Embercore 3: Stormwall (A Progression Fantasy Epic), page 1
Embercore Book Three
Stormwall
Felix Taylor
Copyright © 2025 by Felix Taylor
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or scanning without written permission from the author.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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Contents
1. Chapter 1
2. Chapter 2
3. Chapter 3
4. Chapter 4
5. Chapter 5
6. Chapter 6
7. Chapter 7
8. Chapter 8
9. Chapter 9
10. Chapter 10
11. Chapter 11
12. Chapter 12
13. Chapter 13
14. Chapter 14
15. Chapter 15
16. Chapter 16
17. Chapter 17
18. Chapter 18
19. Chapter 19
20. Chapter 20
21. Chapter 21
22. Chapter 22
23. Chapter 23
24. Chapter 24
25. Chapter 25
26. Chapter 26
27. Chapter 27
28. Chapter 28
29. Chapter 29
30. Chapter 30
31. Chapter 31
32. Chapter 32
33. Chapter 33
34. Chapter 34
35. Chapter 35
36. Chapter 36
37. Chapter 37
38. Chapter 38
39. Chapter 39
40. Chapter 40
41. Chapter 41
42. Chapter 42
43. Chapter 43
44. Chapter 44
45. Chapter 45
46. Chapter 46
47. Chapter 47
Afterword
Other Works
Acknowledgments
External Sites
Chapter 1
Few people ever got an audience with the emperor of the Dominion, and fewer walked out alive.
There wasn’t a high rate of death from a meeting gone wrong, of course, but there was a chance. The emperor didn’t take kindly to anything marginally threatening, nor any mistakes of decorum of any kind. He may have been a mortal, but his influence was vast, and his personal imperial mage-guards were some of the best in the North.
But Lady Neria had an Unbound Lord with her.
She walked down a starlit hallway, her white coattails fluttering behind her. Her boots clomped on the floor and her breaths turned to steam in the humid air. Just a few steps behind her, Unbound Lord Three glided behind her, suspending himself on a bed of invisible, unmanifested mana. His black robes and hood hid everything except for his glowing green eyes, and there was no sign of his familiar.
An entourage of Dominion soldiers rushed behind them, pretending that they were doing something important to serve the Emperor, but these were just mortals, and they couldn’t touch Three or Neria even if they wanted to.
Neria was a mortal too, of course, but Lord Three would protect her.
At every doorway, a pair of mages in white cloaks and silver armour waited. They weren’t the guards to worry about; they were only Flares. If there was trouble, Three could kill them before they or their familiars (a wolf for every one of them) even lifted a finger.
When they reached the doors to the main audience hall, Neria took a moment to pause. She straightened out her coat and neatened her shoulder-length hair, then adjusted the rank-sashes that marked her as a mortal noblewoman. A swell of pride rose in her heart at the sashes, but it wasn’t as intense as she remembered when she first earned them.
No new badges would satisfy the cravings anymore. Only a throne could do that.
For the past forty years of her life, Lady Neria had ruled over a slice of land in Greatsaad Bay. It didn’t have many resources before she took over, except for unexploited titanwood reserves. In a matter of decades, she had turned a host of fishermen into a shipbuilding behemoth for the Dominion’s war machine.
But such a tiny slice of land would never be enough to satisfy her.
She was an ostal, and her horns had rings of grey in them. She was getting older, and her legacy wouldn’t mean anything if she stayed just another petty Lady of the Lower Court. This was her chance to make something more of herself.
She just had to set the pieces in motion.
The Flare-stage mages hauled open the audience chamber doors, using their enhanced bodies to move the massive slabs of wood.
Neria stepped into the room beyond. It was a vast chamber, large enough to host two warships across and tall enough that the ten-foot-wide floral ornaments on the roof looked about the size of coins.
It was late evening, and braziers lit the hall, forming a central walkway to approach the Emperor.
Neria folded her hands in front of herself respectfully, then strode along the central walkway. In the massive chamber, each footstep echoed off the white marble floor and walls.
“How dare Lady Neria approach my throne at such a late hour!” the Emperor called, his voice booming through the hall long before Neria could see him. “I will have your head for this.”
“Perhaps you should have summoned your other Unbound.” She approached the throne on the other side of the chamber. It was a three-storey-tall block of pure white stone with jade inlays. A seat rested at the bottom, barely a few feet off the ground, and the enormous backrest flaunted like a peacock’s plume. The Emperor sat at the bottom with his legs crossed.
When Neria made it halfway across the room, when the Emperor still only appeared as a small green-robed smudge on the throne, she knelt. “It is a pleasure to bask in your presence, Honoured Emperor.”
The Emperor, Tarren Heur, was a middle-aged ostal. He might have been mortal, but he had an imposing figure—broad shoulders, tall, and a square jaw. His ostal horns towered above his head. As all emperors did, he had painted his horns green and draped them with golden ornaments.
He stood up from his throne, cloak flowing out behind him, and six Imperial Guards followed him. They emerged in a line from behind the throne, their wolf familiars trotting dutifully beside them.
They wore polished, pristine armour of jadesteel. It shimmered and glittered dark green, and it had no ornaments. Green plates atop a black gambeson, and that was it. Even though their helmets had holes for their ostal horns to poke out, they didn’t even show a slice of skin or hair.
And even Neria, a mortal, could feel the tingle and pressure of their spirits.
“They are Blazes,” said Lord Three in a soft voice. “If all six of them attacked me, they might overwhelm me.”
“Don’t worry,” Neria whispered. “We aren’t here to fight.”
Three folded his hands. If he had his familiar with him, Neria didn’t see it. He said, “Do not antagonize the Emperor. You cannot keep your end of our bargain if you are dead. I need those elixirs.”
Neria scoffed. “I will not die.”
When the Emperor and his guards were a few steps from Neria, they stopped. The Emperor held his hands in a standard regal gesture—fingers interlocked, held just in front of his sternum.
“Get on with it,” the Emperor demanded. “Why shouldn’t I strip you of your titles, land, and guild for this disturbance, hm?”
“The Red Hand is returning,” Neria said plainly. “He is violating your decree to hunt the Black-Haired Elf.”
“Of the two people you mentioned, Lady,” said the Emperor, taking a step forward, “I wonder who my bigger concern is…?”
“The Black-Haired Elf is venturing to the Mainland as well.”
“If that is news to you, then you will need to reevaluate the value of your informants. They are slow.”
He was speaking exactly how she remembered. She had only ever been in an audience with Emperor Tarren Heur once, and it was enough to judge his behaviour. This was just a confirmation of her hypotheses.
He would behave as expected of a child of a thousand-year-old line. His hands were pale and smooth; he knew no discomfort.
“It would be news to your vassal lords and courts,” said Neria. “It would be news to the ruling council of Aerdia; perhaps the Autumn Elves would finally see through your lies and accept a different king. Most of them already accept that their Governor-King is dead…”
“Ah,” said the Emperor. “You’re here to threaten me.”
“Warn you.”
He raised a hand and lifted a single finger. The guards marched forward, brandishing jadesteel longswords.
“Explain,” the emperor commanded.
“You must finish the conquest. Sirdia is the only land that hasn’t yet bowed to your rule—the Dominion’s rule—and you are running out of time. The Stormwall seethes, and walls are meant to keep something out. If you do not unite the North under a strong, charismatic, and unwavering hand, you may not like the result.”
Though there was a touch of truth to all her lies, the truth of the statement didn’t matter at the moment. She just needed the Emperor to be scared.
“And so you are threatening me?”
“If you cannot unite the e
The Emperor beckoned to his guards. They surrounded him and took defensive stances with their swords. Their wolves growled.
Holding his hand out, Three widened his stance, radiating spiritual power. Lady Neria’s veins shook, and her muscles vibrated. The flare of strength was enough to threaten the integrity of the world itself.
“Now, let’s not resort to throwing punches quite yet,” said Neria. “Emperor, you are speaking with the pre-eminent shipbuilder in your entire empire. I expect you to listen when I warn you about the movements of your political enemies.”
“You build the ships, now, do you?” the Emperor asked. “Show me your hands.”
Lady Neria, still kneeling, stretched out her hands.
The Emperor marched forward. “Palms up.” Neria turned her hands over. The Emperor flicked the center of her hand with a long, sickly pale finger. “I don’t see any calluses. I don’t see any scars or splinters.” He turned away, his robe flicking along with him. “You are just like me.”
“I’m nothing like you.”
“Older, maybe.” The Emperor chuckled. “I remember you, now…” He stepped behind his guards again. “It was back when my father ruled, for sure, and I was maybe fifteen. You came to beg for advancement elixirs for your land’s mages, and my father denied them.”
An entire fleet of fishing ships had been lost that fall. With no high-level mages to protect the fishing boats, the sea beasts ran rampant. They had needed mages to protect the ships.
“We lost an entire year’s worth of harvest. Thousands starved that winter.” Lady Neria, of course, had not gone hungry. But she could pretend.
The Emperor clicked his tongue. “Ah, but you innovated. You built stronger ballistas and cheaper alchemical bombs. You started cutting titanwood for your ships’ hull and building bigger ships, and before you knew it, you were building battleships for the Dominion. Hardship breeds opportunity.”
Neria refused to rise to the challenge. “Then you are breeding opportunity in the Elven Continent. You will find the Aerdians discontented, and that the Sirdians are training a pair of mages more powerful than anyone could ever imagine.”
“The Black-Haired Elf is an Embercore.”
“He’s learning to live with his weakness. If you do not crush them within the year, it will be too late. Send the Ten-Thousand Horn Army to Aerdia.” This Emperor had a strong will, but he had his insecurities. Neria could exploit them. “If you’re afraid of your underlings’ loyalties now, it will be worse when you lose control of an entire continent. Act now. Take their cities and put new vassal lords in their halls—ostal lords, whose loyalty is certain. The Aerdians will do nothing.”
Neria paused to let her words sink in, then delivered the last push. “Send mages. Send stronger mages.”
And when the Emperor’s loyal mages left the Mainland, there would be even fewer to stand in her way when she seized control.
“We avoided direct military involvement for a reason,” the Emperor stated. “The people were tired of war. The conquest of Pherodotes left the armies weary…”
“When the Embercore unites the Elven Continent and sends an army to lay waste to the Mainland, what will you do then? Will you blame weariness for—”
“Leave,” the Emperor commanded. “Leave me, now.”
That was the best Neria could hope for. She hadn’t received an outright death threat, and none of the guards even used a lick of their wolf-Path magic.
She rose and stepped back, still facing the Emperor. “My lord,” she said, “you require absolution. Destroy the elves, annihilate Sirdia, and the entire North will bow to you as loyal subjects. Your empire will be complete.”
Neria turned around and marched out of the audience chamber. Lord Three hovered close behind. “You accomplished nothing,” he whispered.
“I planted an idea in his mind,” Neria said as they stepped out of the audience chamber’s doors. “Now comes our true challenge: we must eliminate the other Unbound Lords. Are you still with me?”
“As long as my family gets the advancement resources you promised, you will have my loyalty.”
Chapter 2
A flash of blue feathers whisked past the Featherflight’s gondola windows. Pirin ran to the front of the gondola, weaving between Alyus and Brealtod, who held the airship’s two control wheels, and pressed his face against the glass.
A hawk-sized bird with blue tail feathers shot past the windows and circled around to the top of the airship. Runes glowed on its back—the Eane fields of the world powered the runes—and it carried a leather pouch in its talons. As its tail feathers quivered, they let off a soft hum, barely audible over the wind.
“Woah there, elfy,” Alyus said. “You good?” He held the rudder wheel steady, maintaining their course.
Brealtod hissed something as well, but Pirin couldn’t understand the dragonfolk language yet.
“I’ll tell you in a bit!” Pirin said, pushing away from the glass and navigating back across the gondola. He reached a ladder up to the main hull of the airship, then he climbed up, passing through the crew quarters, then ascending up through a valley of cloudbags and titanwood spokes of the ship’s rigid frame.
His heart thrummed and his fingers trembled. Lesser steppehawks were messenger birds, and it meant someone wanted to send him a message.
He pulled himself up the rungs as fast as he could, breathing quickly and abandoning the Eane-purification cycling pattern he had been practicing for the past four weeks since they had left Dulfer’s Reach.
He passed the axial catwalk, where Nomad sat cross-legged in a meditative pose, hands folded in his lap overtop his flute-staff. His familiar perched on his shoulder, with its eyes shut as well.
But Pirin wouldn’t need Nomad’s help to catch a steppehawk.
He kept climbing until he reached the airship’s upper platform. It was a square wooden deck, ten feet to a side. As soon as he poked his head through the hatch, a silver spearhead whirled toward his face, trailing sparks of crimson mana. He ducked down, and the spearhead only took a tuft of hair off his head.
“Pirin!” Myraden exclaimed. She called her spearhead back to her, manipulating the silk rope with her Bloodline Talent. It wound up into a firm spear. “Knock next time, or you will lose your head!”
Kythen, her bloodhorn familiar, stood on the platform behind her. He bleated in agreement.
“Sorry,” Pirin muttered as he pulled himself up the last few rungs of the ladder and jumped up onto the observation platform.
The steppehawk circled around beside the Featherflight, a black speck against the puffy clouds on the horizon and the midday blue sky. The bird dipped down for a moment, its black and blue feathers nearly blending into the ocean below before it swooped up to the other side of the Featherflight.
Pirin couldn’t recall the specific time he’d learned about steppehawks, but he had a vague recollection. They were most common in Sirdia, but other nations used them too.
He ran to the other side of the platform, tracing the hawk with his eyes as it swooped under the airship.
The hawk was following them, but it was just a hawk. It didn’t know to land on the airship, and it wouldn’t unless it was tired.
He laid down on his stomach and leaned out off the edge of the platform. Was there some kind of call he had to make? “How does it even know how to follow us?” he asked. “What’re those runes for?”
“Messenger steppehawks always have a target,” Myraden provided. “It is likely for you; it tracked you.”
“How?”
“The runes on its tail are simple vibration runes. They should be the same as were on your signet ring; when you feed them mana, they vibrate with the same frequency as your core.”
Pirin stared at her and blinked. Half of that went straight over his head.
“Every mage’s core vibrates at a slightly different frequency. It is how powerful mages with refined spiritual awareness can recognize someone by just sensing them. But you, being a king, likely had the runesmiths of Sirdia take note of a rune pattern that would vibrate at the same frequency of your core.”
“And the stepphawk tracks that frequency with the same runes as a reference…”
“You are correct. It has strong spiritual senses naturally, but once it gets close, it cannot pinpoint the source of the presence.”
