He leads them up the narrow stairs, boots striking stone in a rhythm that feels almost ceremonial, an ascent meant for triumph, not subtlety. The cellar gives way to the warehouse above, a hollow space thick with dust and old spice-sacks, long abandoned by merchants who learned quickly to avoid this stretch of road after dark.

  Beyond the shattered doorway, the merchant road lies still. Only the heavy boom of the sea against the cliffs and the far sweep of a lone torch cut through the night, its glow drifting in lazy arcs. The air feels brittle, stretched thin, as if the entire city balances on the edge of something about to crack. Fragile. Perfect.

  The sanctum tower dominates the skyline, rising clean above the crooked roofs, stars carved into its stone, constellations swirling around its crown. Faint gold light pulses at its peak, steady as a heartbeat. He imagines her standing there, reading the sky in all her quiet certainty. Seren. The girl who stared too hard at truths she wasn't meant to see.

  Not that the stars can help her now. It is far too late for that.

  Fog gathers thick around the temple’s base, pulled by the rite still burning beneath Vaeron’s skin. It curls around the soldiers' legs, hiding their movements as they advance. No windows open. No voices call out. Highmarrow sleeps as deeply as he hoped, citizens in the upper quarters confident in their quiet, blind to their unraveling.

  He takes them through the back alleys, weaving around shuttered stalls and laundry lines that sway like pale ghosts. The trader’s path slopes downward, a narrow stone trail once used to carry incense and offerings to the temple gates. He remembers walking it as a boy, robes too big, knuckles raw from training, mind bent around lessons he no longer believes. A novice then. A weapon now.

  The memory draws a low, bitter laugh from his chest.

  At the foot of the path he lifts a hand. The soldiers close in, twenty pairs of boots grinding gravel under their weight. The Supplicants cluster nearest to him, their twisted bodies eager, anticipating command.

  Vaeron draws the blackened shard from his belt. The veins of green light still pulse faintly through its core, like a dying heart struggling to keep its rhythm. He raises it high.

  One word.

  A single command spoken in Theron’s tongue, each sound bitter as acid on his tongue, powerful enough to slice the air around him.

  The crystal hisses and splits with a wet crack. Dark light pours from it, not bright, not warm, but heavy, thick as spilled oil. It spreads over the service gate, coating the metal with shimmering threads. The wards flare in protest, runes glowing bright blue, then pale, then trembling.

  The shard drinks deeply.

  Lines of protection unravel like sinew torn from bone. Blue glyphs burn white-hot before snapping into nothing, turning to ash that floats like dead snow. Vaeron feels each ward break inside his ribs, sharp and satisfying, like the crunch of cartilage under a blade.

  The shard shakes violently in his grip, veins of light racing wild through its interior. The air sharpens, thick with sulphur and iron, burning the back of his throat. Stone grinds against stone as the final surge builds.

  Then the crystal shatters.

  Fragments drop to the ground, smoking, hollowed, their interiors scraped clean by the force they unleashed.

  The wards scream once, a long, brittle wail ripping up the tower’s spine, then fall silent.

  He feels it. The wardline collapse echoes through the temple like a spine cracking open. A thousand years of holy protection, gone in a single breath.

  They will stay silent now. Forever.

  The service gate crumbles to ash. The soldiers shift, awed and uneasy. Vaeron lets the last fragments slip from his hand, a thin smile tugging at his mouth.

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  “Forward,” he commands.

  There is no turning back.

  They surge through the breach, flooding the courtyard in a wave of black steel and corrupted flesh. A scream cuts the quiet, sharp, panicked. Then more. The fog splits under torchlight. Bodies scatter. Chaos blooms.

  Vaeron tilts his head, eyes lifting toward the tower.

  High above, a figure moves across a window, framed in gold, in starlight, in everything the temple pretends to be.

  His lip curls.

  “She is here.”

  Finally.

  A Supplicant hisses at his side, a thin rasp leaking through the iron stitches like steam escaping a cracked pipe. Hungry. Always hungry.

  “Hold,” Vaeron snaps, his voice cutting through the noise with the clean precision of a blade. The creature stills instantly. Good. Let the rest of the temple panic. Fear unravels faith faster than any flame. It’s almost musical.

  “Go. You know your orders.”

  The soldiers fan outward, black plates catching stray threads of light as they move. The firebrands on their chests glow a dull, ominous red. Voidblades slide free with that soft, swallowing sound he has grown to crave, steel forged in nothingness, drinking the world’s light rather than reflecting it. Perfect tools. Made for this.

  They split without speaking. Cohesion born of terror and training. Some storm the cloisters, shields up, blades down. Others sweep toward the gardens, hunting those foolish enough to flee into open ground. Boots slam against stone. Shouts ripple outward. The first cries of terror lift into the air, and Vaeron feels the sound run along his spine.

  He draws his own blade. Black steel, forged in pain and quenched in souls. When he breathes near it, the metal hums like something alive.

  “Now,” he says, the hunger low and steady in his throat. “Let us get the Starfire.”

  They move quickly. Two Supplicants flank him, warped bodies swaying with eager anticipation. The rest scatter into side halls, their hulking shadows tearing through doors and walls as if the building itself were no more than brittle parchment.

  Priests fall before they manage more than half a prayer, voidblades parting flesh with merciless ease. He watches a few drop without ceremony. They should be grateful. Their deaths mean something now.

  One Supplicant seizes a priest by the forearm. Black fire erupts along the man’s skin. His scream tears up the corridor as the flesh blisters, splits, and finally rips under the pressure of something unseen pushing outward. The body collapses in two halves. Smoke threads lazily from the wound.

  The Supplicant shudders once, and then moves on, dripping red.

  Power always costs something.

  Chaos blooms across the temple. Servants sprint through the cloisters but drop under blades before reaching cover. Blood sprays across pale stone, streaking murals that once told stories of gods and their quiet victories. The courtyards ring with screams, prayers, the crash of armour, and the relentless thunder of boots.

  Vaeron inhales. The air tastes of fear and iron. He feels alive.

  He reaches the sanctum doors just as it hits him.

  Not sound.

  Pressure.

  A crushing, invisible weight slams into his chest, driving the air from his lungs. He braces against the doorframe, fingers tightening on his blade.

  She is inside.

  The Starfire is with her.

  The thought burns hot in his gut. Almost there.

  The inner doors are barred from within, massive old stone bound in iron, layered with centuries of faith and duty. What remains of the temple’s magic clings stubbornly to the frame, sparking weakly in patches of dull blue.

  Vaeron sneers. “Pathetic.”

  The Supplicants strike first. Twisted hands crash against the arch, sending cracks crawling through the stone. They hit again, harder. Ward-lines flare desperately, scorching their skin, but still they push. The air fills with the stench of burned flesh.

  Vaeron watches it all, impatience biting at his jaw.

  “Faster,” he orders.

  And they obey. Always.

  One steps forward, plants both hands at the centre. Bone cracks under strain. Magic sears its palms, black smoke hissing where flesh meets the ward. It pulls harder, dragging and tearing with blind strength. Hinges groan, splintering inch by inch. With a final wrench, the doors burst apart, shards of iron and stone flying.

  Heat rolls out, not flame, but something older, divine. The weight of it presses against his senses. He breathes it in. This is what he came for.