Chapter 1 

Tarek

Pain.

It is the first and only reality, a white-hot, blinding agony that rips me from the welcome oblivion of unconsciousness. I gasp, a ragged, desperate sound, and the simple act of breathing sends a fresh, grinding wave of torment through my body.

"Nngh... ahhh!" The sound rips from my throat, raw and animalistic. My leg. Triad, my leg.

I force my eyes open, blinking against a world of swirling white. I look down and see it, twisted at an unnatural angle that makes my stomach churn. The bone of my shin is clearly shattered, a jagged end tenting the tough, fur-covered skin. A warrior’s mind is trained to assess, to analyze, to overcome. But this… this is a new, profound kind of agony that threatens to overwhelm all training, all discipline.

"Corvak!" My voice is a shredded ruin, instantly swallowed by the howl of the blizzard. "Silas! Can you hear me?"

Only the wind answers, a physical, battering force of ice and fury. I am on a desolate, snow-swept mountainside, the world a maelstrom of white. Alone.

"Ronan! Lucaris!" I roar their names into the storm, a desperate, hopeless plea. "Caspian! Answer me, damn you!"

The silence that follows is more deafening than the storm itself. The shipwreck… fragments of memory surface through the fog of pain. The lurch of the deck beneath my feet, the taste of salt and ozone on the air. Lucaris, laughing at some jest Caspian had made, his blond hair whipping in the wind. Corvak at the helm, his expression grim and steady as the sky turned a bruised, unnatural purple...

“Hold fast!” Corvak’s voice, a commander’s bellow over the sudden shriek of the wind. “Whatever this is, we face it together!”

And there’s nothing but splintering timber and the roar of a sea that felt ancient and alive with malice. Now, this. No food, no weapons, no shelter. Despair, a cold and insidious poison, threatens to consume me. The pain is an invitation, a siren song luring me toward the sweet release of surrender. To simply lie here, to let the cold take me… it would be an honorable death for a failed warrior.

But I am Tarek Thalric, a manticore of Osiris. Surrender is a concept unknown to me.

"No," I growl, the word a vow spoken to the uncaring snow. "Not like this."

A roar, born of raw pain and unyielding defiance, erupts from my throat, tearing through the howl of the blizzard. It is a challenge to the storm, to the gods who have abandoned us, to my own broken body. I will not die here. I will not be the one who fails.

Walking is impossible; even shifting my weight sends shards of agony shooting up my leg. "Gah!" I slam a fist into the snow. I can only crawl. With a groan that is half-sob, half-curse, I compel my body forward. I dig my arms into the frozen earth, my claws finding purchase in the icy crust beneath the snow. My broken leg, a useless, agonizing anchor, trails behind me, each movement a fresh torment, a new surge of pain that threatens to pull me back into the welcome void of unconsciousness.

Yet, I persist. A vow binds me, a mission drives me.

Corvak. Silas. Caspian. Ronan. Lucaris.

Their names are a silent mantra, a litany against the pain. My brothers. They could still be alive, making their way to Rach, honoring their oath to our king. I refuse to be the one who fails to meet them. The thought of them, of my duty, of the dying world we have sworn to save, is a small, resolute flame against the overwhelming blizzard of despair. It offers no warmth, but it is enough to propel me onward.

Through the swirling, blinding snow, I see it. A faint, orange glow in the distance. A light.

Shelter. Hope.

The sight is a jolt to my system, a surge of adrenaline that momentarily eclipses the pain. My gaze fixes on that single, distant point of light, and I continue to crawl. The journey is a blur, a timeless agony measured only in the desperate, rhythmic plunge of my arms into the snow. I do not know how long it takes. Hours. A lifetime. But finally, I am here.

The light is not the welcoming glow of a hearth fire. It is the guttering, menacing flare of torches lining the ramparts of a sprawling dark elf estate. Its high, black-stoned walls are a stark, menacing presence against the white of the snow, a fortress of cruelty in a land of desolation.

"Cursed luck," I spit, my breath fogging in the frigid air. Of all the fates. I have crawled from the jaws of a natural death only to deliver myself into the hands of my enemies. The irony is a bitter taste in my mouth.

But I cannot go on. My strength is gone, my body a trembling, broken shell. The blizzard grows worse, the wind a physical, battering blow that is slowly but surely extinguishing the last of my life force. To stay out here in the open means certain death. To enter the estate means almost certain death.

Of the two choices, I choose the one that offers a slim, almost nonexistent, chance of survival. I find a small, unguarded section of the wall, a place where the snow has drifted high against the stone, and haul myself over. I collapse into the relative stillness of a frozen, snow-covered courtyard, the air here blessedly calmer.

And warmer. I am drawn by a current of animal heat emanating from a long, low building at the edge of the courtyard. I can smell it, the familiar, musky scent of caged beasts, of hay and of dung. Not a home. Not a sanctuary. But shelter. And in this moment, it is all that I can ask for.

My body is shutting down. My vision is tunneling, the world a gray, swimming fog. I know I have only a few moments left before unconsciousness claims me for good. With the last of my strength, the last dregs of my will, I crawl toward the menagerie, toward the promise of its unnatural heat.

I find a door, unbarred, and pull myself inside. I collapse onto the straw-strewn floor of what appears to be a large, empty beast-pen. The warmth of the place, heated by some unseen, magical means, is a blessed relief against my frozen skin. I have made it. I am safe.

For now.

But as my consciousness begins to fade, as the welcome darkness rushes in to claim me, I feel a tingling sensation on my skin. I hear a low, humming sound, a sound of awakening, powerful, ancient magic. I force my heavy eyelids open one last time.

Shimmering, green runes appear on the iron bars of the beast-pen, weaving themselves into a complex, unbreakable web of light. The enchantments, woven into the very fabric of the cage and designed to hold predators far more powerful than a wounded manticore, flare to life. Their magical energy is a final, mocking insult to my own fading strength.

I have not found a shelter. I have crawled into a trap.

In my long, storied, and proud life, I, Tarek Thalric, the strongest and most disciplined of my brothers, am powerless. My survival is no longer in my own hands. I am a prisoner.

And as the darkness finally takes me, I do not know if I will ever wake up again.