Chapter 11

Pyre woke rested but unsettled.

The first thing he noticed was how real his body felt—solid weight on a solid bed, breath in his lungs that rose and fell as if he had never died at all. He lay still for a moment experiencing it all, listening, expecting the old ache of Farreach’s cold mornings or the distant toll of bells.

There was nothing like that here.

There was hunger instead, sharp and physical. Fatigue lingered behind his eyes like smoke that hadn’t cleared. His stomach tightened as if it had been empty for days. There was stiffness as well, which sat in his shoulders and hips.

He yawned, surprised by the simple human act. Pyre barely recalled falling asleep the previous night. He remembered being led through numerous corridors, the Unclaimed quarter, crystal walls, his room, and then… darkness and blankets and the feeling of being too tired to care where he was placed.

The room was spare but purposeful. A bed rested low to the ground beneath a square window, and there were blankets folded on a chair beside it. A table stood opposite, leaving an open space between bed and door, worn smooth by pacing or practice.

Voices drifted in from outside, mostly Balefor’s.

Pyre sat up, swung his legs over the side of the bed, and stood. He flexed his hands once, testing the sensation. No numbness. No fading. No gray creeping at the edges.

I’m dead, he reminded himself. And yet…

The hunger tightened again.

Pyre patted his hands on his clothing and armor, which had fused to his body during Shriving. It took some getting used to, but it was much more comfortable than he would have imagined.

After taking a moment to collect himself, Pyre stepped out into the Unclaimed’s shared space. A wide table dominated the room, benches pulled up on all sides, its surface crowded with heavy bowls and platters. Roasted meats lay stacked beside unfamiliar fruits split open to reveal vivid flesh. Pitchers of dark and pale liquids caught the light, their contents slow-moving and opaque, colors Pyre didn’t recognize.

Balefor had already claimed a seat. He tore into a slab of dark, roasted meat with obvious satisfaction, juices running down his mane as he chewed, unconcerned with the mess.

“The man from Farreach!” Balefor boomed, a bit of meat flying from his mouth and landing somewhere on the table. Balefor didn’t notice. “We were just speaking about you.”

Pyre slowed.

Balefor gestured with a bone to Saejin, who sat quietly to Balefor’s right with a ladle resting in a bowl. Steam rose from the ladle’s cup, pink liquid shimmering faintly. Saejin’s eyes were still clenched shut, expression unreadable.

Lyra sat across from Saejin, her plate ripe with fruit stripped into thin slivers. She ate with deliberate precision, and her hood was down, ash still marking her features.

Marrowsven was there as well. The woman with pale skin and a strange red circle on her forehead ate something that looked frozen, which produced a smoke that curled and drifted as it melted.

“You were speaking ’bout him,” Marrowsven told Balefor. “You were the only one talking. That seems to be a trait of yours. It makes me wonder if Talkative could be your Domain.”

Balefor grinned. “Are we not all in this together?” He thumped his chest once, the sound deep and confident. “Today, we will better understand if all our years of work paid off.”

“I’m sure some of them did,” Marrowsven said.

Pyre sat carefully, choosing a place where he could see the doors. He reached for the only things that looked familiar—boiled eggs, cured fish, and greens—things that resembled what the people from Farreach ate in the warmer months. The taste was close enough to real that it made his throat tighten.

“Domains today, right?” he asked, trying to sound like he knew a little even though he still had no idea what any of this meant.

“Yes,” Marrowsven said, not cold, but not friendly either. “What we have been working our lives to prepare for.”

Pyre swallowed a bite of fish and felt it settle warm in his stomach.

Balefor’s blue eyes traced over Pyre. He ate a sausage with one bite and waved his clawed hand toward Pyre. “Ah, it’s not so complicated. A Domain is what your soul leans toward.”

“My Sigil?”

“No,” Lyra said sharply. It was the first time she had looked at Pyre directly since yesterday. “How do you have a solid Sigil and not already know this?”

Balefor leaned forward, forearms on the table. “Here’s the way to think about a Domain, Pyre: imagine that your life choices, your beliefs, your training, and your trauma were all brought together to define you. That is your Domain. The Sigil is how that Domain manifests here in the Nether, be it a physical reflection, a weapon, a crown, something entirely unlike either of those things,” he said with a nod to Saejin.

The man remained silent.

Balefor smiled, almost proud. “Mine is a greataxe, which I was excited to discover. That means my Domain must be something fierce, something that defines my life and all the daring adventures I undertook. I undertook many, you know!”

“But you’ve never been in war,” Pyre said before he could stop himself.

Balefor’s grin shifted into something softer. “There are different kinds of war, Pyre. I wasn’t on the frontlines like you clearly were, but I was put through a process that kept me constantly at war.” He gestured vaguely, as if describing an entire life with one motion. “I explored my realm in search of greater challenges, an adventurer of sorts, where I challenged myself to tackle bigger and more complicated journeys.”

He summoned his greataxe briefly. It flashed into existence, translucent and humming, then vanished again like a thought dismissed.

“And how did you die?” Pyre asked.

“Dropped from the sky by a giant falcon, where I plummeted to my death in preparation for Shriving.”

“By choice?”

“Yes,” he told Pyre. “But not all of us end up here this way. Lyra died through a ritual; Marrowsven was assassinated.”

“I was, but where I’m from, that is a natural way to go.” Marrowsven lifted her clawed fingers, flexed them once. “But the point is, regardless of how we passed, we all arrived after tuning our Domains as best we could while we were still in our realms. That is what we will learn more about today.”

Across the table, Saejin sipped from his ladle, eyes still closed, as if none of this touched him.

Pyre lifted a hand in a small, awkward wave. “What about you? How did you die?”

Saejin didn’t react.

“He really doesn’t talk, then,” Pyre said.

“No, he does not,” Balefor said with absolute certainty. “Or at least, he does not speak to us.” A low humming drifted in from somewhere beyond the walls, distant at first, then clearer. The lion-man’s ears perked up. “Ah. Kesh must be up. Our resident bard was humming last night, too. I could hear him.”

“Didn’t he say he prepared for three centuries?” Pyre asked.

“A century means different things in different places,” Marrowsven told him. “Not the word. The passage of time.” She ate another curl of frozen vapor and swallowed without expression.

“And it is here that we all are able to learn about it. Heh. Imagine that, the Unclaimed as my fellow roommates.” Balefor laughed again, too loud, too cheerful. “Where are you from anyway, Marrowsven? Your fighting style is unlike any I have seen. No, I take that back. I once fought a giant squid-spider.” He slapped the table, rattling the food. “A battle it was! You aren’t related to a squid-spider, are you?”

“Hardly,” Marrowsven said. “My realm was known as Kylindros because of its orientation.” Marrowsven’s eyes shifted toward the windows as if the answer lived outside them. “The realm was vertical, and there were half-spheres that people lived on.”

“Then why not call the place Half-Sphere, then?” Balefor asked.

“Because they were once all joined,” Marrowsven said. “And then they separated.”

Balefor’s humor faded. “The Hunger?”

Saejin shifted slightly at the mention of the force that could eat entire realms.

“No,” Marrowsven said. “It wasn’t that. The Hunger does not spare a realm.” Her voice grew sharper. “And the pantheon is generally unwilling—or unable—to stop it anyway.”

A darkness rolled through Pyre at the thoughts that followed. Devourers. The marsh. The outer breach. Old Danar lifting his arms into the oncoming light. Daedalus crying Karastella’s name like it mattered.

Why did Daedalus think he could do something? Pyre wondered. Why had he believed any of it could lead to salvation?

Heat pooled in his palm. He almost summoned his broken Sigil without thinking, the urge rising like a reflex.

He stopped as a door opened.

Windscar stepped into the common space. He didn’t look at them; instead, he moved toward the exit with stiff purpose. He halted just before taking the stairs down and spoke with his back to them. “Do you wish to make Sister Halcyon climb the stairs to greet us?” Windscar asked.

“I don’t wish to make anything, Ascended Bastard of Morthe,” Balefor said curtly. “Have a seat. Eat something. Tell us of yourself.”

Lyra leaned forward, surprising all of them. “Yes, tell us what it means to be an Ascended Bastard. That’s an interesting title.”

Windscar tensed. For a moment Pyre thought he might turn, snarl, and lash out.

But he ultimately didn’t. Instead, he headed down the stairs, footsteps measured, controlled.

Balefor watched him go and laughed. “I wonder if being an asshole is his Domain. Ha!”

Lyra grinned faintly.

Marrowsven’s attention returned to Pyre, slow and deliberate. “We all prepared for this. You do not seem to know anything about it. That is very strange. In my opinion, you will not last long.”

“Tell us how you really feel,” Balefor told her.

Pyre set his hands together on the table, fingers interlaced, holding himself in place. “I want to say I’m like you all,” he said, voice low, “but that is clearly not the case.” He glanced around the room, at the food, the windows, the strange calm after annihilation. “You all prepared for a long time. I respect that.”

Pyre’s eyes narrowed on Marrowsven.

“But until you’ve fought with everything you have, until you’ve seen everything you know consumed by monsters you can barely understand, do not tell me how long I will last.” His voice sharpened. “You do not know me. You do not know what I’m capable of.” The heat in his chest steadied into something colder. “And I will last long enough to avenge my realm’s death and make the Heavenly Host pay for abandoning us.”

Marrowsven straightened, finally attentive.

Lyra tilted her head. “You think the Heavenly Host had a choice?”

“I don’t care if they did or not,” Pyre said.

“You are bold,” Lyra said. “And bold is often stupid.”

“But sometimes bold is wise,” Balefor put in, chewing. “And stupid. But also inspiring.” He swallowed and shrugged. “I guess it depends on the circumstance.”

The door opened again.

Kesh entered as if he were stepping onto a stage. “A beautiful, beautiful morning to be dead,” he sang in a hollow, theatrical way. He took a seat at the table with a flourish. “Good morning, fellow Unclaimed. I hear a lot of discussion going on out here, and I plan to join in.” He sniffed the air. “But first, I must feast. I can’t believe how hungry I am. Well, rather, thirsty. To quench is a step in the right direction, as I’ve heard before.”

He reached for a bottle of wine and peeled the wax top off. The bard finished it entirely, and when he lowered it, he exhaled with deep satisfaction. “Better,” Kesh said. “Wine for a bard is like fish for a shark. No, that isn’t how it goes. Wine for a bard is the light in the dark. No, not that either.”

Lyra’s voice carried a hint of awe when she spoke. “How did you manage to be so in control of your Sigil? You put Urosh to sleep.”

Kesh smiled as if he had been waiting for the question. “Ah, well. It does take fine-tuning, and I have been practicing certain songs for a very long time. Instinct, really.” His gaze flicked toward Pyre. “And mine still isn’t anything like Pyre’s.”

The door slammed open.

Urosh entered, eyes still heavy from yesterday’s forced sleep. He plopped down onto a bench with a grunt and began eating anything within reach—meat, fruit, greens, eggs—shoveling it into his mouth like fuel.

Kesh reached for another bottle of wine, took a sip, and lifted it toward Urosh. “Yes, fine-tuning. Or as a gardener would say, fine-pruning. Or a lover—fine-swooning. Or a barrister—fine-proving.” He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, eyes bright with mischief. “I once had to write a roundelay for a barrister who was a patron for a number of years. A womanizer as well with a nasty temper. But a good client is a client indeed.”

The others exchanged glances, all aside from Saejin, who sat there quietly.

Kesh finished his second bottle of wine and leaned back, satisfied. He patted a hand on his stomach. “Shall we? I am going to assume Domain discovery will be a day for the ages, or the centuries, or even the fatal last moments, however you got here.” He offered Pyre a smile, strangely genuine beneath the theater. “Ready?”

They heard a door open downstairs.

Balefor’s ears twitched. “It appears Sister Halcyon has arrived.” He pressed away from the table. “In that case, good luck to us all. May our Domains be the answer to our lives’ work.”