Lords of the North • Epilogue

## The Wars to Come

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*Thunder rumbles, and the walls of the great hall of Krosholm shake ever so slightly under the onslaught of wind and sleet and rain.*
*It has been one week, to the day, since the fight at the Weeping Stones, and the storm has not abated. An anger hangs on the air. Black clouds still mar the sky, and the distant promise of retribution creeps over the horizon. Waiting. Biding its time. But growing nearer.*
*In a hidden nook up by the rafters, where the warmth of the hearthfire nestles against the thatch, Ku'arr Crimsonwing shifts and twitches in his sleep, troubled by dreams that weren’t dreams. Wings of flame carry him at great speeds through the heavens. Soaring over forest and hill and mountain, to lands far and distant to his own.*
*First to a figure in frost-rimmed plate, marching up a gravel path to a high mountain valley, searching for the spirits of a family he had once lost. Enigmatic as ever, Torfin had spoken no word, to anyone, of what he would do after this task was done. From the skies, through keen eyes that weren’t his own, Ku'arr watches the small dot come to the end of the path. Stop. Pause. Then pass through an archway of stone into a valley of bones.*
*And the phoenix turns west, arching through scraps of cloud over foothills and tundras of red grass, to a figure hooded and cloaked, atop a bear white as snow. Always eager for the next journey, Gera and Misha look to familiar horizons. Home first, to kith and kin, and beyond that, who knows? Maybe south. Maybe north again. Whichever which way the wind blows.*
*With a stiff breeze coming down from the mountains, the phoenix flies northwest. Past idle villages which had never seen war. Past farmland rich with rye, to a trio of figures walking side by side down the road. Rylan, hoping to some day find peace, heads north to Nodvograd, to give word of Arianne's passing, and to help as best he could with the threats that loomed ever closer. Boryenka and Vanya, the latter recovered from the fever that had plagued her these last few days, travelled with him for the time being. They headed back to distant wastes, hoping to reach home before the storms came to the Farlands. They took with them plenty of stories, good and bad, but a warning as well.*
*Dark times were coming.*
*And so at last, the phoenix turns north, into raging skies crackling with lightning fierce as a wildfire. Through an ever-worsening storm it passes, buffeted on all sides by the wind, thrown from one place to the next, and when it finally breaks free it finds only ruin. Smoke rises from a fortress draped between two cliffs of stone. The defences, crumbled. The defenders, fallen. Through the breach an army marches. Not of flesh and blood, but of frostbitten steel and bone. A black scar spreading across the land, winding its way south to the lands of the living.*
*Atop the battlements, one last figure lies, rasping breath through bloody lips, his body broken and dying. Svenmar, still wrapped in the beaten iron that has kept him alive until the bitter end. Until now.*
*A creature with wings of metal and eyes of frozen flame burning through the veil across its head stands above him, one boot stamped on his chest. The phoenix watches it raise its blackened blade and bring it swiftly and abruptly down. When Svenmar rises again, and reaches for the hammer his god had once granted him, there is no divinity in his eyes. Only fire, the colour of molten rock.*
*The phoenix flees south with the storm. Outpacing the dead. Outpacing the wind and rain. Outpacing even the lightning that seeks to tear it from the sky. It comes again to a great fortress atop a mountain crag, to a windswept hall whose lord sits quietly by the hearth, lost in thought, a thick cloak of fur across his shoulders to ward against the chill, pale and sickly but recovering from the worst of the lycan fever’s passing, with Marcella curled up, asleep, her head in his lap.*
*Kalahan Krasnyalyy, Battleborn, Son of Helde and Arlak, Paragon of the God of War, and Iron Lord of the Krosvanir.*
*Still unaccustomed to its weight, the Eagle Ring sits heavy on his hand, all the heavier for the chains of responsibility it has put on his shoulders now. Chains he never wanted, but was born to carry nonetheless.*
*The phoenix descends. Past the doorway. Past the empty tables. To the fireside, where the dying embers flare in response, casting new warmth into the shadowy corners of the room. On Kalahan’s hand, the iron ring glints in the reflected firelight, and half-seen omens dance along the walls.*
*Armies rise and fall, live and die. Gods stand side by side with men, and do battle on a canvas of smoke and flame. An axe age. A sword age. One last shout of defiance before the world sinks.*
*A cold wind howls from the north. A promise of ice and blood. A promise of death and ruin. A promise of the wars to come.*
*But the flames rise to meet it. Strong and proud. Unflinching. Unafraid.*
*And in his seat, Kalahan sits a bit straighter, and reaches for the hilt of his mother's sword.*

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