“Red Falcon,” Jory Fell called out as he approached, voice dripping with mock politeness. “So the Earth Ring finally noticed that pirate ship?”
Red Falcon answered with an easy smile that never reached his eyes. “We’ve been hunting her for half a month. It’s not our fault Windrest Keep only heard the rumor this morning.”
It was a clean cut, delivered with a grin. Jory’s expression twitched.
Red Falcon adjusted the brim of his hat and walked away without waiting for a reply. The rest of the Earth Ring moved with him, treating Jory like background noise.
Benjamin, unfortunately, had a talent for making silence louder.
He paused beside Jory and offered him a gentleman’s smile – the kind that belonged on a stage. “Captain’s always been a little cold,” he said warmly. “But since we’re cooperating, I don’t mind sharing a piece of intelligence. You do know the pirate ship’s name, don’t you?”
Jory’s jaw clenched.
Benjamin leaned in just enough to make it personal. “It’s called the Mist.”
Jory’s face darkened toward an ugly, bruised red. Benjamin gave a polite nod and strolled after the team as if he’d done Jory a favor.
Ethan watched it all with a private, mean little amusement. Jory had tried to throw a jab and ended up taking the hit himself. Turns out the joke was him.
But the tension behind the banter was real.
The Earth Ring answered to the Crown. Governor Panglos Fell might swear loyalty to the kingdom, but out here on Storm Island he ruled like a king in all but name.
Governors across the Endless Sea held absolute power inside their territories. And the kingdom hated that kind of independence.
So it built the Earth Ring – an organization that maintained order in the supernatural world and, just as importantly, watched the governors.
They funded local churches under the Seven Gods, such as the Violet Goldflower Faith, and used those networks to find Pre-Awakened with talent. When someone promising surfaced, the Earth Ring was the first to extend an invitation.
Talent first. Bloodline second. Sometimes not at all.
Windrest Keep was the opposite. Fell’s knights were almost all nobles. The hierarchy there had fossilized into something hard and sharp – a supernatural realm run by families and favors.
In the long run, Ethan knew who would win that fight. One side had a pipeline of fresh blood. The other was a closed club.
Either way, it made Ethan’s own path clearer: Windrest Keep was not for him.
Not that he had the luxury of planning his career. Faranil’s shadow and the price of Moonshadow Elixir were still pinned to his spine.
Out on the water, far beyond the seawall, the Mist waited – a dark shape rising and falling in the gentle swell, distant as a smudge.
Behind Ethan, the White Maple Manor steamship – the White Maple – finished its preparations. Red Falcon and Benjamin checked gear and sealed crates while the rest of the team boarded.
Ethan heard a soft meow from behind a stack of dockside junk.
A black cat watched him with gold eyes that held far too much intelligence.
“Skye,” Ethan thought through the contract, keeping his face neutral. “Why are you here?”
Her voice slid into his mind, impatient as always. “Because that’s the ship. The one owned by the two Infiltrators you killed.”
“I know,” Ethan answered.
Skye’s tail flicked. “Then think. If the owners are dead, why is the ship still roaming around like it has legs?”
Ethan didn’t have a clean answer. That was exactly the problem.
“So I’m going to see,” he said.
There was a full second of silence, the mental equivalent of a long-suffering stare.
“Of course you are,” Skye said at last. “Fine. Take this.”
She nudged a black cloth pouch forward with her paw.
Ethan waited until no one was looking, then scooped it up and peeked inside. Ten small vials. Each one held a coal-red chunk that looked like it still remembered fire.
“Dragonflame,” Skye said. “Works on shadowy magic. Smash a vial on the ground and it burns. If things go sideways, it might buy you a breath.”
Ethan tucked the pouch into his coat. “Thanks.”
“Also,” Skye added, eyes shifting toward Jory, “your little noble puppy wants to impress his father. He’s muscling into this operation.”
Ethan followed her glance. Jory and a cluster of noble knights were herding soldiers onto two ships with the kind of forced confidence that came from never being the one to die.
“He won’t go himself,” Skye said. “He’s sending a hundred soldiers. And the Tilly brothers.”
Jamie Tilly and Jerry Tilly – the names clicked in Ethan’s memory. He’d heard them in the church gardens, voices full of entitlement.
“They’re smarter than they are strong,” Skye warned. “Watch them.”
“Rhine,” Benjamin called from the gangplank. “Move.”
Ethan blinked, and when he looked back, Skye was already gone, swallowed by the clutter of the docks.
Minutes later the White Maple cut into open water, its steam engine churning the sea into white foam.
“Those men will die,” Am said without turning his head.
Candice smiled and produced a small crystal ball like a party trick. “Mmm. Shall I divine it?”
She let a spark of magic dance over the glass. The sphere glowed. Candice lowered her voice into something theatrical.
“The Governor’s Chief Councilor wants the ‘demon from the sea’ gone,” she intoned, “so shipping can resume and his coffers can refill. He’s no Awakened, so he believes in cannons instead. He pushed Jory to use steamship artillery against pirate elites…”
Ethan couldn’t help it. He leaned in, genuinely curious. “Divination can give you details like that?”
Candice burst out laughing so hard she nearly dropped the crystal ball.
“This is why I like newcomers,” she said, eyes bright with mischief. “They let me get away with everything.”
She tapped the glass. “I do know a little divination, but none of that came from the ball. It came from dockside gossip. Everyone knows the Chief Councilor bleeds money every day the docks stay shut. And everyone knows which of Fell’s children he’s backing.”
“Jory,” Ethan said.
“Jory,” Candice confirmed. “So yes – they want a quick, flashy victory.”
As if on cue, a cannon boomed in the distance.
Far ahead, the two Windrest Keep steamships opened fire on the Mist. Bright fire flared. Wood splintered. The pirate ship rocked under the impact and slid back on the swell.
Benjamin stared. “They’re actually using that thing against Awakened pirates?”
For people who’d never heard the Seven Gods answer, Red Falcon’s voice was flat. “Steam and steel are the closest thing they have to a miracle.”
The world was changing. Steam engines, factories, cannons – inventions that improved ordinary lives in ways the churches never could. More young people were turning their backs on prayer and choosing science instead.
And the ones the Seven Gods had ignored all their lives? They wanted technology to dethrone the supernatural entirely.
The Chief Councilor was one of them. He’d equipped Jory with Storm Island’s best steamships and put two Judicator brothers – the Tillys – in charge to ‘balance’ cannon fire with holy power.
Tech plus miracles. In Jory’s mind, it was a guaranteed win.
Ethan didn’t buy it. Neither did the Earth Ring.
If a few cannonballs could solve the Mist, the ship wouldn’t have left a trail of massacres across the sea.
Red Falcon ordered the White Maple to slow.
A second volley hit. Then a third. Under the cheers of noble commanders and terrified soldiers trying to believe, the Mist’s hull became a ragged, broken ruin.
And still, no pirates appeared on deck. No return fire. No screams. The ship simply drifted, dead and obedient.
With the Mist “crippled,” Jamie and Jerry Tilly ordered their soldiers to board. Ladders slapped into place. Blessings flared like cheap fireworks.
The men surged over the rail with raised voices and borrowed courage.
Red Falcon brought the White Maple to a stop at a distance, watching.
He was trapped in a choice that tasted wrong no matter how he swallowed it.
If the Earth Ring boarded now, Windrest Keep would accuse them of stealing credit. The soldiers might even turn their weapons on them before the real enemy showed its face.
If they waited, a hundred ordinary men would die because nobles wanted a headline.
Benjamin exhaled through his nose. “A bad commander buries his men.”
Red Falcon didn’t answer. He just watched, jaw tight enough to crack teeth.
Under a sky that was all blue and sunlight, fog rose from nowhere.
It thickened fast, swallowing the Mist and both Windrest Keep ships in a blanket of white.
A moment later it vanished, as abruptly as it had appeared.
And the sea revealed a new truth.
The Mist was whole again – hull smooth, deck pristine, as if cannon fire had been a dream.
The two Windrest Keep ships, meanwhile, looked like the ones that had taken the volleys. Shattered rails. Torn planks. Damage spread across them like an infection.