Caelus burst into the forge, with the image of the woman still etched in his mind. Bia came with him, her tiny fingers clinging to the fabric of Cal's shirt. The old blacksmith was where he always was – before the anvil, muscles twitching beneath his sweaty shirt, his face hardened by concentration and age.
– Father... – Caelus began, hesitantly, – did you have any visitors today? A woman, with light brown eyes? Do you know who she was? She was in the company of a mountain of a man they call Bear. Do you know anything about him?
The hammer stopped. His father raised his eyes slowly, as if returning from far away. He didn't speak immediately. Instead, he gestured with his chin towards the incomplete sabre on the anvil.
– First, help me finish the sabre. I'll answer your questions while we work.
Caelus placed his hand on the still-warm blade, and his father handed him a file. The work required care, for the metal was temperamental and a slip could cost him a finger.
As they smoothed the edges and adjusted the tang of the hilt, his father spoke. His voice was low, as if afraid of being heard by the ghosts of his past.
– The War of the Windy Hills started over nothing... and ended with almost everything. High lands, not very fertile, but covered in quarries and copper mines. Calentia and Ventosa spent years growling at one another until, in a dry winter, the spark caught fire.
– And the Bear? – Caelus gasped, keeping his eyes on the metal. – They say he fought in that war.
– The Bear appeared in the third month of the campaign. He wore no insignia. Had no commander. No one knew who paid him, but he fought under the colours of Calentia. Or rather, at their head. I saw him in a ravine. There were four hundred Ventoran men against a single infantry company... and him.
Fausto paused for a moment, tightening his grip on the hammer.
– The Ventorans had the advantage. Cannons, muskets, light cavalry. But the Bear didn't retreat. He wore a black cuirass and carried a musket with a bayonet that looked like it had been made for giants. He cut through the Ventorans like a wrathful god. When the dust settled, more than a hundred men lay on the ground, and he was bleeding only lightly from the cheek.
– Was... was he a monster? – Bia asked, who had been silent until then, clutching Caelus's arm.
– No – the blacksmith replied, – he was human. But he is what men become when they no longer fear death.
At last, they fitted the hilt and secured the brass guard with old rivets. The blade gleamed with a bluish lustre, as if a winter sky had settled upon it. The sabre's curved blade, inspired by those of Solterra, ended in an elegant yet lethal tip. Along the spine, Fausto had inscribed a winged serpent – the mark of his forge.
– I've never made anything like this, – the father murmured, running his fingers along the blade. – It's almost... too beautiful to kill.
The three of them admired the piece for a brief moment – an instrument of warlike poetry, a breath held between them to preserve the image of the sabre in their memories.
In the distance, the faint sound of a bell could be heard.
And then another, and another, and then all at once. A deep and irregular melody that heralded neither mass nor celebration. They were the alarm bells.
The father ran to the forge door. The bells of the Old Tower rang out of sync, and the afternoon sky began to darken with a strange dust. Caelus ran after him, with Bia at his side. On the other side of the city, columns of smoke rose and the sound of boots echoed.
It was at that moment they saw, in the distance, soldiers marching through the wide streets, coming from the city's southern gate, wearing uniforms of rough brown tones. Some had already scaled the low rooftops of the tanning district. They were organised and disciplined. Above them, as if it were an insult to the very sky, floated the flag of Ventora: a white horse galloping across a brown field.
– Ventora? – Caelus asked, incredulous. – We're not even at war...
– We are now – growled his father, – and they came from all directions. How did no one notice their presence until now?
Men and women ran through the streets, some with weapons, others only with children in their arms. Screams cut through the air like invisible arrows. High above, atop the city wall, the muskets of the city guards fired, while the invaders crossed the gates with barely any resistance.
– Go with Bia – said his father, gripping his shoulder tightly. – Take the sabre. Hide it and protect yourselves. Barricade the door at home and avoid any confrontation. Your survival is what matters.
Caelus wanted to protest, but his father had already grabbed an old musket with a barrel kept clean and oiled. He packed it with powder using hands well-accustomed to fire, and his eyes gleamed with a fury Caelus had never seen. The blacksmith was ready to kill to protect his son and his city... or die doing so.
Caelus took the sabre, placed it in an improvised scabbard, hastily wrapped it in cloth and slung it over his back. He hurried out of the forge, now cloaked in smoke, pulling Bia with him onto the main street.
As they ran through the cobbled alleys, Caelus thought of his father. Let nothing happen to him and let this nightmare end quickly so he can come back to us. He found himself thinking of the Bear too, and for the first time, wished he were there to protect the city – or more precisely, his father.
Wherever they ran, the city's bells rang and the sound of burning houses filled the air. The city had quickly realised that those soldiers from Ventora had not come merely to conquer; they had come to destroy.
Chaos was swallowing Pisum like a raging sea swallows its rowers. At every corner they turned, there was only more smoke, more flames, more screams. Caelus gripped Bia's hand tightly, so she wouldn't disappear among the crowd running in all directions, with the sabre weighing on his back as if he carried the very fate of the city. But the heaviest weight he felt was fear.
– To the left! – he shouted, pulling Bia with him into an alleyway to avoid the soldiers. A crowd came against the flow, a torrent of panicked bodies, and in the blink of an eye, their hands were torn apart.
– BIA! – he screamed. – BIA!
But she was lost in the chaos, swallowed by a mass of bodies running on instinct, abandoning all reason in their frenzied steps. Caelus tried to go back. He pushed, he shouted, he called for her, but it was like trying to grasp smoke with his fingers.
His heart pounded in his chest. The sabre was still with him. But Bia was not. He wandered the street, dizzy, staggering, and only then did he realise he had just turned into an area that had not yet been taken by fire, but had been invaded by battle.
On the other side of the narrow square, emerging from the black powder smoke, came Ventoran soldiers. The dark brown of their uniforms blended with the smoke, but the gleam of their weapons made it clear they were not here to negotiate.
Caelus stood still, pressed against a wall, wishing not to be seen. His eyes fixed on the short stretch he would have to cross to reach the corner leading to safety. His hand moved slowly towards the cloth covering the sabre. He thought of his father. He thought of Bia. He thought he would die right there, like a trapped animal.
It was then that, from the direction he meant to take towards safety, he saw a woman on horseback.
She rode ahead of soldiers in uniforms different from those of Ventora, with an almost unreal dignity, as if there were no fire or war, only the sound of her horse's own stride.
She was of medium height, with a noble and proud bearing, but of uncommon beauty – not the sweet, predictable kind, but the kind that cuts. Her hair was the colour of polished oak, tied in a double braid that fell down her back like a sceptre. Her fair skin contrasted with her eyes, which were green like emeralds in the shade – not fragile, but firm and inquisitive.
She wore a white linen blouse and a short cape in tones of green and amber. On her chest hung a silver steel cuirass, adorned with golden thread. At its centre, a crafted symbol of a golden pod left no doubt as to her lineage.
– Isabella Pisodorato – Caelus whispered, barely believing it.
Standing before him was the Duchess of Pisum. They said she ruled with an iron hand in velvet gloves. Caelus had heard stories – some legends, others whispers – but nothing had prepared him to see her like this, amid battle and smoke, like a wall untouched by adversity.
The soldiers who followed her – about two hundred, perhaps more – marched with discipline. Their uniforms were vivid yellow, striped with orange sashes and details. They wore brown boots, and the white trousers they donned, stained with mud and blood, seemed insignificant compared to the firmness with which they wielded their bayonets. On their yellow caps shone the insignia of House Pisodorato: a pea pod, with three gleaming peas.
Their march, steady and courageous, brought panic to the invaders, who had expected no resistance to their looting. With a single volley from their muskets, the Ventoran soldiers fell, dead, and those lucky enough to survive turned and fled the way they had come.
The duchess stopped to look at Caelus. Her eyes fixed on the cloth on his back, which bore the hilt of a sabre, its symbol half revealed, and then on him.
– That sabre – she said, her voice cold but clear, – is not the work of just any forger.
Caelus didn't reply. His chest rose and fell in an erratic rhythm.
– What is your name?
– C-Caelus. Caelus Duarte. Son of the blacksmith, my Lady.
– So you are Fausto Duarte's son – she murmured, a note of surprise on her lips. – He spoke much of you. You're taller than I imagined. And if that sabre is yours, Caelus Duarte, then you are more valuable than you appear.
– My Lady, you honour me. But no, this sabre is not mine. It is yours. My father made it according to your specifications. He said it was the most beautiful thing he had ever made in all his years at the forge. I was entrusted to protect and guard it, but the sabre belongs to you. A lady such as yourself deserves a weapon worthy of your stature.
Caelus handed the sabre to Isabella with a resolute motion. The metal of the blade reflected the sunlight, as if Solarius himself recognised the artistry of the forge. She accepted it with the coldness of someone unimpressed by the grandeur of a gift, only by what it represents – something to be used for a single purpose. Her firm hand closed around the hilt and, without a moment of hesitation, she turned to her soldiers, raising the sabre high, for all to see.
– Gather! – she ordered, her commanding voice sharp, echoing through the dense, smoke-filled air. The soldiers, still with tempers flaring, quickly formed up, their eyes determined not to yield, even in the face of the storm of smoke and fire sweeping through the city.
– Caelus, you'll join us. There are others like you who didn't manage to escape in time. Grab a weapon to defend yourself. We're going to sweep through them and show the determination of the people of Pisum in the face of adversity.
Without another word, he joined the civilians rushing to arm themselves. The sound of gunfire and screams was no longer foreign to him. Something inside him was beginning to harden, like the metal his father used to forge.
Near him, an old woman who worked in another local tavern carried a rusted blunderbuss. Elsewhere, a young boy, inexperienced, was struggling to reload an old musket, panic written all over his face. Caelus looked at him, saw the hesitation, and, without thinking, grabbed the musket, suggesting the boy get out while he could and find shelter.
Isabella's men were working tirelessly. Barrels were stacked, forming an improvised barricade. Plank after plank was torn from the market stalls, used to build a defensive line. The front line was ready. It wouldn't be great, nor glorious, but it was all they had. Smoke swallowed the horizon and the shadows, and the sounds of battle were a distant roar, like the sea crashing against the rocks.
Moments later, the Ventorans appeared again. That was when Caelus knew the moment of truth had arrived. There were around five hundred of them. The first shots came from afar, but they advanced, showing no signs of retreat. Determined, and with bayonets drawn, they were ready to crush any resistance.
– Ready yourselves, don't fire until I give the order! – Isabella shouted from atop her horse, unmoving, like a stone wall.
Caelus felt the heat of adrenaline rising up his spine. There was no time for doubt. He looked around and saw the civilians – men, women, widows and green boys – with old and rusted weapons, standing, trembling.
With a cry that tore through the air, Isabella gave the order:
– Fire!
The sound of gunfire was like thunder. The muskets spat fire and steel, and the Ventorans fell in bursts. Caelus saw a mounted soldier struck by a precise shot, falling from his horse in a spray of blood. The firearms continued to fire, and Isabella's soldiers, with impressive military precision, held the line and gave courage to the civilians who had joined them in the clash.
But the Ventorans didn't retreat. They weren't novices, and war to them wasn't about hesitation. They advanced, furious, like an unstoppable storm. A Calentian soldier fell, a Ventoran bayonet piercing his neck, and the blood stained the earth like a black river.
Caelus was in the middle of the chaos, his musket gleaming in his hands. The first Ventoran to reach the barricade in front of him was a soldier with a dark beard and enraged eyes. He advanced with his bayonet forward, but Caelus was quicker. With a guttural cry, he struck him in the chest with the butt of his weapon, the blow strong enough to make him stumble, falling backwards over a barrel. Blood gushed from a wound made in the fall, and Caelus tasted metal in his mouth.
Another came forward, a young woman with a sweat-covered face and bayonet at the ready. She was nervous, her eyes wavering, but filled with blind hatred. Caelus dodged to the right, leaping to the opposite side of the barricade and, with a quick movement, broke her arm. She fell backwards with a scream, but before she could crawl away, a volley of musket fire took her – and the other Ventorans around her – down for good.
The fight was brutal. The Ventorans, more experienced, reacted ferociously, but the Calentian soldiers and civilians fought with a near-savage determination. The square was filled with screams and the sounds of clashing weapons, the crack of fire and the weight of battle echoing through the air.
Caelus did not stop, moving from side to side, as if the combat had consumed him. He felt the heat, the pain of wounds beginning to form, but he didn't think about them. He couldn't think.
When the dust began to settle, and the smoke of gunpowder still darkened the sky, the defensive line began to hold. The Ventorans, with little strength and even fewer soldiers left, slowly retreated, returning through the streets they had once invaded so confidently.
Isabella Pisodorato stood at the head of her troops, her eyes cold and calculating, observing the retreat with the precision of someone who knew the battle was far from over.
Caelus, exhausted and covered in blood, looked around. The field was stained with bodies, both enemies and his own neighbours. But, for now, the city had endured. The fight was not lost, but neither was it won, for the Ventorans could return – and in greater numbers next time.
He looked at Isabella, who still held her father's sabre firmly, dripping with the blood of enemies shed in defence of her city.
– Will they come back? – Caelus asked, his voice hoarse.
– If they do, we'll be ready – said Isabella, looking at Caelus, her expression impassive. And with that, she turned away, already thinking of the next step to prevent this situation from happening again. – Let's march. I want a perimeter set up, and I want to know how they managed to enter my city unpunished.
Her soldiers followed her, some staying behind to assist the citizens.
The smell of gunpowder and blood still hung in the air, thick as morning fog. Caelus advanced with heavy steps, his shoulders sore, chest heaving, his musket dangling from his hands as though it weighed more than an anvil. He passed a fallen body – a young-faced Ventoran, mouth open in a silent scream – and looked away, trying to erase the image from his memory. It was no use. The memories were already inside him.
As he approached the line where the Ventorans had fallen, he noticed something strange. Not in the uniforms – dirty, worn, splattered with mud and ash – but in the armbands some of them wore. They were made of dark leather, dyed with the symbol of a circle divided into equal halves: one black as coal, the other silver as moonlight. The contrast was sharp, almost hypnotic, as if an ancient message was inscribed there that he could not decipher. It wasn't a Ventoran crest he recognised, nor that of any regular regiment.
He furrowed his brow. What is this?, he thought to himself, kneeling beside the corpse of an officer to examine the armband more closely. The skin was still warm. Death had come recently. The mark was meticulous, burned in with iron, not embroidered. A unit within the Ventoran army? Mercenaries? Or something worse?
He had no time for further speculation. His heart clenched in his chest with a more human urgency. Bia was still lost amid all that chaos. Now that he had survived the worst, he had to find her.
–Bia! – he shouted, rising suddenly, eyes sweeping the alleys and ruins around him. – Bia, where are you?
No reply. Only the sound of wood crackling, the wind pushing the dust, and the distant moans of the wounded. Caelus began to run, crossing half-destroyed barricades, stumbling over the remains of broken carts, searching for any sign of Beatrice.
– Bia! – he repeated, now more hoarse, his voice torn by anguish.
He entered a narrow alley, where the walls leaned like old drunkards, about to collapse. The ground was covered in coaldust and blood. Smoke hung low. He turned his head to the left, then to the right. Nothing.
A noise came from behind him. He tried to turn to see who it was, but it was too late – that person was already upon him.
He smelled it first: sweat, rusty iron, and a sweetish touch of cheap wine. Then, a hand the size of a forge shovel grabbed his shoulder with the strength of a vice. Before he could scream or raise his musket, he was pulled back violently and thrown against a stone wall.
– Well, well… – said a deep, laughing voice, with an accent he couldn't place. – If it isn't the little blacksmith playing at heroes…
The world spun. Caelus's vision wavered between shadows and sparks. He tried to get up, but a heavy knee dug into his chest.
– You were looking for your little bird, weren't you? – the voice growled, now far too close, its fetid breath flooding his face. – Your father taught you how to hammer iron, but he should've taught you how to run.
The figure then revealed itself fully. A huge man, with arms like tree trunks and a face covered by a thick beard. The Bear. The nickname was not given lightly. They said he had snapped a man's spine with a hug. His eyes, small and sunken, gleamed with sadistic pleasure.
Caelus tried to fight back, but the fist came fast as thunder. A blow to the jaw, then another to the ribs. Each impact was like a thunderclap exploding inside his body. He tasted bitterness in his mouth – blood.
– Don't worry. You won't have to fret about whether she's dead or alive for much longer. – The Bear smiled, sadistically enjoying the suffering he was inflicting on Caelus.
The third blow brought no pain, only darkness. Caelus fell, and the world stopped breathing.