Chapter 16 – Wings of Vengeance
The march eastward was slow, not from weakness but intention. Seren wanted the vampires to see them coming.
Let them hear the thunder of dragon wings before they ever saw fire.
Let them feel dread bloom like rot in their bones.
The Thornbearer was done hiding.
The Crimson Accord now rode behind her like an army reborn. Their numbers had swelled with every village passed, every fire rekindled in old hearths. Survivors — battered but unbroken — joined them, following the girl with thorns in her crown and dragons at her back.
But shadows moved too. Silent and cruel.
And one of them was stalking Seren.
---
Nyara was the first to sense it.
She'd grown up with ghosts in the alleys of dead cities. She knew the scent of danger, the weight of being hunted. For two nights she felt it — eyes in the trees, a breeze too still, a crack of bone just out of rhythm with the world.
But she said nothing at first.
Because part of her feared who it might be.
And part of her hoped.
---
On the third night, Seren stood alone near a stream, the stars caught in her hair, flame dancing over her skin in slow pulses like a heartbeat.
She was trying to stay calm — to forget the dream, the black fire, the way her body had trembled when Aru'vethra touched her in that unreal vision.
But she couldn't shake it.
She knew he was watching her.
Even now.
"You've changed," a voice said behind her.
She spun, flame blazing in her palm — only to freeze.
A figure stepped into view.
Cloaked in midnight leather. Eyes sharp as broken glass. A face half-covered in a jagged burn.
Laziel.
Once her sword-brother. Now… what?
"Is this where you kill me?" Seren asked coldly.
He chuckled. "If I wanted to kill you, you'd already be bleeding."
"Then why are you here?"
"I came to see what kind of monster you've become."
---
Kael found them minutes later — his hand on his blade, eyes narrowed.
Laziel smirked. "Easy, wolf. I'm not here to bite."
"You shouldn't be here at all," Kael growled. "After what you did in the Iron Vale—"
"I did what was necessary," Laziel snapped. "You're too soft to understand."
Seren raised a hand. "Stop. Both of you."
She stepped forward, close enough to see the regret in Laziel's eyes… and the rage behind it.
"You left me to die," she whispered.
"I saved you," he said. "From yourself."
"I didn't ask to be saved."
"No," he murmured. "You asked to be feared."
A beat passed.
Then, quietly: "I'm not here to stop you, Seren. I'm here to join you."
---
The camp did not trust Laziel.
Whispers rose. The Accord's scouts remembered his betrayal in the eastern pass — how he'd defected to survive. How he left others behind.
But Seren… she saw something else.
A weapon. Flawed, yes. But sharp.
So she let him stay — with eyes on him at all times.
Nyara hated it. Kael didn't speak to Laziel at all.
But Seren knew war didn't give room for perfect allies.
Only useful ones.
---
That night, the shadows came.
Whispers in the fog. Pale eyes blinking from the trees. The chill of death and hunger crept over the camp.
The vampires had sent their first answer.
They came as specters — Silentborn. Assassins molded from nightmare and blood. Creatures that moved through mist and slit throats in silence.
Three guards died before a single alarm was raised.
By the time the camp stirred, the fog was thick with whispers.
And then fire screamed.
Seren burst from her tent in golden flame, her eyes burning.
Ashryx roared overhead, silver wings banishing the mist in great sweeping bursts of wind.
"TO ARMS!" Ronan's voice boomed.
Then came the screams.
---
Seren moved like a storm — fire trailing her fingers, her sword slicing the air. One of the Silentborn lunged at her — a pale blur with jagged teeth and needle-thin blades for fingers.
She caught it mid-air, flame engulfing its chest.
It shrieked and dissolved into ash.
Another came — this one faster, older.
Kael was suddenly beside her, blade meeting claw.
He didn't speak. He didn't need to.
They moved as one.
Slash. Flame. Parry. Burn.
Behind them, Nyara led a group of archers — her arrows tipped with dragonfire. Each one struck with a flash and scream.
The Accord held.
Barely.
---
Then she saw him.
A tall figure in black armor, face hidden behind a porcelain mask — unblinking, unmoving, watching from the ridge.
Not fighting.
Just watching.
Seren knew instantly who it was.
Varion.
One of Aru'vethra's champions. A ghost of the old vampire wars. A tactician and butcher.
Their eyes locked.
And then he vanished.
Not a retreat.
A promise.
---
By morning, a dozen soldiers were dead.
Two dozen more injured.
The Silentborn had retreated with the dawn, their purpose not to win, but to weaken.
To whisper fear into hearts.
But Seren stood atop the ridge as the sun rose, her golden fire still glowing.
"I want every scout doubled," she told Ronan.
"Done."
"Prepare the wounded for movement. We leave at dusk. No more nights in the open."
"And if they strike again?"
Seren turned to him.
"Then we make them regret ever waking me."
---
That day, Kael finally broke his silence.
"You're changing too fast," he said as they walked together.
Seren didn't look at him. "I don't have time to change slowly."
"You're forgetting who you were."
"I have to."
Kael stopped. "What if you forget who you are entirely?"
She stopped too.
"I already did. In that tower. When Aru'vethra took my brother. When he burned my home. When he carved the first rune into my spine."
Kael reached for her hand.
She didn't pull away.
But she didn't squeeze back either.
---
That night, they rode again.
Toward the Sunken Citadel.
Toward the oldest secret of the vampire bloodlines.
Toward war.