The eastern sky burned pale crimson as dawn crept across the banners of the Scion Order.
A fresh wind danced through the high mountain citadel of Phos Hold, home of the realm's most elite knights tasked with confronting the unnatural—rogue mages, cursed beasts, demonic entities, and worse.
In the courtyard below the obsidian tower, knights assembled in formation, their armor gleaming with dawnlight, their gazes firm with disciplined anticipation.
Today marked a rare occasion—the formal induction of their new commander.
She was already among them.
A figure in silver and white stepped onto the central dais, cloak snapping like a war banner in the wind. Her presence, despite her youth, commanded silence—not demanded it, earned it.
Arasha Dawnbringer.
Just fifteen years of age, yet her eyes were colder than steel and older than time.
She had led patrols through blackened forests where cursed spirits roamed, had slain a basilisk with nothing but her sword and a spellbound chain, had faced demon-bound sorcerers and walked away with scorched armor and burning conviction.
Behind her stood Sir Garran, his weathered face unreadable, but the faintest nod of pride touched his stoic features.
He had trained her when most doubted, stood beside her when others whispered, and now, he followed her with absolute trust.
Arasha's voice rang clear and firm as she addressed the assembled knights:
"I stand here not because of my name or age," she began, her tone measured yet unwavering, "but because I've walked beside you. Bled beside you. I have hunted what stalks the night, buried those who fell when light failed, and I have sworn—by sword, spell, and soul—to never let us falter."
Her gaze swept across them—veterans with scars, young squires with bright eyes, seasoned mages with eyes dulled by things they'd seen. "If you doubt my command, speak now. If you think I am too young, too untried, too unworthy—challenge me. I will answer with blade or word, whichever you choose."
Silence.
Not out of fear. Out of awe.
It had been two years since the girl named Arasha had been knighted at thirteen.
In that short time, she'd proven herself time and again—leading rescue missions through plague-ridden villages, commanding sorties against bone-charmed necromancers, and dueling rogue Lords with maddened sigils etched into their skin.
She wasn't merely talented. She was decisive. Precise. Fearless.
A commander forged in chaos and shaped by fire.
Then, from the second row, a young knight—brawny, proud, named Hadren—stepped forward. Not in defiance, but in respect.
"I had my doubts," he said loudly. "But I watched you cut through that banshee swarm in Velgroth Pass when even I faltered. You've more than earned our blades, Commander."
A chorus of armored fists thumped against breastplates in unison.
"For the Scion Commander!"
"For Commander Arasha!"
"For the Light beyond the Veil!"
Arasha nodded once, then turned to Sir Garran.
"What's the next mission?" she asked briskly.
"The Black Ridges," he replied. "Reports of disappearing trade caravans. Locals whisper of a forest that moves… and a song no one survives hearing."
Arasha narrowed her eyes, already analyzing, planning. "We ride within the hour. I'll take squad one and two. Prepare scrying sigils and binding wards. We'll burn the corruption before it spreads."
As she stepped down from the dais, her knights parted for her, not out of courtesy, but reverence.
She was their commander now.
And though the thread of fate was new, and she had no memory of the path she once walked—
The fire in her soul remained the same.
****
The Black Ridges loomed like a shattered crown against the northern horizon, their jagged cliffs cloaked in spectral fog that refused to lift.
Whispers haunted the cold pine woods, and long before Arasha's squad reached the last caravan site, they found boot prints abruptly ending in the snow—vanished, like breath in frost.
By nightfall, the forest sang.
A low, lilting melody floated through the trees, unnatural and beautiful, fraying the edges of thought.
One of the scouts dropped to his knees, murmuring to an unseen mother.
Another began walking toward the sound, eyes glassy, sword left behind.
But Arasha had planned for this.
Before they left Phos Hold, she'd ordered binding glyphs scribed onto all helmets and lined the camp with warding salts.
When the melody struck, her command was swift and brutal.
"Sound dampening sigils, now. Squad Two, close formation!"
Sir Garran's eyes gleamed as he watched her anticipate the unseen enemy. A memory of a girl, too young for war, who studied with fanatical diligence every time a report mentioned forbidden chants or veiled enchantments.
Within the hour, the song fell silent. By the next sunrise, they discovered the source.
A corrupted dryad, bound to a cursed grove and driven mad by an ancient relic—a harp carved from a saint's rib.
Arasha destroyed the relic with a sunburst rune and gave the dryad's essence peace in the old rites. She didn't celebrate. She moved to the survivors.
In the nearby hamlet of Greylight Hollow, where widows clutched empty coats and children stared at the trees with terror, Arasha took off her command cloak and stayed for three more days.
She healed what wounds she could. She replaced burned wards around homes. She helped bury the dead and mend broken doors.
When they rode back to the Hold, her name traveled faster than her horse.
"The Commander who listened."
"The Flame who wept with us."
"The girl who faced the forest and came back with light."
And Arasha did not stop.
In the weeks that followed, she took mission after mission. Rogue warlocks in the Sandmere Wastes. Grave-silent ruins in the Bleeding Fen. Each task, done with speed, efficiency, and care for both her knights and the innocents caught in the shadows.
But even flame must flicker.
On the eve of the harvest moon, during final sparring drills, she stumbled. Not from blade or spell—but from something else.
Blood.
She stared at her inner thigh, where the red stained her training pants and dripped to her boot. Her face showed nothing, but Garran noticed. She made no complaint, no explanation—only asked quietly if the new medic had arrived.
The healer's wing of the Hold was quiet when Arasha entered.
A single lamp lit the chamber where scrolls of anatomy lined the wall, and herbal brews simmered gently over arcane burners.
There, dressed in fresh whites and bent over an apothecary table, stood a girl her age.
Silver curls, observant eyes behind rounded spectacles, hands stained faintly with potion dust.
Leta Rein.
"Commander?" Leta blinked, slightly startled to find her superior standing there, silent.
"I require... assistance," Arasha said, measured as always. "I believe I am wounded. Internally."
Leta followed Arasha's gaze downward. Then she paused, lips parting in sudden realization.
"Oh," she breathed, her voice gentle. "You're not wounded, Commander. It's your first bleeding."
Arasha's brows furrowed.
"My what?"
Leta's heart ached. She'd heard the rumors—no mother, no sisters, only knights and war. Of course no one had told her.
So, softly, Leta guided her to sit. She pulled a clean cloth, warm water, and explained.
"The bleeding comes once a month," she said. "It's a sign your body is growing stronger, capable of carrying life, even if that's not your path. It doesn't mean you're weak. Just human."
Arasha listened silently. A commander who'd slain monsters, undone hexes, and faced horrors that made grown men weep—but this, this left her uncertain.
When Leta offered her a clean wrap and an herbal tonic to ease the cramps, Arasha accepted it with the grace of a soldier but the eyes of a girl suddenly alone in a battlefield she did not understand.
Leta, however, saw more than just confusion. She saw the silent exhaustion. The cracks beneath the steel.
And she made her quiet vow.
"I'll be here," Leta said gently. "No matter what mission comes next. You don't have to face everything alone, Commander."
Arasha glanced at her. No smile. But a long, slow breath.
"Thank you," she said at last.
It was the first time she'd said those words to anyone in the Hold.
And in that quiet moment, among cloth, tea, and unspoken truths, a bond was forged—not of duty or command, but of understanding.
****
A week of rain and firestorms had done little to slow the Scion Order's operations.
Bandits enhanced by illegal arcana had raided the southern trade route.
A stitched golem the size of a windmill was found roaming near the northern border.
And a cursed mirror in the noble quarter had turned three servants to stone before Arasha shattered it with a blast of holy light.
Arasha's hands trembled slightly as she read over the new mission scrolls stacked on her desk.
The new map lay unrolled before her, pinned with smooth river stones.
A crimson seal marked the edge of the Desert of Rhel, west of Phos' known borders, where geography twisted like a fever dream.
Now a forest had grown there—overnight, by some reports. Trees with crystalline bark.
Flowers that whispered. Light that bent wrong and rain that floated upward.
"A living enchantment," Arasha murmured, eyes scanning the accounts.
She reached for her sword belt, already halfway through a plan to investigate it herself when the door creaked open behind her.
Sir Garran stepped in, folding his arms as he leaned against the stone archway. His expression was calm but edged with something deeper—concern masked as dry humor.
"You're not invincible, girl," he said. "No commander worth their steel personally answers every riddle that tumbles out of the earth."
Arasha looked over her shoulder at him, a flicker of irritation in her eyes.
"This could be dangerous. Magical shifts on this scale shouldn't go unchecked."
"Which is why," Garran replied evenly, "you have an entire Order sworn to your command. You've trained them well. Trust them."
She hesitated, staring at the window. The night fog brushed the stained glass like a veil of ghosts.
"I'm responsible," she said softly.
"You are," Garran agreed, stepping closer. "And part of that responsibility is learning to delegate. Otherwise, you'll burn long before your fire reaches the end of its purpose."
Silence stretched.
Then Arasha slowly sat, fingers steepled beneath her chin.
After a long breath, she reached for the command ledger, flipping through the names of knights she had sparred with, studied beside, bled beside.
She wrote a list.
Sir Jorge, a calm, seasoned swordsman with an innate resistance to illusion magic.
Lady Anne, an arcane tracker with the rare ability to commune with plants.
Knight-Binder Thain, a stoic young warrior whose memory could not be tampered with—not even by dream-spirits.
By sunrise, the trio had departed.
****
Three days later…
Arasha stood as the mission team returned, cloaks wet with dew that shimmered like crushed starlight.
Sir Jorge gave a sharp bow, but Lady Anne stepped forward first, her voice calm, her eyes glittering with amazement.
"The forest is unlike anything we've seen. The trees breathe like lungs. The moss sings. We found no signs of malevolence, though some paths loop endlessly unless you walk backward."
Jorge added, "We catalogued flora and fauna. Some of the plants can mend wounds without touch. Others change color based on the speaker's intent."
Thain spoke last, his tone slower, uncertain. "There's a shaman within. An old one. Hooded in roots and crowned with antlers. He said little… but he mentioned you, Commander."
Arasha's brows lifted. "What did he say?"
Thain paused. "He said, 'The girl of steel flame has threads that fray across planes. Her fate is a knot tighter with each life. The twist deepens. She remembers nothing. But her echo rings.'"
Silence fell heavy after that.
The knights looked to Arasha, but she gave no outward reaction. Only a nod.
"You've done well. Dismissed, all of you. Get rest."
They saluted and left. Only Garran remained, arms crossed.
"That mean anything to you?" he asked gently.
Arasha shook her head. "No. But I'll record it. Perhaps someday it will."
Inside, her chest fluttered strangely.
Her echo rings.
****
She sat alone at her desk, candlelight flickering against the window.
The report lay sealed beside her, but her eyes drifted to a small journal she kept locked in her drawer.
Not official records—but thoughts, questions, half-remembered fragments that came to her in dreams.
Names. A boy with storm-colored eyes. A field of dying stars. A promise whispered in wind.
And a name:
Kane.
She didn't know why the name came to her sometimes like a sob caught in her throat.
But tonight, under the whispering shadows of a magical forest and a prophecy she didn't understand, she wrote it down again.
Kane.