Blade of the Fallen Kingdom

Chapter 21 – The Siege Begins

The horn’s cry tore through the mountain like the scream of a dying beast. Villagers scrambled in terror, clutching their children, while soldiers rushed to the battlements of the broken citadel. Torches flickered along the lower slopes, a river of fire crawling toward them—an army vast enough to swallow their hope whole.

Kael stood at the highest wall, the storm raging around him. His sword gleamed in the lightning, his jaw set like stone. Behind him, the people looked to him with eyes that begged for more than strength—they begged for salvation.

Isolde gripped her blades, scanning the cliffs. “There’s too many. Even if we hold the walls, they’ll bleed us dry.”

Kael’s gaze never wavered. “Then we make the Spires fight for us.”

Eldrin planted his staff into the stone. The ruins trembled as faint sigils lit along the broken ground, pulsing with ancient power. “The mountain remembers the kings who defied the gods. If we awaken its curse, the enemy will find no footing here. But…” His voice faltered. “It will not distinguish between friend or foe.”

The villagers gasped, murmuring prayers.

Kael stepped forward. “Do it. Better cursed on stone than slaughtered in the open.”

The old mage’s eyes burned. “So be it.”

The first wave of the commander’s army swarmed up the cliffs—shadows with burning swords, their voices a chant of fire. Arrows whistled down from the walls, felling dozens, but more climbed over their fallen, relentless as the tide.

Kael leapt into the fray, blade flashing. He met the first soldier with a strike so fierce it shattered steel and bone alike. Blood sprayed across the stones, and for a moment the villagers’ cries turned to roars of defiance.

Isolde fought beside him, swift as lightning, her blades carving arcs of death. The villagers, armed with little more than spears and axes, struck with desperate courage. Mothers fought to shield their children, boys too young to hold swords clung to the walls with stones in their fists.

Then the ground shook.

Eldrin raised his staff high, chanting in a tongue older than kingdoms. The ruins screamed as cracks split the stone, releasing a black mist that clawed upward like the hands of the dead. The enemy soldiers froze, their torches guttering, their fire dimming.

From the chasms rose figures of shadow—armored phantoms with hollow eyes, wielding weapons of ash. The mountain itself had given them an army.

For a moment, hope surged.

But then a voice cut through the storm. Deep. Commanding. Familiar.

The masked commander emerged at the foot of the citadel, fire wreathing his armor, his blade glowing with the heat of a star. “Do you think stone can shield you, boy?” His voice echoed up the cliffs. “The throne does not belong to ruins. It belongs to fire—and to blood.”

Kael froze, the words striking his soul like a hammer. Blood.

The commander raised his blade, and fire surged upward, clashing with Eldrin’s curse. Shadows screamed as flame devoured them, light and dark colliding in a storm that split the night.

Kael tightened his grip, rage boiling in his chest. “Then come and take it.”

The enemy surged again, fire meeting stone, destiny clawing closer with every strike. The siege of the Ruined Spires had begun.

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