Ksenia Orlova moved with the predator’s measured grace, her hand already closing around the pommel of her sidearm, a long, thin blade polished to a mirror sheen. Stellan’s shortsword, ‘Cinder’ he called it, was a blur. It cleared its scabbard with a faint rasp, not even a full draw, but enough to show intent. He didn’t meet Ksenia’s glare directly, his gaze scanning the room, assessing angles, exits, the terrified patrons already scrambling for cover. Before Ksenia could complete her draw, Stellan lunged, not at her, but toward Vesna. His arm snaked around her waist, a grip like steel, and he hauled her backward, spinning, toward the nearest window. A guttural roar erupted from the Aethel Justicar. “Coward!” “Not a fight worth winning, Vesna!” Stellan barked, his voice low and urgent, a growl that vibrated against her ear as he pushed her ahead of him. She stumbled, adrenaline surging, but he propelled her forward. Glass shattered. The window frame splintered inward as Stellan kicked through it. They tumbled out into the biting night, landing hard on the muddy ground behind the inn. Vesna cried out as her shoulder scraped against a loose cobblestone. Behind them, the muffled shouts and the unmistakable clang of steel on steel began, followed by the crashing of tables. Ksenia and her retinue had engaged the remaining patrons, or perhaps each other, in the immediate aftermath. Stellan didn't wait to find out. He was on his feet in an instant, pulling Vesna up with him. “The road,” he commanded, already moving, dragging her by the arm. “North. Follow the spine of the Ashfall Crags. The map. Where is the first marker?” Vesna fumbled in the deep pocket of her travel cloak, her fingers numb with shock and cold. She pulled out the rolled parchment, its edges damp from the recent rain. “The… the Ossuary of Saints. In the Shadowgale Peaks.” “Fitting,” Stellan muttered, sparing a glance back at the commotion from the inn, a faint amber glow now spilling from the broken window. “A place of the dead for those who chase death. Let’s move.” The journey north was a brutal test. The roads, once neatly paved Imperial arteries, were now fractured lines of crumbling flagstones and choked ruts, swallowed by creeping tendrils of the Blight. Fungal growths, iridescent and putrid, clung to bare, blighted trees, their branches clawing at the perpetually overcast sky. The air grew colder with each league, a wind like a razor slicing through Vesna’s thin garments. Stellan, in his hardened leather and fur-lined cloak, seemed impervious, his pace relentless. Days blurred into a monotonous cycle of trudging, shivering, and meager rations. The Nemesys, however, refused to be forgotten. Its presence was a subtle, insidious crawl at the edges of Vesna’s awareness. It began as a faint hiss, a barely audible sigh carried on the wind, always just beyond her grasp. Then it grew clearer, weaving through the rustling leaves, echoing in the vast, empty spaces between mountain peaks. *“He will betray you. Just like the others. Just like Iryna.”* The voice was her own, yet distorted, imbued with a chilling certainty. Vesna instinctively glanced at Stellan, who walked a few paces ahead, his broad shoulders hunched against the wind. He hadn’t heard it, or so it seemed. The voice coiled again. *“You are a blight yourself. A mistake. Your power will consume everything you touch.”* She hugged herself, shrinking inward. The fear, her oldest companion, tightened its grip. Stellan, meanwhile, grew more taciturn. His molars ground audibly, his gaze fixed on nothing. Sometimes, a low, rasping murmur, almost like his own voice, would seem to emanate from the shadowed rock faces they passed. *“Worthless. A failure. The Glades were right to cast you out.”* He would flinch, a subtle tightening of his grip on Cinder’s hilt, and then walk faster, his silence a wall between them. The unvoiced accusations in the air thickened, each needle of sound driving a wedge of suspicion. Vesna mistrusted her own thoughts, her own power, and by extension, him. Stellan, she could tell, was fighting similar demons, his past failures magnified by the insidious presence that stalked them. Finally, the Shadowgale Peaks loomed, jagged teeth ripping at the grey sky. At their highest ascent, a colossal edifice of primordial, dark stone emerged from the perpetual snowline. It was a structure born of a forgotten age, half-swallowed by rockslides and glaciers, its entrance a gaping maw carved into the mountainside: the Ossuary of Saints. Silence, heavier than stone, greeted them inside. The air was frigid, tasting of dust and time. Rows upon rows of niches lined the cavernous halls, each holding desiccated remains, some adorned with faded prayer cloths, others simply bare ribcages. A faint, ethereal glow pulsed from deeper within, guiding them. Stellan’s torch cast long, dancing shadows, making the still forms seem to twitch at the edges of their vision. “The map showed… a specific saint,” Vesna murmured, her voice feeling too loud in the hallowed space. She unfolded the parchment again, tracing the faded lines. “Anya of the Silent Tears. Her resting place should be… in the Crypt of Echoes.” They navigated a labyrinth of bone-filled passages, the Nemesys’s murmurs now a constant, low thrum against their eardrums, a chorus of doubt and dread. They found the Crypt of Echoes, a circular chamber carved with intricate, weeping designs. In the center, on an elevated plinth of veined marble, lay a single, perfectly preserved set of remains, shimmering faintly. It was Anya. Her bony fingers were intertwined over her breastbone, and nestled there, a tear-shaped shard of petrified bone, milky white and luminous, gleamed with an inner light. It was unmistakable. The first Lacrima. Vesna stepped forward, a tremor running through her. This was it. The first step toward freedom. She reached out, her fingers trembling, just brushing the cool, smooth surface of the Lacrima. Then, the entire crypt shuddered. The osseous figures in the niches lining the chamber began to stir. A dry, rasping sound, like a thousand brittle leaves skittering across stone, filled the air. Empty eye sockets, once dark hollows, now gleamed with points of malevolent, pale light. Rib cages expanded, contracting. Bone-white hands, once clasped in eternal rest, flexed. Before Stellan could even utter a warning, the first animated corpse lurched from its niche, its brittle jawbone clattering open in a silent scream. It was followed by another, and another, until the Crypt of Echoes was alive with the clacking, rattling movement of osseous guardians, each armed with a corroded, forgotten blade or spear. “Vesna, move!” Stellan roared, Cinder already a silver arc, deflecting a blow from a reanimated spearman. He pushed her behind him, becoming a whirling dervish of steel and fury. He was outnumbered, vastly. The sheer press of calcified bodies was relentless. Vesna watched, frozen, as Stellan fought, his movements economical but increasingly desperate. A rusty axe blade glanced off his shoulder pauldron with a grinding screech. He grunted, stumbling back, a fresh rank of bared bone surging forward. She saw the glint of a spearhead aimed directly at his exposed side. Panic, cold and absolute, seized her. The Nemesys roared in her mind, a cacophony of terrifying prophecies. *“He will die! And then you will be truly alone, truly consumed!”* Something inside Vesna snapped. A raw, untamed force, born of terror and a desperate need to protect, surged through her. A scream tore from her throat, not of fear, but of pure, unadulterated power. From her outstretched hands, not of her conscious will, ripped a torrent of shadow. It wasn’t the wispy, creeping tendrils of the Nemesys, but a dense, churning void, a flood of pure, crushing darkness. It slammed into the skeletal guardians, not merely scattering them, but unraveling them. Bone turned to dust, brittle metal rusted into flaky powder, consumed and extinguished by the inky blackness. The crypt went silent, save for the faint hiss of dissipating shadow-mist. Vesna stood panting, her hands still extended, smoke curling from her fingertips. The air around her shimmered with residual darkness. The dead guardians were gone, utterly annihilated. She stared at her own hands, then at the empty spaces where the aged bones had been, a profound horror twisting her features. Stellan, who had managed to duck the spear and was now slowly rising, stared at her, breath sawing in his throat. The new, complicated fear in his gaze was a wound. He saw not the frightened ward he had rescued, but something else entirely. Something terrifying.

The Ossuary of Saints