For the entire week the drizzle came and went like breath, thin sheets of rain falling from a heavy gray sky, soaking the leaves and stone paths, never quite becoming a full storm.

  Imogen stood in the doorway of the cottage, apron damp from the garden and sleeves rolled up past her elbows. She’d just finished drying the last bundle of stormroot when she heard it.

  Hoofbeats. Slow. Heavy. Purposeful.

  A line of riders emerged from the mist-draped trees, their crimson cloaks heavy with rain, armor streaked with mud. At their head rode a towering man on a gray warhorse, cloaked in dark leather.

  Imogen’s heart thudded once, slow and hard.

  He dismounted without a word. The silver-white gleam of his helm, shaped like a dragon’s skull, cut through the drizzle like a blade. Black iron bound its horns, old runes glinting faintly across bone.

  When he removed it, General Arthur’s face was worn, weathered, and as cold as forged steel.

  “Miss Everhart,” he said, offering a nod that felt more like a warning than a greeting. “Forgive the lack of notice.”

  “General,” Imogen said tightly, her hand braced on the doorframe.

  “We ran into trouble along the coast. A dragon took down twelve men before we finished it. My medics need salves. Clotting agents. Whatever you’ve got left.”

  His tone was clipped, impersonal. But his eyes swept over her, slow and deliberate.

  “I’ve got some stock,” she replied, voice flat. “The last storm ruined most of the drying racks, but I’ll see what I can spare.”

  He gave a thin, unsmiling nod. “Every bit counts. We're heading east by dawn. The creature had scars, could’ve been part of a clutch.”

  Imogen stepped aside, her stomach knotting. “This way.”

  He ducked through the door, the dragon helm tucked beneath his arm, casting long shadows on the walls.

  While she gathered jars and bundles, he wandered, silently absorbing the cluttered shelves, the scent of crushed herbs, the journals stacked beside Elanor’s stool.

  “She taught you well,” he said, finally.

  Imogen didn’t look at him. “She taught herself. I’m just trying not to ruin it.”

  He gave a quiet grunt. “A shame. She was sharp. Harder than half my captains. Didn’t blink when things got ugly.”

  Still, she said nothing.

  “I heard about you and Aiden,” he added, too casually. “Grief makes everything harder to untangle. You’re both young. Idealistic. He’ll steady in time.”

  She turned, a crate in her hands. “Maybe. But I won’t be waiting for it.”

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  He studied her, then let out a quiet chuckle. “Cutting ties is easy. Living with the consequences, not so much.”

  Imogen’s voice was quiet but sharp. “It wasn’t a tie. It was a leash. And I stopped pretending I couldn’t feel it.”

  A pause.

  He set a few coins on the table too few, but she didn’t bother correcting him. Then, with a faint smirk: “Elanor would’ve liked to see you finally grow a spine.”

  As she walked him to the door, the rain picked up. He lingered in the threshold, adjusting the dragon skull under his arm.

  “You should stay inside tonight,” he murmured, gazing at the clouds. “Storm’s going to hit hard. The kind that rips the world sideways.”

  Imogen raised an eyebrow. “Forecasting the weather now, General?”

  He tilted his head. “Not just weather. Dragons get restless when the sky turns like this. Like they know something’s coming.”

  She held his gaze. “And what if they’re not here to burn what’s left?”

  A faint smile touched his lips as he placed the helm back over his head. “Then they’d be the first.”

  He turned to go but paused just past the door.

  “Stay safe, Miss Everhart,” came the echo behind bone. “You’re all that’s left of her. And the dark’s no place for someone with your blood.”

  Then he mounted his horse and vanished into the fog, his soldiers trailing like ghosts in the rising storm.

  Imogen stood at the doorway long after they were gone, the scent of rain and ash thick in the air.

  And somewhere, far off in the distance, thunder rolled like a warning.

  That evening, the rain returned not heavy, but constant.

  A whispering drizzle tapped against the windows in a rhythm too steady and too deliberate. The kind of sound that made your skin prickle and your instincts whisper that something was watching. The wind curled around the cottage like it was circling, waiting. The sky hung low and heavy, swollen with dark clouds that threatened to split open at any moment.

  Imogen lit a single candle at her workbench, the flame flickering weakly as she opened Elanor’s journals. She tried to focus to recopy formulas, label jars, grind root into powder but her hands were clumsy, her thoughts scattered.

  Something was off.

  The air felt wrong. Thick. Charged. As if the storm outside had pressed its fingers against the walls of her home, searching for a way in.

  Her eyes drifted to the window for the third time in five minutes.

  The trees beyond the glass swayed too slowly. The forest no longer looked familiar. It looked… watchful.

  She turned back to the journal but the page beneath her hand was trembling.

  No, not the page. Her hand.

  Imogen swallowed hard and told herself it was the chill. Just the cold seeping into her bones. Just the weather.

  But something in her chest ached.

  It wasn’t pain. Not exactly.

  It was a faint but steady pull. Like a thread tugging at her ribs, calling her name in a voice she couldn’t quite hear. Too far to understand, too close to ignore.

  Night deepened. Thunder rumbled far off in the mountains, slow and rolling, like giants shifting in their sleep. The candle sputtered in protest and finally went out, leaving her in the dim blue wash of lightning flashing through the windows.

  She didn’t relight the candle.

  She didn’t move for a long time just sat in the dark, listening to the wind press against the walls like it wanted in. That strange pull still hummed beneath her ribs, soft but insistent, like it was waiting for her to close her eyes.

  Eventually, with a tired sigh, she slipped off her work clothes and changed into a simple nightshirt loose, soft, worn thin at the hem from too many washings.

  She crawled into bed, tucking the covers up around her shoulders.

  And despite the uneasy weight in the air, despite the storm clawing at the edges of the night.

  Imogen let sleep take her.