Chapter 62- Sand, Spite & Shadowed Roads

POV Sable

The wind over the desert road didn't whisper.

It hissed.

Like a curse slithering across scorched stone, wrapping around his horns and licking at the tips of his wings. The farther they rode from Aurealis, the more it felt like something was watching them. Not a presence. A memory.

The desert remembered what had been done here. And so did he.

Sable stood at the edge of a cracked ley line conduit, fists clenched at his sides. A once glowing channel of divine energy now sat dead and crumbling, severed like a vein. Its glow extinguished. Its pulse silent.

Behind him, Azarion crouched, studying the fracture. Flames flickered along his fingertips like his fury was barely held back. "This one was cut on purpose. With precision. Arcane sabotage."

Liam ran a hand along the edge of the damage, eyes narrowed. "Not even trying to hide it. They wanted us to see it. Like a middle finger carved into the ground."

Sable growled low in his throat.

"General Thorne," Sasha's voice snapped through the bracer link, "you've confirmed seven ley lines disrupted in total. Portal stability along the southern trade road is critically compromised."

"Dispatch the Arcane Engineering Corps," Thorne's voice replied. Cold. Efficient. "We patch every line by nightfall. No excuses. No shortcuts."

"And the survivors?" Azarion asked, standing as sand blew past them. "If more of the Coilborn's people are hiding out there?"

"We make space," Liam said simply.

Hours later, the road had changed.

Outposts sprang up like enchanted mushrooms.

Three small camps reinforced with mirror wards and elemental sentries. One medical tent stationed between two ley spires, staffed with three healers and one soulreader. Soldiers from MoonHollow's tenth legion patrolled the perimeter with blessed blades and pulse tracking lenses.

They weren't just rebuilding.

They were taking it back.

POV Sable

Sable walked alone for a while, talons digging into the hot stone as he surveyed what was once a sacred desert path. The veins of the land had bled dry, and still… he could feel his homeland pulsing beneath it all.

Khezur had done this. His people.

The ones who bowed to cruelty when they should've bowed to justice.

His eyes narrowed toward the south, toward the edge of the dunes where the serpent king's palace still sat, untouched, unpunished.

Azarion joined him silently. "You're thinking about burning it down."

"I'm thinking," Sable said slowly, "about storming the gates and dragging that snake hearted coward from his throne."

Azarion smirked. "Finally something we agree on."

Behind them, Liam kicked his boots against a rock. "Can I vote yes? Or do I just bring the blood and wine after?"

POV Sasha – Internal Dispatch

Restoration crews deployed.

Medical station: functional.

Portal links: 82% stabilized.

Desert outposts: armed and holding.

Status update flagged: "Sable entering 'fuck around and find out' mode."

POV Thorne

The heat over the desert ridge shimmered like snake skin.

Thorne stood with his arms crossed, watching the arcane repair crews work with brutal precision. Soldiers guarded every ley line, healers rotated shifts, and the road, finally, was beginning to breathe again.

It wasn't enough.

Not with him pacing like a storm tethered by twine.

Sable hadn't spoken in twenty minutes. His claws scraped stone. His wings twitched. The sand beneath his feet scorched darker with every step.

Thorne didn't need prophecy to see what was coming.

Scout Varn returned breathless, sand caked, armor scorched.

"We're being watched," he rasped. "Third ridge, twenty degrees west. Can't see them directly, illusion masking, but there's movement. Footprints. Shadow signatures. They're tracking us."

Thorne didn't flinch. "Royal forces?"

"Not sure. They're careful. But whoever they are? They want us to know."

Sable snapped.

"They're taunting us," he growled, voice low, vibrating with shadowed magic. "Hiding behind tricks and sand while their people starved and bled."

His wings flared. His tail lashed. Eyes rimmed in red fire, jaw clenched tight enough to crack bone. "I should fly straight to the palace and remind Khezur what fear feels like."

Azarion stepped into his path. Calm. Grounded. But with fire building behind his eyes.

"I want vengeance too," Azarion said, slow and sharp, "but you don't get to leave a wake of blood and call it justice."

Sable's lip curled. "You don't know what he did to me."

"I don't," Azarion replied. "But I know what you'd lose if you go alone."

Thorne's voice cut through the tension. Quiet, lethal, steel.

"You want war? Fine. We plan it. We survive it. But if you leave now? You're not coming back. And Rhiannan will break."

That hit.

Sable's wings lowered a fraction.

Liam, casually crouched on a sun warmed boulder, finally piped up.

"Look, I'm all for a sexy demon revenge arc, but… you torch the kingdom now, and we don't get to see the dramatic 'bow before your queen' scene Rhiannan's been building toward."

Sable glared at him.

Liam shrugged and tapped the side of his comm crystal. "Also? I already patched Sasha into Rhiannan's chamber. So you're about five seconds away from a divine guilt trip."

Sasha's voice cut in, far too smug.

"Transmitting now."

A familiar voice spilled across the field.

"Sable."

Rhiannan's tone was gentle but ironclad. No fear. No command. Just presence.

"I need you to come back to me. All of you. Whole. Alive. I don't care what the shadows are whispering, I care about the six of you standing beside me when this is over."

There was a pause.

Then she added softly, "Please don't make me feel you die through the bond."

Sable's rage cracked.

He exhaled, long and rough, then dropped to one knee. His fists hit the sand. The fire dimmed behind his eyes.

"Fine," he whispered. "But one day… I'm going to burn that fucking palace down."

Liam leaned over and patted his wing. "And when you do, babe, I'll be there with a bottle of bloodwine and popcorn."

POV Sasha – System Update

Surveillance confirmed.

Targets remain cloaked.

No strike initiated.

Sable: contained (for now).

Emotional Override Protocol: Queenmother Tier Level 1 effective.

Reassigning troop rotation. Prioritizing extraction. Logging emotional stability as "volatile but intact."