The streets of Khorath never slept.
Market criers shouted under the flicker of magelights. Coin clinked in greedy hands. Smoke rose from taverns, thick with laughter and lies. But Kael moved through it all like a ghost, hood drawn low, eyes ever scanning.
His blade—Vareth—whispered in his mind.
"Closer... she knows... Arkanis..."
He didn't know how the sword knew. It spoke without words, with feeling. With pressure behind his skull like storm winds pressing against glass.
His target wasn't a ruler this time. It was a woman.
Lirae Valen. Former Arkanis mage. Exiled, dangerous, and possibly mad. But she had answers—about the blade, about the Order, about what was happening to him.
Kael found her in the slums beneath the west gate, her cloak marked by faint glowing runes. She wasn't hiding. She was waiting.
"You're not subtle," she said without looking at him, eyes fixed on the flickering torch beside her.
Kael stepped closer. "You know what this sword is."
"I do," she replied. "But the real question is... do you?"
He reached for the hilt. She raised a hand.
"Draw that blade, and this street burns."
The tension held like drawn steel. Then Kael stepped back, just enough to ease her stance. He didn't want to kill her. Yet.
"I'm not here for a fight," he said, though the voice of the blade growled otherwise.
Lirae finally turned, her violet eyes narrowing. "It's feeding on you already, isn't it?"
Kael said nothing.
"You think it's vengeance that drives you," she continued, voice like frost, "but it's the sword. It's using your pain, your anger, your need to finish it. You're not its master. You're its vessel."
Kael's hands clenched.
"So break the curse."
Lirae laughed—cold, bitter.
"If it were that easy, your family would still be alive."
A long silence passed between them.
Kael's voice was gravel. "Help me. Or get out of my way."
"I'll help you," she said finally, "but not to save you. I want to know how deep this curse runs. How far you'll fall before the blade eats you alive."
Kael met her gaze. "Then stay out of my way when I start killing again."
"Not planning to."
As they walked into the shadowed alley toward her sanctum, Lirae glanced at him from under her hood.
"You know they'll come for you soon."
"Let them," Kael said.
He didn't look back.
Because behind them, in the distance, on a tower in the heart of Khorath, a dark-robed figure watched their every step.
And whispered to the flames.