(As recounted by Aurelio)
The old man's face grew taut, the memory of that night sharper than any phantom pain from an old wound. "Giovanni called us an arrow. But an arrow does not feel the bowstring snap, or see the archer fall. We learned that truth the hard way."
He opened Gerald's journal to a page stained dark, as if by water or tears. The sketch was chaotic—a fortress under a storm, and a single, falling figure.
"Gerald titled this one 'The Price of a Bow.' For once, his title was too kind."
Memory
The world dissolved into a scream of wrongness.
The thing that had been Cecilia did not move like a human. It was a ripple in the air, a discordant note that vibrated in the teeth and bone. The black-clad riders behind it fanned out with an insectoid precision, their featureless helms turning in unison.
"Cecilia…?" Aurelio breathed, the name a prayer and a question.
The answer was a wave of psychic force that slammed into the front rank of Giovanni's soldiers. Men did not cry out; they simply dropped, their eyes rolling back into their heads, blood trickling from their noses and ears.
"Shields!" Giovanni roared, his voice the only solid thing in the suddenly fluid chaos. "Archers, loose! Ignore the girl, kill the riders!"
A volley of arrows flew. The riders didn't raise shields. They simply… weaved, their bodies flowing around the projectiles with impossible, jerking grace. One arrow lodged in a rider's shoulder. It did not falter.
Gerald, roaring a Norse curse, hefted his axe. "Witchcraft!"
"Stay back!" Aurelio grabbed his arm, his own gift screaming a premonition of dismemberment. "They're not… they're not alive!"
From the center of the maelstrom, the Shade-in-Cecilia raised a hand. Its silver-eyed gaze was fixed on Aurelio. "You hear the whispers. You will serve as a fine tuning fork for the great resonance to come."
Aurelio felt a pressure inside his skull, a needle of ice probing for his thoughts, his memories. He saw a flash of the Weeping Grove, his mother's face, Alicent smiling by the river. The Shade was rifling through his mind.
"Get out of my head!" he snarled, staggering.
It was Liam who acted. He didn't charge. He flowed. A thrown dagger, meant for the Shade's throat, was deflected by an unseen barrier, but it forced the entity to flinch, its concentration breaking for a split second. The pressure in Aurelio's mind vanished.
In that second, Giovanni struck. He was not a young man, but he was a force of will. He bulled forward, his greatsword cleaving through the air toward the Shade. "You will not have my men!"
The Shade looked at him, and for the first time, its expression shifted to something like mild curiosity. It did not block the blow. It pointed a single, delicate finger.
A sound like a mountain cracking filled the courtyard. Giovanni's armor did not break. It imploded. The breastplate crumpled inward, the sound of snapping ribs like dry twigs beneath a boot. He was thrown backward, a broken doll, to land at the feet of his own men.
A silence fell, more terrifying than the screams.
"Go."
The word was a wet, bloody gasp from Giovanni. His eyes, fierce and clear to the last, locked on Aurelio. "The… scroll. Go. Now."
The spell broke. The riders began their advance, a wall of silent, unstoppable death.
"Liam! Riccio! With us!" Aurelio yelled, his voice cracking. He grabbed the dazed Gerald and hauled him backward toward the stables. "We run! That's an order!"
It was not a retreat. It was a rout. A slaughter. They fled into the choking darkness, the sounds of the dying fortress at their backs, the ghost of their commander's last command the only thing pushing them forward.
The arrow had been fired. And the bow had been shattered in the process.
Present
Aurelio fell silent, the memory a heavy shroud in the room.
"We ran," he said, the words simple and stark. "We ran from the ruin of the only home we had left, with the ghost of a girl we were sworn to save hunting us. Giovanni's last lesson was the hardest: that some battles cannot be won, only survived."
He looked at the Scholar, his eyes old.
"And our survival had only just begun."