HOLLOW VOWS

They crossed the river of bones at first light.

The water ran red from minerals, not blood or so Kael claimed but the name had stuck since the Pact Wars, when Mira Hale fought Saris to a standstill on these very banks.

Ari didn’t speak as she crossed. The weight of Mira’s scroll sat heavy in her pack, and heavier still in her chest. The truth of the Pact was clear now, but what she was meant to do with that truth remained a fog.

Behind her, Kael waded silently, hand on his sword. Erin was scouting the ridge. Lyra carried the map. And Jeremiah

She glanced back.

Jeremiah was quiet again.

Too quiet.

They entered the light lands by dusk.

What once had been a thriving border village lay in ruins homes collapsed into ash, trees rotting where they stood. A gray mist curled around them, reeking of copper and old flame.

Kael crouched by a scorched sigil on the ground. “Blood magic. Recent.”

Erin unslung her bow, her expression hard. “Saris is close.”

Ari shivered. She could feel it, too the tremor in the earth, the pull in her bones.

Mira had written that the Pact was balance. What Saris was creating her it was imbalance incarnate.

Then Erin returned, her boots muddy, her tone clipped.

“There’s a fortified camp up the ridge,” she said. “Dozens of soldiers. Maybe more. Shifters. Enhanced.”

“Seris’s inner ring?” Kael asked.

Erin nodded grimly. “And one of them’s wearing Hale colors.”

They set camp behind the jagged remains of an old mill.

Maps unfurled. Options debated. The plan was simple: infiltrate the enemy camp, locate their ritual site, and confirm if Saris was planning another Circle corruption.

Ari tried to focus, but her thoughts swirled.

Mira’s words kept echoing: You must choose what kind of legacy you leave.

It wasn’t enough to stop Saris. She had to prove something better could be built. But how?

Jeremiah offered to scout the camp perimeter. No one argued. He had the quietest step of them all.

After he left, Erin leaned toward Ari. “He’s been different since the Circle.”

Ari nodded. “Withdrawn.”

Lyra added, “Watch him.”

Ari wanted to say she trusted him. She didn’t.

Not anymore.

Night fell with no stars.

Wrapped in illusion sigils and silencing charms, Ari and Kael moved through the woods toward the enemy camp. Erin and Lyra flanked from opposite sides, bows and blades at the ready.

They crested the ridge and froze.

The camp was larger than expected. Rows of armoured tents. Fire pits that burned blue. Ritual circles etched into the earth, feeding some vast sigil half-complete in the centre.

Kael’s voice was low. “She’s preparing a new anchor.”

“Another Circle,” Ari said.

“No. A reverse of one.”

Ari blinked. “What?”

Kael pointed. “She’s not binding power. She’s releasing it. Into her army.”

Ari’s stomach turned.

If Mira created the Circle to protect the forest from unstable magic, Saris was building one to weaponize it to turn her followers into walking vessels of chaos.

They had to warn the others.

They turned back.

And ran into Jeremiah.

Jeremiah stood still, his blade lowered, not drawn but the gleam in his eyes told Ari everything.

“You’re working with her,” Ari whispered.

“I’m working against extinction,” he replied.

Kael stepped forward. “She twisted you.”

“No,” Jeremiah said. “She opened my eyes. The Pact always served the Hales. Always punished those outside it. Saris is ending that.”

“By creating monsters?” Kael spat.

“By creating equals,” Jeremiah snapped.

Ari shook her head. “You believed in Mira.”

“I believed in peace. You brought war.”

He stepped aside.

Three soldiers emerged from the trees enhanced, faces covered in silver bark and bone tattoos.

Jeremiah didn’t raise a weapon.

“I told her I’d lead you here. But I didn’t promise to stay.”

He vanished into the mist.

Kael fought like a storm precise, brutal. Ari summoned root and flame, her pendant flaring with each movement. But these soldiers weren’t like the others. They absorbed pain. Moved without pause.

Erin’s arrow dropped one from the trees.

Lyra cut another at the knees.

But Kael staggered, bleeding from a wound just above his ribs.

Ari screamed and flung a wall of silver thorns around them, forcing the attackers back. One tried to leap over it and Lyra met them midair with her blade.

Silence fell.

Only breathing. Ragged, harsh.

Kael collapsed to his knees. “It’s not just blood magic. They’re bound to her will. She sees through them.”

Ari turned to the ridge, where Jeremiah had vanished.

“She sees through him.”

They couldn’t stay. The enemy camp would be alerted within minutes.

Erin helped Kael to his feet. Lyra retrieved the map.

Ari, shaking, pulled Mira’s scroll from her pack.

Not to read.

To remember.

Mira had known betrayal. She’d written about it. The early days of the Pact were filled with it even among the Hales.

But she hadn’t let it stop her.

She had rebuilt, anyway.

So would Ari.

Even if it meant losing friends. Even if it meant walking into the storm alone.

They made it to a cave two miles south before collapsing.

Kael’s wound was deep, but not fatal. Erin stitched it without a word. Lyra kept watch.

Ari stared at the scroll, still sealed.

She whispered to herself.

“I won’t break. I won’t become Saris. I’ll finish what Mira started.”

And in the silence that followed, the pendant at her neck glowed once more not with heat or fire.

But with memory.

Somewhere deep within the ancient magic of the Pact…

…it remembered her promise.