For the next two days, Byuga remained confined to the infirmary, adrift in a sea of listlessness. He lacked the will for action; even when a spark of intent flickered within him, it vanished before it could take form. Outside, the blizzard grew more suffocating, the air sharpening with a lethal frost. Though twin hearths roared and the stove was stoked to a crimson glow, a persistent, unnatural chill clung to the stones of the room.

  Last night, for the first time, a hollow yearning for home had pierced him. He had never imagined such a feeling when he departed Gaigon. He had known he would miss it, certainly, but he hadn't anticipated this desperate ache to return. He wondered what his father was doing now—perhaps retreated to his beloved spire, sitting before the window he had finally secured after days of bitter contention. There, gas lamps flickered and steam pipes hummed with the warmth of industry. Here, Byuga felt as though he had been cast centuries back into a forgotten age. The rifles of the guards were but rusted relics compared to the shimlyndvyens his father commanded. It seemed the further north one traveled, the further the wheels of time ground backward.

  As darkness fell on the second night, a cacophony of voices rose from the courtyard. Though leaden with apathy, Byuga forced himself to rise and step into the biting air. Only then did he see the pyre of timber and the monument standing amidst them. The guards had assembled. The heavy blizzard had breached the walls, burying the courtyard in a thick shroud of white, yet he strained to see.

  Minutes passed before the truth took shape. As his uncle’s remains were borne upon the shoulders of the hattori and nimras, he saw Balbun sitting in a far corner, a small shadow against the steps of the Black Tower. To his shock, Byuga realized Makar was there as well. The kardam was not bound in chains, nor did anyone seem to heed his presence. He stood at the periphery, his gaze fixed unblinkingly upon Kungam’s funeral.

  Speakers stepped forth atop the pyre, but Byuga noted their movements were stiff, their gestures stifled by the freezing gale. He himself was shivering violently. Then Balbun rose, spoke a few words, and descended. He appeared hollowed out, his spirit dampened. Byuga wondered how the old man could be so profoundly affected by these events when he himself felt untethered from reality. It was only the sight of his uncle’s corpse that brought the world rushing back. He swallowed hard and continued to watch.

  After the hattori concluded the oration, they laid his uncle’s body beside the Shyugan Monument. Byuga watched as the shroud was drawn back from his uncle’s face. The blizzard howled in a frenzy, its whistle echoing off the battlements like a dying scream. He waited for the fire. As the guards approached the pyre with torches aloft, he watched the flames struggle against the wind, smoke swirling into the white dark. Unable to endure the cold a moment longer, he turned to retreat inside.

  In that heartbeat, the blizzard surged with such sudden ferocity that the earth trembled beneath his boots. The orderlies rushed from the infirmary, stopping dead to stare at the ramparts. The crowd below followed their gaze upward. Byuga knew then: a warning had come. He wrapped his furs tight and threw himself down the stairs into the snow-choked courtyard. The wind intensified, feeling as though a thousand invisible hands were pushing and pulling at his frame.

  Chaos erupted. Guards scrambled in every direction, and Byuga, seized by panic, sought only Balbun. Then came a thunderous crack—a sound so titanic it sent a sickening vibration through his skull. Instinctively, he turned his head left, and it felt as if a crushing weight had descended upon his crown. The blizzard had congealed into a physical mass, collapsing into the courtyard. He buckled, bracing himself against the ground, only for a second blow to strike. He and every guard around him were driven to their knees. The snow was now an impenetrable wall; sight was a luxury. He squinted, fighting to stand, when a series of harrowing, soul-piercing shrieks tore through the air. The agony in his ears told him all he needed to know. Byuga knew that sound. He looked up, his heart freezing in his chest.

  The Witches.

  As the shutters rattled and guards fought to reach the armory, the inner gates burst open. Men ran through, screaming warnings that were lost to the gale. Byuga stood paralyzed amidst the bedlam.

  But Balbun had seen him. Amidst the blaring of war-horns, the old man rose and called to Bodhi. The monk looked to him, then peered into the white void where Balbun pointed. Confusion clouded Bodhi’s eyes, but he struggled forward.

  "The infirmary!" Balbun managed to bellow before the wind nearly swept him from his feet. Bodhi caught him, and together they bowed their heads, plunging into the absolute whiteness.

  In the heart of the storm, Makar was running toward the battlements. A shimlyndvyen saw him but said nothing, offering no interference. His duty was to Byuga. As Bodhi carved a path through the gale, the heir of Gaigon spotted them. He collided with fleeing guards, twice tumbling into the freezing drifts. The air inside the Black Tower had become a vortex, both pushing and pulling. He clung to a fallen guard and looked ahead. He could see Balbun now—the old shimlyndvyen barely upright, leaning on Bodhi for support. Byuga tried to scream his name, but the wind stole the sound from his lips before it could reach his own ears.

  The earth shivered again. Though he saw the screaming guards and the total breakdown of order, the logic of their actions escaped him. This was terror in its purest form—the fear of the unknown. Balbun and Bodhi were nearly upon him, perhaps twenty paces away, when a third tremor struck. This time, the infirmary and the surrounding structures groaned and cracked. Byuga was thrown down by the violence of the heave. When he looked up, Balbun was there. The old man hauled him up, and together with Bodhi, they sprinted toward the Black Tower. There, they might find sanctuary. Gaigen had stood for centuries; surely, it would not fail now.

  As they reached the center of the courtyard, the blizzard did not cease, but it thinned, granting a moment of terrifying clarity. A profound stillness, a stagnation that Byuga could feel in his very marrow, settled over the world. Life seemed to freeze, a single moment stretched into an eternity. He looked up as the veil of snow parted. The guards took the chance to scale the walls, while others hammered at the gates.

  Then, they saw them.

  Above Gaigen, the witches had formed a macabre circle. They spun in place even as the entire ring rotated, crimson and white light lashing from their eyes, their hair streaming like tattered banners. The sight held everyone transfixed. Every guard stared upward in frozen horror. The earth continued to moan. Balbun and Bodhi seized Byuga’s hands, dragging him toward the tower, hoping to use this eerie lull to reach safety.

  But as they ascended the steps, a sudden, phantom-like pulse of energy rippled through the air. Byuga looked up just as a wave of force, conjured by the witches, slammed into them. He was sent sprawling across the frozen steps; Bodhi was hurled against the tower wall, and Balbun was thrown back toward the precipice. Rocks shattered at the edge, and the roofs of several buildings buckled inward. Following the shockwave came a cold so physical, so predatory, that Byuga’s lips burned with the sting of it. He scrambled to his feet, grimacing, only to see Balbun sliding toward the abyss. The old man’s head was bleeding; he was senseless.

  A moment later, half the cliffside—carrying the inner wall of Gaigen with it—disintegrated. The tower seemed to hover precariously over nothingness. As the massive shelf of rock began its descent, taking buildings and men with it, Balbun’s slide accelerated. Byuga ran, but the cold was turning his skin to stone. He felt his heart hammering against his ribs. He snatched the whip Balbun always insisted he carry and leapt onto the crumbling rock. As the incline sharpened, he threw himself toward the shimlyndvyen and caught him, but they were both falling. He lashed his whip, trying to snag the marble balustrade of the tower steps, but it missed. Terror seized him as the void opened beneath them. He tried to climb, but Balbun was a dead weight. Another pulse of cold struck the ground above, sending a spray of stone down upon them. They were sliding toward a thousand-foot drop on a mountain of dying rock.

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  "Let yourself go..." The words of the man in Taong echoed in his mind. He turned his head, looking down into the maw of the abyss, and a strange sensation washed over him. He wanted to survive. He had thought he craved death, but now he realized that was a lie. He was merely weary of being defeated by it; he was not ready to surrender. He closed his eyes, and that same sensation he had felt in the courtyard of Gaigon flooded his being. Suddenly, his senses expanded. He felt the very earth, the ice, the ancient soul of the rock beneath him. He felt the panicked guards, the massive army encroaching on Gaigen’s northern flank, and the souls huddled within the buildings. He could almost reach out and touch the witches with his mind.

  They were about to tip into the vertical. Byuga hauled Balbun in with one arm, snapped his whip, and shoved off the falling rock with a desperate leap. He thought he would fall short, but in mid-air, he lashed the whip again. It caught. He felt a hand seize his collar, hauling him upward. As the rock plummeted into the dark, he scrambled up the remaining stone and collapsed into the snow, dragging Balbun beside him. He could feel every movement in the courtyard, every footfall, every scream. When he looked up, he saw the kardam holding the end of his whip. Makar had saved them.

  "Let us go." Byuga understood him. He didn't just read the movement of the man's lips; he felt the vibration of the words in the air. He was touching the sound itself. Amidst the carnage and horror, he smiled. This was the key.

  Instead of taking the kardam's hand, he entrusted Balbun to him, coiled his whip, and moved toward the fortress. "They are through the gates!" someone screamed. Byuga felt the cry. But before he could process the alarm, a colossal explosion rocked the foundations. With a roar of falling masonry, a titanic figure smashed through the walls.

  "Ranoc!" Bodhi shrieked, his voice thick with the scent of death. Byuga recognized the name from the chronicles—monsters that had unmade the world centuries ago. He stared in terror as the creature loomed over them, its hide matted with blood and rubble. The witches shrieked again. Byuga looked up to see them carrying a swirling vortex of white light toward the Black Tower. The cold radiating from it was the source of the blizzard itself, a gale so fierce it made standing an impossibility.

  They were yards from the tower when kardams began to pour over the walls like a dark tide. Byuga watched as the guards made a futile stand. Gaigen had fallen; that much was clear. He looked around in a daze. What was happening? What must he do?

  Then, from the ranks of the kardams, nightmares emerged. One creature tore through the guards, shifting its shape with every kill, its tentacles shredding and consuming. Another unleashed a cry that brought men to their knees, clutching their heads. It was a carnival of horrors. He saw a beast with blades for hands, and another whose entire face was nothing but a concentric maw of teeth. His head spun; he wanted to retch.

  The witches shrieked once more, and a wave of power more potent than the last expanded outward. Makar, already weakened by the cold, was slammed into the ground along with Balbun. The air was a symphony of screams and wet, tearing sounds. For Byuga, the noise was physical—he wasn't just hearing these horrors; he was touching them. He squeezed his eyes shut against the agony in his mind, but there was no shield. He looked up to see a creature approaching Makar. It moved on four arachnid legs that sprouted from its back, its own legs having been severed; its torso was dominated by a cavernous, salivating mouth that hissed as it touched the snow.

  The Prince of Gaigon rose, but a wall of kardams blocked his path. Their eyes glowed a baleful red, their faces gaunt as they marched with a sleepwalker's gait, one stepping over the corpse of the last to continue the assault.

  In that moment of paralysis, Balbun’s whip cracked through the air, lashing out over the fleeing guards. It struck the multi-legged horror across its maw, staggering it, while Bodhi unleashed twin spheres of flame from his palms. The creature shrieked and dove into the snow to quench the fire. Bodhi seized Byuga, and Balbun tried to pull Makar to his feet, but the kardam was too heavy for the old man.

  A few guards rushed to assist, heaving Makar—a kardam borne by the Shyugan Guard—into the press of the crowd toward the tower. Bodhi shoved Byuga forward, and they disappeared into the throng.

  By the time they reached the tower, the heavy doors were groaning shut. Makar and Balbun were already inside, but Byuga and Bodhi were trailing. They lunged for the closing gap, but the tide of panicked men blocked them. Byuga saw Balbun turn back, only to be swept off his feet by the stampeding crowd. He screamed, but his voice was drowned. Just as a creature prepared to leap, the doors slammed shut.

  Byuga and Bodhi turned, their backs to the gate, to face the courtyard of Gaigen. It was crawling with nameless abominations and red-eyed kardams. They were butchering the remaining guards—tearing, eating, playing with the pieces. The cold was absolute, biting into their marrow. He could feel the witches' screams above. He could feel his own fear. To their back was a closed door; to their side, the abyss. The blizzard screamed. Bodhi, like the few guards left outside, looked around with eyes full of the end of the world.

  "Guards!" a voice bellowed. Byuga felt the vibration of a man stepping forward. "Gaigen does not fall while we stand! If we die, let us die with hearts high!" The sentiment died in his throat as a demon coiled its limbs around his neck, its teeth finding his jugular. The remaining men broke, scattering in terror. Some were pushed into the void. Byuga and Bodhi were driven toward the edge.

  The monk of Taom-Dium pulled stones from his pouches and began an incantation. Around them, a shimmering circle of light flared into existence, and the bite of the cold receded. Guards threw themselves against the invisible barrier, begging for entry. Bodhi collapsed to his knees, and Byuga held him. Outside the circle, the courtyard was a slaughterhouse.

  Bodhi’s breath came in ragged, wet rattles. He reached out, his hand trembling as he touched Byuga’s shoulder. "I love you," he whispered.

  Tears blurred Byuga’s vision as he clung to the monk. In all his loneliness, his grief, his brokenness, there had always been Bodhi. Bodhi and Balbun.

  Remembering the old shimlyndvyen, Byuga turned his head toward the tower doors. Only a handful of guards remained alive outside the circle, and they were being extinguished one by one. A few paces away, a creature was hovering over a corpse, methodically sucking the eyes from their sockets. The monsters were beginning to notice the barrier.

  A massive centipede, its body covered in hundreds of sleeping human faces, emerged from the snow. Its cheeks twitched; eyes flickered open. Byuga recoiled, pulling Bodhi closer, but the monk was no longer making any sound. His eyes had rolled back. He was gone.

  The Prince of Gaigon began to wail. He wanted to leave this place, but there was nowhere to go. Awakening to the world’s sounds had been a curse; he had only awakened to hear the symphony of his own destruction.

  The thousand-faced centipede began to batter the invisible wall. It coiled around them, the only thing separating Byuga from its serrated legs was the barrier Bodhi had given his life to cast. If it failed, he would be crushed in an instant. "Help me!" he screamed, knowing no one would hear, yet needing to vent the terror.

  He looked down at Bodhi. The monk was still. No breath, no vibration. Just meat and bone. Byuga bowed his head. The centipede had blocked out the light, surrounding them completely. His tears fell, but they were no longer born of fear. He was simply finished. He was tired. He pressed his hands into the snow, which was melting into a slush of blood, and inhaled the scent of iron.

  Let yourself go.

  He stood up. If he was to die, he would do so without the shame of cowering. This could not be the end. A surge of desire rose from deep within—a foreign yet intimately familiar hunger. He wanted to end this. He wanted the suffering to cease. With a roar of fury, he clenched his fists and pressed them against the ice. He didn't feel the cold anymore. His toes were frozen, his skin brittle, yet he didn't care. He felt the rock beneath the ice, and then the emptiness beneath the rock. Something was clawing its way out of him, as if he were birthing a sea. Something beneath the earth called to him. The ground belonged to him. The sky belonged to him.

  The earth shifted.

  With a roar that eclipsed the blizzard, the world shattered. The centipede was swept away as the very floor of Gaigen collapsed. Walls, buildings, and battlements plummeted into the dark. The Black Tower stood, a lonely needle in the ruin, but all else fell. Byuga saw what lay beneath: the ruins of a titan-city, hidden for eons under the ice, now emerging like a wolf shaking off its winter coat. He watched the Ranoc fall into the yawning gap, a mountain of flesh disappearing into the deep.

  But the destruction lasted only seconds before his own footing vanished. As the glacier splintered into a thousand shards, the heir of Gaigon fell into the abyss. He did not let go of Bodhi. Before his back struck something hard and darkness claimed him, his last sight was the Black Tower standing tall amidst the carnage, and the witches circling above the source of the storm.

  Was he dead? He stopped fighting the air. He simply held Bodhi tight, and let the shadows take him.