The first stream of Valerius's mana entered Teclos.
Cold spread through his hand.
Not the ordinary chill of darkness mana. This felt older, deeper, like plunging his arm into water that had never seen sunlight.
Teclos's fingers tightened against the blackened remains.
More mana followed.
For a moment, everything seemed normal.
Then something inside him answered.
His darkness moved without being called.
It surged through his chest, flooded his channels, and rushed toward the foreign mana pouring from the ashes.
Teclos's breath caught.
Serenna saw the change immediately.
"Teclos."
He did not answer.
The ruined monastery disappeared.
He stood somewhere else.
A battlefield stretched beneath a gray sky.
Thousands of corpses covered the mud.
Valerius walked among them.
Not as a lich.
As a man.
