Ember Pendant

The ghoul's severed limbs still stank on the dark-purple frozen ground.

By the reckoning of the inland regions, it was afternoon at most. But this was the Eternal Night Wall.

A vast patch of dark red suddenly began to seep through the dim sky, a heart-stopping omen that the Blood Moon was about to rise.

Shien gave the order at once: "All forces, halt! Make camp here!"

The entire column sprang into motion. Carts laden with supplies were forced into a circle, each joined to the next.

The portable holy-fire braziers atop the carts became the heart of the camp. Their white-gold light barely held open a small safe zone beneath the dark-red sky.

Then several clerics hauled out heavy sacks and scattered a ring of coarse salt mixed with a trace of Holy Silver powder around the wagon circle.

Once the Blood Moon had fully risen, any low-ranking aberrant that tried to sneak into camp would have its claws burned through the moment it stepped on the salt line.

The camp was in an uproar.

The work-point system had left the convicts wild-eyed. They hauled tents and supply crates with all their might, desperate to earn a few more points in front of their cold-hearted lord.

At the edge of the crowd, the one-armed Victor stood out sharply.

The gaunt old man had clamped his remaining left hand around a heavy crate full of pig-iron ingots. Hunched over, he dragged it with difficulty through the mud.

No one lent him a hand. In this place, there was no time for sympathy.

Crack!

Victor's already impaired right leg slipped, and half his body slammed into the muddy water.

The heavy iron crate slid down the slope, seconds from crushing his shin!

Just as he gritted his teeth and braced himself for the blow...

A hand shot out and stopped the entire crate of pig iron in midair. Victor jerked his head up. It was the silver-haired lord.

"In your condition, heavy labor like this is too inefficient." Shien set the crate on the ground beside him. "Go to the inner ring. The artisans' camp needs people."

In Shien's field of vision, the faint pale-green value above Victor's head suddenly jumped.

But years of persecution had left Victor like a bird startled by the bowstring. He quickly lowered his head. "My lord... you think too highly of me. I'm just a crippled old man who can't even swing a hammer. Sending me to the artisans' camp would only waste rations..."

Shien bent slightly, his voice low enough for only the two of them to hear. "A blacksmith who swings a sledgehammer grows thick, rough calluses across the web and palm of his hand. A knight who grips a sword gets them on his index finger and at the base of his fingers."

He studied Victor's left hand. "But yours are on your fingertips and the inside of the web of your hand, and they're smooth. Those are the marks left by years of holding a fine carving knife and polishing precision metal components.

"And there's machine oil under your nails. You used to be an alchemist who worked with precision machinery, didn't you?"

Victor froze in the mud. His single clouded eye narrowed sharply.

For six full years, ever since an inquisitor of the Holy War Council had severed his right arm, branded him a convict, and expelled him from the Church, everyone had treated him as a worthless wreck.

Yet this young lord had stripped his disguise bare from nothing more than the calluses on his hand and the oil beneath his nails!

Shien turned to leave, offering a few final words. "Stay at the artisans' camp for now. Once we reach the fief, I'll have plenty for you to do. Prove yourself, and I'll build you a workshop.

"If you can't... you can come back and drag crates."

Victor knelt in the mud. The faint pale-green value above his head climbed, one notch at a time.

High overhead, the dark red peeled away from the sky like clotted blood, and a lifeless daylight came to the Evernight Buffer Zone.

At the center of camp, only a faint glimmer remained of the white-gold flame in the portable holy-fire brazier.

But along the outer defenses, the gray-white line the clerics had drawn with coarse salt and Holy Silver powder the night before remained clear.

Several low-ranking Blood Moon creatures lay strewn across both sides of it, having tried to cross during the night.

Shien stood beside a supply wagon, a stub of charcoal pencil in hand, swiftly tallying the night's consumption of holy-fire fuel and coarse salt on a wooden board.

Suddenly, heavy iron boots broke through the morning mist.

One of Bishop Castian's high-ranking personal guard knights came straight to Shien and conveyed the bishop's summons.

Shien asked no questions. He mounted his horse and rode straight for the Holy City Army's central camp.

The heavy curtain was pulled aside.

Bishop Castian stood with both hands braced against an enormous tactical map, his eyes bloodshot from a night spent working through battle plans.

Shien had barely come to a stop when Castian raised his Holy Silver scepter and struck a supply route on the map.

The line ran from the heartland of the Kingdom of Austeria all the way to the Graymist Defense Zone.

"The next batch of penal troops, artisans, and warriors assembled by the kingdom and the major Lineages, along with three times the allotted amount of Holy Silver ore, will be sent through the wind and snow into the buffer zone before spring."

The scepter traced the supply route north, stopping at the marker for Blackpine Fief.

"Once those supplies enter the Graymist Defense Zone, I'll invoke my authority to make wartime allocations."

Castian raised his bloodshot eyes to Shien. "I'll carve out the largest share of its most skilled senior artisans and its highest-purity raw Holy Silver ore for you. The camp you're taking over sits on the main route of the aberrant invasion. Its defenses are weak, so it should receive supplies first."

The reasoning sounded perfectly aboveboard, but both men standing before the map knew better.

In the Eternal Night Wall's frenzied meat grinder, resources were never distributed evenly.

The command Shien had shown throughout the march, his ability to bring the people at the bottom together, and his results with almost no casualties had completely changed the old bishop's assessment.

Shien answered without hesitation. "As you wish. Blackpine Fief will be the toughest bone in the Graymist Defense Zone."

Castian then pushed a black-iron signet ring, the symbol of lawful claim to the fief, toward Shien.

"In another two days, this relatively level stretch of the buffer zone will end. The expeditionary force will split up there for good. Take your people down the westernmost road and head straight for Blackpine Fief."

Shien took the ring into his palm and asked casually, "When will you return inland?"

Castian did not answer. His thin, bony index finger jabbed hard at the center of the map.

There stood the ruins of a vast fortress, the heart of the Graymist Defense Zone.

The bishop's voice did not waver. "I'm not leaving. I'll stay here. Werewolves tore the head off last year's overseer, and this year I have to clean up his mess."

The tent fell silent.

Shien jerked his head up. His eyes, usually as still as an ancient well, showed unmistakable shock.

Only days ago, this old man had told him himself that the Graymist Defense Zone was treated as a sacrificial belt already presumed lost. Lords of the Long Night like Shien were nothing but pawns cast to the edge.

That being so, a cardinal archbishop like Castian had every reason to leave and return to the inland heartland.

But he had not. He had chosen to remain on this wasteland, where even high-ranking knights could be torn apart by werewolves. It defied all logic.

Seeing the shock in Shien's eyes, Castian gave a derisive snort. "Wipe that stupid look off your face.

"Did you think a few dozen greenhorn lords like you and a mob of terrified convicts could hold back an entire defense zone for the inland regions?"

Shien did not know what to say. He could only lower his head. "Your courage has my deepest respect."

Castian fell silent for a moment. Then he reached inside his ceremonial robe and unfastened an old silver necklace.

A thumb-sized crystal hung from its end, a wisp of pure white flame sealed within.

He walked around the desk to Shien. "Take it. The Ember Pendant.

"If a high-ranking dark creature targets you when the Blood Moon is at its height, crush it. It'll strike with the full force of a fourth-tier knight."

Shien accepted the crystal. He rarely received gifts without a price, but this necklace was clearly more than a simple exchange of favors.

Castian did not look at him again. He turned back to the tactical map, with its many marked places where people would die.

"Get back to your camp. I hope the next time we meet... you aren't a corpse."

Shien was silent for two seconds, then closed his hand around the Ember Pendant.

He stepped back half a pace and pressed his right fist firmly to his chest. To the old bishop whose mouth was full of cold calculations yet who was willing to put his life on the line at the Eternal Night Wall, he gave a formal salute of the Holy City Army.

Then the tent curtain lifted, and cold wind poured inside.

The young Lord of the Long Night strode out of the central camp and toward the long night that awaited him.