The rhythm of battle had become a heartbeat, steady and relentless, carrying me through wave after wave of the endless tide. I fought beside Runa, beside warriors whose faces blurred into a sea of exhaustion and determination. I learned to move with the shield wall, to brace when it buckled, to strike when it advanced. The ember pulsed in my chest, a steady flame that gave me strength when my body wanted to fall.
But through the chaos, through the press of bodies and the clash of steel, I caught glimpses of something that stole my breath.
Kaelen.
He was everywhere the fighting was thickest. I would see him at one end of the line, his greatsword a blur of ice and death, and then he would be at the other, carving a path through monsters that seemed to part before him like water before a blade. He moved with a speed and grace that should have been impossible in his heavy armor, his blade singing through the air, each stroke ending a life.
