In the Capital, the former Gold King now enjoyed house arrest in the royal quarters of the palace. He was well fed, attended day and night by palace staff, and provided with any material luxuries that his heart desired.

Many, including the former Gold King himself, would say that he lived like a king. One Shadow, recently escaped from his own house arrest via a convenient window, saw the Gold King’s new existence more as the treatment of a caged pet, akin to the Gold King’s own treatment of his former Chancellor. Yet the Chancellor had chafed under imprisonment, rejecting every luxury offered as trivial and unnecessary while she schemed her days away. On the other hand, the Gold King accepted the bounties offered him with no sign of discontent.

The Cloud Queen knew well that martyring the Gold King would only result in massive outcry from his supporters; hence, she had found a way of rendering the Gold King harmless while simultaneously pacifying his followers. Nowadays, people throughout the Empire praised the Cloud Queen for her mercy, while the Gold King’s power had diminished from ordering the Empire’s affairs to ordering a gourmet dinner.

In taverns and dark places, the Shadow gathered support for his King. If the Cloud Queen could use the Gold King as a tool for ascendance, then the Shadow could surely do the same. The people still remembered the bounty of the Gold King’s sovereign rule; they still saluted respectfully at the memory of the Sheriff who became Interior General, protecting the home front from crime while other commanders charged off to war and devastation. The Shadow spun promises of fame and power through revolution, luring hundreds of vengeful orphans and hotheaded youths to pledge their blades to his cause.

The Shadow soon gathered a sizable number of sworn followers, including several low-ranking palace attendants. This network allowed him to gather information on happenings within the palace.

The Marshal of the West did not often stop in roadside cafes for food. However, even less often did he smell evidence of treason in the drink.

The Marshal’s mouth curved upward, and ember-bright eyes glittered in the firelight. He raised the cup another inch to his mouth, downing the drink in one sip. At the corner of the room, a certain Server watched his every move with premature glee. The Marshal began his dinner.

Half an hour later, after a hearty meal, the Marshal waved over the Server. Fear and dismay mixed in the Server’s heart, yet he met the Marshal’s gaze with an upraised chin and unconcerned bearing.

“How can I help you, sir?”

The Marshal chuckled at the Server’s pathetic attempt at humility. A timid demeanor and a tray of food did not make for an effective disguise. The malice curdled in this one’s eyes would have been recognizable anywhere.

“I am an Alchemist. Did you not think I have hardened my flesh against common poisons?” The Marshal lowered his voice, speaking for the Server’s ears only. “You are not my greatest enemy, but I am yours.” He pressed a stack of coins into the Server’s hand: payment for the meal and a generous tip. “Enjoy this gold while you can. Never forget your steel.”

One day, the Marshal of the West left the Capital for a routine inspection of the border defenses. Such a window of opportunity only arose a few times a year; with the Marshal out of the Capital, the Cloud Queen’s military power was greatly diminished. After a few days passed with no sign of the Marshal’s return, the Shadow decided to act.

Palace attendants supporting the Shadow’s cause helped smuggle the Gold King from his house arrest. Simultaneously, the Shadow and his followers attacked the Sun Pyrotechnic Institute as a diversion.

The soldiers stationed in the Capital immediately rushed to guard the Institute, for the Marshal had impressed upon them the key importance of that facility. It was the most vital building in the Capital, according to the Marshal, and the military had been trained to prioritize it accordingly.

When the Cloud Queen became aware of her hostage’s escape, however, she countered these orders.

“Attacking the Institute is clearly a diversion,” said she. “Find the Gold King at once.”

The soldiers then chased after the escaping Gold King.

In the chaos, the Shadow and his followers looted the Institute, stealing weapons and schematics.

In the end, both the Gold King and the Shadow escaped the Cloud Queen’s clutches, taking with them a large portion of the Institute’s inventory.

The Marshal was most displeased when he learned of this. Mustering the armies once more, he set out to crush the Gold King once and for all.

Come the dawn, another battle of Cloud and Gold raged. As cavalry collided with pikemen and desperation stained the air, a Light and a Shadow collided. A Marshal and a General each fought for the right to call his King the true King, his Empire the true Empire. Yet this Marshal did not believe in the one he served, and this General did not serve the ones who despised him.

Marshal and General fought from the plains to the forest, from rivers to peaks and back again. In this duel, the Marshal’s pyrotechnics could find no purchase against the specially fireproofed armor of the General. The latter’s raid of the Institute had indeed been fruitful; with the black armor of the former Marshal of the East protecting his person, the General had rendered the Marshal of the West’s most prominent advantage useless.

Hours passed with the Marshal and General caught in deadlock. Where the leaders of Cloud and Gold Armies fought, ordinary soldiers of both sides ran for safety, unable to withstand the power of the Fell Magicks of the Sages. To stand near these two at the height of their conflict, one’s skin would blister and blood boil from the heat, while one’s eyes would rattle in their sockets from the force of the blows exchanged. The Marshal and General dueled through hills and valleys to the edge of a cliff overlooking a deep river gorge.

A standard-bearer for the Gold Army had taken refuge among a loose tumble of rocks by the cliffside, safely isolated from the slaughter happening further inland. However, his fortune soon turned to despair—the most dangerous conflict of all intruded upon his hideaway. Marshal and General tumbled to the cliffside with the shattering of stone, breaking apart just in time for each to gain stable footing on the treacherous ground. The Marshal waved an arm, unleashing a wave of fire. Stone turned to liquid beneath the standard-bearer’s feet, and he shrieked. The flag of woven gold burst into orange, and the standard bearer flung it aside.

The General spotted his subordinate pinned by the rocks. He hurled a knife, driving the Marshal back a few steps. Weapons flashed and steel cut through the flames. In the chaos, the standard-bearer hobbled away, coughing from smoke and deafened by the piercing drumbeat of colliding metal. As he crawled along the rocks, trying to stay out of sight of the terrifying enemy Marshal, a field medic swooped down to haul him to safety. Glancing back, he saw only two dark silhouettes against the orange embers.

Both Marshal and General were covered in blood and ash, armor rent in dozens of places, yet neither would yield. Each held a sword scavenged from an unfortunate soldier passed during the battle; their original blades had long since shattered. With the same armor and weaponry on both sides, neither could gain the upper hand.

Sweeping low to the ground, the General transferred his sword to his left arm and picked up the top half of the broken flag. Black smoke trailed from the golden fabric as he lifted it in the air. Dual wielding the sword and flag, the General attacked once more.

The Marshal met sword with sword, flinging out his arm to block the flagpole. It was a defense that the latter had executed successfully a thousand times; the General’s advance should have deflected harmlessly. Yet the Marshal was not as young as he had once been, while the General’s eye remained as keen as his sword.

At the last moment, the General twisted the flagpole sideways instead of thrusting, as the Marshal had expected. The pointy metal crown at the flag’s tip levered open a hidden latch on the Marshal’s armor. The fuel reservoir of his gauntlet burst open completely, and the fluid within ignited in a flash of white flame. The burnt flag shone in bright waves of gold and orange once again.

The force of the explosion threw the Marshal backward, but there was no ground to break his fall. Propelled by the ribbon of escaping fuel, the Marshal lost balance and tipped over the edge of the cliff.

As the Marshal flew downward, the echo of old pursuits took hold of the General. Casting the flagpole aside, the General lunged forward as though to seize the plume of flame that escaped his enemy’s grasp. He was too slow. The luminescent trail billowed out in the Marshal’s wake, plunging into the gorge like a burning arrow from on high.

Behind the General, one allied voice took up the cry of victory—then ten, a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand. Soldiers of the Gold Army cheered for their General’s impossible triumph, throwing themselves into battle with renewed vigor. In the distance, one injured standard-bearer wondered if his intervention might have caused that very victory.

The General knelt at the edge of the cliff, more solemn now than he had ever been during past defeats. Far below, the Marshal’s fall ended in water, and his halo of flame extinguished upon impact. A plume of steam rose from the river.

With this victory over the most feared warrior in the land, the Gold King and his people were at last safe. Without the Marshal of the West to rally the Cloud Army, the battle would be won. The General picked up the Marshal’s discarded sword. The burning blade flickered and went out, its fuel supply at last exhausted. The Student had finally overcome his Master. He should have been proud, yet bitterness tinged his voice as he looked at the distant spot of red and gold armor against the grey riverbank below.

“If not for your guidance, I would never have become more than a Silver Militiaman. I owe this victory to you, above all...”

The Marshal stared into the vast blue sky. Cool water lapped at his broken body, soothing the wounds. On the cliffs far above, enemy trumpets called out in triumph: “The Cloud Army is defeated; long live the Gold King!” Joyous cries resounded from enemy throats, mingling with the alarm of allied voices.

The grimace on the Marshal’s face turned upward in a semblance of pride, a moment of satisfaction amid the pain of impact. A breath escaped him, “Worthy student…”

Darkness seeped across the world, and shapes clouded out as though obscured by morning haze. Through the mist, a hand clasped the Marshal on the shoulder. The Marshal opened his eyes one last time, and green eyes in a familiar face welcomed him into the afterlife. The Marshal forced one last sigh from broken lungs.

“You appear as from a memory, O brother... of East… how true the Sun’s words, ‘I dare… ask for… only the grace of your memory.’”

A misquoted apology to a phantom of his own dying mind was better than none at all.

The Sage knelt by the river, letting cool water cleanse his soiled hands. His faded green robes blended with the grey stone riverbank, rendering him invisible in the fading light of day. Above raged the battle that he had come to witness, the fateful clash between the Cloud and Gold Armies that promised to decide the fate of the world for decades to come. The Sage had toiled for hours in the guise of a simple field medic, helping wounded Gold Army soldiers to safety, but then he saw two warriors collide in a battle that would be remembered through the ages.

In the end, only the General of the Gold Army remained atop the cliffs. Below, the Marshal whom the Sage had once called brother lay half-submerged in the shallows, small waves lapping at pitted golden armor. The Marshal had tried to talk before, but now he was quite firmly unconscious.

The Sage drew a blunt-tipped steel dagger from his sleeve. Lightly etched glyphs in the mystical language of the Northern Sages shimmered along the center of the blade: “1095 carbon steel.” This blade had once tasted his own flesh and blood, plunged between his ribs and deep into his lung. He pressed a hand to his chest, dispelling the echo of that old pain. It was only fitting that he returned the dagger to its owner in the same manner. The Sage cut the knotted straps holding together the Marshal’s armor, removing the multi-layered metal shell from the flesh beneath. Without a full suit of armor, the Marshal looked just as mortal and harmless as the Sage himself.

The Sage held the knife vertically over the Marshal’s heart, gripping it with both hands. The tip hovered mere inches from the outermost leather vest. The Sage took one last look at the Marshal’s face, that perfect mirror of his own. Once bound in duty, forever following the will of a dying star, even unconsciousness could not erase the determination from that furrowed brow.

The Sage’s hands trembled, caught with a hesitation he dared not dismiss.

“You did not even wrong me once. How can I betray you twice?”

The Sage hurled the knife into the river, where it slipped below the dark waves with hardly a ripple. The stream flowed on, unaffected by the turmoil in the one sitting beside it. Releasing a shaky sigh, the Sage took off his pack and retrieved a case of medical supplies. He bound the Marshal’s most severe wounds, displacing cloth and leather layers where necessary for better access. When all stitches and bandages were placed, the Sage gathered the remaining medical supplies into his pack.

A vial of dark liquid tumbled out of a side pocket, and the Sage paused. This vial contained a potent anesthetic. In small doses, it dulled the senses to ease pain. However, doctors avoided using this serum in large quantities, since overdosing could cause permanent memory loss. Most doctors would not even carry enough to fill an entire vial, but the Sage had packed this quantity in anticipation of treating an entire battle’s worth of wounds. Instead, he had saved only a few dozen soldiers before finding the Marshal.

“Forgive me.”

The Sage administered the contents of the vial. Even while unconscious, the troubled lines of the Marshal’s face softened into tranquility as the burden of decades unraveled. If not for the eyes, the Sage and Marshal could have been the same in every way. Yet now one had lost his ability to fight, while the other would lose his will to fight. The Sage sighed, seeing his deepest desire echoed in the peace of those identical features.

“It is better if you do not know; better yet if you had never known. I envy you this future, brother: it is the highest luxury to live without the burden of past regrets.”

The Sage pushed the Marshal into the river, and the waters frothed and boiled around the body. The Marshal slowly floated downstream, carried toward the sea by the restless currents.