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"She is bound to me."

"Is she?" Lirien hums, stepping forward, the water shifting around her ankles, swirling in a slow, deliberate spiral. "Or are you bound to her?"

A muscle ticks in my jaw.

"Enough." My voice is a blade, sharp and cutting. "Tell the others to retreat to the deep waters. When the war comes, they must be hidden."

She watches me for a long moment, then inclines her head. "As you command." Then, she is gone.

The river settles. I exhale, turning from the water, my thoughts still snarled. The path through the forest winds ahead, leading me to another sacred place. A grove where the trees whisper secrets, where the veil between realms thins.

The Titanforged await.

Their massive forms rise from the earth, bodies hewn from obsidian and iron, veins of molten gold pulsing beneath the jagged cracks of their ancient skin. They are not men. Not fully of this world. They are relics of a time before kingdoms, before war—giants molded by the gods, bound to the land itself. They do not serve, nor do they kneel. But when they rise, when they move, the earth trembles beneath their weight.

One steps forward—Rhyzan.

He towers over me, his form carved from stone and fury, his molten eyes burning like twin suns. His presence alone could drive lesser men to their knees, could break bones with the sheer weight of his existence. His voice, when he speaks, rumbles through the trees, vibrating in my ribs like a fault line waiting to break.

"You have come."

"I need your aid."

The others shift at my words, their bodies grinding like mountains moving, the weight of their presence pressing against the very air. They listen, silent as the deep earth, as old as the roots beneath our feet.

"War is coming," I continue, meeting Rhyzan’s molten gaze. "The humans will not stop. I need your strength at the borders. Watch them. Inform me when they cross into our lands, so that together we may end this before it begins."

The stillness that follows is vast. Then, slowly, Rhyzan tilts his head. The golden fissures in his body pulse, the runes carved into his chest flickering with ancient power.

At last, he speaks. "The Titanforged do not serve." His voice is the deep groan of shifting stone, the weight of the world condensed into sound. "But we protect. We endure. We were here before men, and we will be here when their bones turn todust. We will guard your borders. We will wait. And when the time comes, we will break them beneath our feet."

I incline my head in acknowledgment. One by one, they sink into the mountain, their massive forms melting seamlessly back into the rock, watching, waiting—their presence now nothing but a whisper in the wind.

Only Rhyzan lingers.

His molten eyes hold me in place, burning, unrelenting.

"She has changed you," he says, his voice lower now, more thoughtful—a landslide waiting to happen.

I do not move. "Who?" I ask, though I already know the answer.

He exhales, a sound like cracking stone. "The siren."

"She has not."

A slow, rumbling hum—disbelieving. "Lies do not suit you, Dragon Queen."

Then, with a great shudder of earth, he is gone, his body vanishing back into the mountain, leaving only silence in his wake.

By the time I reach the castle, dusk has fallen, casting long shadows over the black stone walls, the glow of torches flickering along the battlements. The creatures of my land prepare, retreating, hiding themselves away in the deepest parts of the forests, beneath the lakes, within the mountains.

The war will come.

And we will be ready.

But my mind is still tangled in the words of the river guardian, the knowing stare of Rhyzan, the lingering feel of Vaela’s hands on my body.

I push open the heavy doors, stepping into the great hall.