Page 58 of Frostforge, Passage Six
"Everyone who'd listen.Everyone I thought wouldn't run straight to Wolfe."Luna's voice held an edge of warning."I had to be selective.Some seemed interested but too afraid.Some I didn't trust at all."
The door opened one final time, and conversation died as Brynn stepped into the room.Her entrance froze the gathering, tensions rising like hackles on threatened wolves.Of all Thalia had expected to join this dangerous meeting, Brynn—proud daughter of Southern nobility, competitive to a fault, and fiercely traditional—stood at the bottom of that list.
Brynn surveyed the gathered faces with calculating eyes, her posture rigid as a blade.When her gaze locked with Thalia's, something unspoken passed between them—not friendship, but recognition of shared purpose that transcended their complicated history.
"Firstborn," Thalia acknowledged.
"Greenspire."Brynn nodded once, sharp and precise, then closed the door firmly behind her."I assume this gathering constitutes treason against Frostforge."
A ripple of unease passed through the room, several faces turning toward the exit as if reconsidering their presence.Thalia rose to her feet, the movement drawing all eyes to her despite her diminished status—stripped of rank, relegated to servant, yet somehow still the center around which this desperate constellation had formed.
"This gathering," Thalia said, her voice low but carrying to every corner of the room, "constitutes survival.For all of us.For everyone we care about."
She stepped into the circle's center, the lantern light catching the planes of her face, deepening the shadows beneath her eyes where sleepless nights had left their mark.For a moment, she felt the crushing weight of responsibility—these people had come because they trusted her judgment, believed in her leadership despite everything the instructors had done to undermine it.
"I've been to the archipelago," she began, gaze sweeping the circle, connecting with each person in turn."I've sailed waters where islands once stood, seen empty ocean where people lived for generations.I've stood aboard a fortress-whale as it fled something ancient and terrible that dwells in the deep."
She described what they had witnessed—the unnatural blackness that had spilled through the water, the tentacles that had risen from the depths to consume their schooner with casual, terrible efficiency.She spoke of Captain Cassia's sacrifice, of a woman who had given her life not just for her own people but for strangers from the mainland who had arrived as potential invaders.
"These refugees now imprisoned on the Crystalline plateau aren't our enemies," Thalia continued, hands clenched at her sides to stop their trembling."They're survivors of the same threat that now approaches our shores.The black waters have been spotted off Southhaven's coast.The Deep Ones are no longer confined to the archipelago."
The room fell silent, each person absorbing her words.Faces that had shown skepticism now grew pale with understanding; eyes that had held judgment now widened with fear.The enemy they had trained to fight—human, comprehensible, bounded by physical laws they understood—had been replaced by something from nightmare, something that consumed islands whole and left nothing behind.
"That's impossible," one of the younger recruits whispered, breaking the silence."Islands can't just...disappear.Vanish completely."
"They can when something devours them," Roran said, pushing away from the wall to step into the circle beside Thalia."The Isle Wardens have been fleeing a losing battle for generations.What you perceive as aggression—the raids, the occupations, the brutality—it's desperation.Fear given form.They're trying to carve out space on the mainland because the ocean is all but lost to them.Their islands are being consumed one by one."
His words sent a ripple through the gathered group—dubiousness, suspicion.Even in this room of potential allies, the mention of Warden motivations from Roran's lips triggered instinctive distrust.Daniel shifted uncomfortably, eyes narrowing at Roran with undisguised suspicion.
"Convenient interpretation," Daniel muttered, just loud enough to be heard."From someone with stormspawn blood."
Roran's jaw tightened."I'm stating facts, not making excuses," he replied, voice hard as glacenite."Believe me or don't, but the truth doesn't change to accommodate your prejudice."
The tension might have fractured their fragile alliance before it truly began, but Ashe stepped forward, her presence commanding attention as effectively as a shouted order.
"I was there too," she said, her Northern accent more pronounced with emotion."I saw what Thalia and Roran described.I felt it.This isn't about Warden sympathies or continental loyalty—this is about survival."Her green eyes swept the circle, challenging any who would question her dedication to Frostforge or the North."We face extinction unless we understand the true enemy.And no mainlander knows as much about the Deep Tide as the Isle Wardens do."
The atmosphere shifted, Ashe's words carrying weight that Roran's could not.If even a proud Northern warrior validated this account, perhaps there was truth to it after all.
Luna moved to stand with them, her usual scattered demeanor replaced by focused intensity."The documents we recovered from Verdant Port confirm everything they're saying," she stated, fingers twisting nervously at her sides despite the confidence in her voice."Frostforge wasn't built to fight Wardens—it was constructed as a defense against what the founders called 'the threat from the sea.'The Deep Tide."
She outlined what she and Kaine had discovered—the references to Frostforge as an anchor point, the descriptions of magical bloodlines that might activate ancient defenses, the desperate Warden search for people with natural attunement like Thalia's.
"They've known all along what was coming," Luna concluded."Their tactics were wrong, cruel, but their fear was justified.They were searching for weapons against extinction."
Silence descended again, heavier than before.Thalia looked around the circle, measuring the impact of these revelations on each face.Some still showed doubt, others fear, but in most she saw the dawning of terrible understanding—the realization that the war they had trained for, had sacrificed for, had been the wrong war all along.
"If what you're saying is true," Brynn spoke, arms crossed over her chest, face impassive but voice betraying uncertainty, "then everything we've endured—the separation from our families, the brutal training, the deaths of classmates—it's all been for the wrong cause."Her gaze fixed on Thalia with laser intensity."You're asking us to rewrite our entire understanding of the world, to side with those we've been taught to hate.Some people here have lost family to Warden raids."
"I'm asking you to see the larger truth," Thalia replied, meeting Brynn's stare without flinching."This can't be a war between peoples anymore.If we continue fighting each other while the Deep Ones advance, both the continent and archipelago are doomed."
Felah, typically soft-spoken, stepped forward.Her voice was quiet but carried an unexpected resolve that drew all attention."I've seen enough death already," she said, eyes moving from face to face."We'll all die fighting one another if we don't change course.Does it matter who was right or wrong before, if none of us live to argue about it later?"
Her simple logic cut through layers of political complexity, laying bare the essential truth: survival trumped ideology.Several heads nodded in agreement, the group's energy shifting from skepticism to grim acceptance.
Kaine, who had remained silent until now, moved to stand at Thalia's side."What exactly are you proposing?"he asked, his question directed at her but meant for all to consider."Defiance of direct orders?Open rebellion against the academy, and the military?"
Thalia felt the weight of every gaze upon her, the responsibility of leadership settling across her shoulders despite her official demotion.In this room, rank meant nothing—only truth, only courage, only the willingness to face impossible odds for the sake of something greater than individual survival.
