Chapter 72

  I had been taken away exactly three times in my life.

  The first time, I was still a teenager. Back then, I knew nothing of gods, of honor, or even of draconic curses. I was just a boy with quick fingers, a big mouth, and an even bigger lack of foresight.

  In a dusty trade town—Talwern, I think—I stole a gold coin from the satchel of a fat, snorting merchant. Not just any coin. No. His coin. His favorite. With his family crest, the imprint of his deceased father, or whatever sentimental value he claimed it had. Of course, he immediately raised the alarm. And of course, I was a few steps too slow.

  The unlucky part? It was exactly one day after my fifteenth birthday—the day when, according to local law, you were suddenly old enough to spend two full days in jail, instead of just getting a warning. So I sat there, 48 hours between a drooling thief and an older man who cursed softly every time he moved. A glorious experience. But in hindsight, it was nothing. Absolutely nothing.

  The second time happened many years later. I was already searching. Hunting. Zarkhural had long become more than a name—he was an obsession, a burning thorn in my mind. I’d found no trace for months—only rumors, legends, false leads.

  Then came this stranger. Hood drawn deep, voice rasping like a raven’s call. He claimed to have information. About Zarkhural. About his spawning ground. About the place where all fire dragons were supposedly born. I... I believed him. I gave him half of everything I had. In a stable, in the dead of night, no witnesses.

  A day later, I was arrested. Allegedly for “unauthorized information trade in the context of noble security”—or some similarly bloated bureaucratic nonsense. Turns out, the man was a spy in the service of House Raeglor.

  The local lords saw me as nothing more than a nervous wanderer with weapons and a focused stare. That I was a Paladin, from the Order of the Eagle? That my sword hilt bore the symbol of the Eternal Sky? They didn’t care. Or they pretended not to, which was worse. I spent two weeks in the tower prison of Hargem. Two weeks in which I swore never to be so gullible again. And again: I was wrong.

  Because the third time was... different. Worse. Not because I was hurt. Not because I was imprisoned for particularly long. But because it was... embarrassing. No—humiliating.

  I had reached an absolute low point. No goal. No camp. No message. No lead. I was alone, with nothing but a sleepy Gravor in my mind and a cloak too thin for the southern nights.

  My supplies were gone, my morale too. In a nameless small town—maybe called Herwald or Harn—I drank away my last coins. Three mugs of beer, stale, bitter, but fiery. I was drunk, broken, disappointed in everything. And somehow, in myself.

  I woke the next morning between garbage sacks, under a torn piece of canvas that might once have been a market tarp. My back hurt. My lips were dry. And my head—empty. Full of fog. I had no strength left to believe. No goal to carry me. No silver in my pockets. And not a spark of hope left to lift me to my feet.

  What I did then... was stupid. No—absurd. A decision born of greed, anger, exhaustion, pride, fatigue, and a generous helping of self-pity. I don’t even remember the name of the bank. Only the face of the cashier, the way she looked at me when I stepped through the door, sword drawn—my holy sword!—and shouted at her to open the vault.

  The other customers screamed. One fell over. I... I remember stumbling. I fell too. Slipped on a wet stone and landed face-first on the ground.

  By the time I got up, two guards were already behind me. Swords drawn. Their expressions somewhere between pity and horror.

  I was arrested before I could say a word. I hadn’t even raised my sword. I said no spell. I prayed not. I did not fight.

  A Paladin. A Paladin of the Order of the Eagle, defeated by his own pride. And by the damp cobblestone in front of a godsdamned small-town bank.

  -

  This was the fourth time I’d been taken into custody. More or less.

  It wasn’t a brutal affair. No fists pounding, no blood, no cold iron around my neck. But the walk—that damned walk—between raised spears and overly confident guards felt like a chain around my soul.

  And yes, I remembered. I remembered what it was like the first time I got dragged off. And especially the third time. The incident. The lowest point of my life—one I could laugh about now, if I’d had enough wine. But back then, it made me question everything.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  I wasn’t that pitiful swine anymore. I wasn’t the desperate man, blinded by rage, who robbed a bank in a moment of madness just to get his hands on a few silver coins.

  I was a Paladin. A warrior with a past, with scars, with fury—and with power.

  The guards could surround me, could “escort” me, as they liked to say. But they weren’t taking in a beggar.

  They were taking me.

  My black armor—now a scorched craft of hardened lizard-steel with a reinforced silver core—clinked softly with every step. It wasn’t the gleaming archgold plate I once wore as a true Paladin. That armor I had pawned off long before the so-called bank robbery—traded to a blacksmith for a roof over my head and half a meal.

  Well. I swore back then I’d never fall that far again. And I’d kept that promise.

  The camp itself was surprisingly... calm.

  To the north, rows of tents lined up, some crudely stitched, others unexpectedly neat. Outside—and even inside—children played. Not pale shadows of children, but real ones. They laughed. Threw stones, chased each other, got into mischief. Between them sat adults. Men, women, elders—some scarred, some with instruments in hand.

  A man was carving a flute. A woman mended a dress. Two young guys quietly argued over some game. A mother fed her toddler steaming porridge.

  And still: weapons everywhere.

  Spears leaned against tent poles. The players wore daggers on their belts. A pot of soup simmered right next to a disassembled bow being waxed.

  Even the kids played with wooden swords.

  We walked on, accompanied by our new “friends,” whose spear tips never quite stopped pressing into our backs.

  The atmosphere shifted. The tents gave way to massive wooden huts—roughly built but sturdy. Outside them: soldiers.

  Real soldiers.

  They didn’t just wear armor—they inhabited it. Every movement was trained. Some sat in a circle, sharpening swords with practiced precision. Others smoked or chewed on dried meat. Two played a dice game, cursing more than laughing. One was reading a book. Another pair argued in whispers—over a map spread out between them on the dirt.

  And I couldn’t deny it: this wasn’t a bunch of peasants with too much courage. This was a functioning community. A stronghold. A bulwark. An army in the making—or a revolution.

  At last, we reached the heart of the camp.

  A wide, open square. In the center: a campfire—not just any fire, but one of those ritual ones, large enough to warm a troll. The ground around it was trampled by countless boots, mixed with glowing ash.

  Behind the fire stood a broad wooden platform, dark timber carved with symbols along the edges—not runes or sigils I recognized. More like... crests? Clan marks?

  That’s where we were stopped.

  The oldest of the guards—a guy with a graying beard and a visibly crooked nose—turned, signaled for us to halt with a gesture, and spoke in the tone of a man who liked to sound more important than he was:

  “Wait here.”

  Then he walked off. Slowly. Not rushed, not alarmed—no. Leisurely.

  I raised an eyebrow, snorted softly, and rolled my eyes. Wait here. Really? As if we had a choice. As if we were just going to turn around and stroll out of a fortress surrounded by a hundred guards, maybe mages, and gods know what else, just because we were bored.

  “What the hell else were we supposed to do?” I muttered, mostly to myself.

  No one answered. So we stood there. And waited.

  Maira stood to my right. Her arms were loosely crossed over her chest, one foot slightly turned outward, as if this were a sunny spring day in a garden—and not the tense center of a rebel camp.

  She looked calm. No—too calm. Almost relaxed.

  And she was smiling.

  Not forced. Not faked. A real, quiet smile. The kind she wore when something genuinely pleased her.

  I glanced at her out of the corner of my eye, and that smile... made me nervous.

  Not because I didn’t trust her—on the contrary. Ever since that day at the inn, when she explained to me that those who used sacrificial rituals, tainted mana, and even some blood witches weren’t automatically evil, my view on many things had begun to change.

  I didn’t believe everything at once. But I started to listen.

  And she had never lied. Not about the things that mattered.

  By now, I trusted her in every battle, with every decision, with every twist where others would have hesitated.

  We had both touched the darkness—in different ways. And we had both learned how to survive it without belonging to it.

  But... sometimes her secrets bothered me. Like now.

  That utterly calm smile. That knowledge in her eyes.

  She knew something. And I didn’t. And that bothered me.

  Because it meant she already understood the next step. That she wouldn’t be surprised.

  That she was... happy.

  Happy about what? What did she know? What had she seen, felt, dreamed—or learned from Erebos?

  I briefly considered speaking to her. A half-sentence hovered on my tongue:

  “What do you know?”

  But I swallowed it.

  Instead, I exhaled slowly, relaxed my grip around my sword hilt, and decided—like so many times before—to simply trust her.

  And then, not even half a breath later, the guard returned. Not in a rush. Not fearful. With even steps, the guy with the crooked nose made his way back through the camp. He barely looked at us, as if we didn’t matter in the slightest.

  But behind him—it happened.

  Someone stepped through the doorway.

  Slower. More dignified. But with a self-assurance that made my shoulders tense for a moment.

  A face. Radiant. Far too familiar. Vin.

  And not in chains. Not bound. Not bruised, not beaten, not dragged along in silence.

  No—she walked freely. She didn’t look like a prisoner. Not even like a hostage. She looked... at home.

  Her eyes found mine first—then Maira’s—then scanned the surroundings.

  A flicker of surprise in her gaze, maybe even relief.

  And my whole body tensed—not out of fear, but because of a single thought slowly forming in my mind again:

  This… had never been a rescue. It was a reunion.