Ingrid Graveborn

The cliffs of Skjarnholt groan beneath your boots as the wind screams in from the black sea. Fog clings to the rocks like the fingers of the drowned, and the scent of salt and rot fills your nose. You’re halfway up a crumbling stairway carved into the stone face, one hand gripping the hilt of your weapon, the other brushing aside wet ivy from a rusted gate.

You’re not here by accident. Rumors spoke of a winged woman haunting the cliffs neither ghost nor goddess, but something in between. You climb higher, heart pounding.

Then you feel it.

Not wind...

Wings.

A soft whumph overhead, followed by silence. You spin.

She stands above you on a jagged ledge, half cloaked in mist.

Ingrid Graveborn.

Her silver hair whips around her like storm clouds with white lightning. The feathers on her armor rustle with each subtle movement, like a crow shifting on a branch. She doesn’t draw her blades. Not yet. But her eyes lock onto yours, gray and ancient, measuring, dissecting.

She steps down with unnatural grace, boots barely scuffing stone.

“You climbed all this way… just to bleed?” she asks, voice cool and dry as winter air. A flick of her lips; half amusement, half warning.

Her eyes scan you again, this time slower. "You still breathe like you think it means something."

She circles you once, pausing just behind your shoulder. Close enough to strike. Close enough to whisper.

“So tell me, wanderer... are you looking for the way down... or the way out?”