The Council

The hall smelled like old smoke and leather and something sweet-rotten underneath—dragon marrow, long depleted, the scent lingering in the bone. Torven's stomach turned.The hall smelled like old smoke and leather and something sweet-rotten underneath—dragon marrow, long depleted, the scent lingering in the bone. Torven's stomach turned.

Benches lined the walls, worn smooth by generations of sitting, waiting, being judged. Five dragon-bone thrones stood at the room's head, empty and waiting.

Behind them, iron brackets climbed the back wall in rows. Most held nothing. The bolts that remained were warped, split at the shaft.

The hunters scattered to the benches. Renn slumped immediately, head in his hands, shaking. Ferne stood by the wall, eyes tracking from Renn to Varn to Torven and back. Grey-beard sat heavily, didn't look up.

Varn paced near the door, claiming captain's territory. His attention kept sliding to Renn, the boy who'd disobeyed orders. His mouth worked silently, rehearsing testimony.

Torven stood at the room's center, alone.

Scorched leather and smoke filled his nose, exhaustion pulling at him—but Moira had the baby. She'd be safe.

Last night he'd been on watch, cold and quiet and ordinary. Standing on the ridge looking at stars and thinking about nothing more complicated than when his shift ended.

Now he stood burned and empty-handed, about to answer for it.

He straightened.

Then footsteps—multiple sets, approaching.

The Council was assembling.

Around the hall, the hunters reacted: Renn's head came up, eyes wide; Ferne straightened against the wall; Varn stopped pacing and faced the door.

Torven closed his eyes and drew breath.

The door opened.

Five elders entered. The Council of Five, judges who'd seen hunters come back empty before, but never like this.

Dessa entered first, grey-haired, bent with age, hands spotted and gnarled but eyes sharp. A single blood gem at her throat, red so dark it swallowed the torchlight. She moved slowly—bent frame, careful steps—but never hesitated, and missed nothing.

Behind her: four others. Keld, one-eyed, burn scars twisting from temple to throat. Haldor, the grey-bearded giant whose hands could span a man's chest. Zora, thin as drought, bone-white hair and a face like carved flint. Nevil, the youngest at fifty winters, knuckles scarred white, still moving like a hunter.

They took their seats in chairs polished by generations, Dessa in the center, the others flanking.

Five judges. Eight hunters. The room stilled.

Dessa surveyed the room, her gaze lingering on each hunter in turn.

Burns and scorch marks covered them all, their shoulders slumped and hollow-eyed, hands trembling with exhaustion.

They'd sent eight hunters with the last Bone bolts, sent them after lights in the sky and sounds that made teeth ache. No dragons since the last kill.

Eight hunters returned with nothing.

Dessa's eyes found him.

Dessa's attention moved from Torven, sweeping across the hunters, settling on Varn.

She leaned forward, hands flat on the armrests.

"Captain Varn. Tell us what happened."

Varn stepped forward, still captain, crossbow in hand.

"We tracked wounded Wyrms north," Varn said. "Two of them, bleeding heavy, moving slow. Last chance we'd had in sixteen winters."

"The Fading. We couldn't afford to fail."

"I ordered the boy to stay." Varn glanced toward Renn, fourteen, ash-pale, still shaking in the corner. "Guard the old ones. He disobeyed, followed us into the dark, and nearly got himself killed."

"How?" Dessa's voice sharpened.

"Dragon fire." Varn's hand tightened on his crossbow. "White-gold, hotter than forge flame. The Wyrms fought back—sporadic, desperate, but they fought."

His voice dropped, head bowing.

"We took cover. Waited for it to stop."

Behind a boulder, Torven thought. Twenty paces back. While Renn stood in the open.

But he said nothing. Let Varn build his story.

"By morning, they were gone." Varn gestured, sharp. "Blood everywhere: pools of it, steaming in the snow. Trails ending in nothing. No bodies. No tracks. No wing marks."

"And the child, glowing in the clearing's center where the Wyrms had just been."

The Council shifted: Zora leaning forward, Haldor frowning.

"Torven chose the baby. Left the hunt. Brought it back."

"The Wyrms escaped. We came back empty."

Heat pressed down from the bone rafters, close and stale. His legs wanted to buckle. He'd been standing for hours, had walked all night, hadn't slept since—

He couldn't remember.

Keld spoke up.

"Sixteen winters we've had nothing," he said, his voice bitter as ash. "Then two fall from the sky—wounded, dying, catchable—and we still come back empty."

He turned to Varn.

"How?"

Varn had no answer. The hall waited.

Dessa's fingers tapped the armrest. The sound echoed.

"Where were you when the fire came, Captain?"

Varn's spine went rigid. "Command position. Captains maintain overview. That's protocol."

"Twenty paces back while the boy stood exposed?"

Varn's knuckles whitened on the crossbow. "Protocol kept us alive for generations. I followed it."

Dessa didn't wait for an answer. "The boy—Renn—did he burn?"

"No, but he would have—"

"Who pulled him from the flames?"

Every eye in the hall turned toward him, the weight of their stares pressing down. He held his ground, exhaustion a weight in his bones.

Dessa found his gaze. "Step forward."

The walk across the floor stretched longer than the trek home from the clearing. His boots echoed, every hunter watching, the Council measuring.

When he reached the center, Dessa gestured.

"Show us."

Torven pulled back his sleeves. The fabric dragged across blistered skin. The burns ran wrist to elbow, both arms, the flesh black in places where dragon fire had eaten deepest.

Nevil sucked in a breath.

"Dragon fire," Torven said. "Saving Renn."

In the corner, Renn made a sound, half breath, half sob.

Dessa studied the burns, then his face.

"Tell us what happened."

Torven took a breath and let it out slow.

"The baby was dying in the snow. He was warm when I found him, but fading. Minutes, maybe less, before the cold took him. The dragons were already gone: blood pools where they'd been, and the baby."

"The child was glowing?"

"Yes. Warm. Impossibly warm for Frost season. The snow had melted around him in a perfect circle."

"And now?"

"Alive. Moira has him."

He didn't say the baby was still warm, still radiating heat through wool like a banked fire hours after the glow faded.

"He's... he's just a baby."

"Something's wrong with it." Nevil leaned in. "Wyrms vanish, this appears—"

"Or something right." Haldor shook his head. "Warmth when he should've frozen. Lived when he shouldn't have."

He looked past them, toward something unseen. "Maybe that means something."

"Enough." Dessa's gaze swept past Torven. "Ferne. Step forward."

Ferne crossed the hall, quiet as always until she spoke.

"I saw the glow," she said. "The clearing was warm. Snow melted in a circle around him, steam rising. The baby shouldn't have survived—not naked, not exposed like that. But the warmth saved him."

"The Wyrms," Dessa said. "When did they vanish?"

"Before we found the child. The blood trails just... stopped. No bodies. No tracks leading out. No wing marks in the snow. Just blood. Scorched earth. Then the baby, in the center of it all."

Dessa nodded once. Looked to the corner where Renn sat, head in hands.

"Renn."

The boy flinched and looked up, face wet.

"You disobeyed orders."

Renn's voice came out raw but clear. "I did. Captain Varn told me to guard the elders. I followed the hunt anyway." He looked to Torven, then back to Dessa. "When the fire came, I stood exposed. Torven pulled me out. I'd be dead without him."

"Why did you disobey?"

Renn's throat worked. "I wanted to prove myself. I thought..." His voice dropped. "I thought I could help."

Dessa studied him for a long moment before she nodded. "Sit."

She looked at Grey-beard who'd given Torven the blanket. The old man nodded when asked if he'd seen the glow.

"Aye," he said. "Saw it."

Nothing more.

Zora—face hard as winter—spoke up. "Two dragons," she said. "Dragon meat. Dragon blood. Bone marrow if there's any left."

Haldor nodded. "Years' worth, maybe."

"Years." Zora turned. "Maybe. But then what?"

She looked around the hall. At walls cracking and wearing thin.

"When the meat runs out? When the last bone cracks? When the scales finally rot through?"

"The deep skills are gone." She looked at the cracking walls. "We let that knowledge die."

Keld looked away. "And when there's nothing left to hunt?"

Dessa leaned back in her throne. Dragon bone creaked beneath her.

"Two Wyrms," Dessa said. "Seasons of meat, but every mouth matters."

"It's an infant," Haldor said. "It'll be seasons before he needs a real portion."

"And by then?" Zora's eyes were hard. "Sixteen winters from now? What will we have left?"

"We wait." Varn spoke from the benches, his voice steady. "Sixteen winters without Wyrms. They came before. They'll return."

Keld turned to him. "And if they don't?"

"They will. Migration patterns shift. Populations recover. That's how it works."

Haldor's voice was quiet. "And if the world has changed?"

No one answered.

Nevil: "Same as now. Probably worse."

Dessa's fingers tapped the armrest twice. The old hunter's count.

"Then we cannot afford to feed what we didn't hunt. The child goes now."

Torven's hands clenched.

Haldor shifted in his seat. "Go where? He's an infant."

"Not our concern." Her face stayed hard. "We lost two Wyrms for this. Every mouth matters."

Nevil nodded slowly. "She's right. The settlement can't—"

"Can it?" Haldor's voice cut through. "Can we exile an infant to freeze and call ourselves anything but monsters?"

Keld spoke quietly. "We've done harder things to survive."

"Have we?" Haldor's gaze swept the Council. "Or have we just become hard?"

Silence fell. Dessa watched them, weighing their words.

"A vote," she said. "The child stays or goes."

Zora spoke first. "Exile now."

Nevil nodded. "Exile."

Torven's chest tightened.

Haldor spoke low. "Stays."

Keld's hand stayed down. He watched Torven: the burns, the empty hands, the price already paid.

Dessa turned to him. "Keld?"

Keld was quiet for a long moment.

"Sixteen winters. Until his Blade Season. Mercy for a child. Exile for a man."

Zora's eyes narrowed. "A term, then."

"A compromise," Keld said, his attention fixed on Torven. "The settlement shows mercy. But a man fends for himself."

Dessa leaned back. The throne groaned beneath her.

"Two for exile. One for permanence. One for term." Her fingers drummed once. "I decide."

The moment stretched. Torven didn't breathe.

"Sixteen winters."

The Council sat in silence.

Then Dessa spoke again.

"The rest of you may go. Torven stays."

The hunters hesitated, then rose.

Varn stood and looked at Dessa—at the Council who'd just bent protocol, allowed an exception, set precedent. His mouth opened. Dessa watched him, waiting.

His mouth closed. He walked toward the door, spine rigid and shoulders tight. He paused at the threshold—didn't look back, just stood there for one long breath—then left.

Ferne glanced at Torven once, nodded, and followed the others.

The hall emptied until only Torven and the Council of Five remained.

The torches burned lower. The ceiling loomed closer, ribs and skull spreading wide overhead.

Torven stood alone. He didn't sit.

Dessa looked at him for a long moment before gesturing him closer.

Torven stepped forward while the Council sat silent, waiting.

"Sixteen winters. That's what we offer. The settlement may show mercy to a child. But at sixteen, a man must fend for himself."

Haldor's mouth pressed flat, Zora's face revealing nothing. Nevil looked away.

"He is not one of us," Dessa said. "And never will be. He is your burden. Yours only."

"Do you understand?"

Torven swallowed the words building in his throat.

His throat tightened.

"I understand."

Dessa nodded once and sat back.

She gestured to someone outside.

"Bring his wife. And the child."

Someone left, footsteps fading.

They waited.

Footsteps echoed.

Moira entered carrying the baby, wrapped in blankets and clutched to her chest. She brought the smell of outside with her: cold air, wool, woodsmoke.

She saw Torven alone with the Council and stopped, her grip on the baby tightening.

She crossed to stand beside him.

Dessa gestured.

"Show us the child."

Moira hesitated, looked at Torven, and he nodded.

She unwrapped the baby slightly.

The Council leaned forward.

The baby was small and whole and silent.

Gold eyes moved across the Council faces, found Dessa, and held.

She went still, her hand rising toward the blood gem at her throat, stopping there, drawing back. The baby's eyes did not look away. Neither moved, and the sweet-rot of old marrow hung in the silence.

Then Dessa sat back, her expression settling. Her fingers pressed the armrest once and released.

Then a sound came—high and thin.

The cry didn't echo—it resonated. Dragon bones caught it, amplified it, sent it through ribs and vertebrae like the hall itself breathing. Not one sound but many, layered, wrong.

Overhead, dragon bones shifted, ribs spreading. Wind moved through them—not wind anymore, but something that felt like recognition. Like mourning.

The bones remembered.

Moira pulled the blanket tighter. "Shh," she whispered. "It's alright."

Cold spread through his gut. The hall watched, bones heavier, pressing down.

His hand found Moira's arm.

Nevil's hand went to his knife. But something eased in Haldor's expression.

"An infant," he murmured.

Dessa looked from the child to Moira. To Torven.

Silence held. Then Dessa sat back.

"The child is your responsibility. Yours alone."

Moira's breath caught, small and sharp. Her arms drew the baby closer.

Dessa continued.

"Feed him from your hands. Shelter him from your labor. Teach him from your voices."

"The settlement provides nothing."

"You hunt no more."

The words ended it.

"You will remain where you are—at the settlement's edge. Not among us. Apart."

Dessa looked between them.

"It's done."

The Council filed out slowly. Nevil first, not looking back. Keld and Zora together, expressionless. Haldor paused, glanced at the baby once, almost said something. His hand found the doorframe, lingered, then he was gone.

Dessa went last.

She stood slowly, hands on armrests, her gaze fixed on Torven alone, past Moira, past the baby. A brief moment of eye contact.

She said nothing, turned, and left.

The hall echoed with their absence. Three of them remained—Torven, Moira, the baby—under fading torchlight, silence settling in like a living thing.

Wind stirred through the bones overhead.

Moira exhaled, shoulders dropping.

She looked at the baby in her arms, then at Torven.

"We need to give him a name," she said.

They stood in the empty hall. Dragon bones and dying torchlight and stillness: the three of them and all that weight.

Torven looked at the baby, small and warm and alive, wrapped in worn wool.

Moira thought aloud, testing sounds and trying names until she settled.

"Fionn."

Torven tested it. "Fionn."

"Old word," Moira said. "Means 'ember.'"

Something loosened in Torven's chest. They said it together.

"Fionn."

The name settled into the hall, into the bones. The baby opened his eyes to meet them.

He still didn't cry.

The baby breathed slow and steady, deliberately. Moira whispered it like a prayer.

"Fionn. Our son."

"Fionn."

The baby whimpered.

Moira tucked the blanket closer. "He doesn't like it here," she murmured, glancing at the bones overhead, then back to Fionn. "Let's take him home."

They headed for the door together.

Moira ahead, whispering the name. A sound he hadn't heard since the third baby that didn't take. Three graves in frozen ground. Three names never spoken.

Torven lingered at the threshold, watching her go.

Torven watched Moira ahead, Fionn bundled against her chest, her voice drifting back.

As she held him, Moira's right hand trembled. The tannin stains had settled deep into the creases. It was meant to be just two more seasons.

But her face, looking down at the baby, was soft and smiling in a way he hadn't seen in years.

Sixteen winters.

He should tell her now.

But that smile—and the words stuck.

Later.

Wind keened through the bones, and dawn light broke cold over the settlement.

Torven's burns ached. But the baby was named.

And already leaving.