The road out of the Serpent’s Trench opened upon the western plateau like an iron shield thrust against the sky.
Val-Roc did not look like a fortress built by mortal hands; it was a scar carved straight out of the living bedrock. Three massive concentric walls of black granite rose eighty feet into the freezing wind, straddling the great chasm where the Dragon’s Teeth mountains plunged into the fertile valleys of the South. From its highest parapets, three dozen catapults watched over the only passable highway connecting the imperial capital to the western sea.
By nightfall, the small convoy crested the southern ridge.
The cold here was sharp, carrying the scent of burning charcoal, horse sweat, and roasting beef. Across the vast exterior plain below the citadel, thousands of cooking fires dotted the darkness like a fallen constellation. The camps of the Five Thousand Spears were awake.
The news had outrun them on the hooves of Kaelen’s vanguard.
As Malakor, Aurelia, and the remaining outriders escorted the heavy treasure wagons down the stone causeway, a deafening roar rose from the encampment. Iron clattered against bronze shields. The sound rolled across the plateau like thunder, shaking loose pebbles from the granite cliffs.
Men in battered chainmail and boiled leather poured from their tents, lining the road three deep. They were the discarded veterans of the Old Kingdom—men who had bled in forgotten wars and been left to rot by the High Inquisitor’s court. They stared at the wagons of silver, their hollow cheeks flushed in the firelight, but their eyes turned with terrifying awe toward the giant riding at the column's head.
"Malakor!" a voice shouted from the front ranks.
"The Iron Wolf lives!" another roared, raising a notched broadsword into the air.
Within moments, the chant took hold of the entire plain, a rhythmic, guttural drumbeat of five thousand voices demanding blood and vengeance: "Malakor! Malakor! Malakor!"
Malakor did not smile. He rode with his back straight, his chin lifted, his amber eyes sweeping over his gathered army with the unyielding authority of a sovereign inspecting his blades. Beside him, Aurelia rode with quiet elegance, her hood down, allowing the men to see her dark hair whipping in the gale and the faint, silver luminescence lingering in her gaze.
She felt the collective pulse of the five thousand—their hunger, their rage, their desperate need for an apex to lead them from the muck. And through the blood-tether in her core, she felt Malakor’s will reach out and wrap around them like a tightening chain.
The massive iron-plated gates of Val-Roc groaned open before them.
They rode into the central keep, where Kaelen had already gathered the mercenary company captains in the great pillared hall. The air inside smelled of roasting boar, spilled ale, and hot wax.
In the center of the hall, Kaelen stood beside an ancient throne of carved ash-wood—the seat of the Western Dukes, untouched since the Concord’s conquest thirty years prior. Above the mantle hung the standard of the Solar Concord, its golden eye staring blindly down at the assembly.
Malakor dismounted before the dais.
Without a word, he drew his great sword from his shoulder. He did not step onto the throne steps; instead, he swept his blade upward in a single, devastating stroke that severed the ropes holding the Concord’s banner.
The golden eye fluttered to the stone floor in a heap of crumpled silk.
Malakor kicked the emblem into the open fire pit in the center of the hall, watching the embroidered thread curl and blacken in the flames. He turned to face the captains, his voice booming through the vaulted rafters with the force of an avalanche.
"The High Inquisitor calls you sell swords," Malakor snarled, his eyes blazing with gold. "He calls you mercenaries without a country. Tonight, you are my vanguard. We take the gold of the south, we tear down their pyres, and we burn the Concord until their priests choke on the dust of their own temples!"
A chorus of wild, savage roars answered him, shaking the heavy roof beams.
Malakor turned his gaze toward Aurelia, who stood at the foot of the dais, her curved blades resting at her hips, her dark eyes reflecting the fire.
He held out his hand to her in front of the entire assembly.
"Come," he murmured, his voice softening just enough for her ears alone, rich with dark promise and unyielding devotion. "Take your place, Aurelia. The war has begun."