Bram stumbled forward through the haze, gripping his mace so tightly his knuckles had gone white. His lungs burned with every breath. The smoke was thick and bitter, but he pushed through it, searching for anything still moving, friend or foe.

  Through the swirling gray, he saw them. Ennett and Vane fought side by side at the center of the street, their movements sharp and practiced. The pair looked almost unreal, their blades flashing in rhythm as they drove their weapons into the chest of a wounded troll. The beast fell to its knees, roaring one final time before its weight hit the ground with a crash that shook the cobblestones.

  Bram didn’t stop to watch it die. He pushed ahead, calling out between breaths. “Korrik! Farrin!”

  The sound of his own voice barely felt real. He turned a corner and there they were, his kin, the two dwarves he’d feared were gone. They were a mess of sweat, soot, and blood. Korrik was locked in a struggle with a kobold that had leapt onto his back, clawing and snapping at his neck. Farrin was fighting another, her axe pinned between them.

  Bram didn’t think. He swung.

  The head of his mace cracked across the kobold’s skull with a dull, wet sound. The creature dropped instantly, folding into a heap at Korrik’s feet.

  Korrik gasped and wiped his brow. “Took you long enough.”

  “You’re welcome,” Bram grunted, raising his mace again.

  Farrin gave a low growl as she yanked her axe free and shoved her attacker back. The kobold stumbled, snarling, before turning to flee. Farrin didn’t let it get far. She lifted her axe and hurled it.

  The weapon spun once, twice, then buried itself deep in the kobold’s back. It fell face-first into the dirt, twitching once before going still.

  For a moment, everything around them quieted.

  Bram lowered his mace. His ears rang, and his chest heaved. “Did we… win?” he muttered.

  The sounds of fighting still echoed faintly in the distance, shouts, screams, the clatter of weapons, but they were fading, slipping away like the end of a storm. He listened hard. The ground no longer trembled. The kobolds’ war horns had gone silent.

  “They’re retreating,” Korrik said, disbelief in his voice.

  Farrin turned toward the gate, where the worst of the fighting had taken place. “No,” she said slowly. “They’re running.”

  Word spread fast. A murmur first, then a shout. From one soldier to another, the news carried through the ranks:

  “They’re retreating!”

  The cry grew louder, stronger, until even the wounded raised their heads. Men who had been crawling or clutching their injuries pushed themselves upright. The sound rippled through the smoke like a spark catching dry grass.

  Bram looked around. The humans and dwarves still standing were few, but their eyes burned bright. A final surge of energy tore through them.

  “Push them back!” someone yelled.

  They did.

  What was left of Harbinth’s defenders moved forward, step by step, through the broken streets. They cut down kobolds that stumbled in confusion, disoriented by the loss of their blood mages’ enchantments. Others simply collapsed where they stood, bodies jerking as the unnatural power that had driven them faded from their veins.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  Vane led a small line of soldiers toward the smoldering gate. Ennett followed, barking orders to clear the wounded and put out spreading fires. Her armor was dented, one sleeve torn away, but she walked as though she didn’t feel it.

  “Get the clerics to the square!” she called. “Check every survivor, no one gets left behind!”

  Vane gave her a brief nod before turning to the archers who had somehow made it through the chaos alive. “To the wall,” he said. “Cut down anything that still breathes out there.”

  A handful of archers obeyed. They climbed the ruined stairwell, arrows already nocked. Through the broken edge of the city wall, they could see the shapes retreating through the smoke, kobolds limping, dragging one another, fleeing into the hills. The archers drew and loosed, again and again, until the shapes were gone from sight.

  Bram leaned heavily on his mace and watched the final arrows vanish into the fog. The silence that followed was almost painful.

  He turned back to his kin. Korrik sat down hard against a pile of rubble, groaning. “If I never see another kobold again,” he muttered, “it’ll be too soon.”

  Farrin retrieved her axe from the fallen creature’s back and dropped beside him. Her hands shook as she wiped the blade clean on a scrap of cloth. “Aye,” she said softly. “But you’ll see them again. We all will.”

  Bram nodded, though he didn’t want to believe it. His body ached from head to toe, every muscle screaming. He looked around at the city, what was left of it. The streets were blackened, walls cracked, the smell of smoke still thick enough to taste. Fires still burned in corners where no one had strength left to fight them.

  “Where’s Maruzan?” he asked finally.

  Farrin frowned. “Didn’t see him. Thought he’d gone to the caves with the boy.”

  “He came back,” Bram said. “I saw him earlier near the market street.”

  Korrik looked up at that. “If he’s still out there, he better get himself here fast. They may scatter to the south if they are fleeing and disoriented.”

  Bram didn’t answer. His thoughts were already elsewhere, on the faces of those he hadn’t seen. Torli, Lysa, Narl, and Eborin. He knew some were gone. Others, he hoped, had made it through. But hope was hard to keep in a place that looked like this.

  A faint sound drew his attention. Ennett was kneeling beside a row of bodies, her expression unreadable. Vane stood a few paces behind her, silent.

  Bram knew what she was doing. Counting.

  She placed her hand gently on one of the fallen dwarves, a gesture of respect, not pity. When she rose again, her face was streaked with grime, her jaw clenched tight.

  “We need water on the fires,” she said quietly. “And anyone still breathing needs a healer. Now.”

  Vane’s eyes flicked toward her. “You should rest.”

  “I’ll rest when they stop bleeding.”

  He didn’t argue. Instead, he turned toward a pair of watchmen nearby. “You heard her. Move.”

  As the orders went out, Bram felt something stir in his chest. It didn’t feel like triumph. It was something smaller, relief mixed with exhaustion, and a quiet fear that this wasn’t the end.

  The kobolds had retreated, yes, but not all of them. And somewhere out there, the one who commanded them still lived.

  Bram knew it. He could feel it, the same way a storm lingers behind clear skies.

  He sank down beside his kin. The ground was hot beneath him, still trembling faintly from distant fires. Farrin leaned against the wall beside him, her breathing steadying.

  “Well done, lads,” she murmured after a moment. Her voice was soft, tired. “We lived to see the end of it.”

  Bram gave a short laugh, though it came out hollow. “If this is the end.”

  Korrik let out a low grunt. “If it’s not, I’ll swing ‘til my arms fall off.”

  They sat there together, dwarves among ruins, surrounded by the quiet wreckage of what had been a city.

  Somewhere in the distance, the birds began to call again. The sound was faint, uncertain, as if the world itself was testing whether it was safe to speak.

  Bram closed his eyes for a moment, feeling the weight of everything around him. When he opened them again, the fires had started to die down, leaving trails of smoke curling into the pale morning sky.

  For the first time in hours, he could see the horizon.

  And though the sun was hidden behind clouds and ruin, its light still touched the city walls, turning the broken stones gold for just a moment.

  It wasn’t victory. Not really.

  But it was enough to keep breathing.

  And that would have to do.