The finger bone drags my skull fragment through endless grey. Time loses meaning. Only the compulsion remains - north, always north. The magic binding us grows weaker with each scrape across scorched earth.

Memories scatter like the rest of these borrowed bones. Which battle was this? Which soldier's final breath gave this shard its purpose? The answers drift away like ash on wind.

Forward. The finger bone catches on debris, twists, continues its mission. My empty socket fills with dirt, then empties, then fills again. The cycle means nothing. Only motion matters.

Grey fog thickens. Or perhaps that's just the magic fading further. Hard to tell when awareness shrinks to a single point of purpose.

A shadow falls across these fragments. Different from the fog. Focused. Deliberate. The finger bone halts its endless crawl.

The finger bone drags my skull fragment through endless grey. Time loses meaning. Only the compulsion remains - north, always north. The magic binding us grows weaker with each scrape across scorched earth.

What little magic remains dims further with each fragment-length gained. The drive north persists, but these borrowed pieces lack the strength to answer its call. The finger bone catches, twists, scrapes forward another fraction. The bone should have crumbled to dust days ago, yet duty drives it onward.

Grey mist thickens around these fragments. Not natural fog - something darker. Hungrier. The kind of darkness that devours bone and purpose alike. The finger bone trembles, its last strength fading.

The magic flickers, a dying light that will soon go dark.

When it fails, these pieces will lie forever in scorched earth, just more fragments among countless dead. The compulsion screams north, but borrowed bones can no longer answer.

A shadow falls across these fragments. Different from the hungry dark. Focused. Deliberate. The finger bone halts its endless crawl.

Ancient boots step into view. Not leather, something older. Metal that should have rusted to nothing centuries ago still holds its form.

Each step leaves no print in scorched earth, yet the ground remembers their passing.

The figure kneels.

Their armor bears no ornament, no marking of rank or allegiance. Just pure function given form.

Even the helm remains unadorned, though it turns slightly as they study these broken lonely fragments.

Steel fingers against skull fragment.

Not gentle, gentleness died with the world. But precise, measuring. The magic binding these pieces responds, recognizing something that remembers equal purpose.

"You carry a king's memory," they say, voice neither living nor dead. "And a soldier's duty."

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The finger bone trembles, still trying to drag northward. Even now, duty allows no rest.

Their helm tilts, considering this unrelenting drive of fragments and magic barely holding awareness together.

The armored figure's presence stirs something in these borrowed bones, recognition without memory, purpose calling to purpose.

Their gauntleted hand lifts my skull fragment, studying the ancient runes etched deep within yellowed bone. The remaining wisps of magic pulse weakly in response.

"I watched them all fall," they say. "Kings and peasants alike. Some prayed. Some cursed. Some just died. I could not intercede. That was not my purpose."

The hungry darkness presses closer, drawn by the last flickers of magic. The figure's hand closes around these fragments, shielding them from the void.

"But perhaps," Their voice carries endless grief. "Perhaps sometimes watching is not enough."

They gather these fragments with careful precision. Not the gentleness of flesh, but the exactness of one who has witnessed too many final moments.

"The Field of Broken Banners remembers its own," they say. "There are better bones to borrow there."

Their fingers cradle these fragments like precious things, though we both know duty would have dragged them north regardless. Or tried to, before the magic failed.

"I watched," they continue, voice heavy with the weight of endless witnessing. "When the legions fell. When kings charged with common soldiers. When darkness devoured worlds."

The figure rises, my fragments secure in their grasp.

They move across scorched earth with steps that leave no mark, yet somehow part the grey fog. The hungry darkness recoils from their presence.

"So many prayers. So many last breaths spent on faith I could not answer. All I could do was watch. That was my purpose - to witness, never to act."

These fragments sense truth in those words. This being once held power beyond comprehension. Now they carry only duty's weight, like these borrowed bones. But where my purpose drives ever forward, they remain bound to endless observation.

They walk north, bearing these pieces toward familiar soil. The hungry darkness does not follow.

"Your magic comes from deeper wells than mine," they say. "Older. Born from choice rather than command. I watched it form in battlefield soil, fueled by final stands and last defenses. No god granted your purpose. You claimed it. You have greater claim to god than I."

Their armored helm turns.

"Justice," they say. "There was a time when that word held meaning. When oaths and laws bound both peasant and king."

Their fingers tighten around my fragments, not from emotion, but simple fact. "Now there is only death. Death and endless watching. The strong prey on the weak. The corrupt devour the pure. And justice?"

"Justice died with the old kingdom. Even the ground remembers no law but suffering."

The Field of Broken Banners emerges on the from the fog. Not through their power, we have simply arrived. The ground here remembers its dead, and through it, these fragments recognize home.

They kneel one final time, placing my pieces in soil that knows its own. The magic pulses stronger here, ready to draw new fragments home.

"I wish," they pause, helm bowing slightly. "I wish I could have done more than watch. But perhaps carrying you here is enough. Some duties must be chosen, not commanded."

Ancient power flows through steel fingers, different from the magic that bonds and binds these last fragments. Where my borrowed power pulses with battlefield oaths and final stands, this energy carries the weight of endless watching.

"I am Juridan," they say, pressing my pieces into black soil. The ground of the Field of Broken Banners responds, remembering its dead.

They rise, armor that should have rusted ages ago catching what little light remains. Their helm tilts down, considering these scattered fragments one final time.

"The field remembers. It will give you what you need."

Then they vanish.

Ancient power lingers where armored knees touched earth. In times past, it would have weighed deeds of right and wrong. Today it merely observes as my borrowed fragments recall their deeper calling and the earth remembers when Justice knelt in charred ground, at last deciding to intervene instead of observe.