The storm blew up at dawn.
Kael awoke to complete silence, no wind, no thunder, merely the hissing of soft snow. The clouds had been thinned during the night, and weak gray light was penetrating. Aching, burning, in every member of his body, where the lightning had touched him, the skin being raw and blistered. There was something new though that pain-- some slight pulse of storm energy running through his shattered nerves. Tiny, fragile, but alive.
He relaxed upon the crest of Needle Spire, and extended aching limbs. It felt a whole new way, still to look upon the view that was endlessly white in all directions. Something had come back to him in the world.
Kael took his time but took one hold after another. The downward side was just as much as the upward side; and his hands were too tired to move. As soon as his feet stood on terra firma he permitted himself one mute sigh of relief.
He needed to test the spark. Properly.
The snow tracks wound to the west--great, claw-like tracks of frost wendigo. Three, maybe four. Kael trailed them carelessly, with his iron sword in his hand.
In the meantime, deep, deep down in Eldren Citadel...
Elara Voss was on the outer wall in a heavy cloak against the wind of winter. Five years had altered her as well. Her silver hair she now had cut shorter, fit to fight. Her green eyes, which had been so easy to laugh at, bore an eternal dark cloud. This day she was in charge of a squad, the youngest captain in the history of the Crimson Legion.
Young recruits were drilling in the court below her. Their gestures were awkward, and not precise as she recalled at another time.
One of the small soldiers came over, and saluted. "Captain Voss, ma'am. There is a mid-level Breach opening in the East of the river which is reported by Pan-duty. They request support."
Elara nodded. "Tell them we march in an hour."
As the soldier ran away her eyes were roving northward, to the horizon that was lost in mist. The reason why she still looked like that she did not know. Nobody had heard anything of Kael Draven in years. Most believed him dead. Some hoped it.
She laid hand to the little lightning-bolt at her neck--a dim-old gift, which she never took off.
Alive I wish to live, windy one, said she. "Just be alive."
Back in the Wastes...
Kael climbed to the top of a ridge and became aware of them.
Four frost wendigos were wandering through a shallow valley with its long white all-ice fur and curved-swords claws. Pack hunters, they were, fast and vicious.
He would have killed them in a few seconds before he fell. Now when it was little more than a crude sword and a spark of fire it would be a real tussle.
He did not hesitate.
Kael strolled down slope without restraint. The wendigo nearest caught a glimpse of him and his head jerked to a snarl. The rest turned, and its eyes were burning.
The first lunged.
Kael moved aside with flash of a blade. His blow fell across the throat of the beast--clean, deep, without killing. The blood was black and it boiled in the snow. The wendigo bawed and struck with a claw which ripped his cloak.
He could sense the spark reacting to danger and glimmering more brightly.
The latter two and the third united. Kael slipped down, dodging a swing, rising behind one. His sword sank into its spine. It collapsed with a shriek.
And pain shot in his side--the first wendigo had scratched him. Blood wet his furs, and then kept them warm and afterwards cold took them away.
He spun, facing the last two. Breath came fast. The spark surged.
Kael pointed out at the sky with his free hand.
One bolt replied- crisp, sparkling blue, not like his roars of old, but right. It piercingly hit the nearer wendigo square in the chest. The monster shivered, hair on fire, and fell spasming.
The final one hesitated. Kael did not. He charged, sword leading. The iron blade met her heart.
The quiet was resumed, interrupted only by his wretched breathing.
Kael was resting his sword in the dripping blood in the snow. The injuries were severe and yet fatal. He would live.
The fire in him had smoldered down, more fiercely. A little but sufficient to establish the trail labored.
Instead, he did not eat them but furred them and made tools out of their claws, and ate them after several years. Useful employment prevented his mind too far wandering.
But at nightfall and when he made a little fire in a lee-sheltered cavity the memories came regardless.
The last night before the battle with Vorath he was nineteen once again.
Elara was sitting opposite him in the officers hall and was nudging chicken around her plate.
You need not go all by yourself tomorrow, said she. "Take the Legion. Let us help."
Kael shook his head, smiling. "It's an Emperor-class. A single blow to the heart and it will be done. I can do it faster alone. Fewer risks that way."
Her eyes searched his face. "Fewer risks for who? The city... or your legend?"
He put his hand across the table and grabbed her. "Trust me, Elara. I've never lost. I won't start tomorrow."
She squeezed his fingers, though her smile did not even reach over to her eyes. "Just come back, Kael. That's all I ask."
He had promised he would.
The fire crackled. Where the snow fell on the flames it hissed.
Kael peered into the fire until it melted.
I am making an effort, he said to the dark. "I'm still trying."
He was wrapped up with wendigo hide strips, his wounds, drank ash-flavored roast meat, and slept down with his cloak.
The spark was tick-toc in him, as a second beating of the heart.
The following day he would go to the spire. The storms would come again.
And he would be ready.
In the meanwhile Elara, way down south, was keeping the watch on the wall long after her time had expired. In that, too, snow began to fall, soft and only heard.
She had no idea that several hundred miles away, the man she still mourned had summoned lightning out of the sky, on the first occasion in five years.
There was something on the wind that was unlike this evening.
She once again touched the lightning-bolt pendant, and wheeled herself in.