Chapter 3 BROTHERHOOD AND BLADES

ETHAN'S POV

"Move faster or you'll die slower!"

The drill sergeant's voice cut through the training yard like a whip. I scrambled to my feet, mud coating my hands and knees. Around me, fifty other recruits struggled through the obstacle course.

Two weeks had passed since I left home. Two weeks of hell.

"Blackwood! Stop thinking and start moving!" The sergeant jabbed his stick at my back.

I ran. My legs burned. My lungs screamed. The heavy practice armor felt like it weighed a thousand pounds.

Marcus sailed over the wall ahead of me, making it look easy. He landed perfectly and grinned back at me. Show-off.

I hit the wall hard and tried to climb. My fingers slipped on the wet wood. I fell.

"Again!" the sergeant yelled.

This time I made it over. Barely.

The training camp was worse than Father had prepared me for. Every morning started before dawn. We ran until we couldn't breathe. We fought until we couldn't stand. We drilled combat formations until the movements became automatic.

And every night, I hid the Silver Covenant badge under my bedroll, wondering who I could trust with the truth.

"Come on, Ethan!" A strong hand grabbed mine and pulled me over the final obstacle.

Sarah. The blacksmith's daughter from a town near mine. She was stronger than half the men here and twice as tough.

"Thanks," I gasped.

"You think too much," she said, the same thing everyone told me. "Your body knows what to do. Let it."

We finished the course and collapsed in the mud with the other recruits. I lay there staring at the gray sky, trying to remember what it felt like to sleep past dawn.

"That was brutal," said a voice nearby.

I turned my head. A thin young man with glasses sat next to me. James. He looked even more out of place here than I felt.

"You're a scholar too, right?" James asked. "I saw you reading last night."

"Used to be," I said. "Now I'm just trying to survive."

"Same." James pushed his glasses up his nose. "My father wanted me to be a priest. Now I'm learning to kill people. It's not exactly what I planned for my life."

A loud laugh interrupted us. Thomas, a farmer's son with a permanent grin, flopped down beside us.

"You two look like death warmed over," Thomas said. "It's just training! Wait until we actually fight orcs. Then you'll really be scared."

"Aren't you scared?" James asked.

Thomas's grin faded. "Terrified. But I joke so I don't think about it too much."

The four of us—me, Marcus, Sarah, James, and Thomas—had become a unit within the larger group. We ate together, trained together, and watched each other's backs. In two weeks, they'd become the closest thing to friends I had in this nightmare.

"All recruits to the assembly field!" a voice boomed across the camp.

We groaned but stood. Our bodies ached, but we'd learned quickly that complaining only made things worse.

Hundreds of recruits gathered in the muddy field. At the front stood a woman in a captain's uniform. Captain Helena Blackstone. Our commander.

She was the toughest officer I'd ever seen. Cold eyes. Hard voice. No mercy.

"Listen up!" Captain Helena's voice carried across the field. "In three days, you march to the Crimson Frontier. The real war. The place where orcs are killing our people every single day."

My stomach tightened. Three days. That's all the time we had left.

"You need to understand what you're fighting," Helena continued. "Orcs aren't like us. They don't value life. They don't understand mercy. They live for violence and destruction."

I thought about my grandfather's journal. About his descriptions of orc families, orc scholars, orc culture. Nothing like what Helena was saying.

"They attacked our villages without provocation," Helena said. "They murdered innocent families. Burned children alive. These creatures are monsters, and our job is to destroy them before they destroy us."

Marcus stood straighter beside me, his jaw set. He believed every word.

But I couldn't stop thinking about the Silver Covenant badge. About the organized destruction pattern at Thornhill. About Father's warning that asking questions could get us killed.

"You will show no mercy," Helena continued. "Because they will show you none. When you see an orc, you kill it. No hesitation. No doubt. Kill or be killed. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Captain!" everyone shouted.

Everyone except me. I moved my mouth, but the words stuck in my throat.

Helena's eyes swept across the crowd and landed on me. For a second, I thought she knew. Knew I was doubting. Knew I had evidence that this whole war might be a lie.

But she just moved on.

After the speech, we were dismissed. I walked back to the barracks with my friends, my mind churning.

"She's right, you know," Marcus said. "We can't afford to be soft. The orcs won't hesitate to kill us."

"How do you know?" I asked quietly.

Marcus looked at me like I was crazy. "What?"

"How do you know orcs won't hesitate? Have you ever met one? Talked to one?"

"I don't need to talk to monsters to know they're monsters," Marcus said. "The evidence is in all those burned villages."

I wanted to tell him about the badge. About the pattern. About my suspicions. But Father's words echoed in my head: Tell no one.

"I'm just saying maybe we should question what we're told," I said carefully.

"Questioning orders gets soldiers killed," Sarah said, but her voice was gentle. "I get it, Ethan. You're a thinker. But out here, thinking too much is dangerous."

That night, I couldn't sleep. I lay on my thin bedroll, listening to the sounds of fifty recruits snoring and shifting in the darkness.

I needed to know more about the Silver Covenant. About who they were and what they wanted. But asking questions openly would mark me as a traitor.

I waited until everyone was asleep, then slipped out of the barracks.

The camp was quiet except for guards patrolling. I moved through shadows, heading toward the officers' quarters. Dangerous, but I had to know.

I crouched behind a building near the command tent. Through the canvas walls, I could hear voices.

"—timeline is aggressive," a man's voice said. "We're pushing the recruits hard."

"Lady Seraphina wants them on the front lines as soon as possible," another voice replied. I recognized it. Captain Helena.

My blood went cold. Lady Seraphina. The same name Father had whispered about in connection with the Silver Covenant.

"The more casualties we sustain early, the more public support grows for the war," Helena continued. "Seraphina understands that. Dead soldiers create angry citizens demanding revenge."

I pressed closer to the tent, my heart hammering.

"And the burned villages?" the first voice asked.

"Proceeding exactly as planned," Helena said. "Three more scheduled for next month. The orcs will be blamed, public outrage will increase, and the king will have no choice but to commit more resources to the war."

I couldn't breathe. Couldn't move. Couldn't process what I was hearing.

They were planning to burn more villages. To kill more innocent people. To blame orcs for murders they didn't commit.

This wasn't just a conspiracy. This was mass murder.

"What about the recruits who ask questions?" the first voice asked.

"We deal with them," Helena said coldly. "Accidents happen in war. A soldier here or there goes missing, gets killed in training. No one questions it."

"And if someone finds real evidence?"

"Then they have a tragic accident before they can share it."

My legs started shaking. They were talking about killing their own soldiers. People like me who noticed things that didn't add up.

I had to get out of here. Had to leave before—

A hand grabbed my shoulder.

I spun around, heart exploding. A guard stood behind me, his face suspicious.

"What are you doing out of your barracks, recruit?" he demanded.

My mind went blank. "I—I couldn't sleep. Needed some air."

"Air, huh?" The guard's hand moved to his sword. "Or were you listening to things you shouldn't hear?"

"I wasn't listening to anything," I said quickly. Too quickly.

The guard's eyes narrowed. "Come with me."

He grabbed my arm and started pulling me toward the command tent. Toward Helena. Toward the people who just talked about making soldiers disappear.

Panic flooded through me. If they found out I'd heard their conversation, I was dead.

"Wait," I said desperately. "Please. I really was just"

The tent flap opened. Captain Helena stepped out.

Her cold eyes locked onto me. "What's this?"

"Found this recruit lurking outside the command tent, Captain," the guard said. "Says he was getting air."

Helena studied me for what felt like hours. I tried to keep my face blank, tried not to show the terror screaming inside me.

"Name?" she asked.

"Ethan Blackwood, Captain."

Something flickered in her eyes. Recognition? "Blackwood. Your father is Captain Roland Blackwood of Ashford?"

"Yes, Captain."

Helena smiled. It was the most terrifying thing I'd ever seen. "I knew your father. Good soldier. Very loyal. Never asked questions he shouldn't."

The emphasis on those last words made my blood turn to ice.

"Get back to your barracks, Blackwood," she said. "And in the future, if you can't sleep, I suggest counting sheep instead of wandering around officer territory. Wandering soldiers sometimes get mistaken for enemy scouts. Tragic accidents."

"Yes, Captain," I whispered.

She held my gaze for another long moment, then nodded to the guard. "Let him go."

I walked back to the barracks, forcing myself not to run. Every step felt like it might be my last. At any moment, I expected a knife in my back or an arrow from the darkness.

But I made it to the barracks. Made it to my bedroll. Made it to safety.

Except I wasn't safe. Not anymore.

Captain Helena knew I'd been outside the command tent. She suspected I'd heard something. And based on what she'd said about soldiers who ask questions having "accidents," I was now a target.

I lay in the dark, the Silver Covenant badge pressed against my chest under my shirt, and realized the horrible truth.

The war was proceeding according to Lady Seraphina's timeline. Villages were being burned on purpose. Soldiers were being used as pawns. And anyone who discovered the truth—anyone like me—was marked for death.

In three days, I'd march to the Crimson Frontier.

The question was: would I survive lon

g enough to get there?

Or would I have a tragic accident before I could tell anyone what I'd learned?