The stair climbed through the wall in long stone flights, each landing lifting Averik and Evelyn. What changed was the wind. It reached them harder with every turn, cold enough to sting an ordinary face raw, carrying the dry smell of snow and the faint metallic bite of the artifacts mounted overhead.
Evelyn kept pace beside him with her spear resting against one shoulder. The red tips of her silver hair kept lifting across her cheek. She caught them once with two fingers, tucked them back, then glanced up toward the next landing.
"They’ve been quiet," she said. "Do you think whatever the watch saw is still out there?"
"If it is, we’ll see it soon enough." Averik continued upward. He saw no point in inventing a threat before one appeared. The Blood Moon would make the outside more useful or more troublesome soon. Either way, standing on the wall beat hearing about it afterward.
They stepped onto the top a few minutes before midnight.
From there, most of Vardel lay below them in uneven rows of roofs, narrow lanes, chimney smoke, and scattered warm windows. The wall rose roughly three houses above the ground. The main gate beneath the center section reached about two houses high, its doors thick enough that the hinges looked more like pieces of a machine than fittings for wood and metal.
The wall top itself was broad and flat. Three enclosed watch posts divided the gate sector, one directly over the gate and one farther along either side. A defense artifact stood beside each post on a heavy pedestal. The clustered emitters around its central frame gave it the bulk of a heavy gun, but there was no ammunition feed and no true barrel. Essence gathered in the reservoir built into the mount, either drawn slowly from the air or fed directly by the operator, then left the emitter as concentrated heat carrying Essence with it.
One FU members were stationed at the center post. He lifted a hand when Averik and Evelyn approached. His eyes moved once over Evelyn’s spear, then returned to the field beyond the wall.
"Still nothing after that last bit of movement," he said. "Could’ve dropped behind one of the drifts. Could’ve kept going. Snow’s playing hell with the distance tonight."
Averik stopped beside the outer wall instead of going into the post. "Maybe"
The man pointed toward a low rise left of the main approach. He shifted his grip on the rail and added, with the casual irritation of someone who had stared at white ground too long, "I’d rather it either show itself or fuck off before the moon gets worse."
"You’ll get one of those." Averik looked out over the snow. "Maybe not the one you want."
The older man gave a quiet grunt that might have been agreement and returned his attention to the field.
Evelyn moved to the parapet. Averik stepped in behind her and wrapped both arms around her waist. She eased into the circle of his arms without hesitation, her free hand resting over his forearm while the spear stayed upright beside her. For a while neither of them spoke.
Beyond Vardel, the world was almost all white and red. The snow flattened distance until the darker ridges looked close enough to touch, while the moon hung above them with a color that had never looked natural.
Midnight arrived without ceremony, only the red deepening above them as Corruption Essence thickened through the air in a slow, unmistakable rise. Averik felt his Corruption Core answer at once. It opened to the surge and drank. No invasive sting followed, only a denser current settling into the Core as the red spread across the snow.
Evelyn’s fingers tightened lightly over his arm as crimson spread across the snow. Averik rested his chin near the top of her head and watched the moon with her. "If that moon didn’t bring Corruption with it, I think it’d be more beautiful to just sit here and enjoy."
A little smile touched Evelyn’s mouth. She tipped her head back enough to look at him from the corner of her eye. "Mm... maybe I’d stop glaring at it for once. Sitting here with you would make the view rather nice~"
Averik’s arms tightened around her. "The view’s already fine from where I’m standing."
Her smile widened, and she pressed herself more comfortably against him. "You weren’t looking at the moon when you said that."
Averik smiled against her hair. "I know."
***
The bell above the center post began hammering hard enough to cut the moment in half.
CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!
Bram was halfway through another patrol lane when the bell started pounding over District 1.
He looked toward the wall on instinct, and a door to his right burst outward.
BANG!
The old man who came through it should have looked fragile. Bent shoulders, narrow frame, loose clothes on a body that had already been losing strength to age. None of that survived the way he moved now.
Cyan showed through split skin along his face and neck. Frost had climbed one arm in hard white ridges, and when his mouth opened, the sound that came out no longer belonged cleanly to a man.
"Shit!."
A FU members two houses down was moving before Bram finished the word. Another FU members near the crossing turned with him. Bram forgot the wall. Fire rolled over his hand as the old man who become Frost Zombie lunged into the street.
***
Evelyn left his arms before the third strike of bell finished. She took her spear in both hands and turned toward the field. Averik was already doing the same. The senior operator crossed the platform, planted himself behind the artifact, and seized its grips.
Averik looked to the senior operator. "What did you catch?"
"One frost zombie, front-left. It came over the mound." The shape cleared the drift while he spoke. It landed low, rose, and began toward the gate with the remains of a coat hanging from one shoulder. Frost plated half its back. Blue-cyan flesh showed around the jaw and ribs. For three steps it moved almost slowly. Then it accelerated.
Something larger exploded into view from the right: a Boar crashing through loose snow with its head down. It was huge through the shoulders, dirty hair trapped beneath plates of frost, blue-cyan flesh visible where corruption had split the hide. Its tusks curled past the muzzle in white-rimed arcs. Snow sprayed behind it with every stride.
The senior operator hauled the artifact around and began tracking the Frost Zombie. Averik looked from the zombie to the boar and decided immediately.
"Stay on the zombie," he said. "I’m taming the Frost Beast."
The senior operator gave a quick nod. "Got it." Essence brightened inside the artifact’s frame as he leaned into the grips and followed the zombie’s changing line.
VRRRM!
A concentrated beam cut across the approach. The zombie twisted away. Heat stripped cloth and burned a black-cyan groove over its ribs, but the beam slid off before it could stay longer. The operator corrected immediately.
Averik raised one hand. Three Frost Spears formed beside him and shot toward the boar.
The beast swerved around the first. The second shattered where its shoulder had been a heartbeat earlier. It cut back under the third, losing a strip of frost from its back but none of its speed.
Fast enough to be worth keeping. Averik spread Frost through the ground ahead of it, the snow hardened around its next landing point and snapped shut over its forefeet as its weight came down.
The boar’s stride folded beneath it. Its shoulder smashed into the snow with a heavy WHUMP, and one foreleg tore halfway out before Averik tightened Frost Authority through the ice. A fourth spear dropped into the trapped leg and punched through.
The beast screamed and thrashed. its corruption essence drove recovery through the wound at once, blue-cyan tissue pulling together around the frost spear.
Averik pressed Corruption Authority against that response. Regeneration faltered, forced to work under pressure while Frost held the leg and pain wrecked the boar’s leverage. It heaved once, ripped one hoof free, buried a tusk into the crust, and tried to wrench itself upright.
The next heave came weaker. Its wounded leg folded before it could recover its leverage, and the boar’s tusk tore a useless furrow through the crust.
Averik invoked Beast Tamer while it was still trying to force itself upright.
The claim met a ragged push, more reflex than a real contest. The bond closed almost immediately. One moment the boar was throwing all its strength against his control; the next the same anger remained inside a creature that was unmistakably his.
::···:::···:::···::
[Target Successfully Tamed]
::···:::···:::···::
Averik released the Frost around its leg. ’Up.’
The boar surged to its feet while the wound began knitting properly again.
The first Frost Zombie had already run beneath the center artifact’s firing angle, so close to the wall that the emitter could no longer depress far enough without cutting into Vardel’s own stone.
Another zombie came over the central approach behind it. Two more appeared farther back, spreading just enough to make the senior operator work for each line. The first was nearly at the gate. The second held the middle. The last pair remained in the artifact’s useful arc.
Averik pointed toward the middle zombie and gave his new frost beast its first real order. ’Take that one. Ram it toward me.’
The rimeboar spun, lowered its head, and charged without hesitation.
The senior operator shifted his weapon to the rear pair. "I’ve got the back two!"
Heat flashed again. One beam tore across the third zombie’s chest. Another carved into the fourth near the hip. Both staggered and kept coming, their Corruption Essence driving damaged flesh back together even while the operator fed more Essence directly through the grips and sharpened the artifact’s hum.
Below the wall, the first zombie was already inside the blind cone.
Averik formed another Frost Spear and hurled it down.
The zombie jerked aside, and the spear exploded against stone and snow. Averik watched the miss for half a heartbeat. He had been throwing spears all evening, and the Frost sword from training was still fresh enough in his mind to make the alternative obvious. "Looks like I’m in the mood to try the sword."
He stepped onto the parapet and dropped over the outer side. As the wall vanished above him, he called back while keeping his eyes on the zombie below. "Evelyn, go inside. Open the gate for me."
Her answer followed him into the fall, soft but immediate. "I’ll have it open for you, Averik."
Wind tore past his coat. Frost appeared beneath one boot. Averik struck the temporary foothold, kicked away, and redirected his fall into the zombie’s path.
A sword grew into his hand before he reached it, dense Frost forming blade. Essence reinforced the construct. Soul gathered along the edge. Corruption Authority bore down on the frost zombie.
The Frost Zombie looked up too late.
SHRAKK!
Averik cut from the head straight down through the body. Before the two halves could finish separating, he landed through the motion, turned, and drove a second cut across the chest. Both arms came away with the crosscut. The divided upper and lower halves spilled apart around him, six pieces striking the snow in quick succession.
The zombie died completely. When Averik turned toward the field, his rimeboar had already reached the second Frost Zombie.
WHAM!
The impact launched it off its feet. One leg snapped. An arm tore almost free. Blue-cyan tissue was already bridging the damage before the zombie struck the snow, and it had barely rolled once before it tried to rise again.
The boar didn’t wait for another order. It wheeled and hit the zombie a second time, catching it under the ribs and throwing it toward Averik.
Averik stepped into the tumbling body. His Frost sword moved in a short burst. The neck came away first. The next cut opened the torso.
His tame snorted and stamped once, visibly pleased with itself. Averik gave the boar a brief look. "Good work."
Behind the beast, the artifact kept hammering the rear pair. The third zombie’s dodging degraded under repeated tracking. Each time regeneration rebuilt enough structure for another burst of speed, the senior operator corrected and burned through it again.
VRRRM!
The next beam sank through frost zombie again. The zombie convulsed and dropped into the snow. Nothing began rebuilding.
The fourth was already moving differently. It accelerated, planted one foot, and jumped before the artifact could pin it to the ground.
The senior operator dragged the emitter upward with it. His beam caught both legs below the knees after the body was airborne. Flesh and frost burst away, but the zombie kept coming on momentum alone.
CLACK
Averik turned as the main gate groaned open. He heard the ruined body cutting through the air and started to turn again.
"Averik, please, duck!" Evelyn’s voice reached him from the gate opening. He dropped low at once.
Her spear passed over him wrapped in a dense sheath of Essence and Holy.
THOOM!
The spear drove through the Frost Zombie’s head, tore the entire length of the body, and burst out through its ass before burying itself far beyond Averik in the snow. The corpse slammed down several steps in front of him and skidded to a stop while Holy radiance crawled over it.
Averik opened Spirit Sight for the only confirmation that mattered. No Spirit clung to the corpse, and nothing around tried to gather itself back together. Dead all the way through. The amount of Holy in the throw made Evelyn’s worry obvious without her needing to explain it.
She was already crossing through the open gate toward him. Garran and several FU members emerged behind her, but Evelyn reached Averik first, empty-handed now and moving faster than anyone who merely wanted a report.
Her eyes swept over him once, from his stance to his face. "Are you hurt? I saw it jump, and for a second I thought..." She stopped herself, apparently deciding she didn’t need to finish that sentence now that he was standing in front of her.
Averik set his palm on her head and stroked her hair back, then ran his thumb once along her cheek. "I’m fine. You killed it before it reached me."
Evelyn’s shoulders eased. She turned her cheek into his palm for a moment. "I know you could’ve dealt with it. I still didn’t want to watch it get that close to you~"
"So you made sure it didn’t." Averik glanced at the corpse.
"Mm." Her gaze followed his. "I may have used a little more Holy than I needed."
Averik looked at the line the spear had punched through the body. "A little." That finally pulled a quiet laugh from her.
Garran stopped a few paces away, surveyed the ruined frost zombies, then looked beyond Averik at the rimeboar. "I came out expecting a cleanup. Somehow you’ve—"
Averik glanced toward the beast. "Frost Beast."
Garran’s expression didn’t improve. His eyes stayed on the tusks. "That’s... Now I see it with my own eyes"
Two FU members coming through behind Garran noticed the boar at the same time. Both weapons came up. "Another one!" one of them shouted.
The rimeboar turned toward the movement, muscles tightening beneath its frost-armored shoulders.
Averik didn’t raise his voice. "Easy. That’s my tame."
The beast stopped before it could lower its head. One of the men stared from it to Averik, then back again as his weapon slowly came down. "You tamed a fully corrupted Frost Beast?"
Averik let the question hang.
Evelyn’s spear was still buried in the snow beyond the dead zombie. Averik gave the new bond a straightforward order and pointed. ’Bring her spear here.’
The rimeboar trotted over, sniffed around the exposed shaft, then tried to wedge it between tusk and muzzle. Its first shove only drove the weapon deeper at an angle.
A rough sound escaped Garran’s throat. This time it was definitely a laugh.
The boar froze, snorted at the spear as if the weapon had personally offended it, and tried again. It hooked one tusk under the shaft, levered the spear free, then discovered the obvious problem: a boar had no hands.
So it shoved the spear over the snow ahead of its snout, nudging it toward them a few feet at a time.
Evelyn’s lips twitched; she covered the smile with her fingers. "It’s doing its best for me. That’s rather sweet~"
"It’s doing what I told it to do," Averik said, though watching the massive corrupted boar bully a spear across the snow was entertaining enough that he didn’t hurry it.
When the beast finally reached him, Averik took the shaft. Blood and blue-cyan residue coated the blade. He dragged the visible filth through the thick fur over the rimeboar’s shoulder.
The beast gave him an offended grunt and tried to twist toward the mess. "Hold still."
It stopped immediately, though the ears angled backward in unmistakable displeasure.
A breath of laughter escaped Evelyn. "I don’t think it liked being your cloth."
Averik turned the spear in his hand. Visible grime was the smaller problem. Averik could still feel thin traces of hostile Corruption clinging to the spear from the zombie. That kind of residue was little concern to him.
He pressed Corruption Authority into the traces. The hostile pressure resisted his control for only a moment before being flattened and neutralized. Only after the hostility was gone did his Corruption Core absorb the Essence that remained.
Averik handed the spear back to Evelyn. "Run Holy through it again."
She accepted it and immediately sent pale light along the shaft and blade. "I will, Averik~. I’d rather not carry even a trace after putting it through that thing."
And then, other FU members took over the remains. One burned corrupted flesh down with Fire while another fed Lightning through a fragment until it broke apart. The work was practiced and quick.
Averik looked at the rimeboar. Another tame meant another bond, another creature he could use, and more practice and progress.
’Stay outside this gate,’ Averik told it. ’Wait for my command.’
The rimeboar backed away from the gate, circled once through the churned snow.
Garran gave it one last look while they walked for the gate. "By morning, half the district will have heard about your new Frost Beast."
Averik started toward the gate. "The other half can hear it after breakfast."
Garran matched his pace and snorted. "You say that like rumors ever wait for breakfast."
Averik let him have that one as they went back through the main gate.
The Blood Moon still pressed red light over District 1. The alarm had ended, but no one on the wall looked relaxed enough to mistake that for safety.
Averik, Evelyn, and Garran had almost reached Unit 1’s buildings when Bram came toward them from another lane. Ash streaked one sleeve, and the smell of smoke reached them before he did.
Garran noticed it too. "We had trouble at the gate. Looks like you found your own."
"Old man in the residential lane," Bram said. His breathing had already settled, but his voice still carried the rough edge of a fight that had ended recently. "Door came apart and he came through it fully turned. Put him down and burned what was left."
Averik watched his face. Bram rubbed ash from his knuckles and only smeared it farther. "He was old, though. Body had already been going downhill before tonight."
Garran’s mouth tightened. "Anyone else in that lane showing signs?"
Bram shook his head. "Not when I left. Patrols are still making rounds, and I told the people there to shout before they try being brave about it."
"Keep the patrols moving," Garran said. "If somebody starts showing signs, don’t wait for them to get worse."
Bram nodded, already turning his attention back toward the lanes. "They know. I’ll keep circling."
Averik looked back toward the red sky above the wall. The Blood Moon’s Corruption still flowed thick enough for his Core to feed on it. Outside, fully corrupted creatures had come straight for the gate. Inside, an old man had turned during the same surge.
’Still not enough to know.’
Bram tipped his head toward the wall. "You kill all of yours?"
"Four frost zombies," Garran said. He glanced at Averik. "And he decided to keep the boar."
Bram stared for a beat. "A Frost Beast?"
Evelyn’s mouth curved faintly. a trace of amusement still in her voice. "It fetched my spear. Eventually."
Bram looked between them, decided there was probably a story in that word, and exhaled through his nose. "Right. I’ll hear the stupid version from somebody on watch by sunrise."
He headed back toward the lanes before Garran could answer.
For several steps, only their boots sounded over the packed snow. Evelyn kept near him as they walked,her arm brushed his once when the path narrowed between buildings.
Garran broke the quiet first. "You were looking for an excuse to use that Frost sword all evening, weren’t you?"
Averik glanced at him. "I found one."
Garran’s mouth twitched. He scratched at the side of his jaw as they neared the Unit complex entrance. "A Frost Zombie isn’t much of a teacher. Fast, hard to kill, ugly as sin, but it still fights like a thing running on hunger and Corruption."
That was more useful than asking whether the sword worked. Averik had already learned that much with his own hand. "You volunteering to do better?"
Garran stopped near the entrance and faced him properly. There was no boast in it, only the look of a veteran who had already decided he wanted the comparison too. "After we get some rest, yes. Spar with me. Not a little shield drill. I want to see what you do when the other side pushes back."
Evelyn’s attention moved between them. She didn’t interrupt, but Averik caught the small lift at one corner of her mouth.
Averik considered Garran in turn. "Fine," Averik said. "After we rest."