The whispers to Alaric continued, carefully spaced, each one a little more specific. They never accused, only questioned.
"Why did the Prince order a retreat before the wall fell?" "Why was his personal guard positioned for flight, not fight?" Alaric's guilt and suspicion festered.
He began watching the King differently, seeing not the hero, but the man who had nightmares. He started his own quiet, treasonous investigation, pulling on the threads of old soldiers' memories. Meanwhile, Kaelen worked on a new body for himself.
The flint armor was strong but clumsy. He ventured into a blighted swamp, a place of phosphorescent fungi and petrified trees. Here, he found a new material: Bog-Iron, a dense, dark metal that held a cold resonance.
He began the agonizing process of replacing the flint plates with this colder, sharper metal. Each piece was hammered into place, fused to his bones with will and necrotic energy.
He was becoming harder, darker, a figure of wrought-iron and vengeance.