What does it feel like to be strong?

  I’ve asked myself that question more times than I t.

  Is it the weight of a sword in my hands? The raw power of my muscles pushing past their limit? The knowledge that I stand my ground while others fall?

  Or is it something deeper?

  I didn’t have time to find an answer.

  The air was thick with the st of blood and damp earth. My arms burned, muscles screaming for rest, but there was no time.

  The creatures kept ing.

  Low growls rumbled across the battlefield, a storm rolling in from the sea.

  They were fast—faster than a man, faster than a horse. Thick, sinewy legs coiled beh scaled bodies, propelling them forward with terrifying speed. Their hides shimmered with an almost metallic sheen, blending into the mud and rock of Valkthara’s war-torn pins.

  Their elongated skulls, filled with rows of jagged teeth, snapped hungrily as they circled us.

  Sch?delwyrms.

  Skull Serpents.

  They moved in packs, swarming like locusts, sshing with razor-sharp cws, tearing through armor like wet part.

  I swung my bde in a desperate arc, cutting deep into the neck of one lunging at me. Its screech split the air as it colpsed, thick, bed blood spraying ay face.

  Another Sch?delwyrm screeched and lunged.

  We moved together, just like we always did.

  We weren’t knights. We weren’t heroes.

  Just soldiers.

  Front feeders.

  The ones who died first so the ones behind us could keep fighting.

  It had been a year sihe Last Demon War. Sihe final demon of this realm had fallen.

  The Heroes of the Realm had saved us. Legends who would be remembered forever. They had defeated the Harbinger of Wrath, vanquished the greatest threat this world had ever known.

  My Kingdom, Valkenheim had overworked their soldiers to up the rest of Astoroth’s soldiers that were trying to quer us. But thankfully, reatest soldier had es bad finish them all by himself.

  A—peace was still a hard price to pay.

  The nd of Valkthara was still overrun with beasts. The war had ended, but the battles never did.

  Every fight blurred into the .

  We fought because we had to. Because no one else would.

  Rikard covered my blind spots. I watched his back.

  That was how we survived.

  By the time the st Sch?delwyrm fell, my hands were numb from the stant csh of steel against flesh. My breath came in ragged gulps.

  Rikard leaned on his swrinning through the exhaustion.

  “Still alive?”

  I wiped the sweat from my brow.

  “Unfortunately.”

  He chuckled, shaking his head. Then, after a pause, he looked at me—really looked at me. The grin faded.

  “You holding up?”

  The question caught me off guard, and I hated that it did. Rikard never asked shit like that. He never o. He just assumed I was fihe same way I assumed he was.

  I forced a smirk. “I’m not dead yet.”

  “That’s not what I asked.”

  His voice was quieter now, g its usual teasing edge. I pretended not to notice. Instead, I sheathed my sword and rolled my shoulders, stretg out the stiffness. “e o’s move before more of these things show up.”

  Rikard watched me for a sed longer before sighing. “Yeah, alright.”

  I could tell he didn’t believe me. But he didn’t push.

  Good.

  Because the truth was, I wasn’t okay.

  None of us were.

  Rikard and I had been fighting side by side for years. From the first day of scription, we had each other’s backs. We had ughed together, bled together. Survived together.

  And I would do anything to make sure he kept surviving.

  Even if I knew—deep down—that we were both just on fodder.

  Front feeders. Desigo die first.

  We weren’t even appointed by the King himself. Hell, I doubted the bastard even knew we existed.

  No, we were sent here by some lower-ranking officer, probably some ander of a ander—one of the tless men who sat behind thick stone walls and pushed pieces across a war map like they were pying a game. I didn’t even remember his name. Just another voice barking orders, sending us to fight, expeg us to die.

  Rikard thought it was worth it.

  “We’re proteg the Kingdom. If we don’t hold the line, people die.”

  That was what he believed. That this was for the good of Valkenheim—reat and noble kingdom, if you believed the songs. The st stronghold in Valkthara, a pce g to stay above the tide of mohat had e spilling across its nds.

  And I?

  I wasn’t so different. I had that same sense of duty, that same instinct to protect. It was why I joihe army in the first pce. It was why I still swung my sword every day, despite knowing I was just a nameless soldier, easily repced.

  But months had passed.

  We had been killing these things for what felt like forever. We were supposed to be clearing our way to their ir—finding their breeding grounds, their s, whatever abyss these creatures crawled from, and putting ao them food.

  But it never happened.

  Every time we thought we were getting close, more of them came. The tide never ended. We kept hag, kept bleeding, kept dying—until it felt like the only thio do was die.

  Maybe that was the point.

  Maybe we were never meant to win.

  “Look!”

  Rikard’s voice rang out over the battlefield, sharp with urgency. He pointed ahead, toward a gaping cave carved into the jagged cliffs. Dark. Uninviting. The kind of pce you stepped into and never came back from.

  Behind us, five other soldiers staggered in the mud. Same rank as us. Same exhaustion weighing them down. Their armor was deheir swords dulled from overuse. None of them looked in any dition to keep fighting. But we had no choice.

  Rikard didn’t hesitate. He moved forward, leading the way, his grip steady on his sword.

  And like always, I followed.

  I hate to admit it, but Rikard—my best friend, my brother in all but blood—is strohan me.

  He’s saved my ass more times than I t. Too many to repay. Too many to even think of evening the score. I owe him my life.

  But as I watch his back, cutting through the mist, fearless as always—I feel envy.

  I want to be strong too.

  I want to be the one proteg him, the oandiween Valkenheim and the things that would tear it apart. I want to be something more than just another soldier waiting to die.

  But who am I kidding?

  I trained harder than anyone in the barracks. I pushed myself until my body screamed for rest, until my hands blistered and my lungs burned. A, I’m still weak.

  Every fight leaves me gasping for air, my arms heavy, my sword dragging. My body ’t keep up, no matter how much I push it.

  Maybe this is just who I am.

  Maybe I was never meant to be strong.

  Maybe I was just destio be weak.

  The cave swallowed us whole. Cold. Damp. The kind of darkhat g to your skin like a sed yer.

  “Give us some light,” Rikard muttered.

  One of the soldiers—Lukas, I think his name was—lifted his hand. Fire bloomed from his palm, ing around his fingers like a living thing. It flickered and danced, casting jagged shadows across the stone walls. Yet he didn’t flinch. Didn’t burn.

  He pushed forward, being uiding light.

  I ched my jaw, watg the fmes. Ahing I’d never have.

  Magic was something you were either born with or without. No training, no amount of willpower could ge that. If you weren’t gifted with it at birth, that was it. You’d never feel the hum of mana in your veins, never and fire, ice, htning. Never be anything more than a man with a sword.

  They must be chosen.

  It wasn’t even ied, either. Rikard’s parents were both powerful mages, legends in their ht. Yet Rikard? He couldn’t jure a flicker of fme. Not even the most basic spell.

  Good thing the gods made up for it by giving him a warrior’s body. If he had magi top of his swordsmanship, he’d be damn near unstoppable.

  “Stay sharp,” Rikard warned, his voice a low whisper.

  o remind us.

  We all knew something was here.

  The deeper we went, the colder it became. The walls closed in, pressing around us, the weight of the earth itself bearing down. Lukas’ fire barely pushed the darkness back—it felt like the cave wao swallow the light whole.

  And then came the sounds.

  Click. Click. Click.

  Faint at first. Just beyond the edge of the light.

  Then another. And another. Eg from deep within.

  The sound of cing against stone.

  Waiting. Watg.

  Hunting.