Another boulder hit Flameheart's front wall like a battering ram.
Stone cracked. Timber splintered. The inn's double doors burst inward, hanging by a hinge, and dust rolled across the common room.
Past the ruined threshold, men and shadows packed in, tightening the ring.
Bandits in mixed mail and leather. Between boots and table legs, blobs of darkness crawled and pooled—too thick, too deliberate to pass for shade. Hearthlight and lantern-glow thinned wherever it touched them.
Evan widened his stance with Ezra warm and limp on his back.
The boy slept through it.
Ezra slept hard.
Real sleep—heavy, body-first, the kind that came after hours of running, fear, and mana spent too close to empty.
His world narrowed to warmth and dark.
***
He was back in Castle Blackfyre.
Stone corridors. Locked doors. The nursery with a study's name nailed on it.
A voice came from below—calm, too close.
"Sire," Evan asked, like he was commenting on the weather. "What are you doing?"
Ezra froze and looked down.
Evan stood at the base of the door with his helm under one arm, gaze up, expression flat.
Third time, Ezra thought. Six months.
The first time Evan had been stunned. The second time annoyed.
This time he just looked tired.
Ezra cleared his throat, buying time like it mattered.
"Uhh. I'm going out," he said. "I want to see Bren."
Evan's brow lifted a fraction.
"Sire, it is good to see your domain," he said. "But Lady Blackfyre forbids you to go out."
Ezra's fingers tightened on the stone.
"But I'm bored," Ezra said. "There's nothing to do here, I want to conduct experiments. But the materials I need are banned from me. I can't do anything."
Evan exhaled through his nose. Evan had already come to terms with Ezra's tantrums. By now he even welcomed it; to him it was proof that even with all the knowledge and brilliance Ezra had, Ezra was still just a child.
Even a clever child still sulked when you said no.
"Mother's a killjoy," Ezra added, flat. "She banned half the things I need."
Evan didn't bristle at the insult.
"That may be true, Lord Ezra," he said carefully. "But she is looking out for you."
Ezra rolled his eyes and nearly lost his grip.
Evan's voice stayed calm. "The Lady loves you."
Ezra's face pinched. "I don't understand that."
Evan paused.
He checked the corridor and then he looked up again.
"It's not meant to be solved," he said. "It's meant to be felt."
"That's not helpful," Ezra shot back.
Evan's mouth twitched again—more like a small surrender than a smile.
"Love is work," he said. "The kind you do when it costs you."
Ezra stared down at him, waiting for the rest.
Evan gave it, but not as a lecture.
"Your mother and father don't sit in Bren for comfort," he said. "They settle disputes. They pay for roads. They keep grain moving when harvest fails. They listen to people who hate them and still fix what needs fixing."
He shifted his helm under his arm, grip tightening.
"I've seen them come back with blood on their cuffs and still go to council," he said. "They do it because Fulmen is theirs, and because the people in it are theirs."
Ezra's throat tightened.
On Earth, emotions had been background noise. Here they hit faster. Harder. The childish body didn't give him reprieve.
"Well," Ezra said, stalling, "uh… I guess. I wouldn't want them to get hurt. I know they try their best to help me. I really don't understand what love is."
Evan nodded once, like he'd expected that answer.
"You don't have to understand it," he said. "You just have to notice it when it's done."
Ezra went quiet.
He stared at the wall's rough stone as if it could answer him.
"I see," Ezra said finally.
He paused, then asked the question that it steered him toward.
"Have you ever been in love, Evan?"
Evan's ears turned red.
He cleared his throat.
"Well," he said, and there was the smallest hint of embarrassment, "I'll tell you… if you get down from there."
"Okay then."
Ezra hopped down.
His feet hit courtyard dirt. He sat in front of Evan like a child being told a story, legs out, hands in his lap.
Evan stared at him for a second, then looked away, jaw working once as if he'd decided something.
"I do have someone I love," Evan said, and he smiled.
"Oh?" Ezra leaned in, curious. "Tell me."
"She had flaxen hair," Evan said. "Warm smile. She would tell me off for the smallest things."
He shook his head once, fond and tired.
"She was kind-hearted," he went on, "but terrible when angered."
At that, Evan winced like a slap remembered.
"But she was my world."
Ezra's curiosity sharpened.
"What's her name?"
Evan's eyes went distant for a heartbeat.
"Carwen," he said.
He paused.
"She was my mother."
Ezra's face twisted.
"What?" he blurted. "That's gross."
Evan laughed—one short burst.
"Hah," he said. "I did say someone I love. Not someone I am in love with."
Ezra scowled.
"No fair," he said. "You caught me with semantics."
Evan's smile softened, and for once he let it stay.
"Well," he said, "my mother was a commoner. I truly loved her, even though sometimes she gave me a hard time."
His mouth tightened.
"But my father…"
Ezra watched him carefully.
Evan didn't look up this time.
"My father was probably Lady Aerwyna's uncle," he said. "He forced himself on my mother. He made her life hard by forcing her to have me."
Ezra went still.
"Mother is your cousin?" he asked, trying to parse the structure. "So you're my uncle? Wow. Shall I call you Uncle Evan?"
Evan's face shut down instantly.
"Nay, Lord Ezra," his voice said, and it shook despite him. "I can't claim kinship with the Lady. I am a bastard."
Ezra's anger flared.
"That's stupid," he said. "Whatever happens, family should still be family."
He clenched his small fists.
"You know what? Maybe I'll change how this stupid country is run someday."
Evan laughed again, but this time it wasn't teasing.
"Very well, Lord Ezra," he said. "I look forward to seeing that day come."
The courtyard wind shifted.
The dream's colors dulled.
***
Evered bought them the half-second they needed.
He stepped into the lane and threw his hand out.
"[Earth Wall]."
Stone surged up from the floorboards and the street grit, raw, fast, ugly. It rose between them and the nearest spill of darkness, a shoulder-high barrier that forced the shadow to detour.
It wasn't a solution.
It was time.
"Move," Rycharde snapped.
He hit the doorway first.
The warhammer led. The doorframe did not survive the impact. Wood split. Iron fittings shrieked. Rycharde drove through the opening like a battering ram and met the first man inside with the hammerhead.
The bandit—soldier in patched leather—barely got his weapon up.
The hammer took him square in the chest. Armor dented. Breath left in a wet grunt. He flew a few paces hard and didn't get up.
The space left by Rycharde was immediately filled up, as Deimos and Phobos rushed the gap. Their whips echoing in the moonlight acting as "suppressive fire."
Deimos and Phobos peeled off into the street to keep the lane from collapsing behind them.
Whips snapped out in alternating arcs—reach, coverage, denial. Leather and barbs cracked across forearms and faces. Men flinched back on reflex, hands coming up to guard eyes and throat. It was ugly work, efficient work. It bought space.
Rycharde didn't waste the space.
He found an earth-caster—hands up, mouth forming the next spell—and crossed the distance in two steps. The hammer came in an upward arc fast.
The helmless would-be bandit's face caved in.
Bone and blood sprayed the doorframe. The body folded.
Evan didn't chase kills, he guarded Ezra through the night.
He stood at the edge of the knot with Ezra in his arms, body turned so the child was shielded by his chest and shoulder. Ezra was still asleep, limp in the way only a child could be, cheek pressed to Evan's tunic.
Evan's eyes kept moving.
Left. Right. Door. Window. Shadow.
If something came in close, it would hit him first.
"Forward!" Oswyn barked.
Galwell and Dynham pushed through the opening with the others. Galwell's spear stayed level, not for thrusting yet—for denying a lane. Dynham hacked at hands and weapons that reached too far into their space, keeping the line from collapsing.
From farther down the street, village knights finally responded. Armored men spilled out from side alleys and doorways, drawn by the bell and the shouting.
"[Stone Barrage]!"
One, then two, then a small volley. Rock slugs punched into the press. One man dropped with his shoulder gone. Another spun and fell with his thigh shattered.
The attackers gave ground by instinct, they recoiled but didn't retreat but this was enough.
"Go," Evan said, and shifted Ezra onto his back.
The child swayed with the run, arms slack at first. Evan tightened the wrap—one forearm across Ezra's legs, the other keeping his balance and his weapon free. Ezra's hands found cloth on reflex and clenched.
They broke into a run toward the administrative district.
More darkness followed them.
It didn't sprint like a man. It flowed along the edges—behind carts, under awnings, between doorways—always trying to pull them into a narrower lane.
Deimos and Phobos covered the rear.Oswyn kept his polearm forward as they ran. Evered ran tight on the right with his polearm, ready.
They weren't worried about the men with steel. Those could be cut down.
They were worried about the dark catching them where the lamps thinned and the streets pinched into alleys. Everyone had spent mana in Irriton. No one was back to full.
Evan still had more than most. Ezra had drilled it into him: don't smear mana through the whole body. Seat it where it pays.
He kept it in his legs and lungs—thigh and calf for the drive, foot on the strike, breath paced so he didn't gas out. The rest of him stayed quiet. It burned less, and carried him farther.
Ahead, the administrative district rose out of the town like a hard knot—wider streets, better stone, more lamps. A place built for records and taxes and men who liked clean lines.
Evan's fingers brushed the token at his belt.
Reitz's mark. Authority on metal.
Help was there if he showed it.
And if he showed it, he declared what he was. Declared who they were.
Tonight, that could cut both ways.
Protect Ezra. Survive. Get to light.
Behind them, Rycharde threw [Fire ball] over his shoulder as they ran—tight, controlled shots meant to shove the dark away, not burn half the town down.
The flames flared against the street and the corners brightened for a heartbeat. The pursuing shadows recoiled, thinning at the edges, forced to re-form behind cover.
They hit the administrative district and felt the pressure ease.
More lamps. More open ground. Fewer places for the dark to pool.
Then the arrow came.
A hiss from above. A hard impact.
Galwell jerked and stumbled, hand snapping to his stomach. Blood spread fast through his shirt.
An arrow stuck up landing cleanly piercing his gambeson.
He made a sound through his teeth—more irritation than pain—and stayed on his feet.
"Contact!" Oswyn snapped, already turning his polearm up toward the rooftops.
Knights stationed in the district were fully awake now. They flooded the street, shields up, bows coming to shoulder. A few loosed at the roofline where the shot had come from.
"Galwell," Dynham said, voice tight.
Galwell forced air in and out, testing. He looked down once, then back up, pain had seared at his side.
"I'm still up, I've paid worse," Galwell rasped. "Eyes on the roofs."
They tightened formation around him anyway, weapons up, eyes searching roof edges and dark windows for the next shot.