A cool breeze swept over Veridian's Ascent as twilight deepened. Joric, standing at the heart of the grazing grounds, offered a quiet, focused 'gesture'. The subtle, vibratory threads that underpinned the flock's instinctual cohesion shifted. Without a barking dog or a prodding staff, the sheep turned, their woolly forms moving with uncanny precision, flowing toward the high-walled pen. Such control was a delicate art, honed over eight years of solitary practice. His mother had taught him the basics of his Scion abilities: a focused intent could subtly reshape reality. A whispered desire, even a silent, mental one, could make the unseen threads bend more readily, demanding less of his own essence. Yet, the limits remained elusive. The 'difficulty' of a task was not always logical. Some profound alterations of reality manifested with an almost shocking ease. Others, seemingly simple, proved frustratingly recalcitrant. Days prior, confronting the mountain cat, his silent plea to 'still' its predatory leap had barely rippled its fierce momentum. The creature’s primal force had simply shrugged off his touch. Contrarily, guiding hundreds of sheep, a complex, living mosaic, required only a quiet focus. And to hurl a stone with enough force to shatter the cat's skull, guiding its trajectory with perfect precision? That had been disconcertingly simple, a basic unraveling of kinetic potential. He had realized then, with a chilling clarity, that such raw force could be unleashed hundreds of times over, if he so chose. As Joric ushered the last sheep into the enclosure, a faint, discordant note in the air caught his heightened senses. A tang, raw and coppery, hung on the evening wind. It was the scent of freshly spilled blood, though not human, nor sheep, nor even the familiar, musky odor of the mountain cat. *Wolf?* The scent was sharp, familiar from a lone wolf he'd culled the year prior. He scanned the horizon. Before long, a figure emerged from the descending shadows, a bulky form slung over his shoulder. Ser Kaelen, his silhouette stark against the fading light of the west, approached with a steady gait. “Greetings, Joric. Would you permit an old Sentinel to shelter here this night? This wolf, perhaps, will serve as fair compensation for your hospitality.” Kaelen deposited the formidable carcass on the ground with a soft thud. A prime catch indeed. Its hide would fetch a decent price in the canton below, and the meat, though lean, would offer a hearty meal. More than enough for a night’s lodging. Joric nodded, a faint frown creasing his brow. “Few wolves venture this far west anymore,” he observed. He had quietly thinned their numbers from the surrounding hills in recent years. “How far did you travel to find this one?” Veridian’s Ascent was a desolate place, its harsh environs discouraging most wild game. Carnivores were especially rare. “A scouting venture near the Skyward Spires,” Kaelen replied, a faint breath of weariness in his voice. The Skyward Spires, far to the west of Veridian’s Ascent, rose like colossal, jagged teeth, their peaks often lost in the clouds. Many called them the Great Barrier, an impassable wall at the world’s edge. “The Spires… even reaching their foothills can take days.” “With my stride, half a day was sufficient.” Kaelen’s lips quirked into a tired smile. Joric felt no surprise. He himself could traverse such distances with a focused effort, blurring the fabric of space around him. Yet, Kaelen's quiet declaration sharpened Joric's internal guard. The old Sentinel possessed depths beyond mere martial skill. --- Hours later, a crackling fire warmed the small clearing before Joric’s house. The rich aroma of wolf meat stew, simmered with wild herbs, filled the air. They ate in comfortable silence for a time, the vast, star-dusted sky of the Dominion unfurling above them. Kaelen broke the quiet first. He looked up, a wistful note in his voice. “The stars here… they blaze with an uncommon brilliance.” “Mother said this is one of the highest places in the world,” Joric responded, gesturing vaguely toward the distant peaks, “apart from the Skyward Spires, of course.” “Compared to *that* place, little can truly aspire to greater height. I visited it today, and my admiration only grew. Even the highest-ranking Architects, with their retinues, would struggle to cross it.” “I had heard… the Architects possess power akin to gods. Could they not simply leap over a mountain range?” Joric asked, recalling old, cautionary tales from his mother. “Not all, my friend. Not all. But the patriarchs of the great Houses… House Aurelian, for instance… I once witnessed their head level a small hill with a mere flick of his wrist. A tremor that shook the ground for miles.” Kaelen’s eyes held a distant, reverent glint. *A mere flick.* Joric felt a prickle of something akin to shame. Sometimes, in his isolated practice, he allowed himself to imagine his own nascent abilities rivaling those of the Dominion's mythical rulers. Yet, Kaelen’s casual anecdote shattered that conceit. His subtle manipulations, his careful re-weaving of reality, felt utterly insignificant next to such raw, overt displays of power. Kaelen turned, a gentler expression on his face. “Tell me, Joric, does living alone in such a place not breed a deep loneliness?” “It does, at times,” Joric admitted, stirring the embers with a long stick. “But habit has become its own kind of comfort.” “Why not find a girl from the canton to share your hearth? Bring her to the Ascent.” Joric gave a dry, humorless chuckle. “What young woman, raised amidst the bustling life of the canton, would willingly spend her days herding sheep on this desolate peak?” “I daresay there are many who would find solace with a strong, capable young man such as yourself.” Kaelen offered a warm, easy smile. Joric’s own smile felt stiff, a stranger on his lips. As a child, before his mother's passing, before the estrangement from the canton, there had been girls. Girls who followed him, fascinated by his quiet intensity. But that fragile connection had long since withered. They would have come to understand the stark reality: marrying Joric meant an unending exile to this lonely pinnacle. “Do not dwell on such matters with negativity, Joric. Who knows? A traveler may pass this way, and an unexpected connection might bloom.” Kaelen’s words were kind, but the thought was absurd. In eighteen years, only Kaelen himself had traversed this far-flung path. After a shared silence, broken only by the crackle of the fire, Joric spoke again, his voice low. “Why do you go to such lengths, Ser Kaelen?” Kaelen raised an eyebrow. “Lengths?” “The Thane of the canton… whatever he promised you, your abilities, your speed… you could earn far more, with far less effort.” Joric’s gaze was direct. In any village, a man of Kaelen’s obvious prowess could settle, demand tribute, protection offered in exchange for wealth and comfort. The villagers of the canton, with their open resentment towards Joric, hardly deserved Kaelen’s selfless protection. Indeed, Kaelen's presence at Joric's humble home was itself a testament to the canton’s avarice, having demanded an exorbitant price for a mere night’s lodging. If Joric possessed Kaelen’s strength, he would have simply taken what he needed, then departed. “They are a pitiable people,” Kaelen said, his voice soft, almost a murmur. “In what way?” “Living in this remote frontier, every day, they tremble. Without the shielding hand of a protector, the Dominion’s fringes are unforgiving.” Kaelen leaned forward, his expression earnest, as if explaining a fundamental truth to a son. While Veridian’s Ascent was barren, the wildlands beyond teemed with threats. He spoke of monstrous beasts, unseen predators that stalked the fertile plains, preying on the helpless. Kaelen described it as the inherent 'pride' of a Sentinel, one who had once pledged to uphold the Dominion's peace, to shield the common folk from such dangers. Even though he no longer served a noble House, he could not simply turn away. This account clashed sharply with his mother’s teachings. Her words painted Architects as oppressors, Sentinels as their brutal enforcers. That was the truth, wasn’t it? Joric’s confusion must have shown on his face. Kaelen smiled, a gentle crinkle at the corners of his eyes, and pushed a bowl of thick sheep’s milk toward him. “Not every soul views the world as I do. For every ten thousand lives, Joric, there are ten thousand distinct philosophies. The Dominion is vast.” --- Dawn painted the Skyward Spires in hues of rose and gold. Joric, with a quiet, precise gesture, cleared the sheep pen. The accumulated dung and soiled straw, lifted by an imperceptible current, drifted to the composting pit behind the house. Once dried by the Ascent’s arid winds, it would make fine fuel for the hearth. His thoughts, however, clung to the night’s conversation. *Pride.* Kaelen’s conviction had left a profound impression. To imagine a Sentinel not as a mere instrument of the Architect’s will, but as a guardian, finding purpose in protecting the vulnerable… it was a perspective that softened the rigid edges of his own world-view. Perhaps, if men like Kaelen truly existed, life under the Dominion’s distant rule might not be entirely bleak. *Still, how to inform him of the mountain cat?* Joric mused. His initial plan had been to let Kaelen search, eventually move on. But to allow a man of such quiet integrity to waste his precious time on a fruitless quest… he could not. Days had passed since Joric had flung the mountain cat’s lifeless form into a remote ravine. Retrieving the rotting carcass would be arduous. Worse, the precise, unignorable traces of his Scion-work, the subtle distortions of reality still clinging to the beast, would instantly expose him. Anyone investigating a potent force in these wilds would inevitably track the disturbance back to him. With a sigh, Joric finished his chore. A little time remained before the herd needed tending. He considered seeking out Kaelen. The old Sentinel had spoken of patrolling closer to the Ascent today, making him easier to locate. Joric closed his eyes, centering his will. He stretched his awareness beyond his skin, beyond the confines of sight and sound, drawing the very threads of perception taut, forming a net of heightened senses. He reached, silently, for the distinct, radiating patterns of vital force – the 'life-threads' of humanity. *A human presence…* His internal compass spun, searching. Then, a sharp, disquieting resonance. His awareness snapped toward it. He opened his eyes, vision expanding, sharpening, piercing the early morning haze. Not merely seeing, but *perceiving* the delicate, intricate patterns of the world, filtering them. The rustle of a beetle’s chitin, the faint pulse of sap in a distant tree – all faded to background hums. Only the vibrant, yet strangely fractured, life-signature of Kaelen remained clear. And the dissonant, terrible resonance that now surrounded it. He saw Kaelen. The old Sentinel gasped for breath, blood streaking his forehead, staining the shoulder of his tunic. Facing him, a horrifying, half-decayed form. The mountain cat. It roared, a guttural sound torn from a ruined throat, its eyes glowing with an unholy, malevolent light. --- *Who would perpetrate such a desecration?* Kaelen gritted his teeth, his grip tight on his sword, as he confronted the unwoven revenant of the mountain cat. When a creature of the wild falls, its residual life-force, the very essence of its existence, often clings to its dying will. This raw, untethered energy, untended, could forcibly reanimate the fractured body, creating an abomination – an unwoven revenant. For this reason, any true hunter, any who understood the inherent patterns of life and death, would always disperse or absorb the lingering essence of a felled beast. It was a matter of respect, and self-preservation. But whoever had struck down this mountain cat had either been woefully ignorant, or deliberately malicious. Given the precise, devastating wound in its skull, it pointed to a practitioner of the subtle arts. A Scion, perhaps, though one with a bizarre disregard for consequence. [—GRRRROWL!—] The revenant shrieked, a deafening sound that ripped through the quiet morning, echoing like the wail of the damned across the empty hills. The comparison felt grimly appropriate. “Take this, foul thing!” Kaelen shouted, bracing for its charge. With a battle cry, he lunged.

Unfolding Threads, Undead Shadows