The first banner fell before the first blade was drawn.
Rhen saw it clearly—the Moonbound sigil stitched in silver thread snapping loose from its pole as a gust tore through the ranks. It tumbled down the ridge like a wounded bird, landing at the feet of a fisherman who stared at it as if it had teeth.
Omen, Rhen thought.
Nymera felt it too. The bond tightened, a quiet warning threading through her spine. The tidefire along her arms dimmed—not from weakness, but from restraint. She was holding back. They both were.
Across the broken plain, the Elders' Vanguard advanced in disciplined lines. Wolves in half-shifted forms moved with brutal precision, armor etched with runes meant to suppress magic. Among them marched humans bound by oath and fear, carrying relic-weapons dredged up from wars no one admitted to remembering.
At their head rode Eldric Moonthane, First Blade of the Elders.
Rhen's stomach clenched. He knew that name. Every wolf-child did.
Eldric dismounted slowly, silver eyes scanning the gathered crowd—merfolk hovering near the surf, wolves bristling on the rocks, humans standing uncertainly between. His gaze finally settled on Rhen and Nymera.
"Step aside," Eldric commanded, voice carrying without effort. "This gathering is unlawful."
Nymera lifted her chin. "So was the lie you built your peace on."
A ripple of murmurs followed.
Eldric's expression did not change. "You speak treason in a fragile place, Princess."
Rhen stepped forward, teeth bared just enough to show he was not bluffing. "You brought an army to silence two people. Who's fragile?"
A few wolves shifted uneasily. Others stiffened, waiting for permission to hate.
Eldric raised a hand. The Vanguard halted in perfect unison.
"Rhen of the Broken Line," Eldric said. "You were born from cursed blood and raised beyond our law. You have no authority here."
Rhen laughed, low and sharp. "Funny. You sound afraid of something that doesn't answer to you."
Nymera felt the bond hum, a current gathering strength. She reached for the Voice—not to command the sea, but to steady herself. The urge to sing—to end this in one sweeping, terrible wave—pressed hard against her restraint.
Not yet, Rhen sent through the bond.
She trusted him.
Eldric turned his gaze to the crowd. "You have been shown illusions," he called. "Echoes twisted by forbidden magic. Do not be deceived. The Convergence ends only one way—with annihilation."
A fisherman shouted back, "That's not what we saw!"
A mermaid's voice followed, trembling but fierce. "We felt the truth in the current!"
Eldric's jaw tightened. "Then you will feel correction."
He dropped his hand.
The Vanguard moved.
Rhen didn't think—he shifted.
The wolf surged through him, not tearing him apart, but aligning. Bones cracked and reformed in a controlled, brutal harmony. Fur rippled across his skin, silver-black under the veiled moon. When he landed, claws gouging stone, he was neither beast nor man—but something forged between.
Nymera gasped—not in fear, but awe. Through the bond, she felt his control. His clarity.
Rhen roared, and the sound carried authority the packs recognized instinctively.
The first clash was chaos.
Moonbound wolves collided with wild packs, steel rang against claw, and the air filled with the sharp scent of blood and ozone. Humans scattered, some fleeing, some dragged into the fray by oaths they'd never fully understood.
Nymera moved.
She stepped to the water's edge and sang—not a scream, not a command, but a thread. The sea answered gently, rising just enough to form a living barrier between the battle and the civilians. Waves curved like shields. Foam hardened into translucent walls.
"Stay back!" she called. "No more deaths for your lies!"
Eldric cut through the melee toward Rhen, blade humming with suppression runes. He moved like a man who had never doubted his right to win.
Their weapons met—claw against steel—and the impact sent a shock through the ground.
"You could have been great," Eldric snarled. "Instead you chose her."
Rhen shoved him back, muscles burning. "I chose the truth."
Eldric's blade flashed. Rhen twisted—but not fast enough. Steel bit into his side, the rune flaring cold. Pain lanced through him, sharp and numbing.
Nymera screamed.
The bond flared violently, tidefire exploding outward. The sea surged, not as a wave, but as a pressure—pinning Vanguard soldiers where they stood, stealing breath without crushing bone.
"Stop!" Nymera cried, voice shaking with fury and fear. "You will not take him!"
Eldric staggered, eyes wide—not at the water, but at Nymera.
"So it's true," he breathed. "The Bridge bleeds when one does."
Rhen forced himself upright, blood dark against fur. He met Eldric's gaze and understood the danger.
"They'll hurt me to control her," he sent through the bond.
Nymera's resolve hardened like ice beneath flame.
She stepped forward, voice dropping into a register that vibrated the air. "Enough."
The battlefield stilled.
Nymera lifted her hands—and showed them everything.
Not images this time. Feelings.
The suffocation of silence.
The weight of inherited lies.
The grief of choosing duty over love and watching the world burn anyway.
The bond amplified it, carried it outward—not as domination, but as shared truth.
Wolves dropped their weapons.
Merfolk wept openly.
Humans fell to their knees, clutching their chests as understanding hit them like a tide.
Eldric staggered, dropping his blade. "What are you doing?" he whispered, terrified.
Nymera's eyes burned—not with cruelty, but with sorrow. "Ending it."
Rhen stepped beside her, wounded but unbroken. He placed a bloodied hand over the sigil on his chest.
"We are not your enemy," he said. "But we won't be your weapon."
Silence followed—thick, trembling.
Then a howl rose—not of rage, but of mourning.
One by one, the Vanguard lowered their heads.
Eldric sank to his knees, the fight gone from him. "If the Elders learn of this…"
"They already have," a new voice said.
Azkarel emerged at the cliff's edge, the sea bowing around him. His gaze swept the battlefield, heavy with judgment.
"The first blood has been spilled," the Warden intoned. "And the world has felt the cost."
Nymera closed her eyes, exhaustion crashing into her. Rhen caught her as she swayed, holding her tight.
The battle was over.
The war had just begun.