“I’m sorry, lad.”

  They sat around a hearth, in one of the few inns that graced Brimstone’s undercity. The owner had cleared it out at Sakar’s request, and had brought out food and drink aplenty.

  It sat untouched, growing cold and stale by the minute. Not even Shiver whetted her appetite.

  “What happened here, Sakar.”

  The old smith grimaced, stroking his beard.

  “Brimstone Manor was attacked. A great Feardamned dragon of all things. It demolished the walls, and walked right into the city.”

  His expression hardened.

  “Then it transformed.”

  “Grandfather.”

  Sakar’s eyes widened in surprise. Caledon just nodded, gesturing for him to continue.

  “Lad, you know as well as I do, there aren’t many things capable of harming yer daft bastard of a father.”

  Caledon broke into a soft smile.

  “I heard accounts, I was working in the forges at the time. He walked in like a man possessed. Carrying a spear of ash, he cut apart your mansion and came to blows with your father.”

  “I know. He’s terrifying. I’ve never seen a Fearshaper so powerful, until…”

  He looked at Sakar, to which the elf just shook his head.

  Sakar rubbed at his forehead, noticing the ring of red, welted skin on Caledon’s own.

  “Hardly, that man is far more powerful than I am. From the looks of it, yer came to blows with him yourself.”

  Sakar stared at the red welt that ran the width of Caledon’s forehead, the result of his grandfather’s burning grip. Caledon nodded, tightening his hands into fists.

  “There was nothing to it lad. He defeated your father, a force of true destruction. But he left as yer father was bleeding out, a rookie mistake, aye?”

  Caledon nodded weakly.

  “I spoke to grandfather. He said he was being controlled by someone else. A Fearshaper, who corrupted his will. When he attacked father, he said that he could sense the Fearshaper’s intent. Whoever controlled him didn’t intend to kill father.”

  Sakar frowned, shaking his head with a downcast expression.

  “Controlled by someone else… Yet, he sealed yer father’s death. Shortly after the dragon departed, the Revenant arrived.”

  His eyes met Vale’s own, as she flinched back. She cast a furtive glance at her brother’s black skeleton, which was now under her control.

  “Had your father been at his best… it is unlikely he would have lost, lad.”

  The silence drew on between them. Vale stared at the floor, her fists clenched so tightly that her fingernails threatened to part the skin of her palm. Berevan Brimstone’s murderer was currently under watch by trusted guards. The black skeleton of her brother she had raised.

  “Go on Sakar.”

  “The guards present relayed to me their suspicions. Some of them had been present when your father was reeling, weak after facing off against Valeric. Then, when the Fearshaper of death struck, Berevan ordered them to take care of the civillians. That was when the Fearshaper of death came fer him. Who knew, that Revenants still walked among us.”

  With a flash of flame, the Dreadwalker called his Phobia to him. His gaze drilling into Vale’s own.

  Caledon let out a soft sigh.

  “Sakar, that’s enough. Vale is a Revenant. They’re alive. I even spoke… to her brother. He told me that Brimstone was allied with the Revenants. He even showed me this.”

  Caledon produced Triol’s dagger that Berevan had arranged to be forged. Sakar’s eyes widened at the sight of it.

  “I’m no stranger to my own work, there’s no doubt that it was forged by my own hand. Yer father must have inscribed it after the fact.”

  “Beyond that, Sakar… the Deathbringer lives.”

  Sakar stared at him in stunned silence.

  “Impossible…”

  Caledon just shook his head.

  “Before your entrance, Vetrian Revenant himself spoke to us. He said that he was killing father to remove a thorn in his side. Then, he attempted to steal his body.”

  Caledon cast a glance at Vale, who averted her eyes.

  The flames in the fireplace flickered, causing their shadows to dance on the walls. Caledon felt like weeping, like losing himself to his grief.

  Yet, with everything he had, he held it together.

  So that’s how he died. Weakened by grandfather, then killed by Triol.

  Caledon’s fists shook. He would find answers. One at a time.

  “Sakar… You’re a Fearshaper. You kept it from us?”

  The stout smith rubbed his forehead in consternation. Then he shook his head.

  “I hardly knew, lad. It all began when yer father visited the smithy. Weeks ago.”

  He cast his gaze far away, as he recounted the tale.

  “He gave me an order. I thought yer old man was joking, trying to make me support Brimstone’s local businesses.”

  Sakar let out a small laugh, then met Caledon’s gaze.

  “He told me only to eat food produced by yer House. Not to touch anything that came from Flora’s lands.”

  Sakar shook his head.

  “I thought it ridiculous. But that expression on yer old man’s face, son… I followed his orders. Every meal, questioning the hilarity of it all.”

  Then Sakar’s hands began to shake.

  “Then… on one day… the headaches began. The sweats.”

  Caledon’s eyes grew wide as he recalled that day in the forges. When he had accomplished his task, what would qualify him to forge darksteel.

  Sakar had been sweating. Caledon had thought the old smith had caught an ailment.

  “My nightmares grew. Horrible hallucinations. Once… it even came after me. My nightmare walked in reality.”

  They stared at the smith.

  “Yer father helped me put an end to it, thank Avalkin. He told me, that he had been complicit in a conspiracy. One that saw an end to Fearshaping.”

  A collective chill fell over the trio. Sakar’s words were… Insanity. Caledon shook his head. What had his father done? Why had he hidden it from him?

  “He called Fearshaping a curse on us, lad. Yet even as he did, the Highlord told me to bide my time. That one day, there would be need of my Fear.”

  Then, Caledon watched as tears filled the old smith’s eyes.

  “My memories began to return. Memories of my guide. Yolren. How he had died in battle when the Deathbringer attacked in the Rampage of Undeath, leaving me on my lonesome.”

  Sakar smiled sadly.

  “After the undead retreated on the day of the Rampage, the damage done, I rebuilt, lad. Worked in Brimstone’s forges. Then, my memories of the past began to slip. Of Fearshaping, of Yolren – that old Blazebear. I even began to think less of me Fear of the forge. How that happened… I couldn’t tell ye.”

  So, Sakar was a Fearshaper all along. It sounds impossible, but he’s claiming to have forgotten about his abilities. His memories of the past are returning.

  Caledon’s mind whirled as he tried to draw together the clues.

  Both House Flora and Dreamer were implicated in the plot.

  His grandfather, Valeric, feeling the call to Somnolence – the Archcity of Dreams. Domain of House Dreamer.

  His father, instructing Sakar not to partake of House Flora’s produce.

  It was connected, and his father had been a part of it. He had admitted as much, to Sakar. His potential cooperation with House Revenant.

  What game were the great houses playing?

  An effort to erase Fearshaping from the memory of elves, to make them forget the past.

  To what end?

  Caledon only sighed.

  Then, a voice cut through the silence, bringing a chill to his blood.

  “Aren’t you forgetting something, lordling.”

  His breath caught as he remembered. Shiver glared, fearlessly at Sakar. Never mind that he had lost his father. Her revenge would be answered, one way or another.

  “Sakar… This is Shiver. My father executed her family. They harboured a young orphan girl of twelve that stole from a Lord from House Flora.”

  The smith erupted into a coughing fit. He cast an incredulous gaze towards Shiver.

  “Your father was a just man, and he would have seen it punished... But execution? Of the girl and her entire family? For mere thievery? Surely not, I can hardly imagine yer old man agreeing to it.”

  “Then you know nothing of it?”

  “Hardly, lad. What did she steal?”

  Caledon met Shiver’s gaze, filled with steel.

  “A delivery from House Flora, which was later unknowingly taken by Shiver. It was likely a substance… that caused Shiver to awaken as a Fearshaper.”

  “Forge and flame. There was only one way of awakening I can recall, lad. Through a temple. What has the Gardener been creating…”

  Caledon nodded. It aligned with their experience in the Archcity of Fear.

  “So, the reason fades with his death. Good riddance.”

  Shiver’s voice could have cut darksteel.

  Yet, in the strangest of ways… Caledon could empathise with her. The pain of losing his father… he could see why she spoke so callously.

  “I’m sorry, Shiver.”

  The girl’s face fell, and they were joined by silence once more. With only the flickering of burning wood to join them.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  Then, he heard a thump.

  They heads snapped towards the source of the sound. Caledon had directed the guards to give them privacy for their discussion.

  Someone had slipped past them?

  Then… they heard a knocking on the door to the rear of the inn.

  The door opened.

  The others rose to their feet, at the sudden intrusion of the two figures in the inn. They had entered silently, evidently from a back entrance. Caledon’s eyes widened as he took them in.

  One towered over the lot of them, a huge woman with wide brown eyes. The other a little girl with pigtails, reaching only up to the woman’s waist.

  Only… there was something very wrong about them.

  Their clothes were charred, burned through. To reveal burnt skin, beneath. Charred by flame. Endless welts and burns covered their bodies, but the blood had all dried up.

  Then, Caledon noticed the rapidly shifting expressions on Shiver’s face, alien to him. Then her expression shifted from a look of longing and despair to sheer rage.

  “Looks like my Fear is acting up again.”

  Shiver drew her Phobia into reality, her first invocation hanging on her lips. Before Caledon lunged to grip onto her arm.

  It couldn’t be… This would explain the contradictions.

  His eyes traced over the features of their faces, and he…

  Brightened.

  “It can’t be.”

  Vale and Shiver turned to him in confusion, at the relief in his voice. He began to laugh. As Shiver’s blade pressed in closer, he felt a weight lift off his shoulders.

  Finally understanding his father’s gambit.

  He let out a soft whisper under his breath. He blinked tears from his eyes, as he realised, that the doubts that had clouded his mind as to his father’s honour had tormented him, more than he realised.

  Especially now that he had lost any chance at redemption.

  “A Highlord to the very end.”

  The faces were uncanny.

  There was only one person that he knew, capable of such artisanship.

  Marta, the larger of the two of them opened her mouth, and a voice transmitted through.

  “Caledon is that you?”

  “Yes! Silas, thank Avalkin, what in Insanity-”

  Blaze, clattered to the floor. As she impacted the ground, her head snapped off the body that it was attached to.

  A puppet.

  Attached to a grisly corpse, to sell the image. Shiver slowly dropped her Phobia that she gripped in her hand. Caledon watched as rivulets of blood flowed from the harsh impressions of her nails on her palm, the result of her vice-like grip on her Phobia.

  “Listen closely Caledon, I don’t have much time. These were the only puppets that survived the attack on Brimstone Manor. We escaped the Manor when your grandfather arrived. Your father instructed me to take your family to the Dreadwood in the event of an attack.”

  “We?”

  “Hey Cally!”

  Tears of relief flowed, as he heard Viveria’s voice, a great weight lifted from his shoulders. The question lingered on his tongue, but he couldn’t bring himself to pose the question to Sakar. Were his family…

  “Your sister and mother are here with us.”

  “Mother? She’s with you as well?”

  Then, the hearth winked out.

  Caledon glanced down, at the mist that his breath dispersed before him.

  The temperature of the room had plummeted, and the edge of a blade of frost gently touched the nape of his neck.

  “Explain.”

  He heard Shiver’s voice, dangerously low, cut through the dark.

  “And why is it that you wear the face of Marta? Answer carefully or-”

  “SHIVER! IT’S YOU! Pov, pigtails come ere, our girl’s alive!”

  The transmission crackled, and the deep voice of a woman overpowered Silas’ words. They heard Silas’ unsuccessful protests.

  Shiver stood frozen, as she heard the mixed voices of Marta, Pov and Blaze echo through the puppet before them.

  “Meanie you left! First, you steal my chocolate, then you leave! How could you – hey give me back the puppet, I want to speak to Shiv-”

  “Shiver thank heavens you’re alright! We were so worried. They told us you had witnessed the Highlord’s deception, that you killed Dag and attacked a noble…”

  Shiver tried to hold her expression together, her Phobia disappearing in a shower of frost. Her voice pitched artificially high.

  “Y-you’re alive. I thought… I thought he-”

  She heard Pov’s forlorn voice through the puppet’s mouth.

  Filled with guilt.

  “Shiv… Highlord Berevan was a friend… he saw value in me as a merchant when I was struggling to find my feet. I appealed to him for help, and he came up with a plan to help us.”

  “I-I see.”

  “He agreed to help us divert Semille. He knew that the lord would brook no insult to his pride – had he not seen us punished with his own eyes, none of us would have been safe. He would have chased us to the ends of Insanity to see his ego mollified.”

  Shiver blinked. Then, she began to shake. To shiver. Pov’s voice crackled, and echoed throughout the empty inn.

  “It was a bit of misdirection. To avoid us from being hounded by Semille for an age. We were to lay low, and to stay at Brimstone Manor for a moment. When they told us what you had done, that you were on the run, Berevan had to hold Marta down himself.”

  A soft laugh tinged with relief reached her, and Shiver flinched. Marta’s voice echoed through the puppet.

  “Shiv… I’m so relieved. The Highlord assured us, that his son would help you. Protect you from Semille.”

  Vale exchanged a glance with Caledon, who had his Phobia tight in his grip. She continued on softly.

  “You know, Blaze took to Viveria Brimstone like a moth to flame, eh? It’s been good for her since the incident, having a role model. You’d like her.”

  Shiver smiled. Vale felt a chill wash over her at the expression.

  “It was all a misunderstanding?”

  Why his father had chosen him for the task, and not Viveria – who would have single-mindedly tracked Shiver down. Thoughtless about her motives. The truth.

  He couldn’t tell me. The bastard Semille never gave him a chance. Any guards he sent would have lost us – the illusion around Anhedonia. Or perhaps… father knew where it was, but couldn’t reveal it.

  In the end… he trusted me with my judgment. The reason he used those words… bringing her to “justice”.

  She heard a crackle, as Pov’s voice came through puppet Marta’s mouth. His voice laced with concern.

  “Are you alright, Shiver?”

  Silence grew in the room. Then another crackle and a mix of voices. Silas spoke through his puppet once more.

  “Caledon, what’s the situation at the Manor? Is the Highlord…”

  “Father is dead… Brimstone Manor has been reduced to ashes.”

  “Caledon. I’m sorry.”

  Caledon gritted his teeth, as the sound of Viveria’s cry reached him.

  “He was part of some plot, Silas. Did you know?”

  His butler’s silence told him all that he needed to.

  “Your father… he anticipated th-.”

  Then the connection started to fade and crackle. As if weakening.

  “Caledon. Come to the Dreadwood. Before you assume your post as Highlord, you must descend. It was your father’s wish for you, and your sister. The artisan’s guild will oversee the city in the interim. Trust it to Sakar.”

  Caledon raised his eyes questioningly to Sakar. The smith nodded his assent. It seemed as if everyone was clued him, except for him.

  “We’re entering the Dreadwood now. Meet us, Caledon.”

  The noise grew louder, and Silas’ voice softer.

  “He felt terrible for keeping you in the dark. It was for your own protection, I-I promise that your questions will be answ-”

  Caledon watched, as the puppet fell to the floor, the connection severed.

  ---

  Vale watched as her friend disappeared into the blizzard that swirled around Brimstone.

  “S-Shiver!”

  She fought against the howling winterstorm, swearing. The cold tore into her skin, but she pushed on, knowing that any of the pain that she was experiencing was amplified a hundredfold for her friend.

  “Quietus! Keep track of her! I’m losing sight of her, Feardamnit-”

  “I see her! Forwards! Vale…”

  “I know. I need to speak to her.”

  After a seemingly endless fight against the harsh winds, Vale finally gained a reprieve as she entered the forest that shielded Shiver’s cave.

  She walked onwards, her footsteps echoing softly in her wake.

  “Shiver…”

  She watched, her friend, sitting in the darkness of the cave. Her back to the wall, just as her Fear had awoken.

  “I should be happy, shouldn’t I?”

  The silence began to draw on, as Vale sat beside her.

  Tears ran from her face, but they had frozen in their tracks. Shiver’s eyes were hollow, as they stared off into the distance. Vale clutched her into a hug, as her heart ached.

  “Vale. It’s ok, you can let go.”

  She refused. Even as she began to shiver.

  Shiver gently pushed her away.

  “Shiver… It was an Insane plan. Faking their deaths to misdirect Semille.”

  Vale’s tone hiked up a notch at her incredulity.

  “What of all the witnesses? House Brimstone’s name would have been dragged through the mud. A Highlord executing a family-”

  “Vale.”

  Shiver just gently shook her head.

  “They lived in the lower circles. It was brilliant, to be honest. They would have been hounded by Semille, you saw how dogged he was. If there was a single redeeming quality to the bastard, it was that he hounded us relentlessly through the Archcity of Fear, no matter how many times he was roasted, or almost split in two.”

  Shiver met her eyes.

  “To the masses, the only oddity would be seeing the Highlord dealing with scum personally. The voices of those that loved them, drowned out. Until their eventual return, when it wouldn’t matter anymore.”

  She shook her head with a smile. Vale tightened her numb hand around Shvier’s arm. Lord Quietus stood on her shoulder, watching on quietly, the green flames flickering in his eye sockets dim.

  “The only price being the temporary grief of those not in the know. Berevan averted the immediate danger posed to Marta, Pov and Blaze, and he had to act quickly. No one could have predicted that I would have seen it.”

  Shiver shrank further into herself.

  "Even after learning of my actions, Berevan trusted Caledon to stay Semille's hand against me, which was exactly what that kind idiot did. There was no reason for Berevan to risk telling him the truth in front of Semille. How would they have known, that I would make the decisions I did in my embracement, to draw in so much of my Fear?”

  Tears trailed down Shiver’s eyes, freezing in place on her cheeks.

  “Don't you see, Vale? I messed up again. Teaching Blaze to steal. Deciding not to stay in this Feardamned cave when they told me to. To lay low, and avoid the city. Don’t you get it? It’s my fault, and Icey paid the price for it.”

  “Then we both would have been killed! Dag’s thugs came for the cave, remember? I would never have gone looking for you.”

  Silence filled the air between them, as Shiver ignored the girl’s kind platitudes.

  “You can let go, Vale.”

  Shiver wore a soft smile as she finally met the girl’s wet, lavender eyes.

  “I know.”

  Vale looked at her friend, and a flicker of emotion crossed her expression.

  Pain.

  She let go of Shiver’s arm, and winced at the feeling of cold that had sunk into her skin. Her friend smiled at her sadly.

  She descended, prepared to take on a Highlord. Just how much of her Fear did she embrace…

  She felt a soft whisper in her skull – Lord Quietus speaking to her directly.

  “I know not how it is possible, Vale… But Shiver has taken in more of her Fear than you have. And you…”

  Took in the death of an Archcity.

  “I still can’t hear her, Vale. I can’t hear Icey.”

  The idle dripping of droplets on the cave floor punctuated the silence. Vale watched as Shiver pulled her legs towards her, hugging her knees.

  The crazy orphan that she knew, the demon of ice, was nowhere to be seen. All she saw was a girl, haunted by a string of her mistakes.

  Teaching a young girl how to steal, in her naivety and desperation.

  Attempting to put end to Lord Semille’s agenda against her family, when her compliance would have averted the tragedy that she now faced.

  The tragedy being, the apparent loss of her guide.

  Icey was gone.

  Sacrifices had been made, by all of them. Vale’s eyes flickered to the cave entrance, where a black skeleton strode into the cave. Then, her attention was drawn to the voices that she heard whispering at the edge of her consciousness, when she concentrated.

  Originating from her Fearcore.

  The voices of the dead.

  After rubbing her hands together, generating a temporary reprieve to the cold she took Shiver’s hands in her own once more.

  “We’ll get her back. That Popsicle isn’t getting away without our say.”

  “Well said, my young guide! While I don’t miss her interruptions-”

  Vale’s eyes bore into her guide.

  “Ahem, I certainly miss her presence. We will find her, Shiver.”

  Vale broke into a smile.

  “Besides, you have to reunite with them, aren’t you looking forward to it? To seeing Pov, Marta and Blaze?”

  Shiver just returned a sad smile, at the girl’s desperate words of consolation.

  Then, a silence fell over them as someone else entered the cave.

  Caledon Brimstone’s eyes were hollow and red.

  “Nice place.”

  Shiver met Caledon Brimstone’s eyes.

  Then she stood to her feet, and came to a halt before him. She did not avert her gaze as she met his eyes.

  The least she could do was to face her mistaken assumption. Take what meagre accountability that she could, now that her mistakes had been made.

  “I owe you an apology. I’m sorry, Caledon. Your father saved them.”

  Caledon waved his hand. His torch appeared in it, and he ignited it, flooding the cave with a dim, golden light.

  “I preferred it when you called me lordling. Forget it. Actually, I’m just as pissed as you were.”

  He sat heavily on the ground, the words tumbling from his mouth. Usually, he would have been embarrassed.

  Now… he just didn’t care.

  “My father, involved in some plot to erase Fearshaping from memory. Working with House Flora, Dreamer, and if Triol was to be believed, House Revenant as well. Only to be killed, by two of the houses that he was supposed to be allied with.”

  His voice cracked, as it was suffused with his resentment.

  “Everything I knew was a lie. Why didn’t he just tell me?”

  None of them had an answer to his question. He never expected it of them.

  “I don’t care about it all. I just want my father back.”

  Caledon’s words echoed before them.

  Accompanied only by the howls of the winterstorm outside.