CHAPTER TWELVE - The Road to the Bloodforge
The stars above the desert did not twinkle.
They blazed.
Cold and merciless, they watched the caravan leave Maravelle in the dead of night—silent as secrets, cloaked in heat shimmer and warding spells. Wind whispered through dunes like distant voices, and every step further from the city felt like peeling back a layer of the known.
Eira rode at the front.
Her horse, a pale dusk-colored mare named Ashra, was restless beneath her—a creature forged for speed, for fleeing. But Eira did not run.
She hunted.
Beside her, Naima adjusted her riding gloves, jaw tight.
Behind them, only five Daughters rode—handpicked, bound to silence. Not one questioned where they were going.
Because they all knew.
The Obsidian Wastes.
The graveyard of magic.
And beyond them: the Bloodforge.
---
A Letter Unread
Kael had left her a note.
It still sat in Eira's saddlebag, sealed with wax, unopened.
He'd written it before she left his side, knowing he might not wake again while she was gone. She couldn't bring herself to break the seal.
Not yet.
Because if it said goodbye, she wasn't sure she could breathe.
---
The Wastes
On the third night, the sand turned black.
Ash instead of earth.
Ruins rose from the ground like broken teeth—old watchtowers crumbled sideways, doorways to nowhere half-buried beneath dunes. Strange sigils still glowed faintly, twisted by time, crawling across the stone like vines of memory.
Naima's horse stopped.
"Do you feel that?"
Eira did.
The fire inside her dulled. Dimmed.
"Magic dies here," Naima whispered. "It's not a myth. It's a promise."
Eira stared out at the wasteland.
And rode on.
---
The Guardian of the Forge
They found him on the fifth day.
Standing in the center of a crater made of cooled magma, where nothing grew and even the wind seemed afraid to whisper.
He looked human—tall, cloaked in dark green robes scorched at the hems. His face was ageless, hair silver but skin unmarred.
Eyes like twin shards of obsidian.
Naima dismounted slowly. "That's not possible."
Eira turned to her. "Who is he?"
Naima's voice was a breath:
"His name was Thorne."
Eira's breath hitched.
She knew that name.
Her mother had whispered it once—on a rainy night in a lullaby of grief.
"Thorne of the Seven Flames. Thorne the Unmaker."
He was not just a guardian.
He was a weapon.
---
Thorne Speaks
"You came to sever a soul," he said.
His voice was deep—honey and iron. It echoed in the air as if the desert itself listened.
Eira nodded.
"I came to save someone."
Thorne tilted his head. "And in doing so… are you willing to lose him?"
She flinched. "What do you mean?"
"The Bloodforge gives what it takes," he said. "You may break a bond. But something must break in return."
Eira stood tall. "What's the price?"
Thorne's smile was sad.
"The memory of him. From your mind."
---
A Choice That Hurts
Naima gasped. "You can't be serious—"
But Thorne raised a hand, silencing her.
"If you forge the blade and sever his tether to the Queen… he will live. But you will forget. Every kiss. Every word. Every flicker of feeling."
Eira's heart thudded like a drum in her ribs.
"How much time do I have to decide?"
Thorne turned his back, gesturing toward the forge—an obsidian door half-buried in stone.
"Until dawn. After that, the forge closes. For a hundred years."
---
That Night
Eira sat beneath the stars, holding Kael's letter in shaking hands.
She broke the seal.
Inside, his handwriting was neat. Careful.
"If you're reading this, it means you're already doing something reckless. Which is entirely in character."
"I used to think love was something only warm people got to have. People born soft. Born bright. But then you burned into my life, and now… I can't unsee you in my every corner."
"If I die, I want you to know: I would choose this pain a thousand times over if it meant I got to love you once."
"But if I live… let me love you again. Even if it's from the beginning."
Eira folded the letter, tears trailing silently down her cheeks.
Then she stood.
And walked into the forge.
---
The Blade Forged in Grief
Thorne guided her to the center of the chamber—a circular room with no ceiling, no sun, no wind. Just flame. It rose from a deep well, not hot, not cold.
Just pure.
She stepped into it.
Fire kissed her skin, did not burn it.
And then she reached into her chest—not literally, but deeper—and pulled him out.
Every moment. Every touch. Every look Kael had ever given her, she drew into a thread of light and wrapped it around the blade.
When the sword took form, it shimmered like frost and flicker.
Beautiful.
And empty.
She collapsed to her knees, breathing heavy.
Thorne caught her.
"Who are you?" he asked softly.
Eira blinked.
"…I don't know."
---
Back in Maravelle
Kael woke up screaming.
The pain was gone.
The mark—gone.
He clutched at his chest, panting, and looked to the door.
Where Eira stood.
Alive.
Eyes empty.
Smile distant.
"Who…?" she whispered.
Kael stared.
And his heart shattered.