"You should be in a grave, Malphas," Alaric said, his silver flames flaring as he sensed the familiar, cold presence standing in the mist. "My father sent you to the wasteland to rot centuries ago, and he did not intend for you to return."
Lucian stepped forward, his eyes narrowed. He had read the records of the great exile and, like the rest of the realm, assumed the former general had been consumed by the void long ago. To see him standing there, armored in rusted iron and backed by an army of rogues, was a ghost story come to life.
"You should be dead," Zephyrus added, his red bow humming with a violent tension. "You were supposed to be a memory, a warning for those who didn't know their place. How did you crawl back from the edge of existence?"
Malphas stepped out of the smoke, his face a map of scars and bitterness. He didn't look like a demon who had come for a parley.
