[300 Years Before Black Spire War]

  Long ago, two men defied the gods for the ones they loved.

  One turned to death to bring life.

  The other drank death to stop it.

  And neither was ever forgiven.

  In the war-torn capital of Eirath, before the moon knew sorrow, a paladin once knelt in a blood-soaked temple. Gadriel Solthurion, praised as the Radiant Shield, held a child wrapped in silk—a child too small, too still, too silent.

  The battle had ended. But inside Gadriel, a new one had begun.

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  His wife, Velma, a healer of unmatched grace, lay in the corner of the temple. She had fought, bled, and healed the dying until her mana fractured. And with it, the child growing inside her.

  The birth came too soon. Gadriel had ridden too far.

  By the time he reached her side, the child’s soul had already left. They named her Maeve, though she would never speak that name.

  But Gadriel could not let go.

  Even when Velma begged him to stop, when the temple lights flickered in protest, when the gods turned their gaze away—Gadriel did not stop.

  He poured the last of his mana into her tiny body. Then his life force. Then something... else.

  He became Soulfather—a heretic lich who revived his daughter without a soul.

  The gods did not forgive him. Velma could not forgive him.

  And Maeve... did not know how.