HAREM: WARLOCK OF THE SOUTH

The Hollow Pass burned with steel. Arrows hissed like rain through the narrow sky-ribbon above, striking shield and flesh alike. Sparks erupted where iron clashed against iron, a storm of war contained between towering walls of stone. Ryon moved at the front like a blade thrust into the heart of the storm, his sword an extension of his will, cutting down Northerners who poured from the cliffs as though the mountain itself had birthed them. Each strike was clean, decisive, merciless. He did not have the luxury of hesitation; hesitation meant the death of the man or woman beside him.

The Ashen Host had been driven into chaos at the ambush's first strike. The narrow confines of the Pass made it impossible to wheel wide formations, and for a moment the South's proud phalanxes threatened to dissolve into a tide of panic. But the war-drums thundered, steady and unyielding, and Ryon's voice—carried raw and hoarse across the gorge—cut through the fear like fire through frost. "Hold the line! Drive them back!" The command surged down the ranks, each captain seizing it, each soldier clutching it as though it were their only shield against death itself. Slowly, painfully, order grew within the maelstrom.

The Northern commander—the scar-faced man who had announced the trap with a smile—fought atop a ridge where the light of torches licked his armor. He raised his hand, and flaming pots of pitch were hurled from the cliffs. They crashed among the Southerners with hideous force, bursting into gouts of fire that clung to flesh, to cloth, to steel. Screams filled the Pass as men became living torches, stumbling in agony before collapsing to the frozen earth. The acrid stench of burning hair and flesh swept through the gorge, making soldiers gag even as they fought.

Ryon saw it all with a heart of stone. He could not afford despair. He raised his sword high, its blade smeared with blood and soot, and shouted words that were not orders but a roar from the marrow: "Ash to ash, steel to steel!" The cry ignited the Ashen Host. Shields locked tighter, spears thrust with renewed fury, and the push began. Step by bloody step, they forced the Northerners back from the ground level, even as arrows and fire rained from above.

Alric fought beside him, face spattered crimson, his great axe cleaving a path wide enough for three men. "They mean to bury us here," he bellowed through the din. "This whole gorge is their graveyard."

Ryon cut down an enemy lunging for Alric's flank and spat blood from his mouth. "Then we will make it theirs!"

But even as he said it, the mountain itself seemed to laugh. A tremor rippled underfoot, subtle at first, then stronger, until stones began to tumble from the heights. Northerners above shouted warnings, scattering back as fissures cracked along the ridges. With a grinding roar, a boulder the size of a war-cart sheared loose and crashed into the southern flank. Dozens were crushed in an instant, their screams cut off as though swallowed whole. Dust and rock filled the air, choking, blinding. The pass was turning into a tomb.

Through the haze, Ryon glimpsed movement—shadows racing the cliffs, faster and more deliberate than the chaos of falling stone. Not more soldiers. Something else. Figures in blackened armor, cloaks that drank the light, eyes glinting like coals. His stomach clenched. He had seen such warriors only once before—at the fall of the Monastery of Ash, where men died with their souls ripped from their bodies. Wraith-knights. The North had sent not only soldiers, but horrors dredged from the old wars.

They struck the Southerners with inhuman speed, blades whistling like whispers of the grave. Where their weapons touched flesh, the wounds bled not only blood but light, as if some essence deeper than the body was being carved away. Soldiers fell screaming, clutching at their own shadows as though they could not hold themselves together. Fear rippled the line, and for a heartbeat, Ryon felt it too—that primal terror, the urge to turn and run, to flee this cursed gorge and never look back.

But the memory of faces held him firm—the men who had knelt before him when he swore the Oath of Ash, the women who had buried sons and brothers and begged him not to let their sacrifice be wasted, the countless who had followed him this far. If he faltered now, they would be lost. He could not falter.

With a guttural cry, Ryon surged forward, meeting the first Wraith-knight head-on. Their swords clashed with a sound not of steel but of shattering ice, a resonance that shook his bones. The knight's strength was monstrous, pressing him back, but Ryon planted his feet and answered with every ounce of his will. Sparks and shadows erupted at each strike, the clash drawing the eyes of both armies. The gorge itself seemed to hush, the battle momentarily stilled by the sight of the duel.

Then came the voice. A whisper, threading through the clash, coiling into Ryon's skull. "You carry the fire," it hissed, not in the knight's mouth but within his mind. "We will take it." The knight's eyes burned brighter, and its blade drove harder. Ryon gritted his teeth, sweat and blood dripping into his eyes. He did not answer with words. His answer was steel.

The duel raged while all around him the Ashen Host and the Northern army tore at each other, men screaming, drums pounding, fire roaring. Alric held the left flank, his axe keeping the shield wall from collapsing. War-priests raised their hands, chanting louder, their voices breaking but fierce, summoning wards of light that flared like dying stars. Yet still the gorge ran red, and still the mountain rumbled as though it meant to bury all who dared disturb its silence.

And above it all, the scar-faced commander watched from his perch, smiling that same terrible smile, as if every death below was merely a stone in the design he had already laid.

The Hollow Pass had closed its jaws, and Ryon knew: the only way out was through blood, shadow, and fire.