Evan von Drakos limped through the derelict orchard where iron-leafed weed rattled like coins in a beggar's cup. Moonlight jagged across his breastplate, silvering the crusted blood that glued his split armor to his aching ribs. Each step bore a new stream of pain, yet the greater ache was the silence—no banter from Deryn, no soft humming from Sister Sura. Six shadows beside him had marched out to river Styx; only his stumbled footsteps returned.
A lone crow croaked from the hedge. Its red eyes gleamed like the flame burning with midnight oil.
Evan froze.
Three cries to the unknown yet no crow responding to it. The code for "safe."
He exhaled a soundful moan etched with his pain yet his brows relaxed in reassurance.
He pressed a trembling finger to the rune-lock on his signet. A pulse of cyan radiated from the family dragon through the fog, dying fast—a symbol of his identity and mission.
Minutes later, a cloaked figure emerged between the trunks, holding a lantern and hooded in a cyan cloak, gait impeccably measured. The stranger's face was swaddled in gauze but even wrapped, that aristocratic poise could belong only to Baron Godred von Drakos.
"Report," the baron murmured, voice flattened and devoid of any familial vowel.
Evan tried a salute; his arm shook. "Objective compromised. Our team… neutralized. Assailants anticipated our route. Entrapment runes, disruptive codes, deadly poisons… I—I was cast ashore from one of the traps by Disavowed Leader Mairn. Her last order was…" His throat closed.
Before Evan could continue from his delirious state, Godred raised his palm ordering him to stop. Evan could only seal his lips in his subservience.
Godred scratched a circle in the mud with his boot, "Stand inside the mark, Disavowed," he said before stepping inside of it himself.
The circle thrummed as transparent walls knitted overhead—an invisible dome. Secrets would not leak.
"Describe the breach."
Rain began—a whisper at first, then needles. Droplets stung his cuts, dragging the yet clotted fresh blood along with it and also dragging away his memories of them:
Mairn's armor buckled, Sura's spell sputtering crimson, and Deryn's laugh cut short.
Unfortunately, Godred was never interested in their dying valor. What he wanted were objective truths. Evan was trained to deliver the same and so he did, masking any emotions attached to the events.
All the while Godred's gloved thumb tapped the pommel of his cane, a metronome untroubled by horror.
Lightning forked, bleaching the orchard. In that flash, Evan saw the baron's eyes behind the ragged disguise—cold and calm, calculating with every flicker.
"…and when I crawled free, Disavowed Bryn was already—" The sentence withered.
Silence pooled. Only rain drummed on their bodies. Evan had no more words to share.
At length Godred spoke, crisp as a notary: "Do you know why your unit was chosen for this mission?"
"Because… we were incompetent and expendable," Evan answered, bitterness acid on his tongue.
After escaping death's maw, with no other thought but his grief… he had entertained this question himself as well. Why was it that he was so easily compromised?
Their team? Tightly knit together. The details of the mission? Extremely classified. That could only mean that the instructions of the mission itself were laced with untold dangers. Only an expendable team would be suitable for the same.
"Incorrect." The baron flicked water from his cuff. "You were selected because we believed a mole nested among you."
Evan's pulse lurched. "A … mole? Sir, with respect, every oath seal—"
"Fake." Godred stepped closer. "The courier you chased? A phantom. The cipher you were told to retrieve? Fabricated. What was real was the cauldron your team was put into—life-or-death stakes. Thought that was enough to root out the mole. A second Disavowed team was dispatched to make observations and report back to me. Yet they failed the mission. No one was supposed to die but everyone did. My soldiers compromised? Only one survivor? Surely, a traitor deprived of a way out of the cauldron would improvise, tilt the odds to save his skin, returning alive."
Wind keened through stripped branches. Evan tasted iron again—this time from his bitten lip. "You think I am the mole?"
"I think," Godred said, "in a team with a single mole only one disavowed emerged alive. Him not being a mole is a statistical improbability."
Evan's laugh fractured into coughs. "I survived because Mairn ordered me to carry intel!" He fumbled at his breast, producing a blood-smeared dagger… a memento of the dying leader. "Her last words—'Run, Evan. Inform the baron that the cipher is lost.' "
Godred's eyes flicked to the dagger but he showed no interest. "Loyalty cannot be forged on the words of a dead woman."
The circle ward pulsed red—truth-spell engaged. Evan felt the heat under his tongue, the sigil reacting. He could taste the magic, coppery, accusing.
"Evan von Drakos," Godred intoned, "by authority of the Obsidian Concord and by accounts of your Disavowed brethren, I charge you with high treason against the royalty and fratricide against your comrades."
His cane clicked; a fine blade whispered free. Lightning flashed again, and in it, Evan saw himself reflected—muddy, bruised, wide-eyed, already a ghost.
"Brother," he sluttered.
"Step-brother," Godred corrected, ice-sharp. "Kneel."
The orchard seemed ready to absorb the nourishment. It demanded more blood.
Evan's eyes rippled on that very command. His choices were locked between fight, flight, or surrender. Rainwater dripped off his helm, blurring his vision. Branches overhead looked like clawed verdicts. And Godred seemed like a phantom wrapped in cyan ready to reap his head.
Surrender if he may, death was certain. Fight? How long could he last with his injured body and soul? Flee, if he may, till when. Charged with treason his fate is bound to be shrouded in darkness.
Somewhere far away a memory stirred: two boys fencing beside the family pond, Godred correcting Evan's stance with patient hands.
Evan sank to one knee, mud splattering his knee armor. The signet slid from his grasp and shattered. Violet sparks leaped in the air — then died.
Godred raised the sword—