It was meant to keep the town busy.
Ronyn drags the whetstone across another blade.
Steel sings.
His eyes drift toward the street beyond the hustle of the forges.
Waiting.
Midday comeswith the distant thud of hooves.
The sound carries down the valley like thunder rolling over stone.
Orrin straightens instantly.
“Ah fuck. Right on bloody time, butwe’renot,” the old smith mutters, wiping his hands on a rag before stomping past the chaos.
Ronyn doesn’t move.
He just watches.
A strong unit of Thalmyr’s Royal Guard rides into Vyrhal in a long column of gold armor and polished steel, their forest-green banners snapping in the ash-laced wind.
More of them than needed.
Far more.
Ronyn counts them without meaning to.
Twenty.
Thirty.
Closer to forty.
That’s not a collection unit.
That’s a deployment.
The commander at the head of the unit sits atop a silver-white stallion wearing full battle armor and a helmet concealing their face. Ronyn fights the urge to snarl. He’s had too many run-ins with Thalmyr’s butchers over the years. Virellin was crawling with them every heartbeat—not even bunkering down in homes kept you safe. They’d come for you there, too. Bloodbond assholes, mostly. Never able to control their need for blood and brutality.
The rest of them? The Aetherstrides, Venomshades, Runewrights—they rarely came out from The Barrier. Save for gambling and whores and state-altering elixirs. Something the slums had in spades.
So this show of a full unit? It was even new to Ronyn despite being raised a Virellin slummer.
The unit stops at the fringe of Vyrhal’s main streets.
For a moment Ronyn expects them to approach the forges.
They don’t.
Instead, the unit splits.
Half the soldiers dismount and begin filtering into the taverns lining the square. Others drift toward the inns. A handful wander through the markets, boots heavy against the stone streets.
Laughing, drinking, ordering food like soldiers on leave.
The townsfolk react exactly as expected: doors open. Tables fill. Shopkeepers scramble for coin. Towns like this rely on visitors to keep the coin circulating. No one in their right mind would turn this kind of business away.
