you—Commander Lorian.” His tone sliced the air. “You will strike the flank. Smash them. Burn their ships. Take their leaders. End this fight by blood or by fire.”
He cut the motion with his hand like a blade falling from a neck.
I looked at Salvatore, searching for the boy beneath those piercing blue eyes, for some steadiness I could read. I wanted him to hesitate. To temper the hunger. To remember the promise we’d both made—home, gold, a life to return to.
But his eyes were hungry. Cold, bright hunger that had been fed a year too long.
Don’t do it, I thought without voice. Just nod. Keep the men alive.
Salvatore stepped forward. The storm light stole across his cheek and revealed something unrecognizable. He lifted his chin, and his voice rang out—steel, unsparing.
“I will bring you their heads,” he said. “I will bring you their leaders’ heads, and this war will end in fire.”
The words landed in the yard and stayed. Men fell silent and measured us both anew.
It wasn’t boldness. It wasn’t courage. It was defiance—reckless, brazen, a challenge flung into the teeth of the gods themselves.
