"Most thought I'd never choose a human over tradition." I meet his gaze. "Yet here we are."
The implications settle between us like smoke from a dying fire. A place where Seris and our child might not just survive, but belong. Where the gods' blessing wouldn't be seen as blasphemy, but as proof of something larger than clan politics and blood feuds.
"You think they'd take you in?" Gargan asks. "A warleader fleeing his own people?"
"I think they'd understand why I'm fleeing."
Three hours past midnight, we move through Azhgar's lower reaches like ghosts. Gargan knows every guard rotation, every blind spot in the watchtowers. Years of defending this place have taught us exactly how to slip past its defenses.
The supply stores sit beneath the old human courthouse, carved into foundations that predate the orc occupation. Gargan produces keys that shouldn't exist—copies made by a sympathetic blacksmith who owes him favors from campaigns past.
We work in silence, filling travel packs with dried meat, grain, medicinal herbs. Gargan adds a water skin that's seen better days but holds liquid without leaking. I select a cloak thick enough to shield Seris from mountain winds.
"Horses?" I whisper.
"Two mounts, saddled and waiting in the eastern grove. Hardy beasts, bred for distance rather than war."
I pause in my packing, studying my oldest friend's profile in the dim torchlight. The scar along his jaw catches the flame, a reminder of the battle where he saved my life by taking a dark elf's blade meant for my throat.
"Gargan."
He doesn't look up from coiling rope with military precision. "Don't."
"You could come with us."
"No." The word comes flat, final. "Someone needs to hold this place together when the council tears itself apart looking for someone to blame. Besides—" He glances up with that crooked grin that's gotten us through a dozen impossible situations. "Three's a crowd when you're trying to start a new life."
We shoulder the packs, checking straps and buckles one final time. At the door, Gargan catches my arm.
"For what it's worth..." His broken tusk glints as he speaks. "I hope she's worth it."
The words hang in the cold air between us. Worth abandoning everything I've built. Worth becoming an exile, a traitor, a man without a clan. Worth the hunt that will surely follow.
I think of Seris's laugh, rare and precious as sunlight breaking through storm clouds. Of her hands gentle on my scars, accepting what others have always seen as marks of brutality. Of our child, growing strong despite a world that would deny their right to exist.
"She's everything."
30
SERIS
Ipull the cloak tighter around my shoulders, the weight of it both comforting and strange. The gates of Azhgar loom before me, iron and bone twisted into patterns that speak of ancient power. The last time I stood here, I collapsed in the snow, begging entrance with nothing but desperation and the child growing inside me.
That feels like a lifetime ago. Like watching someone else's memories through thick glass.
My body still aches from what Zharra did to me in those underground chambers. The healers assured me the bleeding has stopped, that the baby remains strong despite everything. But my legs shake if I stand too long, and my ribs protest every deep breath. I'm not the woman who first arrived here—broken, perhaps, but not defeated.
Never defeated.
The irony isn't lost on me. The first time I came to these gates, they turned me away. Now I'm the one choosing to leave.
"Having second thoughts?"
I don't startle at Vargath's voice anymore. His presence has become as familiar as my own heartbeat, though I'm stilllearning to trust the steadiness of it. Still learning to believe he won't disappear when morning comes.
"No." I turn as he emerges from the shadows cast by watchtowers and crumbling stone. The moonless night makes him look carved from darkness itself, all sharp edges and contained power. "Just thinking how different this feels."
He leads two horses toward me, their breath steaming in the cold air. The animals are sturdy rather than elegant—built for endurance, not ceremony. Travel packs bulge with supplies, and I catch the glint of weapons secured to the saddles.
