Whispers and Wind: A Tale of Gods and Ghosts from the Scroll of the Raithsworn, Chapters 1 - 4

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What happens when a rockstar romance author disappears into a romantasy world?

You get Raithsworn.

I’ve been building something between books. Something darker, more dangerous, a little wild, and I’m sharing a sneak peek.

It's early days for this one. So it's rough in places. Remember it's a WIP.

But, if you like:

Shadow-wielding women. Rebel fighters. An obsessed MMC. Bonded lovers.

Gryphon riders, Fae lore, and a world built to unravel.

Raithsworn is for you.

You've been warned.

Enter at your own risk.

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Prologue

In the beginning, there were the children of Vael’Lorian and Valerion’theil, the first peoples of the continent. Like the elves and fae from children’s tales of old, they were born of the land, the sea, and the stars. The Vyeth and Eeyrenian.

Gifted with great power. Strong. Noble. Ancient.

They lived age after age, practicing the Old Ways, keeping close the teachings and histories of their ancestors, passing their culture down from generation to generation.

​A hundred years before the Age of Golaena, they were known as the Cryscent Kingdoms, governed by the six rulers of Valerion’theil, and two of Vael’Lorian.

Though the continent birthed many races. Grothyn, Dhrellen, Basilisks, Wéwúlves, Drakari,

Tharn, all mystic and magical beings. And the Cryscent Kingdoms stood as their heart.

The Skaerynd and D’raygyn-breeding grounds lay to the east. The warrior clans of Duunari held the northeast, and the fierce desert fighters of Shunnai ruled the southeast.

And though each realm held its own customs, strength, and pride, all peoples, tribes, clans, courts and kings looked to Valerion’theil for guidance, kinship, and leadership.

It was an age of peace. The gods and spirits bestowed. And though disputes arose, as they do in all places where pride lives, it was a time of harmony, of balance. Until men came.

​They descended from the northwest, with their fire-hungry gods and brutal, blood-born ways.

They spoke a language of conquest, of ruin, of dominion. Tribes of war-hardened men ravaged the west, carving through sacred lands like flame through forest.

Still, the rulers of Vael’Lorian and Valerion’theil, offered peace. They forged treaties, shared lands, granted sanctuary. And for a time, men lived beside the other races of the continent.

They traded. Learned. Even thrived.

​Then came the Age of Golaena.

Twelve lords of men rose to power and ruled the west with order. Their numbers swelled.

Their cities grew. Their lands were known as A’Laes.

But one, a warlord with an empire in his eyes, grew hungry.

He wearied of treaties. Of borders. Of peace. He made dark alliances with the southern realms, Sularia, men of dust and fire, and together they became Menetharia and raised an army of thousands.

They brought war to every corner of the realm.

All mystic and magical beings were hunted, enslaved. Forced into labour camps. Made to build ships and weapons, harvest timber, mine the bones of the earth to feed the war machine.

The Cryscent Kingdoms fell, one by one.

The Menetheran Empire brought with them a single god. And with him, his disciples, the

Vexari Order.

Ancient men of unspeakable power, the Vexari carried out the will of their god through blood and fire. Chief among them, the Vexari Knights.God-blessed warriors who rode the backs of Haeryn, beasts of nightmare and flame. They were unstoppable. Formidable.And the kingdoms could not stand against them.

Those who survived the fall disappeared. Some enslaved. Others hidden. The noble bloodlines of the Eight Cryscent Kingdoms vanished into shadow.

The Twelve Lords of Man, once stewards of peace, were branded traitors and hunted. Their families scattered to the wind.

And from the ashes rose a final spark...The Vye’raiths, The Raith Sworn. A rebel alliance.

Sworn to live as shadows. To fight from the dark. To keep the memory of the old ways alive.

To wait for the day the Cryscent Kingdoms would rise once more.

It has been hundreds of years since that time.

The continent is now deep in the Age of Menethera.

The Age of Man. Where dragons are extinct. Magic is outlawed. And all magical races, and any beasts, are enslaved.

The empire rules with iron and ash. The Vel’ariin are silent. The old kingdoms are gone.

Their bloodlines lost.

Their only hope?A scattered rebellion of ghost warriors.

​The Vye’raiths.​

They say they ride on the wind.

Whispers of wings in the dark.​

Ghosts of the Skaerynd.

And though most call them myth, some say…

They are riding again.

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Chapter 1  

Fragments of a fight. Always the same. Never a whole memory, just scattered pieces.

A flash of steel in the dark. A scream. Pain, blinding and sharp, like metal heated red and pressed to skin. A woman, me, begging. The sounds are animal, guttural, desperate. Water follows. Cold and black as night. Then sand, soft, clinging. A beach. Light. A will. Something unseen driving me forward through the dark. Followed by a silence. Then, him.

Strong arms. Dark hair in his eyes. Dark deep brown eyes almost black like ink. Skin gold-lit by firelight, black markings curling along his collarbone. The swirl of emotion, fear, relief, longing. The only place I’ve ever felt safe is there, in his arms, when he says we’ll survive this. That we always do.

But then it starts again. Every night.

Except tonight.

Tonight, he didn’t come. I didn’t feel him. Couldn’t.

It was the first night I didn’t dream of him.

I woke gasping, slick with sweat, hair pasted to my scalp. The air thick with the scent of smoke and damp herbs. Firelight danced across the cabin walls, the kettle hissing with steam. Outside, the garden called to me, soil and roots and the ever-present hum of life. The goats bleated, sharp and impatient.

I sat up, legs swinging over the edge of the straw-stuffed mattress. The cold wooden floor kissed my soles. My breath still came too fast, but I forced stillness into my limbs.

Whatever waited today, I had to meet it head-on.

It was Culling Day.

I hated the White Culling.

It set my teeth on edge. Made my skin crawl. I was too old to be taken, too hardened.

But fear doesn’t care for age or reason.

Everyone feared it.

The day the Empire’s soldiers, known here only as the D’ral, came like a plague upon the villages. Every three moons, always after the full moon waned and Vel’ariin’s light was little more than ash in the sky, they descended.

They came to take.

To choose.

The young. The pure. The unprotected.

They called it The Choosing of Revyre. A sacred rite, they claimed. A gift to Revyre, the one true god they worship.

A god of purity. Of righteousness. Of truth.

I called it what it was.

A barbaric tradition cloaked in holy names.

The Menetharian Empire had conquered these lands long before I was born. They hadn’t just taken the land. They’d taken everything.

They toppled kings and gods alike.

Overthrew the old houses that once ruled. House Greysynd among them. They hunted every noble who bore their blood.

The scribes wrote that history ended there. One dynasty drowned in blood, and a new

empire rising to rule the ashes.

But old tongues still remembered.

These lands had once been called A’Laes.

Not just Laes. Not Empire soil.

And A’Laes had once been a realm of Houses, of Wards, of bloodlines sworn to protect not just their own, but the wild magick of the world itself.

Until the Empire came. Until they renamed everything. Burned the scrolls. Broke the sacred oaths.

I didn’t know much beyond that.

Just whispers.

Half-truths carried on the smoke of village fires.

Grenalda, my mentor, had told me what little she dared.

She found me when I was barely more than a ghost. She took me in when no one else would.

She taught me everything I couldn’t remember and so much more.

The healing arts.

Herbal lore.

The old midwives’ songs whispered over wounded bodies in the dark.

Truths that no longer had a place in the world the Empire had made.

She worshiped the Vel’ariins. The old gods, ancestors and spirits.

As did I.

It was heresy now.

A crime punishable by death.

Many had converted under fear and fire. Others, like us, practiced in secret.

And today, on this Culling Day, as the D’ral marched in their red and gold, I remembered it all.

And I hated them for it.

I rose from my bed and pulled on my shawl.

Gren was likely already in the garden. She was always there in the morning light, like a white rose rooted deep in the earth. Graceful, grounded, and quietly radiant. A force of nature, wrapped in linen and wisdom.

I thanked the Vel’ariin every day that she found me. That she gave me a place, a purpose, and a path back to myself.

Mostly because she feared I would be culled.

Despite the fact that I was no pure maiden and far too old by several years. Gren sensed something in me. She told me as much. That I needed help, though she never could explain why. She didn’t understand it herself, only that time would reveal the truth.

I had no choice but to believe her. I didn’t know who I was, my name, my past, my family. I had simply appeared on the road one day by her cabin, half-dead, ravaged and beaten. Skin torn, eyes hollow, nothing left but will and breath. I was an inch from collapsing like a stone into the earth.

The only things I carried were a dagger, a brooch, and a threadbare bracelet, wrapped tightly around my wrist dozens of times, so tight it couldn’t be undone, and strange black markings that twisted up my right forearm. At first glance, they looked gangrenous, like the limb was rotting, necrotic even. But the marks never spread.

Gren thought I was dying. She brewed me a tea made from ancient herbs to stave off infection. But as my body mended, the truth emerged. The markings were not decay. They were permanent.

A part of me.

Gren insisted I keep them hidden. So I wore laced wristbands, snug and dark, to hide the

truth from any eyes that might ask questions neither of us could answer.

I walked to the large stone fireplace, where the kettle hung above the fire’s low flame. With the iron tongs, I poured the steaming water into a crafted clay pot to steep tea, mint leaves and a pinch of rose hips. The scent curled up with the steam, fresh and calming. I filled my cup, then added a sprinkle of sweetleaf.

I took a sip and hissed in pain.

“Gods! Dammit,” I swore under my breath, wincing as the hot liquid scalded my lips and tongue.

Gren always said I swore too much. She made me pray for mercy and forgiveness.

Three prayers a day, without fail. One upon rising, to bless the day ahead. One after our work, to sanctify our labour. And one before sleep, to give thanks for whatever blessings we could count.

Andriel would be here soon. I still needed to pray, get dressed, and finish my chores before her visit.

I knelt in front of the wooden altar in the small square cabin we shared. Two beds—one for Gren, one for me. The altar stood on the far side of the room, beneath the east-facing window.

I lit the candles and incense. The familiar scent filled the air as I lifted the small wooden effigies into my hands, one in each. In my left, Yyruna, guardian of the seasons and life’s rhythm. In my right, Aryna, patron of healing and protection. The wood was worn smooth in some places, chipped in others.

I closed my eyes and whispered the old prayer.

“Protect the innocent and the righteous. Mend the broken and the sick. Shield us from the D’ral. Guide us to our purpose. Grant the D’ral army and the Empire mercy for their tyranny and cruelty. In the names of Yyruna and Aryna, I pray.”

I rose and readied myself for the day.

I washed in a basin of warm water drawn from the stream. Braided my long hair, thick and unruly now. I hadn’t trimmed it since the day I was found, and it had grown past the small of my back. The ends were black. That part had always been black. I’d tried to cut them once, early on, thinking they were a stain or rot. But no matter how much I trimmed, the black returned. It was stubborn, unyielding. The dark crept upward, like it was consuming the gold at the ends like ink in water.

Gren had once suggested I wear it up in a bonnet, modest and concealing. But bonnets were customarily worn by married women. I wasn’t married. Not that I knew of. If I had a husband, he hadn’t come looking for me. Which meant either he never existed, or he was dead. The alternative, that I had once been married and simply didn’t remember, was equally plausible.

Women my age often lost men. To the sackings of villages. To the wilds along the borders. To the rebel uprisings that flared and died like lightning in dry brush. Whether they were soldiers, innocents, or just in the wrong place at the wrong time, death found everyone eventually. Sickness, violence, thieves on the roads, men who took what they wanted from farmers and travellers alike. There were many ways to die in these lands, and none of them were kind.

I knew little of my past. And it was unlikely, given my age, that I had no family, no children, no tether to anyone. A woman like me, travelling alone? Unheard of. That no one had come looking for me all these years... well, Gren had reasoned that my husband must have died, and any children I might have had perished with him. It was the most merciful version of the truth we could tell ourselves.

So, to the villagers, I was Gren’s widowed cousin from Weufeolf Hills, where she claimed distant kin in case anyone ever asked questions.

I dressed quickly, pulled on my front-laced corset over my chemise and kirtle, then stepped into my muslin skirts, green and worn brown at the hem and knees from hours spent in the garden. I shuffled into my weathered leather boots, wrapped my shawl over my shoulders, and tied a white cloth over my hair.

Basket in hand and tea in the other, still piping hot, scented with mint and rose hips, I stepped outside. Before I left, I plucked a fresh mint leaf from the bundle drying on the rafters and chewed it idly. The coolness bloomed in my mouth as I stepped into the crisp morning air.

Gylan greeted me from the porch.

“Good morning, you grumpy old goat,” I said, ruffling the fur between his horns. He blinked at me with lazy defiance, bleating low and long.

Gren’s head popped up from the onion bed.

“You slept in, Beth?”

Gren gave me the name.

“I did,” I replied. “Rough night.”

“Mmm.” She stood and rubbed the crook of her nose, her blue eyes squinting at me. Her skirts were already soiled with garden muck, her grey corset flecked with dirt. Her silver curls were tucked neatly beneath a white bonnet. “Still dreaming?”

“Yes.”

“The same?”

I nodded.

She sighed. “Well, best get to the tending. There’s nothing for it.” She dusted her hands on her skirts and knelt back down. “We’ll head into town after morning tea. The White Culling ceremonies will be starting early, I imagine. Dancing, drinking, and the like. Best arrive before everyone’s too drunk to stand.”

I nodded again and turned to start my chores, Gylan bleating and plodding along behind me like the old nag he was.

“I’m off to feed the hens,” I called over my shoulder.

Gren waved without looking. “Gy, leave her be, you old goat.”

I laughed uneasily as I walked with purpose toward the coop. Best to keep moving. Best to focus on the task at hand, and not the one that would follow morning tea.

I would feed the hens…

And try not to think about feeding an innocent girl to the wolves.

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Chapter 2

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After tending the animals and gathering eggs, I sat back on my knees in the east garden, picking medicines to sell.

The air was warm, the late summer bringing with it a whisper of coolness.

Autumn would soon be here, and with it the brief brilliance of colour, before winter put everything to sleep.

The wildflowers swayed around me, a living sea of colour.

And then, A pang.

An ache for something lost.

Memories flooded in.

Suddenly, I was eight years old, running barefoot through a field as a boy chased me and my three younger sisters.

A baby watched from a woman’s lap, nestled in the shade of a wildflower-covered hill.

She wore a blue and gold dress, her long brown curls falling down her back, her eyes bright with laughter as she called after us.

The memory broke sharply.

“You’re always on your knees,” Andriel said, smirking as he leaned lazily against the fence post, arms crossed.

I glanced up at her, my hands full of Kressell fern stalks, still half-lost in the past.

Kressell, used to treat men who couldn’t perform for their wives, was one of our most profitable crops.

It fetched a high price at market.

Merchants were always after it.

Some adventurous couples used it for… other purposes too.

We sold it wholesale or bartered it for supplies.

“It’s a rewarding practice,” I said dryly, smirking.

And realized a heartbeat too late how my words could be taken.

Andriel was only ten-and-two. Hardly old enough for such jokes. Gren, of course, had a wicked sense of humour when it came to Kressell. Often praying for forgiveness between fits of laughter. And I, cursed tongue and all, had to do the same.

“—Being in the garden, I mean. And praying, too,” I added quickly.

“I knew what you meant,” Andriel said, stepping into the garden and placing a handkerchief on the dirt so she could kneel beside me. She was tall and slight, her deep brown eyes matching the cascade of hair that fell past her waist. She wore it half up, half down. An old signal that a girl was nearly of marrying age. Not yet culling age, but frighteningly close. Her pale blue dress marked her as untouched. Pure.

On this day, like so many before, I feared for her.

Whenever that fear and anger stirred too much, the markings on my arm began to burn, buzzing with life and warmth, crawling up my skin like wildfire. I pressed my hand to my wrist, steadying my breath.

“How could you?” I asked her finally.

“I’ve heard things. Seen things around Feren Hill,” she said, narrowing her eyes. “I’m not as innocent as everyone thinks.”

“I assume your father’s been lecturing you again? About the behavior of proper young maidens?”

“When does he not?” she snorted. “He sold my sisters’ innocence for their safety, married them off to whoever would have them. Now he preaches chastity and modesty like it’s scripture.” She mimicked a demure look, batting her lashes.

I couldn’t help but laugh.

“Yes, well. Men do that. Do as I say, not as I do.”

“How do you know?”

“I don’t,” I admitted with a smile. “Just seems to be a pattern.”

Andriel was sharp. Too sharp. Beautiful, well-read, and far too observant. Her father, a tradesman, kept her under close watch, but he was busy. And her mother had died giving birth to her. Her two older sisters escaped the culling only because her father had made arrangements, political ones, with Amr Sala, the Ward of our region, and his advisor, Dúnchad Medaw. It was filthy business. But he likely chose the lesser of two evils, better to be ruined by someone you knew than handed to the D’ral.

Gren and I were outsiders here. She was a druid, a healer. They needed her, but rarely welcomed her. And by extension, they shunned me as well. I didn’t mind. I preferred the quiet. The solitude. The safety of being overlooked.

Andriel tossed her hair back, grabbed a trowel, and began digging up a Kressell stalk.

“Do you think your husband was handsome?” she asked, too casually.

“I don’t know. Maybe.”

“Maybe he was a knight. Or a warrior. Or a child of Valerion’theil. Vyeth or Eyrenian. Maybe a Raith?” Her eyes widened with wonder. “They exist, you know?”

“Raiths are myths. Tales of old,” I said. “Vyeth and Eyrenians live mostly in the camps. Their elders left these lands long ago.”

“To hidden realms,” she corrected.

“Honestly, Andi, where do you get these ideas?” I scoffed, as I pulled at a weed.

“Books. Scrolls. The stories my tutor tells me,” she said simply.

“I doubt that. You’ve been spending too much time with the scribe in the temple archives. Reading forbidden texts,” I said, amused.

She put a finger to her lips.

“Hush, Beth. Father has already scolded me for it. He thinks it’s important for me to learn to read. Although he doesn’t approve of the materials I choose. He’s hoping I’ll marry above our station, since he couldn’t do that with my sisters. So he thinks I should read books on how to remain pious and good-natured.”

“That’s wise. You’re lucky, in a way,” I said. “Most girls aren’t even allowed that kind of education. It does make you more noticeable, though. More vulnerable to being culled. They like to take the most beautiful flowers.”

I tucked a hair behind her ear.

“Yes,” She said looking down. She stared off for a moment. She looked gripped by fear.

“He did what he thought was best.” I said to her.

“I disagree,” she said flatly. “You didn’t see what I saw. You didn’t see the aftermath.”

The marks on my arm throbbed under the band. A fire burned deep and low inside me.

I nodded. “That’s true. I only wanted to ease your anger toward him.”

“You won’t,” she said simply. “Not when I saw the price my sisters paid. The only thing worse than what they endured was the culling itself.”

“How did you escape it?” she asked, studying me.

“I couldn’t begin to tell you. Maybe I married young.”

“Maybe. You’re beautiful, Beth. I’m sure they would have wanted you. Some handsome man swept you off your feet early.”

Something prickled at the edges of my mind, and the hair on my neck stood on end. Another lost memory, perhaps? I shook it off, laughed softly. “Those books of yours are filling your head with complete and utter nonsense.”

“Maybe. But you’re...refined, Beth. Smart. Articulate. Beneath all the dirt, quite elegant. Do you remember being taught manners? Etiquette? Propriety?”

“I’ve told you many times, I remember very little of my past.”

She didn’t look convinced. “I thought maybe talking about it might help.”

“It can,” I said as I dug up more fern. “But not always.”

My frustration grew.

“Well, maybe one day someone will come for you, like in the story of the Fall of Draryja. The elder Vel’ariin, guardian of fire and flame. When she fell from Thalvareth, the realm of Vel’ariin. She forgot everything. Except for her fire, which she gifted to humans. That’s why the Vel’ariin abandoned her. All but Bereus, her lover. He found her and brought her back to fight against the armies of the Fallen ones. The Noctavell and Ashvalen. They sent them back to Tahlmorren with a flame so big and beautiful and bright, Thalvareth could be seen from the mortal realm.”

“Those are old Vyeth and Eyrenian tales,” I said.

“But you do know them,” she said, beaming. “So you must have read them.”

“I don’t know. They just... feel familiar.”

I scratched at my armband. The markings were growing hot, humming beneath the skin as my frustration built. The earth gave a subtle tremble beneath us.

Andriel stilled. “What was that?”

“I don’t know.” Then an unmistakable sound filled the air. I rose quickly, scanning the horizon. “Come.”

I helped her to her feet, my stomach knotted. The sensation was unlike anything I’d felt before. Urgent. Electric. Like something in me had snapped awake.

We walked through the trees to a low hill that overlooked the road leading into the village.

The rumbling grew louder. Hoofbeats.

I dropped to the ground and pulled Andriel down beside me.

Over the crest, we saw them. The red and gold banners emblazoned with a spiralling golden sun, the crest of the Menetharian Empire. Followed by the Black Serpents of the Sularic realms.

A line of horsemen thundered past. Carriages. Carts. A battalion.

My chest clenched. Too many men. The Cullings never required this kind of force.

My heart pounded. My wrist burned. I gripped it.

“What’s wrong?” Andriel asked.

“Nothing. Just an old injury. Acts up when the weather turns damp.” In this region, that was all the bloody time. A good enough lie.

“Come,” I said, crawling back and rising to my feet. “You should go to your father. I need to find Gren.”

“Beth, wait! That’s a lot of men.”

“I know,” I said, keeping my voice calm. “But it’s likely they’re not just here for the culling. Perhaps they are after someone not on the Culling list.”

Even as I spoke, a voice, quiet, primal, whispered through my mind.

One I had only heard once before.

Run.

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Chapter 3 

Gren and I made our way into town, baskets brimming with healing pouches and bushels of herbs to sell. It wasn’t a proper market day, but we expected a scattering of merchants and sellers, enough to make the trip worth it.

The ceremonies would begin soon. Dancing in the village square, all the young maidens on display, those who might be chosen. It always struck me as cruel. Parading them like that.

The girls moved so stiffly, so hollow. Dull in complexion and defeated in posture, even before the D’ral arrived.

I hated the White Culling ceremonies.

Most of the village drank heavily, and I understood why. What else was there to do when a handful of foreign soldiers came, on behalf of an emperor no one had ever seen, to tear your daughters from your arms?

Still, the drinking made the night wild. Dangerous.

After nightfall, no woman was safe. Especially on a Culling night. Anyone out after dark was fair game. Everyone knew it. Any woman out past the evening bell risked not only her freedom but her life.

So Gren and I always went early. And we left early. Always before the bell.

I had never seen a White Culling ceremony. Not with my own eyes. I only ever heard about it the morning after. The names whispered, the grief clinging to every wall, the sorrow in the square. The aftermath was always the same.

And once the name was known, the three-month countdown to the next Culling began.

Each time, it brought Andriel closer to the line. Closer to the age. Closer to being taken.

The thought twisted my gut. My markings throbbed in answer.

When we arrived in the village, we were met with something unusual. Everyone was already in the square. Not scattered in taverns. Not weeping in the shadows. Not clutching their daughters behind shuttered doors.

Everyone. Was. Present.

All eyes forward.

Then it hit me. A sharp, searing pain in my arm.

I cried out, the basket falling from my hands.

“You alright, dear?” Gren asked, kneeling to retrieve it quickly. Her voice was low, calm, as a nearby D’ral soldier turned to eye us.

Shit.

Oionia, Vel’ariin of mercy, please don’t abandon me now.

His gaze narrowed, cold and mean, set into a face caked with dust and grit from the road.

There is nothing more dangerous than a soldier who has been travelling for weeks surrounded by other men. Every woman in every region had heard the stories. There were entire folklores built around warnings. Don’t be seen. Don’t be out. Don’t be caught.

The soldier stepped forward.

His boots were caked in dried mud, silvered chainmail clinking over leather armour. He stopped right in front of me. Too close. Invading my space, like he meant to.

The soldier reeked of horse piss and road muck. Likely horse shit and sweat layered on top of one another like rot.

I bit my tongue and fought back a grimace.

“What’s the trouble?” the soldier barked, his voice like gravel.

“Nothing,” I replied sweetly. “Just an old injury acting up.”

I bent to gather the spilled Kressell fern and stood slowly. His eyes followed every movement, watching me too closely.

Measuring.

Calculating.

Leering.

I didn’t need to guess what was on his mind. If I lingered in town past the White Culling, after dark, he’d find me. And he’d make sure I was well and thoroughly ruined. If he let me live at all.

I silently prayed that every good woman in the village stayed indoors tonight. Locked behind doors and shutters. Far away from men like this, when the streets turned dark and dangerous.

The thought bared my teeth.

The itch in my right arm was unbearable now. Burning beneath the band. The dark markings there pulsed with heat, and every nerve in my body begged me to grab him by the throat and squeeze until he turned purple… blue and then white.

I shoved the thought away.

Hard.

I was going to need to do a fair bit of praying. So very much praying. But later.

A voice rang out across the square, breaking through the crowd’s tense hush.

Five prisoners were paraded forward in shackles, each wearing black leather armour.

Their exposed skin was inked in swirling black tattoos, markings that ran like living maps across their flesh.

A crescent moon with eight stars hovering above it was embroidered on the right breast of their chest plates. The emblem represented the eight Cryscent Kingdoms of old. Two Vyeth and six Eyrenian kingdoms that no longer existed. A circle of eight flames marked the left shoulder of their armour.

The Waking Flames of the children of Vael’Lorian and Valerion’theil.

Only Vye’raiths wore such markings, if the rumours were to be believed.

Vye’raiths were said to be rebel fighters.

Most people called them Raiths because they were more myth than anything else.

Ghost stories told in pubs by drunkards, who spoke of dark, caped figures moving through the woods, fighting monsters and D’ral, freeing camps, and riding mythical creatures called Skaerynd. Hybrid beasts that were part bird, part beast, and part d'ragyn.

My heart seized.

“These rebels are charged with high treason against the United Empire of Menetharia!” the herald cried.

“They shall stand trial in two days’ time for crimes against the Emperor. Tyraneus The Great, of the house of the Menethari, partisan of the Sularic empire of the southern regions, conqueror of the continent now known as the United Empire of Menetharia, third of his name!”

Tried?

Hardly.

They would be accused.

Condemned.

Executed.

No one would question it.

“Rebels? Up here? I’ve never seen a Raith in all my bloody years,” Gren murmured to Darah. She was the wife of a well-known pig farmer.

I remembered visiting her last spring when the piglets were born. Andi had loved the squealing little things.

Darah nodded, wary.

“They’re bloody myths, ain’t they? Ghosts. I heard they steal children in the night, seduce young maids, fillin’ their heads with lust and sin.”

“That’s not true,” I snapped.

I didn’t know how I knew.

Only that I did. Deep in my marrow.

As certain as the sky was blue, even beneath storm clouds.

The Empire spreads lies about them. That they wielded dark magicks, seduced maids, twisted men’s minds, stole the sons of good men for their wicked wars.

Some whispered of impossible feats. Warriors who felled entire platoons alone, who shifted into beasts, who called fire and shadow with nothing but a prayer.

Bards sang of their mysterious ways. Their betrayals, their blood-soaked defeats.

The Empire painted them as heretics.

Witches.

Monsters in the dark.

But the truth was something else.

Every young boy once dreamed of fighting alongside them. Before the D’ral came and dragged them into conscription for the Empire.

Every mother once prayed quietly in her home for someone, anyone, to rise against the cruelty.

Of course, there were loyalists too.

Mostly the rich.

The powerful.

The ones the Empire had elevated centuries ago for betraying the old houses. The true noble bloodlines who once ruled these lands in harmony with the Vyeth and the Eyrenian courts.

Then Sularic and D’ral armies came, breaking treaties, slaughtering kings and lords, stealing magicks meant to protect the realms. Twisting it to bind them instead, using the Vexari order. A sodality of elite fighters and priests meant to enforce conversion to the one true god, Revyr, the Sularic Empire followed.

Those who prospered preached their self-righteousness, “progress” and “order.”

But only because their daughters hadn’t been taken.

Because they hadn’t lost brothers to the D’ral armies.

Because their knives had carved out places for them in the Empire’s shadow.

Under the Emperor’s rule, power could destroy honour and lineage.

It was earned through betrayal, through the blade, through sacrifice.

Sacrifice of anyone but yourself.

That’s what the White Cull was about.

Not purity.

Not tradition.

Power.

It was a message to every mother, every father, every soul in the realm. I can take what you love.

I can desecrate what you hold sacred.

I can steal your brightest, your purest, your most beautiful souls.

And there is nothing you can do to stop me.

Because I’m doing so in the name of my god.

Gren and I pressed through the thick knot of bodies as the soldiers dragged the Raiths forward, their chains rattling with every step.

The crowd parted, silent, breathless, as the rebels passed through.

And somewhere deep inside me, something cold and edged began to stir. The pain in my arm sharpening into to a fine-tipped point.

Villagers shouted.

They threw rotten fruit, stones, spat curses like venom.

My blood boil.

Vyeth, Eyrenian, any races with magic in their lineage, were feared.

Feared and hated.

Most had been forced into camps by the empire. Displaced from their sacred lands, crushed beneath the Empire’s fist. Slaves. The empire kept them broken so they could never reclaim their birthright, their power.

And people were taught to despise them.

So they did.

I didn’t. I couldn’t.

Deep in my heart, I knew they weren’t monsters to be feared or dehumanized.

Somehow, I knew that the Empire spun lies about all of them.

I drew a long, shaking breath, trying to steady myself.

My hands curled into fists, nails biting into my palms until crescent moons bloomed in my skin.

Then...

A memory struck, sharp and unrelenting.

Him.

The man who haunted my dreams. Night after night.

The one never far from my thoughts, or my heart.

Deep, dark eyes flecked with blue and onyx.

Slightly pointed ears, leading to a sharp jawline and lips carved by sin itself.

He hadn’t seduced me, not in the way the villagers whispered about.

It was the feeling he left in me.

An ache. A longing.

A resonance through my entire being.

I didn’t have a name, but I felt him as surely as my own heartbeat.

Had I loved an Eyren man once?

Maybe.

Though all that remained were fragments. Snatches of memory, feelings in dreams, a hollow ache in my chest for someone, for something, long lost.

A sudden uproar jolted me back to the present.

I craned my neck, trying to get a better look.

I was taller than most, lean, strong, but even on tiptoe, I could only make out the churn of movement ahead. The press of bodies, the roiling fury of the crowd.

Finally, the rebels were dragged to the centre.

Shackled to the twin wooden posts that marked the square.

Heads bowed.

Faces streaked with blood, grime, and exhaustion. They looked young. Younger than I by a few summers.

But even beaten, even bound, they did not look broken.

And that made my heart pound in a way I didn’t yet have words for.

The markings on my arm flared again.

“Show’s over for now, pissants,” one of the D’ral spat at the crowd.

“Move along. Back to your work,” another barked.

The crowd began to disperse, people returning to their tasks as preparations for the ceremony resumed.

That’s when I saw them. Really saw them. And something inside me shifted.

I couldn’t explain it. Not then. But I felt it in my chest, like a tug. A pull I didn’t understand. Like I needed to go to them. Like I had to.

One of the village elders, a hunched old woman with a shawl over her shoulders, tried to offer the rebels a cup of water. A soldier shoved her aside roughly, and I saw my moment.

“Come,” Gren whispered, but I was already moving.

“Tess, that bucket looks heavy.”

I shot a sharp glance at the soldier watching her struggle. He didn’t move to help. Just stood there, lazy and smug.

Fucker.

Oh, dammit. Pray.

“I’m just giving the prisoners some water,” Tesswyn said matter-of-factly. Always the shit-stirrer, that one. Nearly a hundred years old, spry, sharp-tongued, and wholly unconcerned with authority. Her opinions were carved from stone, and she flung them like daggers. Her husband was long gone. Her children scattered across distant provinces. But her fire hadn’t dimmed in the slightest.

I still remember the day we met.

“What’s your name, dear?” she’d asked.

I hesitated. “Beth.”

“Is that short for something?”

“...I don’t know,” I said.

She’d nodded, looking at me with a deep knowing. “That’s not your name. You need a name with weight. A warrior’s name.”

She had both insisted I change it. But I stuck with Beth. It felt safe for a reason I couldn’t have articulated.

“In the old tongue,” Gren had said, “Beth means ‘home.’”

Then she’d looked at me, serious as scripture.

“We’ll keep you safe, protected. We’ll be your home. Until the time comes when you need to find the one you belong to.”

Gren had always known how to feel the weight of things. And the wait they required.

I ran to Tess now, grabbing the bucket from her arms. “Let me help you.”

She gave it up without argument, grateful beneath her pride.

I turned to the soldier leaning against the wall of a grain store. Waiting. Silently asking with my eyes.

He smirked, eyeing me like he already owned the answer.

“For a kiss, lass,” he said, tapping his filthy cheek.

“Bloody scoundrel,” Tesswyn muttered.

“Quiet, you old codger,” he snapped.

I exhaled. “Absolutely not.”

“Then they go without.”

“If you don’t want to sacrifice your honour for them, I don’t blame you. They’re hardly worth it.”

I looked at the rebels. I wanted to speak to them. I felt compelled to.

I cursed under my breath, shot the soldier a tight-lipped glare, and stepped closer, leaning in just enough to brush my lips against his stubble. He reeked.

He grabbed my waist and pulled me into a full-mouthed kiss, his tongue forcing its way in. He tasted of ale and tooth rot.

I jerked back, my face twisting in disgust. I wiped my mouth on my sleeve and straightened my skirts, trying not to gag.

Motherfucker.

Gods, I was a lost cause.

At this rate, theVel’ariin were going to strike me down themselves.

Then the soldier pulled me back in and grabbed the ladle. He took a sip from the bucket, then he spat it back in.

I grimaced. Shook my head. Rolled my eyes.

I dumped the ruined water out right in front of him, then marched to the pump, drew two clean fills, and brushed past him.

To the rebels.

The soldier eyed me with a look that made it clear that if I kept being a defiant little bitch, I would be arrested, or worse.

“This one’s got serious balls, lads and ladies,” one of the rebels said. A male, his ochre skin gleaming beneath layers of blood and dirt, his long braids tied neatly back, black tattoos winding along his arms.

I side-eyed him and said nothing.

I knelt and lifted the ladle, offering him water.

“You could be killed—” another started. A female.

“You could get worse than killed,” the redhead beside her muttered, cutting her off. Her voice was blunt, sharp with truth.

“Skara, seriously. You shouldn’t interrupt your Lagna. She’s your bloody Talon leader. It’s just...bad manners,” said the blond one. Curly hair falling in his eyes. He smirked like it was all a game.

“I don’t need bloody defending, Grim,” their Talon leader snapped.

“Looks like you do, Lagna,” Grim added with a chuckle.

“You lot are awfully cheeky,” I said, “considering you’re about to be drawn and quartered.”

“And you’re awfully brave,” Skara replied, “defying a soldier who’s eyeing you like you’re next on his list of people to fuck up.”

“In his bloody dreams. I’d sooner slice my own throat. Or his cut balls off first,” I clapped my hand over my mouth.

Where the bloody hell did that come from?

The rebels laughed.

“I apologize. I did not mean—,” I said.

I glanced at the soldier watching us intently and smirked. Then turned back to her.

“Yes, you bloody did,” Lagna said, still chuckling. She was beautiful, with mahogany-coloured skin and wild, long black curls braided intricately down her back. “You’ve got fire in your belly. I like you.”

She pulled me closer, so near I could smell the elderwood incense clinging to her, a hint of burnum oil and mint on her breath. That’s when I saw it. A dagger, hidden just beneath her breast, sheathed along her ribs. The markings on the hilt were familiar.

“That’s a—” I stopped. My wrist tensed.

She cut me off with a sly grin. “You’ve seen one before?”

“Lagna, go easy on her,” Krag, the man with braids, warned. “She’s getting us water, not trying to bed you.”

“Kind of wish she was eyeing me like that,” Grim muttered.

Skara kicked him. “Shut the fuck up, Grim.”

“Easy, Skara,” he shot back. “Won’t be anything left for the D’ral to have.” He made a kissy face at the soldiers still watching us like hounds.

“They always find something to shred,” Skara muttered darkly.

Lagna held my gaze. Didn’t blink.

“It’s a stealth dagger. You get one after you complete your first year of training,” she whispered, just for me. “Most females wear it between their thighs. Easier access when you’re pinned.”

She arched an eyebrow. “Want to help a girl out?”

She glanced toward the guards.

I hesitated, heart pounding. Then slowly reached for the dagger.

My fingers brushed the cool metal handle. I slipped it from its sheath and placed it on the ground beside her hand, pretending I was refilling her cup.

Touching the dagger sent a jolt through me.

My eyes locked on it.

And something shifted inside me.

Fragments flashed like lightning.

Fists. Screams.

Blood. Wood and stone.

Pain. Fire. Rage.

“You one of us?” Lagna cocked her head, studying me.

I cleared my throat. “Of course not.”

“You sure? You look haunted,” Lagna said. “Like you’re looking at ghosts. And not the kind the villagers speak of.”

A soldier stomped over and grabbed my arm. “That’s enough of that, lass.”

He tossed me aside, and I hit the ground hard. The bucket clattered away.

I scrambled to my feet, cheeks flushed and chest burning.

The Raiths heckled him. The soldiers glared.

I shot the bastard a look.

Then turned and walked off, fast.And then faster.

I had just helped a Raith leader and her entire troupe. Or talon. That’s what the blond one, Grim, had called it. Talon leader.

My body was buzzing, my mind spinning, my wrist pulsing with heat beneath the band. I broke into a light jog, heading toward the cabin, when I nearly ran straight into Gren.

“Beth, are you bloody mad?” she hissed. “Helping those...those rebels? You’re lucky they didn’t beat you senseless. Or worse, the soldiers might’ve…Gods, I pale to think of it!”

“I was helping Tess,” I said.

“I saw that. Tess is a right shit stirrer. Hates D’ral. Lost two sons to conscription,” she said, shaking her head. “Come on. The dancing’s started. We’ll be going soon.”

“I have to go back to the cabin. Now,” I said firmly. “I’ll come back for you.”

“What? Have you actually gone mad?” she asked, eyes wide. “It’s too long a walk!”

“I’ll run.”

“You’ll what? What in the bloody hell has come over you, Beth?”

“I—uh, ” I stammered. I needed a reason. A good one. “It’s…it’s my courses. They just came, and I need… cotton strips. I didn’t bring any.”

She shook her head at me. “That explains the rosehip tea this morning?”

I nodded solemnly.

“Fine,” she groaned, waving me off. “Go. Hurry back. I don’t want to be here past dusk. When the White Culling starts I would like to be long gone.”

“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” I promised.

My thoughts raced faster than my feet. Something was happening. My body felt electric—like lightning danced beneath my skin, especially in my arm. I couldn’t tell if it was energy being drawn into me or if I was trying to bleed it out.

Either way, I needed to move.

I pulled my hood up and took off down the road, sprinting. I wished for a horse. Not that I knew how to ride one.

The jog turned into a full run. My lungs burned, but it felt good. Better than I expected. Like I had done this before. Like I’d always been able to run.

---

Chapter 4 

I burst into the cabin, drenched in sweat. My breath came in short, shallow gasps.

I moved straight to my bed and shoved it aside. It slid surprisingly easily. Grabbing the trowel, I pried at the floorboards, testing until I found the right one. My fingers scrambled. I ripped it up.

I’d been found with some things. Things I’d kept hidden beneath the cabin floor, in a wooden box. Gren knew about them, but didn’t know what they were, and of course, neither did I.

My hand trembled as I reached down, pulling a dagger from its sheath. The metal was smooth and silver, polished to a perfect shine. It caught the light of the evening sun pouring in through the window above my bed.

Without thinking, I spun it in my hand, effortlessly. As if I’d done it a thousand times.

A stealth dagger. Just like Lagna’s.

Fuck me.

I glanced up at the ceiling. “Please don’t smite me.”

I held the blade steady and caught my reflection in its mirrored surface. My eyes, a mix of pale green and gold, like an Eyrenian forest. Then, in a flash, it hit me.

A blinding strike of pain.

Visions, too fast to grasp. Sounds. Smells. Blood. Stone. Screams. Fists. Fire. Shadows. Voices.

I gasped and stumbled back, accidentally cutting myself on the blade. A sharp cry escaped my lips. A single drop of blood hit the floorboards.

The voices came. Thousands of them.

Whispering. Singing.

They sang like wind through the trees.

The ancestors fell silent, the children of Valerion’theil wept,

And kingdoms disappeared to where the stars are kept.

But two remain, the fates begun.

The Eyes of Varrakth and Serathyn.

One of fire, one of flame,

One bears ruin, one bears a name.

One shall rise to scorch the skies to black,

One shall burn with truth and bring all life back.

I knew the verses.

Not all of them, not clearly, but the cadence, the weight, the truth of them... it felt like something that had once been whispered to me. Over and over. Like a lullaby, I had forgotten how to sing.

When moonlight dims, and dawn does falter,

When blood is spilled at the sacred altar,

One is born in shadow’s breath,

and rises to bind the hands of death.

The Eye of dark, it seeks an end

To take down the world and begin again.

For only light, in Vel’ariin form,

Can still the tide and break the storm.

For I am Raithsworn.

I finished, then said it again, this time out loud.

My wrist burned, hot and sharp beneath my skin, as if my essence, my life, my soul were being sucked through my fingers. I yanked off the armband.

Black marks twisted and climbed up my arm to my elbow, a mess of vines curling deep and dark. Years without movement, and now they surged, trailing, living.

Alive.

Dread and terror filled the rest of my body, cold and numbing.

My thoughts dissolved into a haze of panic and half-formed memories.

I let out a scream. It ripped through me as I gripped my arm, the tendrils still climbing.

I fell to my knees. The wood planks of the floor cut into my knee caps, sending a sharp, splintering pain through my thighs.

I ignored it. Too busy panting. Pleading. Looking for anything to stop the claws from crawling up my arm and taking over my entire being.

I reached for a rope on the table in the centre of the cabin. Hoping to make a tourniquet to stop the rot.

But then I started laughing. softly at first. Then, manically.

What was happening to me?

It was like my body wasn’t my own anymore.

I started hyperventilating. Then laughing again.

And then I passed out.

Everything went dark as I lost consciousness, but not completely. I could still hear. The laughter changed. It wasn’t mine. It was that of a male. The timbre deep, dark, like death itself. The laugh was amused, like he was mocking me.

“You think you can escape me, Lhynara?” a deep voice roared through me. “You will never escape me. I will always find my way to you.”

Then everything went still. So still. Like I was sinking beneath deep, dark waters of a roaring sea.

I awoke with a start.

I had no idea how long I had been unconscious. 

I was disoriented and sore. My head ached. I inspected my arm. The markings were still, but they had moved, creeping a little higher, past my elbow, now. Like branches and blackened veins. The contrast stark against my otherwise pale skin.  

Panic came again, fast and choking.

I searched my surroundings and remembered what I had been doing before...he came.

I didn’t know what was happening to me.

But I knew one thing.

It wasn’t safe for me to stay here. I had to get out of town. Away.

But first, I had to find Gren. Bring her back safely.

It was past dusk. The cabin was dark, shadows filling every crack and corner. Outside, the sky held the barest strip of orange as the sun set over the riverbed.

The Raiths would try to escape, using the dagger I’d placed within Lagna’s reach. I’d be the first person the D’ral would come for. I was the only one who had gone near them. If they broke free, or even tried, I would be considered an accomplice.

I needed to disappear.

I could not be caught.

I knew that down to the fibre of my soul.

Because the Empire didn’t question. Not the D’ral.

They punished. Swiftly. Brutally.

If I weren’t detained for questioning, which meant torture, they would hang me in the square. Or worse, cull me.

I started gathering my things, what little there was. I grabbed food and drink for the road. I put together a kit of herbs and remedies, in case illness or misfortune found me. Even some I could sell or barter with.

Then I heard a voice. Young. Familiar.

I froze, sucking in a breath to steady myself.

I wrapped my arm quickly, choking down the fire climbing beneath my skin. I sheathed the dagger at my waist, beneath my skirts. Then I grabbed the only other thing I kept hidden in the box beneath the floorboards. A brooch etched with a coat of arms, a phoenix in flight. It was pierced into a swatch of cracked leather. The other was a book. The book itself was not of import. It was filled with blank pages, but also these dried purple flowers. The pages of the book were yellowed, falling from their binding, but they kept the flowers safe. I had it with me when I was found.

I shoved them into my pockets.

I put the box back in the dirt beneath the cabin, reset the floorboard, and covered it.

I ran to the door.

“Beth!” Darah’s youngest, Caedraan, hollered. He skidded to a stop just beyond the porch.

“My ma sent me after you.”

“Why?”

He was panting hard, barely able to catch his breath.

“Spit it out, Caed!” I shouted from the porch.

“Slow down,” I pleaded, trying to piece together what he was telling me. But somewhere deep in my darkest thoughts, I knew. I already knew what he was trying to say. I just needed him to say it.

The small, scrawny, sandy-haired boy, who had only lived ten and three summers, struggled to catch his breath.

“What happened?!”

“They took Andi.”

No.

No.

No.

I said it aloud, over and over.

“And her father, too. Even Gren. They took them all.”

Black.

I saw black. 

It crept into the edges of my vision, blotting out every thought. All I felt was rage, deep and primal, so strong it made my markings writhe. I thought I might tear the earth open beneath my feet. 

I grabbed the porch railing to steady myself, shaking, gasping, trying to think through as the shadows closed in around me. Trying to breathe through it. To not let fear and panic overtake me. I had to stay strong, or all was lost. 

And then, something inside me. Someone. Woke up. Another voice. A woman’s voice. Mine. Steady. Certain. Almost calm.

“You need to move. Now. Find a bloody horse.”

I stilled.

“Faster than this,” the voice in my head, snapped.

Right.

“Caed, I need a horse!” I barked.

He blinked at me like I’d just sprouted wings. 

“Pa’s got one at the farm, but it’s not a riding horse! She plows fields—”

I didn’t wait for the rest. I took off. The farm was closer than the town, and I didn’t need a steed. I needed a beast that could carry me through Tahlmorren itself.

And a plow mare would have to do.

*****

I barrelled through the trees faster than I could mentally keep up with. 

The plow mare—bless her wide, stubborn heart—held a steady stride. I drove her hard, digging my heels into her flanks. My skirts were hiked up to my knees, scandalous by village standards. Riding bareback, no less. A fact that was appalling, even to me.

Ask me if I gave a shit.

I didn’t. 

Not at the moment.

My mind was racing. Planning. 

It would be dark by the time I reached town. And after dark… nothing good happened. Especially not on a White Culling night.

But Gren. I had to get to Gren.

They’d likely be holding her in the village square. Chained. Or worse.

Vel’ariin help me. My gut twisted. I whispered every prayer I could recall to every ancient spirit and ancestor I could name, and if they didn’t answer, I’d start praying to the old, dark Vel’ariin. The ones that got shit done.

Wait! How the hell did I know that?

Apparently, I just knew things, now.

My second priority was Andi.

She’d be taken to the Keep where the Ward and his Hand resided. They would prepare her, purify her, offer her to the Emperor’s stewards in Revyre’s name. That cursed god of “purity” who demanded virgin blood to keep the bloodlines clean and holy.

Fucking bollocks.

Ritual after ritual, all just smoke and mirrors to justify what they really wanted. To violate her.

Andi, bright and sharp, not even of age. Why her? Why any of them.

The thought gutted me.

Andi deserved a life. A long one. One that didn’t end with ritual raping and a death passed off as divine revelation.

My blood boiled. My thoughts darkened with violent resolve. Whatever they intended, whatever gods they invoked, if one of them laid a hand on her, I’d rip him apart.

Whether he was a steward, soldier, or emperor. It didn’t matter.

To be continued...