Thael perched by the waterfall, staring down into the roaring stream, mulling over his own death. His pale body bristled with dark hair gone wild and grey, as unkempt as his haggard beard. He wore only a pair of braies, barely covering his upper thighs. Although grizzled, his frame was lean in muscle. He fidgeted, akin to a wolf waiting, itching for the hunt, narrow dark eyes glinting with a grim determination.

Scars crisscrossed his back and limbs, each a tale to be told. Dark Glyphic tattooed over his back, riddles of his origin, known only to a few. Thael drew a deep breath and waded into the raging abyss. Step by step he did not shiver, did not retreat from the biting cold. The churning torrent overtook him. Thael did not resist its pull. The cold seeped into his bones and chilled him to his marrow, yet he felt a contented warmth.

He opened his mouth in a silent cry as he plummeted over the edge, seeming to float into open air for a few breaths before the water crashed and pounded over him and he plunged into the murky depths at the base of the falls.

Thael peered up underwater, the sun’s light glimmering and rippling on the surface. He was rising, and his head bobbed up to the misty bank, heaving a gasp. He was still alive.

Pebbles gave way in a wet crunch against his plodding feet, worn smooth from countless years of the eddies foaming around the waterfall.

The weary man ambled to the tree line past the grey beach. He paused before a dead tree, bleached white from the sun, bare branches reaching skyward over fifty feet high.

With trembling arms, Thael straddled its trunk and reached for a branch. The chill waters had taken its toll. His chest and numb limbs were soon grazed by the tree's rough bark. Still he climbed.

The leather backpack was where he had last left it that morn. Once the backpack was secured to his shoulders he clambered down. He grimaced, for his grip was weakening, and fell onto his back against the hard earth.

Thael stared at the cloud brushed sky, his breaths deep and labored. He unshouldered his pack to wear its contents: leather pants, tunic, boots, and the grey cloak which would keep him warm.

He trudged up the steep hill back the way he had come, grabbing exposed gnarled roots to pull himself upward, limbs soon warming with familiar strain. The trek was arduous, daylight dimming to dusk, body still slick with sweat.

He arrived at where he had fallen, the chasm of water raging ever on. A thin column of smoke snaked up against the horizon a mile away. Thael quickened his pace.

A log cabin beside a burbling stream came into view. Smoke still wafted from the chimney, the door ajar, revealing a dark figure sitting on a rocking chair next to the hearth.

He walked over and closed the door, ignoring the shadow that swept past the corner of his vision behind him. In truth, Thael did not care.

The figure upon the chair was hidden beneath the same hooded cloak Thael wore. She stood to face him, pulling back her hood to reveal a tan slender face framed by tawny bangs that glinted orange from the sputtering fire.

“Hello Thael.”

Thael pulled back his own hood, dropping his pack to the floor with a hollow thud. “Verena. Looks like you haven’t aged a day.”

Verena studied him, grey eyes harder than they had ever been.

“You look like shit, Thael. I was half expecting a dagger to my throat. Still, it took two days to find this place. Had to build a blasted cabin atop Azure Peak, didn’t you? Had to land our wrynn outside the valley.”

“Why are you here, Verena?”

“The Prince of Arcadia has been kidnapped.”

“Find someone else to rescue him.”

“This isn’t some lordling’s ransom,” Verena snapped. “Nor the sole heir of the arch king’s ransom either. It concerns the Prophecy of the Black Sun.”

“I never thought you one for superstition.”

“I’m not. But the ones who took the prince believe in it. And they believe in the blood sacrifice of the Danir line needed for the prophecy.”

“Princes die,” Thael shrugged. “The arch king can always go fuck off somewhere else.”

Verena sighed. “Prince Arrin is just over his fourteenth span. No tyrannical despots to be overthrown, Thael. Just rescuing an innocent boy from sacrificial murder.”

“Find someone else.”

“I know what you do every day. There are better ways to go off into the Long Night.”

“What, the falls?” Thael scoffed. “It’s how I bathe every day.”

“I’m sure,” Verena said flatly. She looked around. “So this is how you plan to spend your remaining years? Or do you want your corpse to be eventually caught by some unfortunate fisherman down the river?”

“You can go back to Krystos now, Verena.”

She shook her head. “Sadly I can’t, and won't. The arch king wishes to speak with you.”

“He can speak with me face to face. Unless he’s too afraid to fall down the steps from his high throne.”

From the corner of his eye, he saw the shadow lurking at his shoulder.

“It’s not a request, friend.”

Thael turned to face the coarse voice. It belonged to a man whose scarred mouth was puckered into a permanent sneer, head and face rife with stubble. He loomed over Thael, who regarded him with a blank stare.

“Seriously, this is the Kingmaker?” the man said. “Looks like nothing but a sallow bellied, Haolan willed—”

Thael jabbed his throat with an open palm and speared a knee though his gut, cutting him off into a choking wheeze.

“Please excuse Ircham,” Verena spoke. “Young men tend to still chase after glory, and end up tripping over themselves, as you once said. Ircham, get out.”

The bigger man retreated outside, still croaking for breath, closing the door with a meek clatter. Verena stood up and walked to Thael, just close enough that he could feel her warm breath touch his face. "But we know the truth, though, don't we? Kingmakers never get the choice of a quiet life. Glory goes hand in hand with all the gore we have wrought. Men like you will always be needed, Thael, until they die. And your strength is too valuable to die in this… existence you've made for yourself here. The arch king demands to speak with you. It would be wise to simply accept." Her face softened in the glow of the fire. "Please, Thael. The prince does not deserve such a fate."

Thael brushed past Verena and held his hands out to the warmth of the flames. "Do what you will."

The woman nodded and produced a silver locket, a scryer, opened it and set it upon the floor beside him. A reed-like man shimmered to existence from atop the open locket, his gilded robe adorned with a regalia of medals over his chest. A band of gold rested on his head, stamped with runic markings of dwarven making. His immaculate hair was coiffed, dark goatee sprouting from his pointed chin. The man wrung his hands together, lips pursed, brows pinched over his feverish jade eyes.

“It’s been a long time, Thael.”

“Krystos.”

“I would have come myself, but—”

“But the plot concerning your son has you corralled in the capital,” Thael cut him off. “You have the whole Order of Wraiths at your beck and call. Get them to do your work.”

“I had the whole Order of Wraiths,” Krystos replied. “Nearly half have already died trying to save my son.”

“Send more, then.”

The arch king frowned. “Arrin is being held in the city of Dres Laneith. I know you have… ties there. The Wraiths sent to rescue him have all been crucified atop its walls. The rebels have Wraiths of their own. That was how they were able to capture my boy, Thael. The Empire needs you, this one last time." Krystos nodded, more to himself than Thael. "You helped me become arch king. Now you must help protect my line. The day of the prophecy arrives in less than a week’s time, and those heathens wish to sacrifice my son for some misbegotten ritual.” He paused. “Will you help me, old friend?”

“You said you would give Arcadia peace, Krystos. Doesn’t look like you’ve played peacekeeper after all these years.”

“Men will never want for peace, Thael.” The image of the arch king flickered in the firelight.

Thael turned to face him. “How can you have peace, Krystos, when you leave men with no choice?”

“Men will only answer to power. It is the only sway that keeps peace alive. I learned that, perhaps too late," the arch king murmured. "Will you save my son?”