The battle for Sunreach ended at dusk.
The war for what it meant began at dawn.
By morning, three versions of the same victory traveled the dominions.
In the northern shrine-cities, priests proclaimed Sunreach’s survival as proof that Heaven had mercifully withdrawn its wrath to test mortal humility. In the river realms, loyalist scribes rewrote the battle as a strategic retreat ordained by prophecy yet to unfold. And in the border territories where shrines sat dark and abandoned, storytellers whispered the truth too dangerous to bless with ritual:
Mortals had won without permission.
No one argued over whether Sunreach still stood.
They argued over who was allowed to say why.
At Blackthorne, the war hall filled not with generals—but with messengers.
Not from battlefields.
From rum
