I slide my fingers into Dagan’s, lacing them tight.
If the world is going to crack, I know exactly where I’m standing.
Chapter 17
Idris
Hidden SoulTakers Camp Outside the Rooted Marches
I am Idris.
They call me a dozen things now.
Dark Sage. Traitor of the Silver Flame. Grave-Thief. Soul-Breaker.
They whisper my names like curses and warnings, like children hissing monsters around a dying hearth.
They forget who taught them the shape of their wards.
Who held the first lamps in the tunnels when the Ember Vein was nothing but raw, screaming power in the dark.
They forget that once, I bled for this realm.
Typical.
I stand at the edge of the cliff, the wind snapping my cloak about my legs, and watch Stone’s Edge bleed.
The village clings to the face of the escarpment like a barnacle, stacked homes carved into the rock itself, their windows glowing a soft, pathetic gold.
Terraces spiral down, lit by root-lanterns and dream-glass, each step built from generations of miners’ hands.
Pretty, in a mortal way.
Fragile.
Below, my SoulTakers pour through the lower causeways—shadow-clad, blades humming, faces painted with my sigils. They move with purpose. With faith.
My faith.
Once they worshiped the Prime. Once they sang to the Great Flame and called themselves “servants of the multiverse.”
Servants.
No, they were not that.
Slaves.
And no more.
“Master.” A voice behind me is careful, deferential. “The wards nearest the Vein shudder, but they do not fall. The earth fights.”
“Of course it does,” I murmur, eyes on the cliff. “There is nothing more stubborn than stone that thinks it has a purpose.”
The acolyte swallows and says nothing.
They’re learning.
I lift my staff and touch the carved bone tip to the trembling rock beneath my boots.
