The first rays of dawn crept over the town of Sharil, painting the rooftops in hues of soft gold. The air was crisp, carrying the distant scent of fresh bread from the marketplace. To any ordinary passerby, the town was waking as it always had, stretching into the promise of a new day.
But for Remoran, there was no warmth in the sunrise.
He sat stiffly at the wooden table in Demoris Valhaven’s home, his hands clenched into fists, the skin around his knuckles bloodless. The table was set for breakfast—thick slabs of bread, a bowl of steaming porridge, and a small plate of smoked ham. But the boy had no appetite.
His gaze was distant, fixed on nothing, locked in the echoes of last night.
His home in flames. His family—gone. His hands, red with orc blood. The sword, humming in his grip like a living thing.
A nightmare that would never end.
“Eat, boy.”
Remoran flinched. The voice was gruff, but not unkind. Demoris sat across from him, cutting into his ham with slow, methodical precision. The captain of Sharil’s town guard was a broad-shouldered man, his dark hair flecked with silver, his face lined with the weight of years spent on the battlefield. His brown eyes studied the boy with quiet intensity.
“I—” Remoran’s voice cracked, hoarse from the smoke, from the screaming, from the silence that followed. He pushed the plate away.
Demoris set his fork down and leaned forward. “You’ll need your strength.”
Remoran barely heard him. His family was out there. They had to be. The fire had been monstrous, but there had been no bodies. He clung to that fact, drowning out the sick feeling in his gut.
“They escaped.” His voice was barely a whisper.
Demoris let out a slow breath. “Maybe.”
Remoran’s head snapped up. “Maybe? What do you mean ‘maybe’?” His heart pounded.
Demoris met his gaze evenly. “We don’t know for sure what happened. But I sent out men at first light to search the woods around your farm.” He took another bite of ham. Chewed. Swallowed. “If they made it out, we’ll find them.”
It should have been comforting. But something about the way Demoris said it—calm, certain, but edged with a truth Remoran wasn’t ready to face—made his skin crawl.
His fists clenched tighter. “I need to go.”
Demoris wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and sighed. “No, you need to stay here.”
The boy shot to his feet, his chair scraping against the wooden floor. “No, you don’t understand! If they’re out there, I have to find them! They don’t know I’m alive! I have to—”
“You have to stay here.”
The finality in Demoris’s voice slammed into Remoran like a brick wall. The weight of it left no room for argument.
Anger boiled inside him, a sudden and irrational fire. Why wouldn’t he let him go? He had to find them. He had to—
“Listen to him.”
The voice slithered into his mind like a serpent.
Remoran froze.
It wasn’t Demoris’s voice.
It was deeper, richer, with a dark amusement curling at the edges.
His fingers twitched. The sword rested in the corner of the room, wrapped in its leather bindings, silent and still. But he felt it.
Watching.
Waiting.
Not yet.
Remoran sucked in a sharp breath and looked away. The fire inside him cooled—just slightly. He forced himself to sit.
Demoris didn’t notice the hesitation, or if he did, he said nothing. He simply nodded, as if Remoran had made the only choice that made sense.
“Good,” he muttered. “Now eat.”
The sun had barely risen when Demoris and his men mounted their horses and rode toward what remained of the farm. The official search party—all trained guards—was already combing through the forest, following the broken branches and scorched trails for any sign of Remoran’s family.
But Remoran wasn’t waiting for them.
As soon as they left, he moved.
His heart thundered in his chest as he slipped down the narrow back alley behind Demoris’s home, sticking to the shadows, his stolen cloak wrapped tightly around him. He had spent his whole life running through the woods—he knew how to move quietly, how to step lightly on the cobbled streets.
The guards wouldn’t find his family. He had to.
The world smelled of ash.
By the time Remoran reached the charred remains of his home, the blackened skeletons of buildings jutted toward the sky like skeletal fingers. Smoke still curled from the ruins, coiling against the windless sky.
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His heart hammered. They weren’t here. They had to be in the woods.
He ran past the barn, his feet crunching against brittle wood and something else—something wet.
He stopped.
His stomach lurched.
There, barely visible beneath the collapsed beams, lay a body.
No.
No, no, no.
Remoran staggered back, bile rising in his throat. It was human.
The tattered remains of a blue dress fluttered weakly in the wind. The fabric was familiar—too familiar. His mother’s.
The world tilted.
A sound ripped from his throat, something broken, something wild. He clawed at the debris, hands bleeding as he dug through the soot and rubble, desperate to pull her free, to see her face, to—
"Step away, boy."
The voice was steady. Cold.
Remoran whipped around, heart pounding.
Demoris.
The captain stood at the edge of the wreckage, his face grim, his sword still sheathed. Behind him, a dozen guardsmen stood silent.
Remoran’s breath hitched. He hadn’t even heard them arrive.
His hands shook. He turned back to the body, his vision swimming. "It’s her. It has to be her."
Demoris’s voice was softer this time, but no less certain. "It isn’t, boy."
The words hit him like a fist.
Remoran looked up, face streaked with soot and tears.
"Wh—what?"
Demoris stepped closer. "That’s one of the farmhands. The ones that worked your fields. Your mother wore blue—but she wasn’t the only one."
Remoran’s mind reeled.
Not her.
She could still be alive.
A sob broke free from his throat, half relief, half despair.
Demoris crouched beside him, resting a heavy hand on his shoulder. "We’ll keep searching. But you need to be ready, Remoran. If they didn’t make it, you need to be prepared for that truth."
Remoran swallowed hard, the weight of those words pressing against his chest.
No.
He wouldn’t accept that.
Not yet.
Not until he had proof.
The sun had dipped lower by the time they found them.
Remoran was the first to see the bodies.
His breath caught. His legs locked in place.
He barely heard Demoris’s order for the men to stand back. His vision tunneled—everything else vanished except for the grotesque scene before him.
His mother. His father. His little brother, Bryn.
They lay sprawled on the forest floor, half-covered by undergrowth, their limbs twisted unnaturally. His mother’s blue dress was torn, her lifeless fingers curled against her chest as if she had died reaching for something—someone. His father’s body was draped over her, as if he had tried to shield her with his own.
But it was Bryn that broke him.
The boy was so small.
His little brother, only seven summers old, lay just apart from them, his wide, unseeing eyes fixed on the sky. His throat had been slashed.
Remoran's stomach twisted violently. His knees hit the dirt before he even realized he had fallen.
No.
No.
This wasn't real. This couldn’t be real.
Something inside him tore open—a howling, empty void that swallowed everything else. He reached out, shaking hands hovering over Bryn’s cold skin, but he couldn’t bring himself to touch him.
A sob raked through his chest. His mind refused to accept what his eyes saw.
“They could have been left alive,” came Demoris’s voice, quiet and grave. “But the orcs didn’t allow that.”
Orcs.
The word burned through Remoran’s skull like a red-hot brand.
He staggered to his feet, his blood pounding. His vision blurred—not with tears, but with rage.
"They—" His voice broke. He tried again, stronger. "They did this."
Demoris nodded. "They did."
Remoran’s fists clenched so tightly his nails cut into his palms. His breath came in sharp bursts, too fast, too shallow.
His family was gone.
His mother—who hummed while she baked, who whispered stories to him when he couldn't sleep.
His father—who had taught him how to ride, who had told him that strength wasn’t in the body, but in the heart.
Bryn—his little brother, who had been so small, so full of life, so full of dreams.
Orcs had taken them from him.
"Why?" The question was raw, broken. "They were just… farmers. Bryn was just a boy!"
Demoris sighed heavily. "War doesn’t care for innocence."
The words only made the rage burn hotter.
Remoran’s fingers trembled, his nails biting into his palms, his entire body shaking with something too large to contain.
A whisper curled through his mind.
Let me help.
The voice wasn't Demoris’s.
It was colder, darker—stronger.
He turned, staring at the wrapped blade strapped to his side.
Orkinder.
A presence pressed against his thoughts, a promise of strength, of power, of vengeance.
Take me. Let them feel what you feel.
Remoran’s breath hitched. His fingertips brushed the hilt through the leather binding.
He wanted to listen.
He wanted to take the sword, to hunt down the ones who had done this, to make them suffer, to watch them bleed the way his family had bled.
But Demoris was watching him.
The captain’s gaze was unreadable, but his jaw was set. He saw what was happening. He saw what the sword was doing.
And Remoran hesitated.
He tore his hand away, his nails dragging against the leather before he could grasp the blade.
Not yet.
Not yet.
They buried his family at the farm, in the very fields they had worked, beneath the old oak tree that had stood for generations.
Demoris’s men dug the graves, but Remoran insisted on placing the dirt himself.
The work left his hands raw, his back aching, his nails chipped and blackened. He didn’t care.
He didn’t speak as they finished. He just stood there, staring at the mounds of fresh earth.
The rage hadn’t left.
If anything, it had deepened, curling around his ribs like a parasite.
The orcs had taken everything from him.
He would not forget. He would not forgive.
That night, Remoran lay awake in Demoris’s home, staring at the ceiling.
The rage kept him from sleeping.
And so did the whispers.
You are not weak. You are not helpless.
You can make them suffer.
You need only take me.
His hand twitched.
Orkinder was waiting.
And Remoran was listening.