Celestial Blade Of The Fallen Knight

The forest fell away like a receding tide, trees thinning until the convoy emerged into a vast sweep of open plains.

Soren blinked against the sudden brightness, his eyes accustomed to woodland shadow.

The morning sun burned through patches of ground mist, transforming the landscape into something ethereal, half-solid, half-dream.

"First time seeing the Elarian Plains?" Lady Aveline asked from the carriage window, noting his expression.

Soren nodded once, scanning the horizon with practiced efficiency. After days surrounded by trees, the openness felt exposing, almost dangerous in its lack of cover.

Yet something else stirred beneath his wariness, a strange lightness as his vision extended for miles in every direction.

"The mist burns away by midday," Lady Aveline continued. "Then you'll see Elaris properly."

She was right. As the sun climbed higher, the last wisps of ground fog dissipated, revealing a landscape of rolling grasslands punctuated by occasional stands of silver-barked trees.

And there, beyond the horizon's gentle curve, spires. Distant and hazy, but unmistakable against the sky. Towers of white stone and gleaming metal that seemed to float above the plains.

"Elaris," the steward announced unnecessarily, his voice carrying a reverence that seemed at odds with his usual pragmatism. "The White City."

Soren studied the distant silhouette, committing its outline to memory. Somewhere within those walls stood academies, mages, the best swordsman, though from this distance, individual structures were impossible to distinguish. Just the impression of something vast and ancient, yet oddly luminous even at this range.

The caravan continued across the plains, following a road that grew progressively wider and better-maintained with each passing mile.

By late afternoon, they reached a fortified waystation, a squat stone structure surrounded by a wooden palisade, positioned at the junction of three major roads.

"We'll rest here tonight," Lady Aveline announced as the gates swung open to admit them. "Continue to the city tomorrow."

The waystation courtyard bustled with activity, merchants unloading goods, travelers watering horses, guards in various liveries exchanging information.

Soren noted at least three different noble house insignias among them, along with the eight-ringed emblem of Church officials gathered near the main building.

The air felt different here. Lighter, somehow, despite the press of bodies and the din of commerce. The constant tension that had followed them through the wilderness seemed to dissipate, replaced by something else, a weight of civilization, of rules and hierarchies that pressed in different ways.

'This place has forgotten the forest,' Soren thought, marking exit routes and defensive positions out of habit. 'It thinks itself safe behind stone and wood.'

As the servants established their quarters and the guards secured the carriage, Soren maintained his position of watchful readiness.

Lady Aveline disappeared inside with her steward, leaving instructions that they not be disturbed until evening meal.

The shard against Soren's chest pulsed once, faintly cool. Valenna remained silent, though her presence felt alert, interested in this new environment.

He sensed her awareness extending through his own, cataloging details he might have overlooked.

Hours passed. The sun began its descent, casting long shadows across the waystation's central courtyard. Travelers moved indoors for evening meals, torches were lit along the walls, guards changed shifts with practiced efficiency.

Soren noticed Lady Aveline watching him from an upper window, her amber eyes thoughtful, measuring. When she caught his gaze, she didn't look away, but held it for a long moment before disappearing from view.

Later, as night settled fully over the plains, a servant approached. "Lady Kareth requests your presence by the main fire," he said, gesturing toward a stone pit where flames leaped high against the darkness.

Soren followed, hands loose at his sides, senses alert despite the relative safety of the waystation. The fire pit stood at the courtyard's edge, partially sheltered by an overhanging roof but open to the night air. Lady Aveline sat alone beside it, her steward conspicuously absent.

"Sit," she said, gesturing to a bench across from her. The firelight caught in her amber eyes, turning them to liquid gold.

Soren obeyed, though he positioned himself where he could still observe the courtyard. The night air carried the hum of insects from the surrounding plains, punctuated by occasional shouts from the waystation's common room where travelers shared drinks and stories.

"Your discipline," Lady Aveline said after a moment of silence, "is wasted on guard work." Her gaze remained fixed on the flames. "You're young, too young to be carrying ghosts already."

Soren didn't respond, though the shard pulsed cold against his chest at her words. How much did she know? How much did she suspect? The fire cast dancing shadows across her face, making her expression difficult to read.

"I have connections," she continued, looking up at him now. "Former instructors at Aetherion Academy. The place where the most gifted are refined into weapons worthy of nations."

The name hung in the air between them. Aetherion. Even in the Veiled Hand's sanctuary, that name had carried weight, spoken in tones that mingled respect with wariness.

"You could disappear there," Lady Aveline added, her voice dropping lower. "Under a different name. A place where no one asks questions if you bleed talent."

Soren studied her face, searching for the trap behind her words. "Why?" he asked finally.

"Because strength attracts notice," she answered without hesitation. "And notice gets people like you killed." She leaned forward slightly, firelight highlighting the determination in her expression. "At Aetherion, you'd be invisible until you're ready not to be."

The shard remained cold against his skin, though Valenna offered no comment. Soren weighed Lady Aveline's words against what he knew of her, a noblewoman with connections, yes, but also someone who had recognized what he was and hadn't flinched.

"I can handle the documents," she continued when he didn't immediately respond. "The alias, the introduction. All of it."

The offer hung between them like smoke from the fire, intangible yet impossible to ignore. Soren's mind calculated possibilities, risks, advantages.

The Veiled Hand had given him purpose, direction, but also limitations. Aetherion represented something else entirely, unknown, unpredictable, potentially dangerous.

"Think on it," Lady Aveline said, rising from her seat. The firelight caught in her hair, turning it to burnished copper. "Before we reach Elaris."

She left him there, disappearing into the waystation's main building without looking back. Soren remained beside the fire, watching flames consume wood with patient, inevitable hunger.

—

Aetherion Academy stood at the heart of Elaris, built atop an ancient leyline nexus where powers older than recorded history converged beneath the earth.

Its white stone walls rose in graceful arcs, towers spiraling toward the sky like frozen music. Founded nine centuries ago after the Celestial Fall, the Academy had survived wars, purges, and the slow transformation of nations around it.

Within its walls, two traditions existed in uneasy balance.

The Blades, swordmasters, duelists, and tacticians who honed their bodies into lethal instruments of precision.

And the Arcanists, the rare few born with the Spark, whose abilities connected them to forces beyond ordinary comprehension.

Magic remained rare in the world, its practitioners few and jealously guarded. Most who possessed the Spark never reached the Academy, discovered and claimed by Church authorities or noble houses before their gifts could fully manifest.

Those who did arrive at Aetherion's gates found themselves entering a world of rigid hierarchy and ancient traditions, where power determined everything from sleeping quarters to dining privileges.

The institution answered to the High Instructors' Council, divided between martial and arcane divisions that maintained an uneasy peace despite centuries of philosophical differences.

Their decisions shaped not only the Academy's future but often the realm's as well, for Aetherion's graduates served in positions of significant influence, as bodyguards to noble houses, officers in the dominion's army, or in quieter roles that left no trace in official records.

—

Soren sat apart from the waystation's bustle, perched on a wooden rail at the compound's edge. Beneath his feet, plains grasses swayed in the night breeze.

Above, stars glittered in patterns he'd memorized during countless night watches, though they seemed brighter here than they had in the Wastes.

Lady Aveline's offer tumbled through his mind, each possibility branching into a dozen more. The word "academy" felt alien on his tongue when he whispered it, a concept that belonged to a life he'd never lived. Schools were for nobles' children, for those with futures planned from birth. Not for weapons forged in blood and necessity.

"A place of learning," Valenna's voice drifted through his thoughts, breaking hours of silence. "How strange... perhaps there, you'll find something even I cannot teach."

The shard pulsed cool against his chest, her presence sharp with interest rather than warning. Soren didn't respond, his eyes fixed on the far horizon where the faintest glow marked Elaris, too distant to see clearly, but present nonetheless, a smudge of light against the darkness.

What awaited him if he accepted? New masters, certainly. Different lessons, different blades. Perhaps more freedom than the Veiled Hand allowed, or perhaps less. The uncertainty itself felt dangerous after months of clear purpose.

A sound caught his attention, the faint brush of movement too deliberate to be an animal. Soren remained motionless, senses sharpening as he pinpointed the disturbance. Someone approached from downwind, steps careful but not entirely silent.

"Thinking of running?" Mira's voice emerged from darkness a moment before she did, her tattooed face catching starlight as she moved to stand beside him.

"Thinking of options," Soren replied, unsurprised by her appearance. He'd suspected she still shadowed the convoy, though she'd kept her distance since the ambush.

Mira leaned against the rail, her dark eyes fixed on the same distant glow he'd been watching. "Sylas expected this."

The statement hung between them, neither accusation nor reassurance. Just information, delivered in the Veiled Hand's typical economy.

"Did he order you to stop me?" Soren asked, hand drifting casually toward his hidden blade.

Mira's mouth curved slightly, not quite a smile, but close. "If he had, we wouldn't be talking." She turned to face him fully, her expression unreadable in the darkness. "She's offering you a longer leash, not freedom."

"I know."

"Good." She pushed away from the rail, preparing to disappear back into the night. "You should go."

The words caught him off-guard, not what he'd expected from Sylas's most trusted assassin. "Why?"

Mira paused, considering her answer. "Because weapons get replaced," she said finally. "But a blade that learns to think for itself becomes something else entirely."

Before he could respond, she melted back into darkness, leaving him alone with the weight of her unexpected counsel. The night breeze carried the scent of open plains, so different from the Wastes' acrid tang or the forest's green decay. New territory. Unknown risks.

Soren remained at the rail until false dawn began to lighten the eastern sky.