- Chapter 1 -

  The Dump

  Eight years later.

  "I’m going to become a Holy Knight!" I shouted at the top of my lungs, waving a crumpled piece of paper toward the castle that still floated, mighty and unmoving, above the clouds.

  I stood proudly atop a pile of junk, striking the most heroic pose I had spent the entire morning rehearsing.

  “Come down from there, Dad. Do you even hear yourself?” Nina called out, smiling sweetly.

  She was only nine, but she already carried that same mischievous spark her mother had when she was young.

  Both of us wore ragged clothes, caked with mud and reeking of the garbage surrounding us.

  Life hadn’t exactly gotten easier since we lost Elie that cursed night.

  "I need to make an impression, princess," I said, puffing out my chest. "If I don't, Sir Kane will never take me seriously when I ask to join the Holy Knights."

  I leapt dramatically from the trash pile — and landed hard in the muddy ground.

  Filthy water oozed between my fingers, carrying with it the sour stench of rotting earth.

  "By the thunders of the Castle, Dad!" Nina exclaimed, crossing her arms and pouting — a face that always made me laugh.

  "You really think you’re going to become a Holy Knight? They're demigods!"

  "They’re not demigods, my little one," I said, ruffling her twin ponytails.

  She swatted my hand away with a little grunt, planting her hands firmly on her hips.

  "We could be playing on your day off, but noooo... you have to go on with this crazy talk about being a Knight."

  "Wouldn’t it be awesome if your old man became a super cool knight?" I teased, winking at her.

  "Dad, you’re not even one of the Marked! You’re just... a chubby, middle-aged coward!" she blurted — and instantly regretted it.

  The smile vanished from her face like a snuffed candle.

  I froze for a moment.

  It was true.

  I was a coward.

  I had let her mother die that night — even if Nina didn’t remember, no one knew it better than me.

  "Dad, I... I didn’t mean it..." she murmured, tears welling in her eyes.

  I forced the biggest smile I could muster.

  She wiped her tears quickly, thinking she had hurt me — but before she could say anything, I scooped her up and tossed her over my shoulder, spinning her through the air.

  "You are no match for the mighty future Holy Knight, little princess!" I cried, fake bravado dripping from every word as I ran across the junkyard.

  She laughed wildly, pounding her tiny fists against my back, no stronger than a playful tickle.

  Nina squirmed free with a slippery twist, bolting away with an agility I could only dream of.

  "Holy Knight?" she called out, laughing as she jumped nimbly from one trash mound to another. "You can't even catch a little girl!"

  I laughed and chased after her — until I noticed we weren’t alone anymore.

  From the shadows, hollow, hopeless eyes stared at us.

  "Azragor... Azragor..." they whispered, in a daze, like a broken prayer.

  Families scavenging among the filth, their faces pale, hollowed out by despair.

  All of them were victims of that night —

  The Night of Gods and Swords.

  They had suffered because of him.

  His wicked smile flashed across my mind, followed by Elie's tear-streaked face, the blood on her lips as she made me promise...

  I shook the memories away.

  Now wasn't the time.

  I focused back on Nina, who danced across the slick mud, her laughter carrying through the ruins like the last bright light in a dead world.

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  She finally stopped at the edge of the junkyard, where the land dropped off into the sea.

  It was strange, how even a trash heap could offer such a beautiful view of the ocean.

  She sat down, hugging her knees, her gaze locked on the horizon as if searching for answers there.

  I arrived beside her, out of breath, letting the sunset wash over my thoughts in a vain attempt to keep the old ghosts at bay.

  "That Azragor they were whispering about... did you see him?" Nina asked.

  "I'm not sure, princess," I replied.

  "The sons of Sir Kane say Azragor is evil... a Marked one who wields two swords... the one who killed a god."

  "There are a lot of legends about that night, sweetie," I said, listening to the waves crash against the rocks below.

  "You know... you've never told me what really happened," she said softly, never taking her eyes off the dying sun.

  Her arms, thin and scratched, were covered in soot.

  The wind played gently with her messy hair, and seeing her like that — so fragile — hit me harder than any blade ever could.

  God, I had to protect her.

  Protect her from them.

  "What, sweetie?" I asked, even though I knew exactly what she meant.

  I hesitated, like I always did.

  "How did Mom die?"

  I took a deep breath. The sun touched the sea on the horizon, painting the sky with a fiery orange, as if melting into the waters.

  "After the rain of swords, many people died," I began, forcing myself to revisit memories I'd locked away in the darkest corner of my mind.

  "Some were pierced right away, cut in half by the blades falling from the sky.

  Others... others tried to wield them, and something inside them changed.

  It was as if the swords corrupted whoever touched them, turning them into beasts, starving for power. They went mad, fought each other to the last breath."

  "So that's what happened? Some crazy guy holding a sword killed Mom?" she asked.

  "No," I murmured, feeling a knot tighten in my throat. "With your mother, it was different."

  "I heard that's when the Marked ones appeared," she said, her eyes still fixed on the sunset as she hugged her knees.

  "Yes," I confirmed, my voice heavy with distant memories.

  "Some people, when they touched the swords, were struck by lightning instantly. It left a black mark on them, like intertwined lightning burns on their skin.

  For reasons no one understands, these people didn’t fall into madness after wielding the Fallen Blades or feel the unbearable pain of being struck by lightning. Kane, my best friend... he was one of them. And ever since, he... changed."

  "That doesn't make any sense, Dad."

  "Oh, and a giant castle floating in the sky does, sweetie?" I replied with a smile, trying to lighten the mood.

  "It does. It’s always been there for me," she answered, in the simple way that children accept the impossible.

  "You're still a child, Nina. You don’t know how the world used to be."

  "Grandma said the gods fell along with the swords," she countered, her voice full of conviction.

  "She said they jumped from the castle, coming down to earth like bolts of lightning."

  "Yes," I agreed, my mind being dragged back to that day.

  "That's how they came down, right after the rain of swords.

  But they're not gods, sweetie."

  The words got stuck in my throat as the memory resurfaced:

  his smile, dark and hungry, a scar itching inside my mind.

  His armor gleamed under the rain, his red cape danced in the wind,

  and around him... fallen bodies, homes consumed by fire.

  I clenched my fists, trembling, as if it was all happening again right before my eyes.

  "It was them, wasn’t it?" Nina’s voice pulled me back.

  Her small, warm hand touched mine, breaking the cruel spell of memories.

  "Yes..." I whispered, closing my eyes as the cold breeze tousled my hair.

  Promise me, Toni... promise me...

  "I used to think that the appearance of the castle was some kind of heavenly punishment," I confessed, my voice steeped in old thoughts.

  "Like a divine selection for something grand.

  But in these eight years... they’ve done nothing for us."

  "They did something," she said, her eyes shining with innocent stubbornness.

  "They gave the swords to the chosen ones, the Holy Knights, Dad."

  I didn’t answer.

  I just watched her as she continued, determined.

  "Grandma always says that only cowards are driven mad by wielding the swords. And that the Marked ones... they were chosen to protect us from the great evil that's coming. They’re the army of the gods, she says. Everyone believes that."

  "Not everyone, sweetie."

  She fell silent.

  For a moment, we just sat there, letting the sound of the waves and the salty breeze fill the empty space between us.

  We looked out over the ocean, as if the vast blue could offer us some relief, some form of forgetting.

  Behind us, reality loomed heavy: starving villages, desperate families.

  "Sweetie, that night, your mother—"

  "Look, Dad!" she shouted, standing up so fast I almost couldn’t follow her movement.

  On the horizon, as the sun sank into the waters, the great flag of the Holy Knights' ship appeared, cutting through the sky tinted orange and red.

  It was majestic, white as daylight, adorned with the symbol of three crossed swords — and behind them, a castle floating above the clouds.