Oath of the Broken Sword Chapter 2

Panic erupted. The Wardrakes, smelling our fear, charged into the crowd of terrified recruits. They were monstrous things, all muscle and scale, moving with a horrifying speed that belied their size. A boy next to me—I think his name was Finn from some southern mining town—screamed as a drake’s claw ripped through his tunic, sending him tumbling across the rough stone floor in a streak of red.

"Forget your pasts! Forget your homes! You are nothing!" Lieutenant Renn’s words echoed in my skull, but all I could feel was the primal urge to *live*. I scrambled backwards, my heart hammering a frantic rhythm against my ribs. The air was thick with screams, the coppery tang of blood, and the sour stench of terror.

"Get to the walls! Form a line!" a sharp voice cut through the chaos. I turned to see a girl with hair the color of dark honey, her Gray tunic already torn at the shoulder. She moved with a predator's grace, a sharp-edged piece of rock held like a dagger in her hand. It was the girl from the wagon—Elara. She wasn't just staring ahead now;

her eyes were blazing with fierce calculation.

But a line?

Against these things?

It was impossible. The drakes were herding us, isolating the weak. Liam was sobbing, frozen in place as a drake turned its sluggish gaze toward him.

I reacted without thinking. I lunged, grabbing the back of Liam’s tunic and yanking him backward just as the drake’s shut on the empty air where he’d been standing. We fell in a heap, the impact jarring my teeth.

"Get up!" I shouted, shoving him toward a cluster of taller recruits who were desperately trying to fend off another beast with rocks and bare hands. My own hands were shaking badly. This wasn't a test;

it was a slaughter. Renn and the other knights just watched from the periphery, their faces impassive. *Acceptable losses.*

A heavy impact sent me sprawling. Pain blossomed in my side. One of the drakes had slammed its armored tail into me, its dull eyes fixed on me now. It lumbered forward, drool dripping from its dagger-teeth. This was it. I was going to die on this cold stone floor, a nameless piece of "raw material" culled before I even started.

Despair threatened to swallow me whole. But then, something else surged up from the pit of my stomach—a raw, desperate heat. It was a feeling I’d felt only in rare, uncontrolled flashes back in Frostleaf, always suppressed on Old Oliver’s frantic orders. A strange warmth flared on my wrist, beneath the leather band I always wore.

The drake lunged.

I threw my hands up, a useless, instinctive gesture. A searing pain shot up my arm, and a crackle of energy, visible as a flicker of raw, crimson light, erupted from my palms. It wasn't a controlled blast—it was a shockwave of pure force. It struck the drake in the chest, not enough to kill it, but enough to make it reco a surprised hiss, stumbling back a few paces.

The cavern fell silent for a heartbeat. The screaming stopped. Every eye, recruit and knight alike, was on me. I stared at my hands, stunned. The hidden mark on my wrist was burning like a brand.

Lieutenant Renn’s voice broke the silence, colder and sharper than before. "Hold."

The Wardrakes, obedient to some unheard command, immediately backed away, their aggression vanishing as quickly as it had come. They retreated into the shadows, leaving behind the moaning wounded and the three motionless forms on the floor. *Acceptable losses.*

Renn walked toward me, his boots echoing in the sudden quiet. He didn’t look at the dead or the injured. His gaze was locked on me, dissecting me.

"What was that, recruit?" he asked, his voice dangerously low.

"I… I don't know," I stammered, my voice trembling. The heat in my wrist was fading, leaving behind a deep, throbbing ache. "It just… happened."

He grabbed my forearm, his grip like iron, and roughly pushed up the leather band. The mark—a faint, intricate pattern that looked like a shattered sun—was visible, glowing with a faint residual light. His eyes widened almost imperceptibly.

"A latent reaction. Unregistered," he murmured, more to himself than to me. He released my arm as if it were contaminated. "Consider yourself lucky, boy. That little parlor trick just bought you a pass. For now." He turned to the stunned survivors. "The culling is over. The fifty of you who are left… welcome to the Aether Knights. Tend to the wounded. The dead will be disposed of. Your real training begins at dawn."

He strode away, leaving me standing there, exposed and terrified. The other recruits were giving me a wide berth, their expressions a mixture of fear and awe. All except Elara. She was watching me, her head tilted, not with fear, but with intense, analytical curiosity.

* * *

The next week was a blur of exhaustion and pain. Dawn till long after dusk, we were pushed to our absolute limits. Endurance runs along the perilous, wind-lashed edges of the Sky-Spire. Strength drills with weights that felt like they were tearing my muscles from the bone. Weapon drills with dull, heavy practice swords that left my hands blistered and raw. Lieutenant Renn was a constant, brutal presence, his criticisms as sharp as any blade.

I saw the girl from the wagon again, the one who’d tried to form a line. Her name was Kaela, I learned, and she was everything I was not. Where I was clumsy with a sword, she was a natural, her movements precise and economical. Where I struggled with the complex history of the Empire’s political houses, she recited them with bored fluency. She was nobility, that much was obvious. And she made sure everyone knew it.

During a forced march through a simulated mountain pass—a brutal maze of magical obstacles within the fortress—I stumbled, my legs giving way from fatigue. I braced for the impact of the cold stone.

It never came. A strong hand hooked under my arm, hauling me back to my feet with surprising strength.

"Don't give them the satisfaction, border-rat," a voice said, laced with disdain. It was Kaela. She released my arm as soon as I was steady, not even breaking her stride.

"Why did you do that?" I panted, struggling to keep up with her.

"Because a weak recruit drags down the entire unit's time," she said flatly, not looking at me. "And because whatever that… *episode* was with the Wardrake, it suggests you might be more than just useless. Perhaps marginally. Don't prove me wrong."

Her help was as cold as the mountain air, but it was help nonetheless. It was the first hint that survival here might require more than just individual strength.

* * *

A few days later, Lieutenant Renn addressed us after a particularly grueling combat session. "Physical prowess is meaningless without a partner," he announced. "A Knight is defined by his bond. Tomorrow, you will be taken to the Hatcheries. You will face the dragonets. Some of you may be chosen. Most of you will not. For those who fail, your service will continue in the infantry. Dismissed."

A nervous energy crackled through the barracks that night. This was it. The entire purpose of this nightmare. The chance, however slim, to bond with a dragon.

The Hatcher or the Dragon Crags as the veterans called them, were a vast, open-air series of terraces carved into the underside of the floating fortress. The air hummed with a deep, primal energy that made the hair on my arms stand on end. The sound was a chorus of clicks, hisses, and high-pitched chirps. Dozens of dragonets, each the size of a large dog, scrambled over rocks and nestled in warm, geothermal vents. Their scales shimmered in every color imaginable—emerald greens, fiery reds, deep blues.

We were lined up along a precipice, overlooking the main nesting ground. The directive was simple: walk among them. If a dragonet approaches you, do not move. Let it make the choice.

One by one, recruits ventured down the winding paths. I saw a burly boy from a northern fisher-village be immediately followed by a sturdy, bronze-scaled dragonet that butted its head against his leg like an affectionate puppy. The boy’s face split into a grin of pure joy. Another girl stood perfectly still as a sleek, green dragonet circled her twice before leaping onto her shoulder, nuzzling her cheek. Success.

Then it was Kaela’s turn. She walked down with an air of absolute entitlement. A magnificent crimson dragonet, larger than the others, with horns already beginning to curve, stalked toward her. It was a perfect match for her noble bearing. It sniffed the air around her, then let out a dismissive snort and turned away, wandering off to bask on a rock. Kaela’s composed mask shattered into a look of utter shock and humiliation. She stood rigid and alone, for a long moment before marching back up the path, her face pale with fury.

My turn. My mouth was dry as dust. I walked down the path, feeling hundreds of reptilian eyes upon me. The energy in the air felt different now, charged and wary. The dragonets scattered as I passed, chirping in alarm. It was as if I carried a bad scent. A deep, profound loneliness washed over me. This was my final proof. I *was* nobody. Unwanted even by the beasts.

At the far end of the terrace, away from the warm vents and the bustling dragonets, was a single, large egg. It was a dull, mottled gray, covered in a faint layer of frost, looking ancient and forgotten. On impulse, feeling utterly defeated, I walked toward it. As I got closer, a strange pull resonated in my chest, a faint echo of the heat I’d felt during the Wardrake attack.

I reached out, my fingers hovering just above the cold shell.

A voice, ancient and vast as a glacier, spoke not in my ears, but directly into my mind. *You… carry the scent of broken stars.*

I jerked my hand back, stumbling backward in shock. The voice was gone. But as I stared, a hairline crack appeared on the egg’s surface. And from within the crack, I saw not the soft glow of a new life, but the piercing, intelligent silver eye of something fully awake, and infinitely old, staring back at me.