Silence crackled—thin and ready to snap, like the air before lightning tears the sky.
Turtanu did not blink or breathe. He held Salvatore in a stone-hard gaze, the storm mirrored in his eye. Then, slow and terrible, he nodded.
“Then go earn the right to say it.”
The quiet was ruptured. The camp went wild—howls like animals with nothing left to lose. Fists hammered shields; a single voice rose, and the chorus swallowed it. Men stamped the mud until the earth seemed to tremble.
They chanted our names—mine, his—lifting them like banners into the bruised air. For the first time in months, a ghost of fire flared among the ranks; ten thousand dying hopes sparked bright, if only for a breath.
Pride flared in my chest, and under it a cold, crawling fear. Salvatore might end this war tomorrow, or he might become the thing that finished us all.
Before dawn bled light, the camp lay under an indigo bruise. Smoke curled like a dying breath around broken spears. Wind hissed through the tents; everything smelled of iron and wet cloth.
We hauled ourselves up from mud and soaked blankets. I found Salvatore at the tent line, lacing his gear with steady hands, fire already kindled in his eyes.
“Salvatore,” I said, pulling him aside. “My unit leads. You follow my command—no deviations. Not today.”
He turned slowly. “You think I don’t know what’s at stake?” His voice was low. “You think I’d fuck this up? Now? Not after everything.”
“I think your pride might,” I said. “You want this so badly you’ll do anything to win. Even if it kills us.”
He closed the gap until the heat around him was dangerous. “You’re damn right I want it. I’ve lived in the shadow of dead men and colder fathers. This”—he nodded toward the black horizon—“is how I crawl out of that shadow. The only way I stop being the boy everyone spat on.”
“Then do it right,” I said, voice steady. “With me. Not against me.”
His jaw flexed. “You’ve always believed in me, Lazarus. But you’ve never had to carry what I carry. They doubt me the moment I speak. I don’t want pity. I want to be feared.”
The word landed like a thrown shard.
“I know what you’ve lost,” I said. “I know how they broke you. But this war doesn’t settle old scores. The men behind us are fragile—they look to us as the last thread. Don’t tear it to feed your vengeance.”
He looked away for a breath. When he looked back, his eyes were colder, honed.
“You’re wrong,” he said. “I don’t want his pride. I want him to choke on my victory. I want to shove it down his throat until he cannot swallow his shame.”
He said it like a verdict. The words hung, bright and inevitable, between us.
My heart thudded. “I trust you,” I said quietly. “But don’t make me regret it.”
His gaze softened—just enough to feel it. “You won’t,” he promised. “I won’t let you down. We’re walking into hell. I’m coming back with the enemy’s head in my hand.” He leaned in, voice a low growl. “I’ve got this, Lazarus. Let me fucking shine.”
For a breath, I saw the boy who’d pulled me from the dirt repeatedly—then the man was gone. The face before me held no plea for approval. He was a storm, waiting to fall.
I nodded, dread coiling in my gut like a living thing. “Then let’s go show them who we are.”
Together, we turned toward dawn and the darkness waiting with open arms.
The sun rose like a blood-red coin tossed by indifferent gods, washing the field in a savage light. A heavy silence clung to the earth—too thick to be peace. Even the birds refused to sing.
A soldier raised a long bronze war-horn to his lips and blew.
The sound tore the heavens wide, and we moved—into blood, into legend, into the waiting mouth of fate itself.
I barked orders; my voice cleaved the air. My men surged, shields locked, sandals slapping the earth like percussion. The ground trembled with our charge. Chariots hammered forward—their wheels ripping through mud, flinging dark spray behind them like ghosts shaken loose.
Then—impact.
Arrows fell like blackened hail, loosed by the Sea Peoples. Their armor gleamed with a ghastly sheen; faces painted with runes that looked like teeth. Javelins found charioteers—one after another—men ripped from their seats, blood trailing through the air like torn banners. Horses screamed, stumbled, and fell; harnesses split, axles snapped.
