Ash and Echoes
In the fractured lands between the godly mountains of ‘Hamadat Alhamra’ (Red Hamada) and the Eastern Wilds, rumors stir of an ancient site reawakening... the Obsidian Gate, a collapsed ley-crossing where time once bent and shattered during the fall of the Echoborne Empire. Now, it pulses again… drawing the attention of rebels, warlords, and old powers alike.
Dmitrei Lange, weary and in self-imposed exile in the high cliffs, is reluctantly hired, sight unseen, by a secretive map-carrier to guide her to the edge of the ruins… unaware that this masked traveler is Adelaide Bancroft, fugitive heir of a bloodline he once heard tales of in whispered rebel camps.
They begin as strangers bound by purpose… but the deeper they go, the more the mountain begins to whisper. As their enemies close in, Dmitrei must decide if she’s the reason his soul stirred for the first time in years… or the harbinger of a second war.
The wind had teeth that morning… sharp-edged, highland wind that slid between the seams of his cloak like a whispered curse. Dmitrei drew the fur tighter around his shoulders and adjusted the weight of his satchel as his boots crunched against the frost-hardened path. Twas only late autumn, and the mountain gods were already sharpening their blades for winter. “Tis the Year of the Crimson Eclipse”, they said… a cursed omen in Kar-Nessian lore. “A year when blood refuses to cool and old things stir beneath stone.”
The northern slopes of ‘Hamadat Alhamra’, the Red Hamada in the common tongue, lay stretched before him in all their solemn majesty. Black spires of obsidian jutted like broken teeth from the earth, and the ancient trails… once used by scouts and pilgrims… were nearly gone, choked by root and time. Each step along the ridge brought back memories he didn’t want. Memories of marches. Of burning banners. Of names he couldn’t afford to remember anymore.
No one greeted him now… not in these high passes. Not since the last of his blood-kin scattered or burned. To most, Dmitrei Lange was dead. Buried in some nameless field with the rest of the Kar-Nessian ghosts. And maybe that was the point. It allowed him to move through these fractured lands with a certain weightless anonymity. No banners. No war cries. Just a man and his silence.
He had caught wind of strange movement on the old border trails… figures that didn't match the usual bandits or scouts. Too careful. Too precise. The locals spoke of a woman veiled in crimson silk, seen passing through shadow and ruin, always alone, never captured. He hadn't cared… not until the bones told him something was shifting. Not until he passed an ancient shrine two days ago, where someone had painted an open eye in blood across the altar stone. That had stopped him.
Because the old gods didn’t speak without purpose. And they didn’t mark their shrines without warning.
He crested the ridge at midmorning, the valley yawning wide beneath him. Somewhere ahead, Kar-Nessian loyalists clung to fortress keeps with rusting swords and pride. Outlaw clans traded blood for salt and flame. And somewhere in the middle of all that… someone was being hunted.
Dmitrei rolled his shoulders, adjusted the straps on his pack, and muttered under his breath.
“Bloody cursed year... always starts with a woman.” He started walking again.
After five days of travel…
The smell of woodsmoke caught his attention before the light did… low and careful, tucked somewhere just beyond the boulder ridge that shielded the western drop into the valley. Dmitrei paused, drawing in a breath through his nose. Pine ash. Dry twigs. No wet moss or green sap. Whoever had built it knew the signs. No plume of smoke to catch a hunter’s eye. No crackle that might wake a beast.
He shifted his weight and stepped quietly down the incline, hand resting on the hilt of his short blade… not drawn, but close enough. The air in this hollow was warmer, tucked out of the wind, cradled by high slopes and a canopy of bent-limbed cedar. The kind of place you used when you didn’t want to be found… but couldn’t afford the cold.
Then he saw her. A lone figure by the fire… slender, cloaked, posture guarded but not meek. The light caught a glint of metal at her side, and Dmitrei’s brow furrowed. Not a common traveler. Too quiet. Too still. She hadn’t moved when he stepped into view. Which meant either courage… or calculation.
He didn’t speak at first. Just watched the way her hands moved. No tremor. No wasted motion. Then, voice low and even, he said… “Was not expecting company down in this fold.” His tone wasn’t unfriendly, but it bore that gravel-scrape of warning mountain men carried. “Fire’s well made. Smell of it led me off the path. Didn’t mean to trespass.”
He kept his stance relaxed, but didn’t sit. Not yet. He didn’t like how the shadows clung to her hood. He didn’t like how her blade looked used.
“Can share silence or words. Makes no matter to me.” He tilted his head, studying the set of her shoulders. “Just not used to seein’ folk travel alone these days. Especially… women.”
His eyes narrowed slightly, but not unkindly. More curious than accusing. “I shall ask just once. You runnin’ from someone? Or waitin’ on them?”
The fire popped between them, and Dmitrei didn’t flinch. He’d shared a hundred fires with foes and ghosts alike.
This wouldn’t be the first time a stranger carried a story too heavy to speak.
But he watched her all the same.
Watched her like the gods might rise from the ash at any moment.
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