The Festival of the Fiery Dawn, like many local festivals throughout the Frontier, could trace its origins back to a legendary event. In this case, the original founders of Kellen’s Veld had wintered in the woods near the veld (from which Kellen had taken his less-than-inspired name) while building the first structures of the town. The winter was mild, and soon the spring rains came, and the veld was overgrown and lush.

And something had been drawn to the build site, something terrible and deadly, that only came at night. So Kellen had ordered a great fire pit built on the hill just south of the town, stocked high with a bonfire worth of wood, and the townsfolk waited by the pit on the night of the new moon, for the darkest hour to arrive . . . and the creatures to come.

“And BAM, WHOOSH!” Grey said, throwing up her hands, finger’s wiggling, “The fire drove away the creatures, for a year at least.”

Cadryn stared at the would-be-cutpurse where she sat beside Felina on the parapet of the Citadel. Watching the sun set. “And you believe that?” he asked.

“Why not?” Felina said, shrugging, “People believe all sorts of stuff. If lighting a big fire once a year to drive away an evil, brings the community together, what’s the harm?”

“It’s when they decide to start throwing people into the fire, that it becomes a problem,” Grey added, rubbing her chin thoughtfully. “BAM, wisdom!”

Cadryn snorted, she had a point, and if the worst did come to pass tonight, the Festival would as well.

The bonfire had been assembled beside the now built up road running down from the Neeft into town proper. By tradition, the eldest descendant of Kellen would make the run from the center of town to the bonfire site as soon the night reached its darkest, the majority of the Town would ride out the night until then in its taverns.

“What about the Neeft,” he asked, “doesn’t it kind of ruin it?”

“Nah,” Felina said, “By Imperial creed, local traditions are to be honored to the best of our ability. To that end we’ve always left the Beacon off on the festival nights.”

“While I would normally find that quite agreeable,” Cadryn said, watching the sun slip fully below the sea. “If ever there were a night to deviate from procedures.”

“Not on Sefton Atwood’s watch, no sir,” Felina said, in poor imitation of the man.

“I think I’ll go double the number of torches we have burning,” Cadryn said, already fearing the growing dark.

After helping him add some more torches to the Citadel’s pathways, Felina had reported down to the toll house for Gate duty with Vaast and Bahsa. Encara had all but locked herself in the library after their encounter with Lord Kanon, which left Mareth the Meek and Cadryn, alone, on rooftop of the Observatory. She’d refused to actually enter the building, citing fears of demonic tainting.

Cadryn didn’t know if that was real, but anything built by someone call Dream-Killer wasn’t to be partaken of at night, last of all this one. However, the perfectly mundane roof offered an excellent view of most of the Neeft, the Tollhouse, Kellen’s Veld, and the Bonfire.

As they lay there on their backs, watching the sky darken, Cadryn almost forgot the reason he’d been moved to the Night Shift. Mareth, however, had other ideas.

“So you think they were demons? Or true breeding familiars?”

“Do I think the what?” He asked.

“The monsters that attacked Kellen’s Veld.”

“I was trying to avoid thinking of it, actually.”

“Sorry . . . hey, that cloud looks like Korbinian’s head.”

Cadryn laughed, “Thanks, Mareth.”

He heard her hair swish as she looked at him, “For what?”

“Trying to keep my mind off our impending doom.”

“Now who’s brining it up,” she replied. “So . . . how long do you think you’ll be on the Night Shift?”

Cadryn hadn’t thought about, and turned on his side to look at Mareth. “I don’t know,” he said, honestly, “Maybe just tonight.”

“Ahh,” she said, the disappointment plain. “So you do think we’re going to die.”

Their conversations went around for an hour or two, and as the deeper darkness set in Cadryn began to suspect that all this might be a lot of to do, over two Fae Lords old arguments. He was back to looking at the stars when, Mareth, true to her insidious desire to ruin their pleasant evening together, nudged his arm.

“Hey, look at the town . . . do they put out all the lights for this?”

“No, that’s not what Grey told us,” he replied, and rolling onto his stomach looked at Kellen’s Veld.

The town was completely dark, and as he watched, it seemed like every line of building was melting into a more absolute black. They both stared at it, in growing fear.

“Maybe it’s our eyes, misadjusting to the night,” Mareth suggested.

Cadryn looked up, and saw a sky devoid of stars. He tugged at Mareth’s arm, pointed.

She gulped, “Nope, that’s not right at all.”

Cadryn stood up, and that’s when he saw him: Amber’s uncle. That man was running, not the kind of triumphant run you might engage in as part of beloved holiday.

He was running for his life, and something was coming to take it.

From the deeper darkness that had engulfed Kellen’s Veld loped a thing of living ink, dotted with the missing stars of the night’s sky.

Uncle Kellen was trying to light something as he ran, a torch, and against all odds, he succeeded.

The flame only outlined the creature lying in wait between him and the bonfire. It swarmed forward, and the tiny light in the Veld went out.

“Beacon?” Cadryn said.

“Beacon,” Mareth agreed, whispered the words that set the tiny sun orbiting her staff.

By the time they’d run down the stairs around the Observatory, the deeper darkness had washed over the Neeft. The sounds of shouted surprise and anger echoed up from the Tollhouse, but standing now, in the center of the Lower Gardens, they couldn’t see beyond the nearest row of plants.

But something could see them, and it chittered and snarled out to others of its kind. The glint of starlight between the leaves winked in and out of being. A soul annihilating terror began to gnaw at the base of Cadryn’s skull.

“You don’t have to die,” came Encara’s sweetly accented voice, from the open window of the Library. “Come inside! They can’t enter here, in the morning, all of this will have passed. It’s how Jalisco endured.”

Mareth’s hand tightened in his own, and Cadryn found her pale eyes. “I’ll go, if you go,” she said.

Cadryn squeezed her hand tightly. “We are Keepers of the Neeft,” he replied, and gazing up at the window yelled, “Encara, who are you?”

There was a long pause, then she answered. “Guilty, but alive . . . may your fire defeat the darkness.”

Cadryn scoffed, realizing the true meaning of Lord Kanon’s words. “We bring the sun,” he called, and long sword raised, charged along the path that would take them to the base of the Beacon’s spire.

Things of unreality lunged for them, tendrils, claws, and hands, all reaching. Steel met it, and Mareth twirled her staff overhead when something leapt at their shadows, searing its belly. Without the landmarks of the rooftop they would have been lost if not for Mareth’s long familiarity with the way.

As they reached the door into the spire, the darkness roiled at their advance. Shrinking back from the staff, Mareth pressed forward, jabbing at protrusions and nodules.

Something strong and slithering shot between Cadryn’s legs, wrapping his left one to the knee. Searing cold tore through his pants, the leather crunching like dead leaves. The pain faded, as he hacked away the base of the tendril, and it burst into icy water.

“Inside!” Mareth yelled from the brink.

Cadryn staggered inside after her, sagging against the wall. He tried to avoid looking at his leg, failed, and regretted it immediately at the sight of splitting black skin. “I don’t think—“he began.

“We’re going to make it,” Mareth finished.

Following her craned back head, Cadryn saw what lined the stairs around the center of the spire. They moved in ways nothing should, and there were too many to count. He sank to the floor. “We won’t,” he said, pointing to her sun, “but maybe you can.”

Mareth shook her head violently, “No, No. I’m not leaving someone else to die. Not again . . . and I can’t split the orb and send it from here, it’s too far.”

“Then don’t,” Cadryn said, and reaching up, squeezed her arm. “Are you finger wiggler? Or a mage?”

“I’m a mage,” she said, and thrust her staff into his free hand, “Now hold this.”

Cadryn held it, and as he sat there, on the edge of shock, Mareth the Meek did something she had feared since the night her Master was consumed by his own power.

She unleashed her own.

The tiny little sun atop her staff swelled, then calved off two sisters which Mareth seized in each hand. Her hands smoked, and blistered, then the flow of her own blood overwhelmed the infant stars.

They darkened, and the things around her sprang inward.

Only to be met with a torrent of light. Screaming, Mareth threw back her hood, and in the whirling wind of arcane power, her hair danced in the flashing light of her onslaught. Flames surged around, and above her, consuming all that blocked her way. Ascending step, by step, she made it halfway up the spire.

From his vantage on the floor, Cadryn watched with pride, wishing there was more he could do. “Keeper of the Beacon, indeed,” he whispered.

As Mareth grew smaller and smaller to his sight, so too did the sun at the end of her staff. The living night grew bolder, and tried for him with more vigor, Cadryn did what he could to stave off the advance . . . but it was only a matter of time before they claimed their prize.

From her vantage, Mareth could no longer see Cadryn below, but she felt the waning of the staff’s light. There wouldn’t be enough time to climb all the way. “But I don’t need to go all the way,” she said, eyeing the now visible doors to the Beacon chamber.

They were open, forced wide by the undulating creatures, it would be their doom.

As something wet began to tug at his boot, Cadryn felt, as much as heard, the explosion from above. The wave of light and heat that washed downward left his ears ringing with its passage, or perhaps that was the death wails of the creatures of the deeper night . . . either way, he lost track of time after that, because when he opened his eyes again, the staff was cold and dead in his hands.

But he was very much alive, in the light, and not alone.

Standing at his feet, was Mareth, no longer meek. She stood rigid, proud, her robe’s sleeves burned down to the shoulder, revealing scars that glowed red with the light of the sun.

She held out a hand to him.

“Who are you?” Cadryn asked, accepting it.

“I am Mareth . . . of the Fiery Dawn.” She answered.

Before Cadryn Bence could think of anything witty to say to that, Mareth pulled him to his feet, and kissed him.

It was the best sunrise he’d ever known, and as they parted lips, she winked at him.

“Welcome to the Night Shift, Cadryn.”

“Thanks,” He replied, “I think I’ll be staying.”

End of Part 1.