cycles of the sun as told by gallivandalid...cycles of the sun, gallivandalid 1 a note from the...

Cycles of the Sun, Gallivandalid

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Cycles of the Sun

As told by

Gallivandalid


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A Note from the Narrator:

I have been tasked by the provisional government to research the events of the recent past

and assemble them into a coherent narrative. My instructions were to establish the connection

between the Resurgence of the Harbingers eleven years ago, the subsequent Civil War and

Rebellion, and the fall of the High King last autumn. What follows is my finished report. I feel I

must apologize to my readers, particularly for the Prologue – multiple details are missing, most

notably the names of the Warrior and her companion. Even worse, most of the prologue is based

off second- or third-hand stories and local rumors from the area where the Warrior reappeared.

I’ve attempted to make it into a coherent narrative that is both easy to read and decently factual,

but I fear the lack of eye witnesses complicates things somewhat.

That said, the Prologue deals with the story of the Warrior and the resurgence of the

Harbingers eleven years ago, while the main report deals with the fall of the High King. My

most used source is Adam Taylor’s fifth interview – a transcript of which I am willing to provide

in the future, if it is asked of me. In that interview, he recounted for me a story which the

Harbinger of War once told him during their brief companionship.

For reference, this story begins eleven years before I began researching for this report, or

thirteen years before the date on which it is due for presentation to the Senate of the provisional

government.

Your faithful narrator,

Gallivandalid.


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Cycles of the Sun (From Adam Taylor’s collection)

In the depths of a heart a shadow may grow

Like a rot in the trees of a forest grove.

And while none might see, and few may know,

The disease will take that for which it strove.

The dark will strengthen

The rot will spread

The shadows will lengthen

The trees will fall dead.

For every evil takes its root in purity

Corrupting what exists with frightening surety.

The grass might wilt and turn to black.

The heart might suffer and break.

And the soul’s willpower might falter and slack

As, from nightmare, it struggles to wake.

But not all is lost in the black morass;

For through the leaves shines a light,

Distant and dimmed as through tinted glass…

But enough to restore the soul’s lost might.

For every evil has its counterpart,

A force to balance, to soothe the wounded heart.

Hope may bring despair to light,

And shift the balance in the fight.

And this light will drive the shadows back,

Bringing new growth from the fallen trees,

And the heart will find its strength does not lack

In fighting off this dark disease.

For many this is enough;

To find strength to fight anew…

To be able to overcome the rough…

To grow again where the old trees grew.

For though darkness takes the hearts of some,

Hope thrives among men.

And so, while night will always come,

We know the sun will rise again.


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Prologue: Dusk


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Part I

Far below, waves shook the cliff wall, sending white foam spiraling through the currents.

Above, the sky dimmed, the brilliant gold of the horizon fading to crimson, then violet, and

finally to black. A chill wind brushed his face and kicked up the dust at his feet. The warmth of

the day had long since passed, and now, as the sun dipped below the horizon, the wind grew

colder still. Closing his eyes, he smelled the air. Dry, it came from the north: the next few days

would be cool, and the nights, especially along the water, cold. He let the breath out in a long,

quiet sigh. His companion appeared at his side.

“Nice sunset,” she said.

“Yeah,” he replied.

“You know,” she murmured after a moment’s pause, “I’ve always liked sunsets.”

“Why is that?”

“They just remind me that, even though we can’t stop night from falling, if we just wait,

the day will come.”

“Hmm.”

He turned and walked into the forest, leaving her to follow. She took a last glance out at

the failing light, then turned away. The two strode through the forest, hoping to put some

distance between themselves and the cold coastal winds before settling down for the night. As

the darkness intensified, signs of exhaustion began to appear on his face. Dark circles, blue as

bruises, filled in under his eyes. Lines deepened, creases lengthened. By the time the two found

a suitable shelter beneath some particularly dense brush, he had aged twenty years. In the

darkness, she couldn’t see, but she knew. She saw it often enough.

Beneath the heavy canopy of the trees, nothing moved. A velvety darkness covered all,

sheltering their alcove, and silence reigned until morning.

Every night he relived the same nightmare in his dreams. He had long known it by heart,

as it never varied. Yet somehow the pain of it never faded. He and the girl, his closest friend,

had gone to walk the base of the town’s wooden walls at dusk, overlooking the lake and

surrounding plains of rolling farmland to the east. Somehow, with the events of the evening on

the cliff overlooking the sea it was even clearer and more precise in its tranquility and beauty

than it had been in years. They had talked, as they often did, and took the opportunity and

privacy of being outside the town to speak freely. He himself had never been a particularly

joyous person, even before that fateful day. And so the dream went, they talked in the serene

light of dusk in the countryside, the wall ever to their side as they walked around the ring of the

town. As they came back around towards the western gate, where the trade road ran into the

encroaching forest, something shifted in the gathering darkness.


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An arrow appeared out of nowhere, and he saw it tear straight through the throat of his

closest friend. He briefly heard shuffling feet before a blow knocked him unconscious. When he

awoke, his dearest companion was gone.

After that night took her from him, the dark had never been the same. It made him both

fear and hate the night, and he fell into a melancholy mood every night after that, brooding and

lamenting what he had lost. The dreams that reminded him every night helped to keep the pain

fresh, and he had never truly recovered from the blow. After a few years of failing to make

anything of himself in the town, he had taken to self-exile. One day he simply left. And in his

wanderings he had met the girl he traveled with now, in so many ways similar to the girl he had

lost all those years ago.

He awoke. Years ago, he would awake stiff and sweating after that dream, back when it

still felt like a nightmare. It no longer tormented him, though. He had relived it far too many

times. Rolling over, he realized his companion was nowhere to be found. She had probably left

to forage for some sort of breakfast. Usually whichever of them woke up first did the gathering,

while the other prepared for the rest of the day. He clambered out of their little shelter.

In the bright early morning light, he could finally appreciate the beauty of the forest. A

little stream, weaving and winding through the moss, burbled across the meadow. Wildflowers

grew in the openings where the sun shone brightest, while heavier groundcover grew in the deep

shadows around the thick pines’ trunks. Vast arrays of birds fluttered among the branches of the

canopy, occasionally sending out their songs to break the early day’s silence. As the chill wind

blew in from the coast, the swaying of the trees sent golden light dancing through the meadow,

reflecting from the little steam to splash the trunks of the great pines.

Some distance away, farther up the stream, she had found another meadow. All the

world, it seemed, had come together to create a perfect moment, a perfect place. The melodies

of the birds wove together to form not a cacophony but a song, a beautiful dance; the gurgling of

the stream and the sparkling lights that shone off it threw the golden light of dawn all over the

glade – yet the patterns were not chaos, but beauty. Serenity flowed in the peaceful waters, joy

shone in the light, and hope rang from the throats of the songbirds. Falling to the ground, she

cracked her back, then laid on the ground.

How long had she been journeying now? Four years? Five? In all that time, the only

person she had met was the man who she now travelled with. In all that time, she had never

come across any town, or city. Never had she needed to, either. Certainly, winters had been

rough at times, when food became scarce. But she never felt the need to go to a city to buy food.

Not that she had anything worthwhile to trade anyway. But winter wouldn’t be back for a long,

long time. For now, the early summer light, warmth, and wind were all she needed. Everything

else could wait for another day, another time. For now, peace, and loving the world she lived in,

were all that mattered.

Gradually the morning lengthened, the shadows of the trees grew short, and gentle warmth filled

the woods. She lay in the grass for a long, long time. Eventually, she decided it would be wise

to search for food; they might want something to eat. Hopefully the man had gotten himself


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breakfast; otherwise he’d be hungry for quite some time. So she set out, gathering what berries

and edible plants she could. Late in the afternoon, she met back up with him at their camp from

the previous night. They ate, and set out down the little stream, settling down for the night once

darkness had fallen.

The next day they travelled. But before long, they found their path through the forest

blocked by a large river, swollen within its floodwalls by the early summer snowmelt from the

mountains. Cold and deep, or else running in rapids through the shallows, the river was too

dangerous to cross. Accustomed to not speaking, the two simply looked at one another and

shrugged. For the rest of the day, they hiked downriver, searching for a crossing. Finding none,

they settled down for the night.

* * *

This was not the way the nightmare was supposed to go. The light and the view were

right, and the girl walked alongside him… but when they reached the gates, no arrow came.

They entered, and she walked away, shooting back a smile. He was left alone. Sitting down, he

leaned against the wall that surrounded their little village. Even in his dream, sleep overcame

him. And when he awoke, he was holding her body as he had when he awoke from the blow to

his head, in the last hour before first light, when the world was at its darkest.

He awoke in the middle of the night, his body tense. Never before had the dream shifted,

changed in any way. Before, it had always been true to life – though, he supposed, this one was

true to life as well. But this one reflected all the days before her death, all the better times.

All the things he missed.

Yet, in the end, it brought him back to her corpse, laying there on the ground, the smell of

smoke in the air. He had left that day, left the ruins of his life behind, and set out into the forest.

Nearly three years later, he had met his current companion. And now, five years after that, they

still lived in solitude, still lived apart from the world. He wasn’t sure he would ever go back.

They lived well enough out here. They got by. Going back would mean settling into a new

town, answering questions, telling their stories…

He didn’t actually know her story that well – but she didn’t know his, either. They both

knew that the other had fled some sort of conflict, that they had each faced something that was

easier to run from than to face. Not that it mattered. So long as they had food, water, and

shelter, so long as they didn’t freeze to death, he didn’t care about much else. She could have

her secrets, and he could have his. Telling the story wasn’t necessary. They wanted to be out

here, away from everything, and that was as much of an explanation as they needed.

In the middle of his musings, sleep overtook him again, and the next thing he saw was the

brilliant rays of dawn cutting into their little lean-to among the rocks. After cracking his neck,

he stood and went to the shallow, swift-running section of the stream that lay outside. In the

early morning light, he could see the bottom – and he thought most of the rocks on the shore

would stick above the surface if he moved them into the water. Sure enough, the rocks were

taller than the water was deep, and he set out to build a bridge. By the time she awoke a few


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hours later, he had nearly completed his work. The two ate breakfast, threw the last rocks into

place, and crossed the river. On the far side, they came across a large patch of huckleberries, and

spent most of the afternoon gathering and storing the fruit.

The following morning they set out, only to run straight into a cliff wall, which loomed

above them in the late morning mist. They followed the cliff roughly south, winding down the

side of the river. By noon they came across the road. Being the only opening in the wall they

had seen yet that day, they decided to take the risk of running into others and started up the

sloping hill. Sure enough, not long after that a trade caravan overtook them from behind, the

whole brigade clattering to a halt as it came across the two rather ragged looking figures in its

path. A group of the traders approached, somewhat cautiously, as if not sure what they were

seeing. She looked at him, the look phrasing an understood question. He sighed and shrugged.

“Hello there!” he called to the group of men awkwardly milling about. One man, dressed

slightly nicer than the others, pushed his way to the front of the crowd and responded.

“Good afternoon,” the nicely dressed man called back, “What brings you to this God-

forsaken valley?” He walked toward them, speaking uncomfortably rapidly.

“There aren’t any decent towns for nearly thirty miles,” the man said. “We only pass

through here because the towns north of the river will pay quite well for goods from the south.

You certainly don’t seem to have much in the ways of transportation…” The man trailed off

here, leaving the implied question to be answered.

“Our horses were rather old and shaky,” he replied, feeling her stiffen at his side in the

face of the lie. “They weren’t quite up to the crossing. We had to leave them.”

“Well, I think my boys and I can ferry you the rest of the way to the next town,” the man,

seemingly the leader of the group, said back, having now walked all the way up to the two.

“Would you care to come with us?”

He knew she was going to hate this. Saying yes meant visiting a town, which they both

hated. But saying no was going to look strange. “That would be wonderful, but we wouldn’t

want to burden you if you don’t have room to spare,” he said, deciding that was the best course.

“Oh, we have plenty of room. Dropped off some stock at the last place we passed for

coin and didn’t pick up any more stuff to replace it. We have almost an entire wagon empty,”

the leader said, gesturing to one of their wooden vans.

“Well, we would be most grateful then,” he said. He moved to walk toward the caravan,

and she came along, albeit slowly and stiffly.

After a brief argument, they decided to walk with the men rather than ride in the wagon

for most of the remainder of the day. While she had wanted to stay in the wagon, he had insisted

on getting to know their new company. Though she had protested that they would only be

travelling with them a few days, and therefore didn’t need an incredible relationship with them,

he had pointed out that they were willing to give them a ride for free. That was worth at least a

friendly conversation or two. As it turned out, the leader of the caravan, an amiable man, was


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quite talkative, and so the two ended up doing very little talking. The man went on and on about

gossip, rumors, and news that meant nothing to the two of them, out of touch with civilization as

they were. If the man noticed that something was wrong with the way that they responded, if he

sensed that they didn’t know any of the topics, he made no indication. Finally, dusk came and

they retreated to the offered wagon.

As was his custom, he fell asleep quickly. She shot a look at his prone figure – he needed

to be awake tonight. While he had carried the conversation with the leader, she had noticed the

shiftier looks among some of the men. Not all of them were of the caliber of their leader, and

she had seen the others watching them all afternoon. The one time she needed him for

something she wasn’t sure she could handle – she could try, and probably take one or two, but

not more – and he was asleep.

Perhaps an hour and a half before first light, she felt the wagon shift, and woke to the

sound of voices outside.

“Are you sure about this? If the captain finds out he’ll have us killed.”

“How’s he going to find out? We cut the wagon loose when we’re done, and the two of

them’ll go right back down the hill. There’s nothing in here worth going back to save, and we

barely have enough supplies to make it to the next town, let alone go back.”

“Fine, but hurry up. We need to have him dead before she wakes up.”

She was petrified. It was her worst fault, the way she totally froze when she was scared.

She could barely breathe, let alone try to speak. She couldn’t just sit here and let them kill him,

but in her debilitating fear she could neither move nor speak. The door opened and the first man

stepped inside, to the shadows to the right of the door, as she faced it. The second stepped up,

his silhouette framed in the doorway, a long knife in hand.

A clenched fist hit him sideways in the temple, and he slumped. A second hand picked

up the knife as it fell from the unconscious man’s fist and skewered the first, hidden trader

through the chest, pinning him to the wall. The man momentarily coughed up blood and then lay

still.

Her companion stepped out of the shadows by the doorway.

“Let’s get out of here,” he said as he picked up the blankets and bags of food that had

made the mannequin of his sleeping body. He helped her to her feet and slung the bags of his

shoulder. “Don’t want more of them showing up.”

As they exited the wagon, they came face to face with the captain as he swung around the

corner, weapon drawn. All three stopped dead.

“Thank God. I thought they had killed you… or worse. But if you’re alive…?” Said the

captain, leaving the implied question hanging. He didn’t react to the sacks of stolen provisions

they carried.


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“Well, one of them is unconscious. The other is… uh, skewered to the wall,” he

stammered. He still wasn’t quite sure what to make of the captain.

“Good on you for the one. The other will be summarily executed in the morning. I see

you’re preparing to head out, but that won’t be necessary. I insist you stay. You will find you

have no more trouble from the men.” With this the captain stepped inside and kicked the

unconscious man down the stairs before lifting the other bloodied man over his shoulder.

Seemingly uncaring of the blood than ran down his shirt from the man’s corpse, he signaled for

another man to bind and carry away the unconscious man. He then waved them back towards

the wagon, and walked away.

They looked at each other, completely dumbfounded. For a few moments they tried to

deliberate, but eventually decided that staying the night wouldn’t be too terrible – even if they

were a little disturbed by what had just happened. They also weren’t ready to head into the

forest at night without shelter, so they headed back into the wagon and took shifts keeping watch

until morning came.

* * *

Blood saturated the mud of the battlefield, while mauled corpses of man and horse and

dog littered the landscape. A solitary tall and gracefully muscular figure stalked the land among

the screams of the dying. The figure’s armor, made of heavy but flexible black leather, lined

with red seams, covered their full body, while a hood and mask covered their face. The sky was

dark; no moon had risen that night and the cloud cover hung heavy. The figure in black and red

strode across the ground, twin swords of glimmering steel hanging loosely in each hand,

silencing the screams of the dying one by one. Smoke hung in the air, flowing from the sections

of the battlefield where men had slaughtered each other with fire or burned the corpses of their

enemies to inspire fear in their other foes. Death hung in the air, and the figure reveled in its

presence. The figure came upon a youth, no more than sixteen, lying on his back in the dust. He

looked up, in massive pain from an arrow lodged in his side, but not dead. Beneath the mask,

the figure smiled, and stabbed one of the twin swords through the youth’s forehead.

This time it was she who awoke shivering. It had been a long time… but the scent of the

fresh blood on the floor of the wagon where she slept had awoken her memories. She shuddered.

She had never wanted to set foot near fighting again. She had barely made it away the first time,

and never wanted to go back. She had left everything behind when she went for the woods, and

not long after, she found him. When she had seen how broken he had become, she had hoped

she could make up for the pain she had caused others by healing him. And now there were two

more deaths because of her.

Once a killer, she thought, always a killer. Even if her fear of returning to such had

paralyzed her on the spot, the men were dead because of her. It would have been better if they

had managed to avoid returning to civilization. She was only a danger around others. The

woods and their peaceful, untouched, uncorrupted beauty had been a perfect refuge, far from the

crowds.


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That morning, the captain greeted them with an execution. She turned away before she

could see the second man’s head be removed from his shoulders. The night before, the shadows

had kept her from seeing the man die, but now she could only look away. She could not bear the

all too familiar sight. He, however, looked on, his mouth set in a hard line.

“It’s for the best,” he said, laying a hand on her shoulder, “the others won’t bother us.

Perhaps a night near a town wouldn’t be so bad. We can get some new clothes for once, rather

than mending what we have.” He looked up at the sun; it was nearly noon. “We can travel with

the caravan for a while longer. The captain seems intent on being kind to us. He’s even offered

us the provisions and pay that he would have given to those two.”

He didn’t understand why she was sobbing so hard over this.

The remaining two days of travel passed without major incident, each day going by with

her hidden in the wagon and sulking while he walked or rode with the men of the caravan. She

knew he couldn’t know what was bothering her – she’d never told him. He probably assumed

she wasn’t used to the sight of blood. She chuckled quietly at the irony. Perhaps she’d tell him

soon. Or perhaps not. After all, he might not be so eager to travel with her once he knew.

Yet there was something else, too. She wanted to be sickened by the lingering smell of

blood. She wanted to feel guilt for the death she had caused. But the men deserved death for

what they had been planning to do, so she couldn’t regret. And the smell brought back more

nostalgia than she liked. A longing for days she never wanted to return to – a longing she fought

with all her heart, yet a longing she couldn’t stop. So for two days, she hid inside the wagon,

struggling within herself, and emerged at the end to find that they had entered the next town.

The captain sent them to stay in the upper level apartment of one of his residences.

Apparently the man was quite wealthy and held properties in many of the towns he visited on his

route. He had quite graciously granted them the apartment for as long as they needed it, even

after he left town if need be. They assured him they wouldn’t stay that long.

The man walked out onto the balcony at dawn to find her standing at the railing, staring

out toward the horizon. The red light of dawn bathed the city in a crimson glow, as if the hatch

roofs of the town were all burning. The smoke coming in thin streams out of every chimney

intensified the effect and cast a haze between them and the horizon. Beyond the low wooden

walls, a quarter mile distant, stood several groups of trees, forming a sparse forest with golden

light streaming through it from the sun behind. High above all else, the canopy of the sky was

covered with a bank of clouds, lending an intensity to the brilliant sunrise, which rose beyond the

end of the cloud cover. Between the walls of the tall houses near theirs, the horizon, and the low

near cloud cover, the crimson dawn was framed in a near perfect rectangle. Yet the beauty of the

scene, the light streaming through the trees highlighted something else: for every standing tree a

half dozen stumps filled the clearings in between, casting long shadows across the plain from the

low angle of the sun. The inside of the wooden walls, fresh and new from being cut from the

forest only recently, lay in deep shadow. The town stood ugly against the landscape, and for a

moment he almost wished the burning illusion to be real, and that the trees might return to their

rightful place in the forest, that this blemish on the beauty of the world removed. For him, this


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only lent him more resolve to be out of the town and back to the woods soon, perhaps heading

for the mountains this time. For her, she leaned heavily on the railing and put a hand to her face,

not wanting him to see the few tears she shed over the images that flashed through her mind.

She quickly regained her composure as he came to stand beside her.

“It’s a beautiful dawn.” He spoke softly as he reached her side, placing his hand on her

shoulder.

“It is,” she said, her voice barely a whisper.

“Look, I know it’s been a rough few days. We’ll get back out in the woods as soon as we

can. I know the city’s bothering you.”

“Yeah.” She lapsed back into silence, and he turned to walk inside.

“I hate seeing all this worthless destruction,” she burst out. He glanced back at her,

raising an eyebrow, but she was still looking out off the balcony.

“There’s no reason for them to cut down the forest; there aren’t any nearby towns that

would attack them, and wild animals would be kept out by a much smaller fence,” she said.

“They didn’t have to destroy so much in their attempt to be safe! They could have done half this

or less and been totally fine!”

He took a deep breath. “Is this about the forest, or is this about me killing those two

men?”

She didn’t respond. He sighed.

“Pack your things. We’ll leave right now,” he said, and walked into the apartment.

Despite their general lack of possessions, getting disentangled from the apartment took

some time. When they finally reached the city’s eastern gates, each with a small pack of basic

supplies and he with a sword at his hip, heavy storm clouds covered the sun. A light rain picked

up as the gates opened for them to head out – gates which quickly shut behind them as they

stepped out into the countryside, and tried to get their bearings as to which way they should go.

“I saw some mountains up to the north before the clouds rolled in,” he suggested,

gesturing to the left.

She didn’t say anything, but nodded, and so they headed north along the wall, in the

general direction of the peaks he had seen. They reached the forest’s edge just as the storm

began to pick up. The wind pushed against their backs, and the rain, even through the trees, fell

heavily. A light fog began to gather on the ground as the temperature fell and humidity rose,

growing denser as they walked further into the heavily treed forest and as the rain intensified. At

one point he seemed to walk through a solid wall of the fog, between two larger tree trunks, and

disappeared entirely for a moment. She sprang forward on losing sight of him and caught sight

of him again, briefly. He then disappeared again. He was no more than two meters in front of

her, and yet the mist was so thick that even at that range she could barely keep track of him.


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“Perhaps we should stop and wait for this mist to clear,” she said; “for all we know we

could be going the wrong way entirely, and I’m having trouble following you in this mist.”

“Good idea,” came his reply, and he reappeared out from behind the next tree in front of

her. The sound of a breaking branch cut through the mist behind him, and he half turned again to

face the sound. Peering around the tree, he came face to face with yet another wall of fog.

Another crackling sound came from within the fog, and he stepped forward, his hand on his

sword.

A wolf leapt from the fog, pouncing for this throat. His knee-jerk reaction moved just

enough that the wolf missed his throat, instead slamming its body into his head. He fell into the

leaves and dirt at his feet, twisting sideways to land on his chest. He did not move to get up

again. The wolf slunk into the trees on the other side, turning again as it disappeared into the

mist. She knew the animal wouldn’t be alone, that the pack lurked in the mists beyond the

visible ring of two meters or so to each side. She propped her friend up against a large trunk and

knelt over him, listening carefully. Sure enough, there was the rustling of undergrowth in all

directions: the wolves had surrounded them as they had been wandering blindly.

She pulled the sword from his belt and looked at it cautiously, unsure of herself. She

didn’t know if she could fight anymore. Worse yet, if she could, what else could she still do?

What else had she failed to forget? She panicked momentarily: if she still remembered, she

thought, they would survive. But if she did not, and she had been successful in forgetting that

life, they would die. She looked down at his inert form against the tree. His breathing, shallow,

indicated he still lived – and better yet, he wasn’t bleeding from the few light scratches that the

wolf had left. The slightest sound of a wolf pouncing shattered her pensiveness, and she whirled

around, bringing the sword arcing up from the loose grip she had unconsciously held. The blade

caught the wolf squarely in its underbelly, slicing it open from its tail all the way up its abdomen

to its ribcage, and penetrating nearly to the spine. She moved instinctively as she delivered the

blow, and the wolf sailed straight past her, dead from the cut before it even hit the tree where she

had laid her companion. The dead wolf fell into his lap, streaming blood onto his clothes. She

frowned with distaste at the sight, and then, still holding the sword loosely in her right hand,

moved to stand over him, with her back to the tree.

Some time later, he awoke. There was a pressure on his shoulder, he thought. Also, he

was covered in some warm, sticky fluid. He pulled himself upright, forcing his eyes open, and

started in shock at the wolf carcass that fell from his shoulder. His clothes were drenched in

blood. He grimaced, but he didn’t think it was his own. If all that were his blood, he wouldn’t

have woken up. But, he thought, where’d the wolf come from? He was no match for a pack of

wolves. Also, he figured he might remember fighting a wolfpack.

That was when he realized there were at least another dozen corpses around him. Then

he saw the blade impaling a wolf’s head to a tree to his right. The mist had cleared while he was

unconscious. About a dozen strides away, his companion knelt in the dirt, head in hands. He

moved to stand beside her. He hadn’t realized how stiff he was… how long had he been out? At

least she looked unharmed.


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She heard him moving, but cared little that he was awake again. She had long since

stopped crying, as she had started when she had impaled the last wolf to the tree. The flashback

to the boy she had murdered, along with so many others who were only trying to survive in the

service of men who had sent them to die, had unnerved her. After all, the wolves were little

different from the boy. He had been trying to survive, as had they. Nature compelled them to

kill for survival, whereas whatever lord he had served had compelled him to fight. She, too, had

fought for survival this time, yet she couldn’t shake the feeling that perhaps it could have been

avoided.

If only she hadn’t been so hasty to leave town, the fight might never have happened.

Then, she thought, all this unnecessary death might have been avoided. Her friend wouldn’t be

coated in blood. She wouldn’t have had to kill again.

For the two hours since the last wolf fell, she had knelt where she knelt now, sifting

through her doubts and fighting back memories.

“Uhh,” he mumbled stupidly, breaking the silence. “Did you do all this?”

“Yeah,” came the reply as she raised herself from the dirt. “Don’t worry about it.”

She turned and walked off towards the mountains now visible through the tops of the

trees. He, bewildered, picked up the sword and followed. He had never asked where she had

come from but… then, she had also never killed an entire wolf pack before.

The next few days returned them to their familiar lifestyle: hiding out in whatever natural

shelters they could make; scavenging the woods for food; heading constantly toward some goal

that looked interesting. As the week drew on, the mountains loomed closer and closer, and the

woods grew older but more open and alive. They followed a small stream that ran through the

valley between two foothills, winding down from the melting snowline to the Great River

somewhere below. During the day, golden sunlight streamed in shafts through the holes in the

canopy, glinting brown and auburn off of the ground cover of fallen leaves and dark, rich dirt.

As they approached the mountains, the ancient trunks grew massive, but stood far apart; and the

lowest bows stood easily twenty meters off the ground. The ground cover dwindled to patches

of dark green ground shrubs bathed in pools of sunlight that streamed through the holes in the

canopy; the small stream shone, a brilliant silver ribbon running through a shallow trough in the

lowest point of the valley. The whole scene exuded peace and beauty, untouched in all of time

by anyone who would harm or exploit it.

Yet, he noticed, her customary peace and joy had not returned. A week or two earlier she

would have danced through these woods. The scenery would have caught her up and carried her

away. Carefree and joyful, she would have drunk in every detail of the woods. But now, she

was, well, none of those things. She stalked sullenly at his side. He saw something flashing

behind her eyes, something unstable, something unknown – something that made him afraid.

For himself, the brief contact with society had made his mood significantly better. But she… she

had reverted to the mood she had when they first met – dark, grim, unmovable. He knew that

first night in the caravan had been disturbing, but she had seemed almost past that by the time


14

they reached the city. Returning to the woods should have pushed it out of her mind, and

restored her to a place where she could find peace. Yet since the incident with the wolves, her

mood had only grown steadily worse. Unfortunately, he felt bound by their customary silence.

He wouldn’t ask until she decided to tell him.

For her part, she saw the beauty before her, and yet it rang hollow. Death permeated her

thoughts, and its shadow seeped into the world around her – or so it seemed to her. It had been a

fool’s hope, she thought, to try to run from her past. The failures, the regrets, the guilt would rise

each time she drew a sword, each time world forced her to defend herself. Trying to push the

emotions away, she focused in on the forest. Yet with each step, the light of the afternoon

darkened in parallel with her thoughts.

And so the two walked through a veritable wonderland of living beauty and vitality. He

looked about, gathering in all the joy and wonder he could hold, reveling in his newfound

freedom, while she strode quietly, slipping silently into an ever-deepening chasm she had opened

in her soul.

Days later, they had travelled far enough to bring the mountain summit to loom silent and

frozen above them. With the last of the alpine forest several miles behind, they stood in an open

field of snow, boulders, and ice – a gently sloping sheet of black rock mingled with the blue of

ice, all under the pure whiteness of untouched snow. They stood near the top of the ridge,

looking upward at the summit. He huddled in the leeward shadow of a boulder, hiding from the

biting wind of the mountain. She stood, poised on top of the boulder, balancing on the toes of

her left foot, left hand resting on the pommel of the sword hanging from her belt, right dangling

loosely at her side. Her eyes closed, and she leaned into the wind, taking long, slow, deep

breaths of the alpine air. Here, where not even low ground shrubs or grass could survive the

endless cold, where the unrelenting freezing brought death to everything that tried to live, she

decided that she needed to choose.

Silently, she turned and beckoned to him to follow her. They began the trek back down

the mountainside.

They stopped to rest in an alpine meadow. Unlike the ridge, the meadow bloomed with

life – lupine, avalanche lilies, and other brightly colorful blossoms filled the open space between

the low trees. A small pond sat in the central bowl of the meadow, surrounded by blazing

patches of the orange, purple, yellow, and white wildflowers, all on a background of bright,

vibrant green. The sky hung brilliantly blue and cloudless overhead, the sun streaming bright,

white light onto all below. He sat, eyes closed, listening to the hissing of the wind in the trees,

basking in the quiet warmth of the sunlight. They should have come to the mountains sooner, he

thought. These valleys and peaks brought him more peace than he had known in years.

She quietly stood from where she had been sitting, not wanting to disturb his peaceful

rest, and approached him. For a moment she stood behind him, watching him bask in the sun,

then landed a swift kick to his temple. He fell sideways in the grass and lay still. She checked

his pulse: still alive. She turned and walked on down the mountain, playing with the pommel of

her sword, leaving him unconscious in the meadow.


15

When he awoke, he found the sun was pleasantly warm on his cheek. He hadn’t thought

he had fallen asleep. He certainly hadn’t meant to. But he was glad that he had. He felt good.

Rested. Ready to keep going. He had an unexpected headache, but other than that, he felt great.

He sat up, shielding his eyes against the light of the late afternoon sun. He had been out for quite

some time, it seemed. He hoped she wasn’t too upset at his laziness. Normally he wouldn’t

have worried, but worrying about her was all he had done the past few days.

“Well, we should probably get moving again. Sorry I slept so long. You could have

woken me up,” he said, to no response.

He looked around. She was nowhere to be seen. A slow sinking feeling grew in his chest

as he stood up. She had left him in his sleep. And taken the sword with her. And not told him

where she was going. He didn’t want to stay by himself, he had grown too used to company.

Not to mention, he didn’t feel safe unarmed in the wilderness – a wilderness that he knew all too

well contained wolves.

He decided to try back for the town. At least there he could gather himself and find

supplies and a new sword. He’d worry about what he’d do after that once he got there. So he set

off down the mountain.

* * *

At dusk two days later, she stood at the edge of the field, facing the walls of the town.

She had taken up an alternating jogging and walking rhythm for sixteen hours of each of the past

two days and covered in those two days what had taken them five to cover going out. She hadn’t

felt this good in years, blood coursing, muscles slightly tired but strong and fluid, staring down

on an unwitting target. The sun was falling in the sky to her right, she knew, as the light was

fading, but the sun itself was covered by a heavy layer of clouds. He would be returning here in

the next few days, hoping to find her or at least recover before heading out to seek her out. She

felt a slight pang of guilt that he would be disappointed… but then, she had already disappointed

him once. Shaking the thought away, she surveyed the town. She hoped she would find the

armory before too long; she wanted to find a second sword to match her first. And perhaps a

longbow. Armor would be nice as well, and she had no doubt this town -- on the frontier as it

was -- would have no shortage of the heavy leather she liked. Perhaps not in her style, but

functional at least. The sky darkened substantially, and no moon or stars shone through the

cloud layer to replace the rapidly fading light of the sun.

Her mood shifted and settled. If she did this, she thought, she could still turn back. She

could make up a story, maybe, and wait for him here. She could tell him that she had come back

down to arrive here only hours before him and find the town the way it would soon be. Or her

attempt would end in her death, and everything would end. Or, she thought with a shudder of

equal adrenaline and fear, she might find that she really was ready to return. In any case, she

wouldn’t know until she tried.

After slipping across the field, she climbed the wall, paused, then, vaulting the top she

sank her blade into the back of the neck of a guard as he walked by. With the blade through the


16

chink in his heavy metal armor, he sunk to the boards of the narrow walkway along the top of the

wall silently. She pulled the blade out and extinguished the torch the man had been carrying.

She then pushed the body into the dark shadow of the wall, and moved onward toward the next

guard.

Twenty minutes later, with all the guards dispatched and the lights on the wall out, she

moved to the gate, where the two on-duty men were looking nervously at the darkened wall,

unsure what to make of the disappearance of their men when no enemies had been sighted. She

shrugged the longbow she had taken from a corner guard off of her shoulder and put an arrow

through the throat of the man standing at the alarm bell, and then the next man near him, the

gatekeeper. To her disappointment, none of the guards thus far had carried swords, only spears

and a crossbow or longbow. Unsheathing her single sword, she ran down the stairway toward the

small guardhouse by the gate. The three men sleeping inside died noiselessly as she slit their

throats. She smiled grimly as she took stock. The assault had gone better than she could have

possibly hoped. No one had made a single noise, nor raised an alarm, and thirteen guards lay

dead, with eight on the walls and five at the gate. Again, she extinguished all the torches in the

guardhouse and gatehouse, and moved along the base of the walls, extinguishing all those along

the inside as well. The inner town now sat in an island of light, its walls swallowed by the

darkness.

Keeping an eye out for townspeople, she crept through the streets and extinguished all the

torches there as well. Now only the governor’s house remained, an island of light with a futile

two guards on night watch, and five more sleeping inside. Twenty men armed at all times to

defend the town in total. A tiny number. She aimed carefully and dispatched the two men

standing on the ramparts. She noticed three more men higher up, looking curiously out across

the darkened town. They had noticed the oddity and raised more guards after all. No matter.

The three fell within five seconds of the first arrow being fired.

Shortly after midnight she skewered the governor to his bed with a long, finely made

dagger she had found in his armory. She had also found a full-body suit of black leather, not

quite her size, but close enough once she had fixed it in a few places. It lacked a mask or a

helmet, but covered everything else quite nicely. She had also found a second sword and a

second quiver, which she filled with two dozen arrows. She stood in the top of the town’s bell

tower and looked out on the dark city. The time had come for her vision of the city burning to

come true. She headed out and built piles of kindling all over town. Taking the final lit torches

from the governor’s house, she ran through the town, lighting the piles, starting with the ones to

take out the stairs to the walkway on top of the walls. She arrived back at the gate before any of

the townspeople’s houses had truly caught. She slipped through, then barred it with the iron-

shafted spears from the guards’ quarters.

Climbing a tree to the east of the city, she peered above the walls, watching the trapped

townspeople flee to nowhere as their town burned to ash with them inside. She smiled. She had

done her work well.


17

Part II

He arrived at the ruins of the town three days later. The grey ash had blown across the

field in streaks, creating a massive black sunburst across the grass outside the charred walls.

Inside, low, charred ruins of each house remained, each standing no more than three feet, save

for a few major columns built of whole tree trunks. A blanket of fine ash lay on everything, iron

grey and shot through with charcoal where larger beams had fallen. The outer wall stood largely

intact, though the stairwells had taken a segment or two with them when they collapsed.

A wind, blowing steadily in from the west, swirled the dust at his feet as he gaped at the

scene. Light grey clouds hung heavily in the sky, so that all before him, from the ground to the

roof of the heavens, lay cloaked in grey. He walked among the low charred shells of houses,

along what used to be streets, unable to believe the town he had visited barely a week and a half

before had been utterly destroyed, and had obviously been so for days. She couldn’t have made

it here before the fire, he thought. The ash had seen rain, and the last shower had passed two

days ago. And he couldn’t imagine her travelling that quickly. It was unreasonable. She must

have found the town burned and continued on. A movement caught his eye.

“You might find that the people here are a little… burnt out from the last week. Must’ve

worked too hard,” said a voice from behind him. Though female, it was not hers.

He turned around. A pretty girl in her early twenties, slender, pale, with dark curly hair

framing her face, leaned against one of the few upright columns. She threw a charred stick at

him, smiling devilishly.

“What are you doing here, stranger?” She asked.

“I have a friend who I think must have passed this way. She came down out of the

mountains before me,” he answered, still put off by her sudden appearance.

“How long?”

“Not too long, I would think. A day or less. She’s probably a little faster than me. I took

about five days.” He wasn’t quite sure what to make of the girl. She had a straight, thin nose,

virtually unnoticeable under her large, dark eyes.

“Well, unless she blazed through the forest the way the fire blazed through this town, that

seems a reasonable guess. That would put her here after the fire, don’t you think? It’s a few

days gone.” She continued smiling at him, head slightly bent forward. He pushed down an

instinctive desire to back away from her. There was something uncomfortable about her gaze.

“Ummm… yes. I would think so,” he said.

“I come from the next town over,” she said. “When I heard about the fire, I came straight

over. I’ve been here for a day and a half, and I’ve found some signs of what happened. I also

have an old friend I think was here – luckily, I think she escaped. I’ve kept looking, trying to


18

decide where she might have gone.” She stepped away from the column she had been leaning

against.

She moved with surprising grace, stepping through the uneven rubble with ease. She

came and walked around him, tapping him on the left shoulder as she came around. “Maybe I’ll

see you later in your travels, if you come by my town. I think that’s probably where my friend

went – and maybe you’ll find yours there, too.”

With that, and an unnecessarily dramatic half-spin, she walked off through the ashes. He

was thoroughly confused. Who was she? Why did she just walk off like that? Who spends

almost two days alone in a burnt down town? Why had none of the people from her town come

with her? The headache that had plagued him for the past few days started to throb again as he

grew more confused. No matter, he would continue down the road. Though the girl was

confident she knew where her friend had gone, he wasn’t so sure about his. But then, she could

be anywhere, and the next town would at least be a place to stay. Though, he doubted she would

be there.

Unbeknownst to him, his companion watched from the trees as he started down the road

towards the next town. Good, she thought, he had decided not to search the woods for her. She

slipped back into the undergrowth below. She would never see him again, if he kept up his

current course. Well, perhaps not never. She had more work to do, and a name to reclaim.

Depending on how unlucky he was, he might find himself in her path.

She stood, only to find her feet knocked out from under her by a kick from behind. She

landed on her back, rolling as soon as she found purchase, and shot out her feet in an upward

kick. She saw a shape move, and her kick missed. Using the extra momentum, she launched to

her feet. A punch caught her in the right shoulder, hard, and she staggered for a second. She

turned, and caught a glimpse of her assailant spinning behind her. She continued her turn and

caught the next punch before it could land, and twisting clockwise she pulled her opponent

toward her next kick. The attacker jumped over the kick, and pulled her forward in turn, landing

a left-handed hook on her jaw. Frustrated now, she shoved herself forward and slammed her

shoulder into the figure. She let go of the arm, turned in mid-step, and brought a sweeping kick

to the back of her attacker’s legs. Her enemy fell over, landing in the brush. She kicked the

figure in the side, rolling her foe to lie face down. She knelt, with her foot on her enemy’s lower

back and knee in between the shoulder blades. She pushed down, and leaned forward and pulled

off the mask the person was wearing. The mask she would keep, it would be useful. It

completed her outfit.

“Who are you, how did you find me, and why did you attack me?” She grunted.

“You don’t recognize me? I heard a town had been burned down, no survivors, no

witnesses, no alarms. I thought it might be you, but I had to fight you to be sure.”

She stepped back, and her attacker quickly stood. Pulling long black curly hair out from

underneath the collar of her shirt, the pale, slender girl turned to face her.

She stepped back from the younger woman. “You were still looking for me?”


19

The girl nodded assent.

“Still? After five years?”

“You should have known we would never stop looking for you.” the girl said. “You were

far too much of an asset to us and our training. We would have followed you anywhere, if you

had asked. But you didn’t ask. You just left.”

She recovered quickly. “I didn’t think I would find any of you this close to the River

Divide. We never used to come this far south.”

The girl chuckled softly. “You didn’t seriously think that the Harbingers would stay

together when The Warrior had left us. Without our Mistress, we were a crew without a leader.

None of us could fill your role. Death’s a good fighter, but she’s no leader. We couldn’t pull off

the raids the warlords asked for without you. So we split off, going to cites all over the West to

look for you. When we found you, we wanted to come back together. Get things going again.”

The pale girl smiled as the older woman paused, thinking. Alone, the older woman

thought, she had been deadly. With the Harbingers at her side, she had been unstoppable. Their

band had single-handedly tipped the balance of wars. They had usually fought for the highest

bidder, but she could change that. Use their skills to build herself something better than just cash

reserves. She breathed deeply, images flashing through her mind of a fine life, surrounded by

riches, lording her power over the common folk.

A tiny part of her resisted. Called for her to stop this before it ran out of hand. Begged

her to catch up to him, discard her weapons and armor and return to the forest, tried to make her

feel pity for the poor who would be crushed in the war, crushed by her rule. She pushed aside

the resisting part of herself, discarding it as a weakness. But a shred of doubt remained. She

forced the thought out of her mind. It would not do to hesitate in front of one of the Harbingers.

“Fine. Take me to wherever you’ve been staying – and then we can talk about gathering

the others.”

The devilish smile returned to the girl’s face. The smile that had made this girl one of her

favorite Harbingers. She did very well on undercover missions, with that pretty smile that won

so many friends so easily. But in private, she could see the malice in it. She liked that in a

smile.

She beckoned, and they walked off into the woods, toward the town he was heading for

as well. There was work to be done.

He, for his part, traveled south for the remainder of the day. He had forgotten how

distantly towns were spread. No one wanted to be too close in case relations went sour, but also

wanted to be close enough in case they needed help. Frankly, he felt it was all silliness. Too

many people in one place all trying to live off the same land. They tried to stay together because

it was “safe”. He had spent ten years wandering a forest, the first five totally alone. And the

only time he had been attacked was when he went near a town. He sighed quietly. There was

nothing to be done about it, so he might as well not worry.


20

Walking through the gate, he looked around the town. It was significantly larger and

better fortified than the last town, with high stone walls surrounding what looked to be twice as

many low wood buildings inside. His geography was a little rusty from being gone for so long,

but he thought this was the first major trade town this side of the River Divide. The destroyed

town had been the first this side of the Divide, but this was where the trade route split to go to

roughly another half-dozen towns. If he was correct, two of those were frontier-towns like the

last he had visited, two or three more were like this, and the last was a larger city which lay on

the trade route to the capital of the area. From there, the biggest trade road ran northeast into the

plains and across the border into the Central Plains Kingdom.

He arrived at the town center. Since he still had almost all the coin the merchant captain

had given him, he set about looking for a place to stay, as well as some food. He would need to

find odd jobs to keep paying for himself, or perhaps hunt for a brief time. He needed to find her,

but it wouldn’t do to starve in the meantime. But before he could do anything for her, he needed

to establish himself. So work it was.

* * *

The two women slipped into town at night. The pale girl had paid off the night guard at

the gate long ago and he let them in through a hidden side door. The two made their way to the

girl’s home, an old run-down house in the poorest part of the town, with an interior more

reminiscent of a fortress armory than a slum house. Well-made weapons and armor of all kinds

lined the racks on the walls, and the doors and walls were reinforced with steel grating. The girl

moved to set up a second bed alongside the one at the far end of the room.

“It gets a little warm in the summer, what with the reinforcements to the walls, but the

extra security keeps out the petty criminals here in the slums,” she called across the room.

“We’ll only be here for a little while, I assume? I don’t think we can fit more than you

and I in here,” she said, perusing the weapons and switching out her throwing knives for better

balanced ones, as well as choosing a pair of twin blades in place of the run-of-the-mill short

swords she was carrying.

“Of course. I have ways of getting all these supplies out of here and into the safe-house

in the next town over. That one is larger, watched over by another Harbinger, and will be able to

hold all of us.”

“Good. How many of the Harbingers do you think will still be loyal, given my absence?”

“Well… I know of the nine of us that had followed you, all of the Harbingers of my unit,

War, are with you. That’s three. I also believe the Harbingers of Doom are still loyal, but I

don’t know where they all are. I believe at least one to be here in the southwest. Perhaps more.”

“That leaves the Harbingers under the command of Death. Where is she?”

“I can’t rightly say. She stayed in the northeast, but the last I saw of her was five years

ago. When you left, she asserted herself as the most senior Harbinger and asked the rest of us to


21

follow her. When we said no, she dispersed us all over the region. I wouldn’t be surprised if

she’s turned on us.”

“Frankly, I wouldn’t be surprised either. Back before I became the Warrior, she was first

in line. Then I proved myself the better fighter.” She paused, then, seeing that the younger

woman was still watching her, she muttered “If she has turned on me, I’ll make sure to show her

that I still am the better fighter.”

She saw the pale girl’s eyes glow in admiring fear. She knew the girl was terrified by

her. Turning back to the wall of weapons, she frowned. She had always ruled the Harbingers by

fear; it was the only way to keep them in line. The younger ones loved her for it – she had

brought them into the fold, trained them, and they had always seen her as a paragon of strength

for it. The older ones, however, resented her.

Yet there was something wrong. The girl was as admiring as ever… but she herself

hadn’t felt the words as she had said them. Her old drive to conquer, to fight, to destroy – she

didn’t have it. Or at least it was very, very weak. Shoving the thought aside, she reasoned that

the old mentality would come with the territory as she regained her skills and started training.

She had gone soft, but that would change.

The choice had been given her, up on the mountain, and she had taken the chance. She

had been the best before, and she could be the best again. Time and time again she had proven

it. Everywhere she went, people died. The question was simply whether she could harness that

death to her own end. She was Death. She was Doom. She was War. She was everything that

the Harbingers stood for. And that was why she had become the Warrior. By challenging and

killing the last Warrior, and defeating the other claimants as well, she had taken the title.

Everyone fell before her. And now they would again.

She was the Warrior. Or she had to become the Warrior again. It was the only thing she

knew, the only thing she could come back to.

She spoke toward the wall, but addressed the girl behind her. She forced her voice to be

steady to hide the unease inside her. Her voice came out harsh and commanding, just as it had

been in the old days.

“Get some rest. We leave in the morning.”

“Yes, mistress,” came the reply. The girl obediently finished preparations and went to

her cot.

She walked to the door and looked outside, standing in the doorway. Glancing back at

the girl lying in the cot across the room, she felt a pang of guilt. As she stared out at the rising

moon, her doubts and guilts, repressed for so long, ate at her. Silently, she cried. It would not do

to show the girl her weakness. But she could not help but feel guilty for her treatment of the

Harbingers as a whole, and this girl in particular. The child was so sweet, and despite being

made into a killer, she had never lost her innocence. She had conscripted the girl at fifteen, and

then left when she was seventeen. The girl loved her as a leader and a teacher. And she had


22

used that to turn her into a weapon. A weapon to crush her targets and silence her enemies. The

pain of the hundreds that had fallen by her hand was barely a dull weight, nothing compared to

what she felt as a result of corrupting the girl. She leaned against the doorframe, exhausted. So

much death, but that had all been impersonal. This girl was the only true person to her, other

than the man she had just left. And she had, was currently, and would continue to use and hurt

both of them, no matter how much she wanted to heal them. She chuckled bitterly. Death was

the only thing she knew. Causing pain came more naturally to her than healing, anyway. And

with that thought, she pushed down the regret building in her, wiped away the tears, and went to

the bed set up for her. In the morning, she thought, she must stop with the regret.

After all, it was time for war anew.

* * *

He trudged back in the gate at dawn, wooden wheelbarrow behind him. He had gotten a

job working for a butcher as a gamesman, and had gone into the nearby forest at night to hunt for

deer while they slept. He had enjoyed a bit of success, and carted a deer with him in the

wheelbarrow. He arrived at the butcher’s shop at the same time as the butcher did, and handed

over the deer for his coin once they got inside. As he turned to leave, he heard a commotion

starting down the street.

“Sounds like the slum-folks are getting riled up again,” the butcher said without looking

up. “There’ll be a short riot, maybe an execution, and they’ll go back into their hovels again.

Nothing to worry about.”

He started outside, leaving the wheelbarrow by the door and ignoring the butcher’s

comment. This didn’t look like any ordinary riot. Almost all of the town’s fifty guards were in

full armor in the streets surrounding the entrance to the slums. He asked a guard in the back

what was going on.

“We caught an illegal weapons shipment being smuggled out of the city early this

morning. The man in charge of it easily gave in when we threatened him, and we traced the

shipment back to a slums house. We asked around, and some of the slum-dwellers said they saw

two girls in heavy black leather armor walking yesterday. Based on the descriptions, and the

weapons we found, we think we’ve found two of the old Harbingers. Never thought those

murderers would show up again, and certainly not this far south. But we have it under control.

There’s only two of them, and fifty of us, with the town’s men-at-arms getting ready to help.

They’re penned in.” The guard turned form him and moved back into the formation waiting by

the entrance to the slums.

He stood for a second, not sure what to do. Then that was answered for him. A wave of

surprise moved through the guards as two women walked out of the slums, dressed in identical

black leather armor. The surprise, however, was that only one was wearing a hood and mask, the

signature mark of a Harbinger. The other wore neither. Craning his neck to see over the guards,

he did a double-take. The girl without a hood was the one he had seen only yesterday. Dark


23

curly hair framed a pale and startlingly grim face. Then the women drew their swords. Each had

a matching pair of twin blades. One of the guards saw him gaping and turned to him.

“It’s fine, there’s no way they can take on all of us,” the guard said, laughing

dismissively.

“That’s not it. I saw that girl yesterday… in the ruins of the town down the road.”

He regretted the words as soon as he said them. Two of the guards looked at each other,

then at him.

“We’ve been asked to detain anyone coming from that direction, and anyone who knows

a Harbinger. Sorry, sir, but we’ll have to ask you to come with us.”

He didn’t resist as they tied his hands and shoved him through the crowded streets toward

the governor’s house.

An hour later, he was sitting in a cell beneath the house, under the watch of one of the

governor’s private guards. He looked up at the sound of the first of the three heavy iron doors to

the security cell opened, then the second, then the third. The pale girl, bruised and unconscious,

was thrust in next to him. The doors slammed shut and were barred again behind her. A few

hours later, she woke.

“Are you okay?” He asked.

“I’ve been worse.” She replied, with a quiet chuckle.

“Worse?” He gasped, incredulously. “You’re covered in blood!”

“Yeah, but almost none of it’s mine. As to the bruises, they’ll heal quickly enough.

Nothing is broken, at least not that I can tell. That means I’ve been worse.”

“None of the blood is... Wait, hold on.” He paused. “There are more important things

here. Who are you, why are you here, and why are you fighting the guards? Where’s the other

woman you were with?”

“Oh, I threw her over the top of the wall when we got cornered. The gates were barred,

and she needed to get to the next city. She didn’t want to leave me, but I’m very persuasive.”

“You… what?”

“We fought to the top of the walls, and when men kept coming, I got her out of here. It

was obvious we couldn’t fight all of the men in the city alone.”

“Okay, that didn’t answer any of my questions. Why are you fighting the guards? Who

was the girl with you? The guardsmen called you Harbingers, and that seemed to mean

something to them, but I’ve never heard of that.”

“Never heard of the Harbingers?” – She giggled -- “You must have been out of contact

with the world for quite some time”


24

“Ten years or so wandering the wilderness.”

“Well, that would do it. Eight years ago, that other woman I was with became what we

call the Warrior. Before she took the lead, we were just an elite fighting unit controlled by one

of the local kings. After she took over, we became mercenaries – the best mercenaries. No king

or army could stand against us. I was conscripted seven years ago to replace an older Harbinger

who fell attacking the town I lived in. We continued with our mercenary work for two years, and

then the Warrior disappeared.”

“Where did she go?”

“I can’t rightly say. Five years ago she vanished without a trace after one particular

mission, and the group essentially dissolved there. One woman tried to take over, but it became

obvious she wasn’t going to be a good leader. Anyway, the Warrior was the friend I was looking

for back in the ruins. I knew it had to be her work. We were on our way to meet up with another

loyal Harbinger in the next town over when the guards caught us.”

He shook his head, taking a deep breath only to sigh. “This is insane,” he mumbled.

She smiled, and chuckled again. “So you say, so it is.”

“How can you be in such a good mood when you were beat unconscious just hours ago?”

“My mistress is safe, and I saved her. That is all I need to be happy. I have my life back.

I am a Harbinger again, in the service of the Warrior.”

He raised his eyebrows in disbelief. “Never mind, maybe you’re insane…”

“Says the man who spent a decade wandering the woods alone,” she said, smiling slyly.

“At least I have a purpose. Now, if you’ll excuse me…” she turned and laid down on the cot

across the room.

He shook his head, still somewhat in shock, and laid down on his own cot off to the left.

Three weeks passed in the cell. Guards would come and deliver food or question one or

the other of them, then leave and bar the three heavy iron doors behind them. He knew nothing,

which the guards quickly found out, so they largely left him alone. She, on the other hand, was

questioned daily, and often was returned to the cell unconscious, battered, or otherwise tortured.

He had to admire her tenacity, especially out of someone so young. There certainly was

something odd about her… even on the worst days, when she was brought back unconscious and

beaten, she would awake, eat whatever ration had been left for her, and then make light and

pleasant conversation with him, constantly smiling. Even bruised as she was, with small cuts

over much of her face, her smile was devastatingly bright and cheerful in the face of all her

obvious physical pain.

One evening – or at least he assumed it was evening, as they had just been given the

second of their two daily meals – they were both lying on their cots, when the doors opened, and

a group of guards came in. As usual, they went over to her cot, and beckoned her to move

outside with them. He looked at her, concern written on his face, and she returned the look with


25

a dazzlingly bright smile… but a smile that did not reach her eyes. Her eyes showed the pain

that had been engraved into her flesh over the past few weeks. She did hurt, but she would not

show it, not to these men. To him, maybe, but not to the guards. To them she would show her

strength. The look lasted only a second, but it left a profound impression on him. The girl was

strong, yes, but she was still only human. Pain would take its toll eventually.

A while later – it was impossible to tell how long – the doors reopened, and she was

tossed back inside. It had been a worse session than ever before. She was unconscious, with a

long cut running down her cheek from temple to chin, new bruises on her face, neck, and arms,

and likely more elsewhere. Two of the guards came in and flanked the door as the third threw

her to the floor in the center of the room. The sight awoke something in him, the same feeling

from the night with the trade caravan, when he had been afraid for his companion’s life. He

stood, and delivered a single blow to the guard in the middle of the room. The man fell

unconscious.

The other guards sprang forward, one hitting him in the temple with the butt of his spear,

the other knocking his feet out from under him. He fell to the floor, and they knocked him out

with a kick to the head.

* * *

When he awoke, he was back on his cot. She was cleaning the gash on his forehead

from the kick with a rag and some of their water ration. He went to sit up and speak, but she

shook her head and pushed him back down. She put a finger to her lips, motioning for him to be

silent, finished cleaning his cuts, and then split the remaining water with him. She went and laid

on her cot, and soon was asleep. Confused, he decided it was best for him to sleep as well.

Another two days passed. Since he had knocked the guard unconscious, they had been

left alone except for their food deliveries. He lay awake, wondering quietly whether they would

be executed, if the governor and his advisors were sitting in the hall upstairs debating their fate.

He had been quietly contemplating this possibility for about four hours, laying on his cot and

staring at the ceiling. The pale girl -- as usual, he thought – was sleeping deeply, somehow

undisturbed by the sudden lack of interrogations in her life. He looked over at her on her cot.

And the room shook slightly, as a distant crashing sound resonated down the stone

corridor outside their cell. She immediately sat bolt upright, staring intensely into space,

listening carefully. He, bewildered, started to ask what she was doing, but she motioned for his

silence. After a short time a second crash came.

“A little over a thirty second interval. The other Harbingers are here.” She said, “And

they’ve brought at least one ballista from the other safe-house.”

“They… what?” He stammered.

“Brought one of our ballistae. You can tell from the interval. A good crew – and the

other Harbingers are the best, of course – can fire about two bolts a minute and hit structures up

to a mile away. Not too accurately, of course, but something as big as the governor’s mansion is


26

an easy target.” Naturally, she delivered all these remarks with the same offhandedness as the

first comment. He stared at her, wondering why fate had thrown him into meeting this girl at the

burned down town. A third crash came. They sat in silence, with her pacing and breathing

deeply, while he sat on his cot wondering what was to become of him.

The triple doors to their cell slammed open. Five guards walked in. The leader motioned

to both of them.

“You’re both to come with me. I don’t know where you Harbingers got so many ballista

bolts, but one has been bombarding the mansion, while another one has been focusing on the

gate, and a third dropping bolts randomly on the city. The Governor wants to try to ransom you

two to stop the attack.” The guards came forward and tied their hands, then lead them out the

door.

They followed the guards down several corridors and up the stairs. A man-at-arms,

panicking, ran up to them.

“The gate is down, and the Warrior plus five other Harbingers have come into the city.

The other guards are no match for them. The Governor and the Captain of the Guard want the

both of them out on the front steps of the mansion, now. They want to end this attack before the

keep is overrun.”

The guards rushed them outside in time to see a figure in heavy black leather armor with

red seams pull a massive black longbow to full draw and release. The arrow lodged in the neck

of an older man in finely made steel armor cowering against the wall of the mansion, surrounded

by the corpses of guards. On the other side of the steps, one man-at-arms was decapitated by a

tall woman in black, another run through the gut by a shorter, similarly dressed woman, and a

third stumbled as the woman in front of him dodged his next strike. Before he could recover, she

bashed him upside the head with the pommel of her blade and he collapsed.

The five guards standing around them turned and ran inside the mansion, barring the

massive steel-reinforced door behind them. Sounds of further barricading could be heard

through the door for several minutes thereafter.

The woman in black and red strode up the stairs toward them, flanked by the five women

in black.

“War, it is good to have you back again. I found your auxiliaries, as well as Doom and

hers, in the next safe-house over. I found the ballistae there as well, and decided to put them to

use,” the woman in black and red said when she reached the top. “As for you, sir,” she said to

him, “You may call me the Warrior. Your cellmate is War; this woman” – she indicated the tall

one who had decapitated the man-at-arms – “is Doom. These others are the Auxiliaries, these

two of War, and these two of Doom. Their names or titles are unimportant, not to mention

nonexistent.”

“Uhhh… yes. Nice to meet you.” He stammered, totally overwhelmed. He just wanted

to find his old companion, thank her for the time they had spent together, and then either settle


27

down in a nice hut just outside of town. When he started paying attention again, the Warrior had

turned back to talk to the pale girl – War, as the Warrior had called her. He wondered exactly

what was going to happen to him.

“It seems we will have to bring your cellmate with us, War. He would be executed

otherwise, and I would have to consider him a casualty from our side. And I will allow none of

those.” The Warrior said.

The pale girl – War – replied, “Of course mistress. And thank you for coming to save

us.”

To his surprise, the Warrior backhanded the younger woman across the face. “I did not

come to save you, War. I came to restore the structural integrity of the Harbingers. We can’t

have you lazing around in a cell when you should be commanding your unit. Now come on. We

need to go.”

And with that, she turned and walked out of the city, leading them through the rubble, out

the ruined gates, to the tree line nearly three quarters of a mile away where the ballistae were set

up. The Harbingers set up an extra tent for him, set up a watch schedule and went to their tents.

He went to his and sat for a moment. The entire attack had barely lasted an hour, had occurred

entirely at night, and a governor and all but a handful of his guards and men at arms lay dead.

And, naturally, the portion of the city nearest to the gate was on fire. Even from here he could

hear the distant yells of the remaining townsfolk as they tried to put the fires out.

And here he was, in the company of a group of what he could only think to call ‘insane

murderers’ – especially the Warrior – and he wasn’t sure what they would do if he tried to leave.

He tried to take stock of the situation. It was certainly better than being in that cell. Yet not as

good as living a simple life in nearby hut. He decided it would be best to stay with them until

either they tried to kill him or offered to let him leave, since they would almost certainly do one

or the other fairly soon. And right now, it would be best to sleep while he could. He laid down

in the offered bedroll and fell asleep almost immediately.

On the other side of the camp, pacing slowly back and forth, scrutinizing every inch of

the tree line and the plains, the Warrior panicked within as she served her watch. How was it

that he managed to come back? He was an inconvenience, a nuisance she could not stand to deal

with at a time when so much depended upon striking swiftly and unrelentingly. The Harbingers

needed to assault and destroy the defenses of as many cities as possible in as short a time as

possible in order to regain their old prestige. Tonight had just been a start. She had planned

three more attacks that month, each near an old Harbinger supply depot that contained ballista

bolts, and while she was certain the girls could keep the pace, she wasn’t so sure about him. He

was the weak link in her plan at the moment.

She glanced upward as a cloud covered the falling moon, draping the world in an even

deeper darkness. She could kill him, of course… but War seemed to like him. And she wasn’t

sure she’d be able to bring herself to kill him anyway. She went back to her circuit as the cloud

passed. No, she would not kill him. Not yet. Not until he had at least shown that he needed to


28

be killed. She looked over at his tent. She had spent five years in the forest with him, and never

revealed her past. It was just as well. If she had her way, she would no longer be the woman she

had been a month ago. That woman had forgotten what strength was. She had forgotten the

thrill of defeating your weakness, banishing it to some distant corner of your heart, and doing

what had to be done. She had come to love the life around her, rather than using that life to gain

for herself.

She stopped. She had loved life in the forest. Now she had nothing but marching,

bloodshed, and fire to look forward to each day. Violently she shoved the thought aside. A

choice had been made, she reminded herself. She wanted to return to this, wanted to see if she

was still capable of being the best. And she would prove that she could be. She would prove

that she was still the Warrior. The sky began to darken as the moon set. Yet from there on, her

doubts only grew with the night, until she was relieved by one of the auxiliaries, and went to rest.

A few hours later, the sun rose. They packed up camp shortly thereafter and traveled to

the next town. They set up camp again, spent the night, and rose at dawn. After a week of

trudging down roads, using their only two horses to pull the ballistae, and sleeping on the

ground, they arrived outside the next city. At nightfall the prepped the ballistae, and at midnight

they attacked. Then they repeated the whole process.

On the last day of the month, she stood watch again at moonset. She smiled bitterly as it

went down over the distant ruins of the walls of the city they had attacked.

Another day passed, and yet again he found himself sitting in his tent. This was the first

night where they had neither traveled nor set up for a battle. His entire body was sore from the

forced march pace. Reflecting on the month, he was surprised to find that the pale girl – War, he

reminded himself, was what he was supposed to call her – was the only bright spot in the

otherwise terrifying journey. The Warrior was clearly insane, and dangerously so. The pale girl,

on the other hand, was still, well, crazy, but she was at least kind. Also, she was the only one

there who hadn’t threatened to kill him if he didn’t walk fast enough. She also was the only one

who hadn’t threatened to kill him if he tried to escape. Or if he complained about the food –

which he hadn’t – or if he didn’t roll his sleeping mat correctly.

More than anything, his new companions made him miss his old friend. He still needed

to find her. He added ‘apologize’ to the list of things to do when he found her. He hadn’t been a

particularly good travelling companion either. Always brooding, always silent. They probably

would have been better friends if he’d just spoken up more, been more willing to make

conversation. But missing her didn’t do him any good now. He just had to keep working with

what he’d been given.

Three days later, the Warrior stood and watched him, as smiled and laughed with War.

The girl should know better. Frivolity was not something a Harbinger could allow in her life,

and any friendship was frivolous in the life of a Harbinger. Anger grew in her heart, and she

resolved to stamp this out as soon as possible. If she had to, she would kill him… but it would

be better for someone else to do it, or War herself if possible. Or perhaps she could wait for his


29

own insecurities to crush him again. Heaven knows she was unable to cure him of the demons

inside him.

After all, the only thing she was good at was killing.


30

Part III

The dark grey of mixed charcoal and ash blended against the sky’s failing light on that

overcast evening. Charred shells of houses stood against the darkening sky, the smell of burnt

bodies hanging putrid in the air among the husks of their fallen walls. The sun would be setting

about now, he thought, if the clouds were rolled back… these people laying charred in their own

streets could be watching it had their own final sunset not come that day. As if in sync with his

thoughts, the light faltered and dimmed once more. Darker clouds had come across the horizon,

threatening rain for the night.

He knelt in the dust, inspecting the bodies of the townsfolk who had remained in the

village. Watching the battle had been horrifying, as the Harbingers tore into the unwitting

village, slaughtering everyone in sight. War and her auxiliaries had taken out the few watchmen

and then stood off to the side as Doom, her auxiliaries, and the Warrior had burned the town and

slaughtered its inhabitants. Shaking his head, he cleared his mind of the memory and went back

to looking at the bodies. He realized he could tell which Harbinger had killed each person.

Doom and her girls tended to decapitate their victims, or sever a limb or two. The Warrior

crushed skulls or stabbed through the head. All these four killed indiscriminately, and the

majority of the bodies in the town had been horribly disfigured and desecrated at their hands. By

comparison, War and her girls killed cleanly. Most of the time they disarmed their opponent and

gave a single stab into their lungs, stomach, or heart – and only attacked armed men. Standing

with an empty feeling inside, he gazed around at the ash and dust of the town. A strong, cold

wind from the west came across the town, swirling the ash, and bringing down some of the more

fragile walls. He felt there was something inexplicably wrong with killing the civilians so much

more brutally than the soldiers, but he was powerless to stop the killing rampage of the Warrior.

At least War was not the killing machine her mistress was.

He began the walk back to the camp as the last of the light faded. A soft rain began to

fall, blanketing the world in comforting white noise. He felt it was almost as if nature herself

were providing a counterpoint to the unnatural destruction wreaked upon the town. He missed

the forest dearly. All those years wandering came back to his mind… peace, calm, and

companionship had filled those times. Now nothing made sense. Reflecting on this, he made his

way through the misting rain and the darkness on his way to the camp. What had he thrown

away by not realizing how good things were when he still had them? Where had she gone, now?

Would he ever see his old companion again? The wind picked up again, swaying the tall grass

on either side of the pathway. He wondered about the other Harbingers. Were they all as evil as

their leader? Did Doom’s auxiliaries actually enjoy killing? Did War and her auxiliaries

secretly want to leave? They, at least, held back more than the others. Maybe he could convince

them that they didn’t want this life. That they could leave, and take him with them, away from

the rest of the Harbingers. But would the Warrior allow it? Or would she kill them first?

The camp was customarily quiet as he approached. The Harbingers were constantly

either silent or simply very, very quiet, with most conversations carried out in hushed voices.

Yet still, there seemed to be even less movement than normal as he came towards the tents. No

shadows fell on any of the walls of the tents from the area where the fire burned, and he didn’t


31

see the sentry posted. He tripped on something lying across the path, and fell to find one of

War’s auxiliaries – mask missing, blond hair trampled in the mud – laying dead.

In his shock, he found himself wondering if all of War’s unit was purposefully more

attractive than the other Harbingers, or if it was just a coincidence… then he shook himself clear

of the thought as the impact of what he found hit him. Someone was able to kill a Harbinger.

One of the women capable of taking down entire towns alone had been killed.

He crept along towards the tent, slowly and carefully now, and came across the other

auxiliary from War’s unit, again, mask gone. But across from her in the mud… another woman,

an older woman, wearing Harbinger uniform who he didn’t recognize. He was perhaps ten

meters from the circle of tents now. He moved along the ring, and slipped behind a tree,

carefully peering out from behind. In a gap between the tents, he could see the center ring.

Across the fire from him, the Warrior, still in full armor and mask, stood shoulder to

shoulder with War, who was missing her mask as her auxiliaries had been. They stood in front

of the far tent, and three women stood between them and him. None of them were wearing

masks. The one in the center was Doom, he knew, and one of Doom’s auxiliaries stood to her

right, but the woman in Harbinger gear to the left he had never seen before. They were arguing,

but he couldn’t make out the words. War blinked back tears.

The images of War’s auxiliaries ran through his head. War’s closest friends, killed by

whoever these newcomers were. He moved out from behind the tree, staying behind the cover of

the tents, and picked up a large rock. He moved to the opening in the circle off to the left, and

knelt to listen. He still couldn’t make out their words, but whatever it was seemed to be

escalating. War looked overwhelmed, while the Warrior stood tense yet loose. Like a mountain

lion ready to pounce, he thought. He stood and moved into the opening in one motion, drew

back his arm, and launched the rock into the side of Doom’s auxiliary’s head.

The woman slumped, and all the group turned to look at him simultaneously. All but the

Warrior, that is, who immediately jumped at the woman he didn’t recognize. Now that he could

see the new woman, she looked older than any of the rest of them, perhaps ten years older than

War. She didn’t stay looking at him long as she turned to fight off the Warrior. Doom, on the

other hand, started to move toward him, but War stepped into her way, and the fighting began. It

all went blazing fast, it seemed to him, but as some point the Warrior disarmed the new woman,

who somehow managed to hit the Warrior in the kidney in the same motion. The woman then

turned and ran. Doom quickly disengaged from War and followed.

He stepped forward, unsure what to do. War collapsed, crying, and he went to her and

knelt beside her. The Warrior, breathing heavily, yelled something at the running women, and

then turned and looked at him. She hesitated, then turned again and took up watch for the night,

where she stayed until dawn of the following day.

She stood with her back to the fire and gazed out into the night, off across the tall grass

plains Doom and Death had fled into. The last time she had seen Death came into her mind; the


32

eldest Harbinger had been the last person she had seen before she had left the Harbingers to live

in the forest.

They had stormed a castle that day. It had been the greatest assault they had ever

staged. A King had hired them to depose a rival King, and had given them ten thousand men to

do it. The battle before the walls had lasted a week, with herself and her nine Harbingers each

killing dozens of men a day, facing down an army of almost equal size to theirs. Two dozen

ballistae and a number of immense trebuchets and catapults barraged the massive stone walls all

throughout. On that final day, the ten women had stormed through the fallen gates and fought

their way to the throne room. When they had broken open the doors, she and Death had entered

the room while the other eight stayed outside to keep out any reinforcements that might have

come. The throne room was empty save an old man – the King – sitting alone at the far end. She

had pulled out her bow and shot an arrow through his neck. As he slumped to the steps in front

of his throne, a young girl – no more than four or five, had run from behind a pillar. A woman

followed her, but Death shot the woman before she took three steps. The girl had cried over the

body of the King. A few guardsmen entered, and Death ran off to fight them, telling her she

could have the honor of killing the apparent princess. She had walked up to the sobbing girl and

knelt down. And her heart broke. She turned and ran from the room – glad for the mask

covering her face. Death yelled after her, calling her a coward, mocking her for declaring

herself “the Warrior”, for proclaiming herself the greatest of the Harbingers when she was in

truth a weakling. She had half turned just in time to see Death running the girl through with a

spear. Once she had gotten out of the room she avoided the Harbingers, ran from the castle, and

fled into a forest. There she had stayed for five years, and there she had met the man who now

knelt with War by the fire.

Now, Death was back. And Doom was on her side. Too many Harbingers lay dead in

the campsite behind her. It was interesting, she thought, that all the killing she had done was

being turned on her now that Death had found her again. She looked over her shoulder. War

was still on the ground, and the man spoke softly to her. He seemed to be trying to calm her

down, and was having some success – she had stopped crying, even if she was still heavily

shaken.

She realized she couldn’t imagine what the girl was going through. The girl hadn’t

known about the schism in the Harbingers that had happened when she took the title of Warrior.

At the time she had killed the old Harbinger of Death – her main competition for the title – as

well as War’s Auxiliaries and one of Death’s. When the dust settled and the rest had fallen in

line, she had recruited the new girls to join them. The new Harbinger of Death, the old Death’s

oldest Auxiliary, had never forgiven her, and Doom seemed discontented, but less dangerous.

That night in the throne room likely was the end of all Death’s respect for the Warrior, but even

if not that, then her disappearance surely did in whatever begrudging loyalty Death had for her.

War had seen all three women, the Warrior, Doom, and Death, as mentors and confidants.

Doubts pecked at her heart. Had it been worth it, coming back? Betrayal and death

followed in her footsteps. Cities burned, lives and families destroyed fell in her wake. And now

the Harbingers – the group that all her vain plans hinged upon – had fractured, with more than


33

half its members dead. And all the while, she’d never been able to become the Warrior properly.

Sure, she had shown her prowess in battle. Sure, she’d been able to conquer and destroy, able to

hold off even Death and Doom in single combat. But never once had she been able to banish the

doubts from her heart. Never once had she been able to do any of it without regret, without

wishing that she had chosen another path.

Maybe it was time to give up. To move on. Maybe the death of the Auxiliaries and the

disappearance of Doom and Death meant that she should take War and go away again. But –

what if War saw that as another betrayal? Could she back down from being the Warrior and

still hold the girl’s respect? Or would the young Harbinger see her as a failure, as a lost cause,

and abandon her?

Was tracking down Doom and Death, ending them, and then ending the Harbingers the

best option?

She stood watch silently the rest of the night.

The following week passed dizzyingly. The trio moved from city to city, with the man

and War in plain clothes, asking the citizenry if they had seen women who looked like Death or

Doom. In each city, the response was the same: no. The two women seemed to have

disappeared, with no way to track them down. He had kept an eye out when they had passed

through the multitude of refugee camps for his old friend from the forest, but had no luck in

finding her. Wandering among all the faces of the displaced and desperate, he started to lose

hope that he would ever find her. It certainly didn’t seem likely, not when so many people were

on the move from the devastation the Harbingers had caused.

War, meanwhile, fell into an uncharacteristic silence for the week. Her normally cheerful

demeanor darkened, and she grew quieter and more tired as the week wound on. She had cried

as she had buried her auxiliaries, and had not spoken more than three sentences in a single

conversation since then. The Warrior kept looking over at her, as if worried, but he couldn’t tell

for sure – the woman had never even once removed her mask or hood. She kept around at least

three sets of the armor, as she had switched out of the blood spattered one, and had been wearing

another set when she had stopped to wash the bloody one and the dust-covered one she had

travelled in. He, for his part, tried to keep War company, but she kept shying away from him.

He had tried to talk to her about what had happened, but he had as few answers as she did, and

she would shut down after a few sentences and stop talking.

By the end of the week, he found himself resenting the Warrior. The woman just let War

sink farther into her sadness, ignored her as she pushed ever harder to try to find the two women

who had killed so many of their party. She might be a greater fighter than War, but apparently

the price of that skill had been her humanity. But time wore on, and they kept moving, and there

was nothing he could do to change the circumstances. So he waited.

* * *

The rain pouring down on War’s upturned face hid the tears streaming down her cheeks.

Somewhere behind the clouds it was dawn, but it only came through as a pale grey light that only


34

served to turn the dark horizon and trees into silhouettes, the light not reaching the black expanse

of the plain below the cliff edge she stood on. She stood still, surrounded by the hues of grey of

the sky and the pure darkness underneath the pines, all blurred together by the rain streaming

from the sky and across her face, across the tress, across the rocks and rivulets in the ground, off

of the cliff, down into the abyss below. She kept her eyes closed, hands hanging loosely at her

sides, as a chill wind sprayed the rain across her trembling features. She collapsed to her knees

as the wind blew harder, crumbling to a kneeling position, cradling her head in her hands. As the

rain slashed across her back, she cried all the harder.

What had she lost? Her two closest companions, the girls who had stood by her for five

uncertain years, were dead at the hands of their friends. She had been unable to stop it… no, not

unable. She was able, she had just failed. She had gone to them too late, hadn’t noticed the

incoming attack until the both of them were locked in losing battles, at which point she had been

assaulted herself. She had, during the fighting, not fallen back until she had seen both of them

cut down by Doom, another close friend. What had happened, why were the Harbingers --

sisters in war and in heart – killing each other? Why hadn’t she fought hard enough to stop it?

She was War. Battle was her only home – how could she have lost, lost so badly as to lose her

only friends? Why wasn’t the Warrior able to stop it, or if she was able, why hadn’t she? She

felt something slip inside and slumped to her knees again, slowly falling until she found her head

in her hands. A dull pain grew inside, became unbearable, and then broke in turn. Her hands

fell away from her face, and all thoughts went from her mind as she stared off into the darkness

beyond the cliff edge, ignoring the rain slashing against her face. She felt empty inside as she

stared into the abyss. The girls she called family were dead. The community she called home

was gone.

And her will broke, and she stared unmoving into the rain as somewhere the sun rose

higher and the dull light brightened. Eventually the Warrior and the man found her around

midday, collapsed in the mud and staring off over the soaked plains.

* * *

He got out of his tent and looked around. It was probably about an hour after dawn, three

days after he and the Warrior had found War kneeling by the cliff. The sun was warm and the

moisture left in the air from the overnight rain was pleasant enough, giving a fresh feeling to the

early morning. He closed his eyes and stretched his neck first one way, then the other. A hand

grabbed his shoulder and spun him around.

“Have you seen her?” The Warrior asked – rather unnecessarily loudly, he thought.

“Seen who? You know I don’t know where those women who attacked us are.”

“No, War. She wasn’t in her tent this morning”

“And what? You though she came over to mine?” He laughed good-naturedly. He was

in a good mood this morning, and the thought deserved a little gentle mocking. It certainly

wasn’t anything that would happen. He was surprised she had even wondered it.


35

“You two HAVE been a little too friendly recently,” she snapped back. “I never know

what you’ll do.”

He thought she seemed a little over-exasperated; it was just a joke.

“So she’s not here. She’s probably just off for a walk, like last time. She can take care of

herself,” he said.

“Normally, I’d agree, but the past few days haven’t been normal with her. The past

weeks haven’t been. And now she’s gone without even reporting in that she was going. That

certainly isn’t normal for her.”

“Whatever. She’ll come back and it’ll be fine. We might as well get a meal ready and

pack up camp in the mean-time. Then at least if we do need to go looking for her we can. I

mean, at worst she’s probably huddled in the woods somewhere again.”

It was the sense she expected out of him, mixed with a joviality she couldn’t stand. She

wasn’t happy about it, but he had a point. They couldn’t just run off after War with the camp

still up. Because if her fears were true, they might need it again before they found her.

He went about making breakfast, pulling down his tent in the spare time while cooking.

The Warrior had packed hers up quickly and was wandering the camp, checking the perimeter

continuously. He was worried about the way War had been acting too, but more in the ‘she

might decide not to keep travelling’ way than the ‘she might run away and never come back’

way. She didn’t seem like the kind of person who would just leave her friends, anyway. She

was probably huddled in the woods nearby, just as she had been when they had found her by the

cliff. It was no big deal, most likely. He would make sure to try to talk to her again tonight,

maybe spend a while longer on this try. She would open up again eventually, he was sure of

that. All he could do was hold out hope.

* * *

Elsewhere, Doom and Death were watching War stumble through the woods.

“Come on, we could take her right now,” Doom said.

“No, not yet. She hasn’t gotten far enough away. Just keep following her,” came

Death’s reply.

“She’s put a solid two hours between herself and the camp – that has to be enough.”

“No. Let her stumble along blindly a little longer. Her grief will keep her from realizing

what she’s doing for a while yet.”

“And when she does realize she should turn around and go back? What then? By then it

will be too late.”

“No, if we go sooner it will be too late. She’s mourning deaths which we caused and

which she could not stop. If we go out there now, she’ll react poorly. She’s still at the point of

being unreasonable. She could attack us,” Death posited.


36

“And if we wait until she comes to her senses, she won’t?” Doom shot back.

“I can’t guarantee that. You know what she’s like when she’s unstable”

“Isn’t she always unstable?”

“Well… usually, yes. But you know what I mean.”

“Sure. Crazier than normal. So we wait, then?”

“Yeah. Just a little longer. Then we can take her. We just need the right moment. Right

when she’s not sure what to do.”

They waited, creeping through the underbrush parallel to War’s path. Before long, their

problem was solved for them, as War stumbled and fell, cracking her head against a rock. The

young woman slumped in the dust, unconscious, and the two came out of the shadows to carry

her away.

Several hours later, War woke to find herself hanging from a tree branch by her wrists,

bound hand and foot with coarse rope.

Doom stepped forward into her range of view, hand up as if to calm her, or stop an

outburst. She was wearing dark green, not Harbinger black, and looked tired, worn down… sad.

She had no time to reflect on this though, as Death followed Doom from out of view. The

second the older woman stepped into her field of view she grew angry.

“You,” she growled. “You took my auxiliaries from me. My friends. My family. What

right do you think you have, to come in and destroy our lives?”

Death smiled sadly. “I haven’t done anything to you that you haven’t been doing to other

people for years. All those battles, all those wars you fought and won, were just a series of

shattered families. Every soldier you killed, every woman or child who died when you

bombarded cities, each death broke a family. Now you know what you’ve done to others,” she

knelt in front of War and looked up at her, straight in the eyes.

“It’s best if you accept that,” Death continued. “It gets easier once you have. You know

the pain. It’s time to wish it on everyone. That’s what made the Harbingers great, before your

Warrior. Each and every one of us came from a shattered family, from some place with death or

loss.”

“And what changed after? That’s exactly how you recruited me.”

“Perhaps the recruitment stayed the same. But before her, we all hated everyone. Even

one another. Then she brought in compassion – for her friends, for her enemies, and weakened

us. And then she disappeared, and you all lost your way. But we can come back from that. The

Harbingers have been broken, but we can be remade.” Having said this, she stood.

War looked over at Doom. The sadness she saw there… it backed a certain steel. War

realized that the other Harbinger had lost both of her auxiliaries that day too, had gone through

all the same grief and pain that she had. And she seemed to follow Death willingly. Maybe


37

there was something to it, to taking all your anger and pain and putting it into your work. Doom

looked her in the eye, and nodded. She took a half step forward, and spoke in a soft voice:

“War, I know how much you loved those girls. But love can’t exist in our lives. We

destroy families, lives, every time we step out onto the battlefield. The only thing that can cut

you off from the compassion you have learned is pain. Take all of that pain and sever yourself

from everything. Only then will you be able to be a true Harbinger.”

Still the younger woman did not respond, shaking her head silently. Doom sighed.

“The Warrior never told you why she left, did she? She felt mercy for an enemy in

combat, and exiled herself for doing so. Death here had to finish the job for her. If your loyalty

is with the Harbingers, with the Auxiliaries you lost, cut yourself off. The only way to make up

for your own inability to save them is to perfect yourself.” She paused. “We can help you with

that. Come with us.”

War cringed from the look in the woman’s eyes. The sadness was there, but so was an

intensity she had never seen before. But then, that look of insanity had always been there – just

not so intensely. She looked up into Doom’s eyes again, and a fresh spike of pain went through

her chest as she saw that all humanity had been driven from those eyes by pain and sorrow. She

thought back to her day in the rain. All the pain she had felt. All the loss over her friends. It

could all be gone. And she could be the perfect Harbinger.

“Okay. I’ll try. And then what?”

Death stepped forward, smiling coldly.

“Then, my child, we go after the Warrior. She can’t be left alive to try to stop us.”

* * *

A streak of brilliant crimson shone across the balcony she stood on. Dawn broke over the

city, the slanted light glinting off of the polished stone and marble pillars. They had searched for

days, wandering the forests, looking desperately for any sign that War had passed by. All the

while, she had been realizing in her heart how much she had cared for the younger woman, for

her auxiliaries, and even for Doom. As her desperation to find them grew – and as despair that

they were lost grew – she was forced to throw aside the act she had built as the Warrior. She

couldn’t keep it up. She knew she couldn’t hate the way she needed to in order to be able to kill

indiscriminately. She knew she couldn’t be the Warrior any more. Not when she had found

people she cared for. If only she had realized it sooner.

And when they reached a week with no sign of War or of anyone else, they had come to

the city to seek aid from a King she had once worked for. He had welcomed her graciously,

granting her the position of head trainer for all recruits in the army. The army certainly needed a

good trainer, he had said. He was working with the other nearby kingdoms to put down the

recent resurgence of warlords in the area. To do so, he had begun conscripting the poor into the

army, and he needed a good trainer to make them into a real fighting force. Hers was a powerful

position, and so he gave them a luxury suite in the palace to go with the command position. As a


38

light wind picked up and blew into her face, she reached up and unclasped her mask, dropping it

at her side. It thumped quietly onto the stone of the balcony. She pushed her hair out from under

her collar and let it flow in the breeze.

He was walking by the door, planning to head out for an early morning walk, and looked

out to see the rising sun. He stopped, started, and walked toward her. She had taken the mask

off.

He started to say something as he came out the door. But then she turned around and he

stopped both midsentence and mid-stride. He leaned back against the doorframe.

He stood aghast for a moment before chocking out a single word. “You…?”.

“Yeah. It’s me. Sorry it took so long to figure out who I am.”

He recovered himself and stood beside her, unsure what to say. He wasn’t even really

sure if this was real. He didn’t see how it could be. The Warrior and the girl he had known were

too different. They couldn’t be the same person. Then again, that would explain why she never

took the mask off.

She turned and looked back out at the sunrise. The Harbingers were gone. Done. She

would work, still, in combat, but as herself. She was no longer the Warrior, she repeated to

herself. Not in her heart. There couldn’t be a Warrior without Harbingers to back her. That,

after all, was the entire purpose of the Warrior, to lead the Harbingers. Now that the Harbingers

were dead or lost, the real Warrior was no more. She could listen to the doubts which had held

her back – the doubts that she now realized represented the truth. She would keep the name, if

just as a title for the King and his men to call her. A tear rolled down her cheek. She had a

chance to be free of her past at last. She hadn’t run from it, this time. It had left her. She would

need to look out for Doom and Death, and she wouldn’t stop searching for War, but she could be

safe in her new home. She had made sure of that. Her past wasn’t gone, precisely, but it was out

of the way, and couldn’t stop her from being herself any longer.

He looked over and saw her crying silently. He put his hand on her shoulder in an

uncertain attempt to reassure her, and they stared out together into the rising light of dawn.

After a few moments’ silence, she spoke again, so softly that, even at her side he could

barely hear the words.

“What if I’m not actually afraid of what I was, but of what I will be? I mean, I know I

was a killer. I embraced that. I know I was a heartless commander, and that I tried to break my

followers so that they would be like me. I embraced that too. Without those things, what am I?

Who am I? Even now that I’ve decided that’s not a part of me I want, not a part that I can ever

really be again, what if I can’t get rid of it entirely? What if it’s become such a part of me that I

can never be free from its shadow?”

He glanced over at her, his eyes soft, then stared back out at the sunrise. He then replied,

slowly at first.


39

“Your past will always be peering over your shoulder. Maybe the darker parts of you

will never truly go away, but you might be able to keep them away. Just make sure that every

time they haunt you, you refuse them. Tell yourself over and over again that that’s not who you

are anymore.”

“I know it’s not who I am. But I know it’s a part.”

He paused again. She was on the edge of crying again, and her whole body was shaking

as she spoke. He squeezed her shoulder and sighed. He replied:

“Did you ever have doubts? As the Warrior, I mean.”

“Not in the old days. These past months, yeah, constantly.”

“So you couldn’t be the Warrior, even when you wanted to?”

“Not really, no. Not the way I had been before I ran away.”

“And now you have doubts that you’ll ever be fully free of being the Warrior?”

She paused for a moment. “Yes,” she said.

“Then that’s just a part of you. You don’t have to worry about it controlling you, since it

didn’t even when you wanted it to. But you’ll never forget the past or your skills. And you

shouldn’t try to.”

She drew away from him, head in her hands, and leaned on the railing. Taking the cue,

he went back inside and readied himself for the day. When he left, he glanced out the door to see

her still standing on the balcony.

When he came back in the afternoon, she had gone, leaving a note saying that she had

been summoned to the gardens for an audience with the King. So he set out, arriving there only

a few minutes after her.

Every color imaginable lined the rows of the garden of the King. The air itself glowed

with the light refracting through the stained glass that lined the outer walls; the brilliant blue of

the sky overhead providing a sapphire dome that filled the remaining empty space with brilliant

color. The entire scene rested on a background of soft noise; the quiet gurgling of the fountains

that ran between the rows of flowers, the whispering of the wind through the leaves of the taller

trees that stood at the four corners of the enclosure. The light in the garden, where it was not

pouring multicolored through the stained glass, emitted a soft golden glow. Hundreds of

fragrances filled the air, somehow never clashing with one another, all blending perfectly, yet

still distinct. She and the King had walked together for a while, discussing his plans for the

future, and what she saw as the best policy for making those designs reality. It became clear he

saw her as a means to an end, a necessary evil, someone to be watched and never trusted, and not

truly as an ally or friend. She could deal with that. The King eventually left, and her friend

rejoined her to wander the garden. He knelt by a stand of wildflowers, lupine and paintbrush

among assorted alpine grasses.


40

“What did the King want?” He asked.

“He… has a friend who he’s working for now,” she replied slowly. “I’m unclear what

the terms of their deals are, but this man seems to want to unite all the kings into one

government. Wipe out the warlords, use the army to ensure peace on a massive scale. He needs

me to help with the initial phases and with defeating one particular local warlord who he’s been

tasked with defeating.”

“And this ‘friend’, he actually thinks he can get the kings to sign on?”

“He already has. Our King here, the two in the Northern Kingdoms, the King of the

Mountain Steppes in the southeast, and the King of the River Delta to the southwest. If all goes

well here, he’ll try to go east of the mountains and south of the river after that.”

He let out a low whistle. “Must be quite the talker.”

“He certainly has our monarch convinced. He’s sold on the idea of a new age. That’s

why he’s been raising such a large army. Stability to drive out uncertainty, order to replace

chaos, the peace of a realm united with its neighbors, quiet within its borders, and secure against

the enemies of the Empire.”

“A place where the Harbingers won’t be needed?”

She sat silent for a moment. “Yeah,” she responded softly, “A place where the

Harbingers won’t be possible.”

He nodded as the conversation trailed into silence. Then he spoke up again:

“Do you really think this ‘new age’ will be as good as he thinks?”

“Of course not. But I think it could be better than what we have. Depends on this fellow

who’s setting himself up to be High King. He’s not royalty, as far as I can tell, just a very

influential noble. Someone who controls a lot of the trade north of the River.”

“So the sort of guy who might be a problem.”

“Exactly the sort of guy who might be a problem. At least for his political enemies. But

for the common folk… wandering bands of soldiers are their biggest concerns. People like the

warlords, people like the Harbingers. The united kings would be better able to keep those

problems down.”

“Does this mean we’re in support of it?”

“It means it’s my job to lead the armies.”

He laughed. “Yeah, that it is. I suppose it’ll happen whether we support it or not, won’t

it?”

“Oh yeah, it’ll happen. We just might not live to see it if we’re not careful.”

“Well, let’s be careful then.”


41

Now she laughed. “Yeah, we will. Now let’s get home.”

And with that, the two set off back to their suite, and the day drew to a close.


42

Part IV

Death approached the bound girl, kicking her down onto her knees.

“Close your eyes… yes, that’s good. Now imagine yourself in a city. It’s burning.” She

paused. “Yes, all of it. You can hear the screams of the dying and the trapped over the blazing

of the flames as you walk down the central road toward the fortress at the center.”

The girl on the ground didn’t move, didn’t answer. So Death continued. “There is a

man, a wounded soldier on the steps. You kill him. What do you feel?”

War shook her head, then drew breath to speak. Death, kneeling in front of her, put a

finger to War’s lips. “No, don’t answer, just feel it. Was it the joy of the kill, hatred, or both?

… Don’t cringe, you fool, embrace the pain.”

War shook her head, and went to stand. Death backhanded her when she had made it

halfway to her feet, and War fell back into a sitting position. Still she stayed silent.

“You needed that hit,” Death said. “Now, I’ll ask you again; you kill the man on the

steps – do you feel either of those?”

War shook her head. Death laughed. “We can keep this up until you do. The blows will

only get harder. Let’s try again.” She kicked War in the stomach. The younger woman doubled

over, and her face set hard.

“Still nothing? … Alright, let’s try it a different way.” Death pondered for a moment.

Then, without warning, she punched War in the throat. The younger woman gasped for air.

“Can you hate me for hurting you? Yes? Good. Now turn that hate on him. And kill

him.” She waited for War to nod.

“… Better? Perfect.” Kneeling again, she slapped War harder. The young woman

opened her eyes, glaring at Death in indignation, her mouth set hard. Death laughed.

“Keep your eyes closed, you shouldn’t have expected the blows to stop just because you

passed that time.” She paused, chuckled again, then refocused. “Now, you walk on through the

shattered doors of the fortress. You find your target and kill him. You come back to camp.

What do you do?”

War said nothing. “Answer me,” Death prodded, pressing her boot heel into the girl’s

back.

“I sleep.” War muttered.

“… No. You don’t sleep. Not yet. First, reflect on everything you have done. Glory in

the destruction of the city, in the death of men at your hands. Only when you realize that true

domination requires you to not only be able to kill, but to love doing it, can you become the

perfect warrior.” War did not so much as blink in response. Death let out an exasperated sigh.


43

“Let’s try something else. Keep your eyes closed. Turn inward. I know you have the

longing to kill in you… let it out.” War still didn’t move. “LET IT OUT!” Death yelled, kicking

War onto her side.

“Take your anger and your pain and let them out as well! Let it all mix, focus on it, make

them stronger, let them feed on each other and create something new!”

She paused for breath, then stopped altogether, a strange light flitting behind her eyes.

“I’m going to bind your feet now,” She said. Immediately, she took more rope and tied

War’s feet together. War didn’t resist. And then, after checking the bindings on War’s wrists,

she continued.

“Good. Now that you can’t fight back, I’m going to beat you.” She laughed, an ugly

chuckle rising from her chest. The first blow came. And a second.

“I want to see you feel your pain and desperation build. Let them mix with your anger

and desire for death.” A third blow, a fourth. She kicked War’s head, stomach, and back. War

lost count, somewhere around thirty as she writhed on the ground in pain from the endless

beating.

“Do you feel it yet? The brokenness inside you? The helplessness? The rage? Let

everything spill over. Let it all out once you can’t hold it in any longer,” Death panted, mania

rising in her voice, her pitch and fervor rising with every blow.

“Have you noticed that the anger and desire to kill are gone? That you only know of your

own pain and helplessness? This is how you want your victims to feel. Cry if you wish, this will

go on until you give in to breaking. But you have to choose.”

This statement she repeated like a mantra for what felt to War to be an eternity. “You

have to choose,” Death said. “You have to choose!” Finally, as War began to slip into

unconsciousness and her movements slowed, the blows stopped.

“The pain and desperation will get you closer, but you have to make the choice in the

end,” Death whispered. “But no… it seems you are not ready to make the choice. Your will has

broken to the pain before you could choose it consciously. Very well, we will do this again

tomorrow. And eventually, you will choose to embrace the pain, and to wish it on others too.

I’d tell you to go to bed, but it seems you’re on your way to sleep already. So, better yet, stay

here all night. I won’t remove your bonds either. You can suffer here on the ground for hours.”

She knelt next to War, and as darkness closed in on the girl, Death’s words rang in her

ears.

“I will show you no pity. Because I feel no pity, of course. And soon, once you realize

that ultimately there is no power other than the ability to cause pain, you will feel none either.

And then you will thank me. Here’s one last kick for your health.”

She delivered a brutal kick to War’s back, and the young woman collapsed into

unconsciousness.


44

“See you in the morning.”

* * *

Back at the King’s castle, he had spent the morning watching her go about her duties as

commander of the King’s army. She had spent a fair deal of time training soldiers in the drill

yard, then had gone and taught strategy and small unit tactics classes for the officers and more

advanced soldiers. He had nothing else to do, so he had followed. He was fairly impressed by

how easily she kept the men in line. Not that it was particularly surprising that they stayed in

line. At the start of the time in the drill yard, one of the men – apparently taking offense at a

woman giving him orders – had spoken out against her and tried to intimidate her with his size.

She had knocked him out cold with one punch, and from then on there hadn’t been a single

complaint from the other soldiers.

He had approached her during what was essentially her lunch break. He had decided

there was some unfinished business between them, and wanted to resolve it.

“Hey, there was something I wanted to talk to you about.”

“And?”

“I wasn’t sure if you ever realized it when we were travelling with the Harbingers, but

I’m doing a lot better now that I was back in the forest. I figure it was mostly due to all the

support and help you gave me, even if it seemed like it wasn’t going anywhere at the time. So I

wanted to thank you.” He laughed. “For a while I wasn’t sure I would ever see you again to get

to say that. But I suppose it all worked out.”

She looked at him for a moment. “I’m not really sure I helped all that much. I might not

be a heartless killer, but I know I’m not a healer.”

“You are more than you think. You certainly helped me more than I could have ever

done for myself.”

“But I wasn’t able to do it while I was there. You mostly recovered while I was gone.

And I totally failed to keep War from losing herself in her sorrows.”

“You didn’t notice how much you were helping me because you were distracted with

your own issues. What happened with War, I think, was just another version of that – you were

so held up in trying to decide who you were that you couldn’t help her decide the same thing at

the same time. You help more than you know, and can’t see it through your own troubles. But

trust me, you do help. I would certainly know.”

She looked at him a moment longer, then turned away. “Well… Thank you, I guess. Or,

you’re welcome, maybe. I don’t know which to say to all that,” she said as she walked away.

He stood and looked after her. It was actually fairly funny, he thought. He had

mentioned that she couldn’t see what a help she was because she was distracted by trying to

figure out who she was… and she still couldn’t see it because she was still trying to decide. She

just needed a little more time, he thought. In the end, if he kept reminding her, she would realize


45

where her strengths truly lay. She may well have been the greatest soldier in the world, but she

also was compassionate, and caring when people needed it most. She just had to realize that, and

then she could work with that skill and be able to fix some of the lives she had broken. Her own.

War’s. Maybe even Death’s or Doom’s, if they would let her. She just needed more time, and a

little push in the right direction. He smiled. He could provide both those things.

* * *

Death had gone into the fortress that morning and not come back out. It was nearly dusk.

War had been sitting in front of her tent for most of the day, occasionally getting up to go for

walks. Doom had been tending to all the duties around the camp and generally avoiding making

eye contact with War. The two didn’t speak for the entire day. Night came and still Death had

not returned. Doom kept looking over at the fortress nervously, aware of the guards on the wall

who had been watching their camp for the whole day. War wasn’t quite so concerned.

What did it matter if the men in the fortress had killed Death? If they had, it was no great

loss. Death probably deserved to die anyway. Scratch that thought, she definitely deserved to

die. And if they came down and killed herself and Doom, that wasn’t that important either.

They were all traitors anyway, the kind of people who didn’t deserve the life they were living.

She went into her tent and went to sleep. Whatever was going on could be dealt with in the

morning.

At dawn, the gates to the fortress opened. Death walked out at the front of a column of

men. She came over to the camp as the soldiers continued to march along the road.

Her eyes sparkled as she approached War and Doom. “The warlord here has agreed to

support us in a war against the King that the Warrior has hidden behind. We have an army, and

as much money and as many supplies as we could possibly need. It’s time for this to end.”

War looked with a dull gaze at the men still moving out of the fortress. “How did he get

this many men ready in a single day?”

“He has every man in this area at his beck and call. He asked for them and they came.

The warlord is a marvel of a man… very efficient in the way he does things.”

War stared disdainfully at the column of men. IF they had surprise on their side, it might

be enough to take the King’s central city. But if the King got wind of what was going on, it

would be woefully inadequate. But that wasn’t her problem. If she fell in battle, it still wasn’t

that big of an issue. That hadn’t changed over the course of the night.

She fell in line with Doom and Death at the front of the column. She didn’t care what the

outcome was, so long as she could be done once it ended. Rest was all she wanted now. Rest

and an end to things.

* * *


46

Back in the capital, the troop movement had not gone unnoticed.

“Sire, there have been reports of an army moving in from the west. They’re avoiding

towns in general, and avoiding conflict, but seem to be moving as directly towards this city as

they can.”

“Really? Well, I assume we have a new general who will take care of them. I don’t see

what else I hired her for. Go, tell her that her services are going to be put to the test sooner than

we thought.”

“Also, my lord, there are reports of another disturbance moving along with the army.

Though the large group of men are avoiding towns and conflicts, there is reportedly a group of

women – three of them – clad in heavy dark green leather armor, not unlike that which your new

general wears. They have been attacking towns without support from the army, slaughtering

people in the streets and beheading the governors before leaving. Should I tell your general of

them as well?”

“Yes, we’d best tell her. If she is the Warrior, as she claims to be, it seems we have

found her errant Harbingers… and it would seem they don’t like her anymore. Actually, don’t

tell her any of this. Tell her I want to see her, and I will tell her myself. I want to see her

reaction first hand.”

“As is your right, my lord. I’ll go get her right now.”

“Yes, you do that. Now… where are the diagrams of the city’s defenses…”

Late that evening, she stood on top of the wall above the city’s only gate. She stared out

west into the falling light of the sun. Soon it would be behind the low-lying storm-clouds on the

horizon. The sunset tonight would be dark, not beautiful. Once it was behind the approaching

clouds, it would shine no more. Somewhere, she thought, in the forest on the horizon was an

army led by some of her oldest friends. Friends now bent on destroying her. She wondered what

War was thinking, what she was doing. Had Death put her through the old trials? She certainly

hoped not. The trials were the worst part of the Harbingers – and something she had personally

removed. She didn’t want to think what effect they would have on the younger woman.

Looking down at the stone parapet in front of her, she fiddled with her fingernails. She

regretted everything. She had broken War to begin with, created a killer from a lost and

confused teenage girl. Taken a homeless orphan and created a monster. Her hands dropped to

her sides, she looked up at the sun as it disappeared into the clouds, and she sighed. Everything

was coming to a close. Everything, that is, that she had started. It was all of her creation. All

the death. All the insanity. All the broken lives. She stopped herself. This wasn’t the first time

she had thought all this, and it wasn’t the right time to be thinking it all again. There was a battle

to be won. She had a King to serve and an army to lead. They couldn’t all lose their lives and

livelihoods based on her own self-doubts. She had a duty to do.

She turned and walked down from the gatehouse. He had been sitting in the stairwell,

waiting for her. Together they walked from the gate to the castle, and spent the rest of the night


47

studying the defenses of the city, deciding where men would be, deciding what to do in the case

of a breakthrough. The gate seemed the most logical place to have the heaviest guard; the rest of

the walls were shorter but still massive in size and thickness. The King had spared no expense in

building the defenses. This was the capital of the soon-to-be empire, after all, she thought.

Eventually they both headed back to the suite given to them as their living quarters. By that time

the storm-clouds had long covered the remainder of the sky.

A flurry of action filled the rest of the week. Prepping defenses, mustering men, arming

everyone and giving orders. Supplies had to be carried to the tops of the walls, the defensive

trebuchets inside the city had to be prepped and stocked with boulders. The parapets on the

walls each needed a quiver of arrows, a shield, and two spears. Food needed to be prepared and

served to the growing body of men, clothes needed to be provided. And despite the flurry,

nothing was fully ready by the time the warlord arrived at the gates.

At the end of the week, the army had blockaded the road into town and set up camp.

Death had decided that since the defenses would be in place, the best they could do was wait and

try to force the King and his army to come out to battle. The Warrior wouldn’t be able to resist

the fray and would come with the army… and then the combined Harbingers could kill her.

Whether they actually took the city or overthrew the King was of little matter to her. The

warlord she had approached would never survive running a kingdom the size of the King’s. He

would lose all the territory and go back to being a warlord anyway. The only thing that mattered

was the Warrior’s death.

The siege lay for six days with no contact between the armies. On the seventh day, the

Warrior still hadn’t moved, hadn’t shown her face. But it wasn’t her patience that would wear

thin first.

The King entered the room where she had been re-planning strategy based on the

extended siege. She was painfully aware that they were starting to reach the end of available

food stores, and would need to go out to battle soon. With his entrance, she felt that might be

now rather than later.

“I hired you based on the fact that you could take entire cities with ten women. You’re

telling me you can’t defend one city – an easier task than taking one – with an entire army? No,

don’t respond. The men are getting restless. We can’t get a messenger out for reinforcements.

You’re taking this army out there tomorrow and ending this. You can be right on the front lines.

You have your orders. I’m not losing my city to starvation and surrender without a fight. Now

win me a battle.” He left the room.

She turned to her old friend. “Well… this looks like it might be it. Death, Doom, and

War will be out there, and they’ll be looking for me directly. You shouldn’t come. It’s way too

dangerous.”

He looked up from his chair. “I don’t care if it’s dangerous, I’m going with you. I’ll be

right at your back. If you and the army fail, I don’t care to be just sitting around when your


48

Harbingers find me. I think Doom is still mad over me killing her auxiliary with that rock. I’d

rather die out there than find out what she has planned for me.”

He stood, and their eyes met. He nodded. She decided not to challenge him, and nodded

back. Then she left the room to go get her gear together.

No more than an hour later, the great gate opened in front of them. She was back in her

heavy black leather armor with the red seams. She wanted to put a show on for the men

following her, who had all heard the stories of the black-clad Warrior. He stood on her right, in a

simple steel outfit the King had pulled out for him. As the huge gate swung open, a tremor ran

through the army at their back. The time for battle was at hand. She stepped across the

threshold, and felt certain she was walking into battle for the last time. She started across the

open field in front of the gate, and the army followed her.

War watched the gate open, a massive hole in the massive walls. A stream of men started

to move forward from it, towards her and the other two Harbingers. She felt no joy at the

prospect of the oncoming battle. In fact, she really didn’t care about it at all. She just wanted it

to be done. She wanted to rest. The time for fighting was over. She wanted peace. She wanted

rest. And if she couldn’t have those when the battle came to a close, then she longed for the

oblivion of death, whether in battle or by her own blade. There probably wouldn’t be anyone left

who knew her anyway, when the battle was done.

* * *

It was late afternoon. The battle had truly only gone for a little under two hours or so, but

blood saturated the soil, pouring from hundreds of corpses. The two armies were surprisingly

well matched. The initial attack and counter-attack nonsense had taken most of the day, each

army testing the other’s strength. Then, about two hours before sunset, the true battle had begun.

The deadly clash that ensued had so far spent about half the strength of each army. The ex-

Warrior had claimed what was, in her opinion, too many lives so far. Her companion fought by

her side, but served more as a shield-man than anything else. He did very little killing of his

own, and that was fine by him. Finally, a ballista bolt separated them, each diving a different

direction. A melee moved straight in between them as men from the invading army took the

slight gap as a path to move forward.

Death and Doom had been waiting for the two to get separated, and moved to take out the

Warrior. She immediately recognized the two, and realized that this could very well be her

death. She pulled out her twin swords, discarding the shield and long sword she had used for

most of the battle, and stood to meet them. A flurry of blows followed, with her – feeling

stretched to her limit – somehow standing her ground against both of them. She wasn’t even

really sure that they were trying to kill her. Surely she wasn’t really good enough to take both of

them… and they certainly couldn’t be that bad.

War had been picking off men from a distance, using a longbow to take out the stronger

soldiers in the King’s army. She saw Death and Doom charge off towards the Warrior. The

failing light of dusk made it hard to tell who they were fighting, but eventually she made out the


49

red and black of the Warrior. Maybe… maybe it could all be over, here and now. She nocked

an arrow, and moved forward. As she came to a small hill, really just a mound, near where the

three were fighting, she stopped. Somehow, the Warrior had stood her ground, and even gained

against the two women.

It just proved what Death had said, she thought. The Warrior became more powerful

when spilled blood was on the ground. She went into a killing frenzy, became an unstoppable

machine, only concerned with killing more. She was so insane and so powerful that only the

combined strength of Doom and Death together could even stall her. She pulled the bow to full

draw, took aim, and fired.

Dazed, he stumbled through the fray where the ballista bolt had fallen to see the Warrior

fighting Doom and Death. He went to go to her side, to help her, to take one of the attackers

away so she could deal with the other. But as he moved toward her, an arrow tore through her

throat, the thin leather of the neck-piece doing nothing to stop it. Death and Doom instinctively

pulled back a few steps, startled, and turned to identify the shooter. He ran forward, knelt by her

side, pulled her mask and hood off. She was dead. He flashed back to the death of his friend at

his home town so long ago… He looked up at the shooter. A third Harbinger, who looked to be

War by her size and stature, was standing on a small nearby hill with a longbow loosely dangling

in her hand: emptiness, sadness, and brokenness in her posture. He looked back down at his

companion from the forest, and wept. All the sadness of the years he had spent mourning his old

friend came back at once at seeing this friend killed in the same way. It was all just too much.

He couldn’t handle it.

Death walked up next to him, looking down at him.

“Crying men are so pathetic,” she said, and kicked him in the head.

He rolled to his side, stunned, and looked up at her. She put a foot on his throat, picked

up the Warrior’s twin blades, and put one through each of his lungs. She turned and walked

away, leaving the two lying in the dust. She beckoned to Doom and War.

“We’ve done what we came to do. Let’s go.”

War watched Death and Doom as they turned to leave the battlefield. Yet she didn’t

move to follow them. She sighed, nocked an arrow, and planted a shot in the back of Death’s

head. As Doom spun on her heel, War drew again, and an arrow sprouted from Doom’s neck.

The older women slumped down in the blood and dust, and lay still.


50

Part V

She had run for hours after that, fleeing into the forest. By nightfall, she had gone deep

beneath the trees, which stood dark on either side. The battlefield lay far behind, the sounds lost

to the distance and to the soft rain that fell through the light canopy.

Some had called her the pale girl, not knowing who she was. Some called her War, not

knowing her real name. But no more. All those people were gone as she ran through the woods

that night. Either they had killed each other or she had killed them.

Her name was Aracelia. She was once the Harbinger called War. She destroyed cities,

people… and herself. She fell to the darkness inside her, first embracing it, and then fearing it

as she realized it was corrupting everything inside her. And then she killed the only people she

had ever called friends, and watched those “friends” first fight each other and then kill the only

person who had ever truly been her friend. As she stumbled over roots in the dark that night she

wondered if she should even keep going, if her life would be worth living given how changed it

would be. The Warrior was dead by her hand, as were Doom and Death. The man who had

traveled with them had died that day too… funny, he was the only person she could say she ever

truly saw as a friend, yet she never learned his name.

She walked off of the battlefield that day unsure of her future, unsure she would even

make it off of the field, let alone out of the woods the next morning. It wasn’t that she thought

there was anything in the forest that could kill her – she thought she might kill herself. That was

her only concern. There wasn’t a force left in the world that could threaten her. Only the

brokenness of her own soul could do that.

She stumbled through the undergrowth of the forest, sobbing. What had she just done?

Everyone she had ever cared for lay dead on the battlefield behind her; she had fled a battle

before its end; she had killed her only friends.

More than all of that, she had lost herself to the deadness growing inside of her. She sat

down against the trunk of a large tree and leaned her head back against the rough bark, tilting

her face up towards the dark canopy.

It was a like a hole in the center of her chest; a dark void at the very center, surrounded

by a shell of frustration and despair; the shell constantly closing in on the void but never

reaching the center. Pressure. That was the first thing that came to mind. The dark rot of the

depravity of her soul crushing down with incredible pressure upon the last struggling remnants

of her heart’s resistance. She hadn’t even realized that there was any resistance left to be

crushed, but some clearly remained, as now it was in danger of being overcome. As the pressure

grew, a shooting pain cut through her soul. She gasped at the pain, and staggered to the ground.

In her mind, she wanted to be done, to go to her rest and be finished with it all. But there was a

nagging doubt, that same tiny but powerful force arguing back that she felt being crushed inside

of her. Another shooting pain started her sobbing again, and she laid down at the base of the

tree, curled up in a ball.


51

Without anyone she cared for, or anyone who cared for her, what made her life worth

living? She could never go back to a normal life, she was too scarred too deep down. She would

never be like the other people. She had known too much pain, too much sorrow, too much

death… she had been driven beyond the edge of her sanity too many times. The pain in her chest

was constant now, the pressure driving down nearly to the core of the resisting sphere – the

sphere, she realized now, not made of a void of natural instinct but of her remaining hope for her

own life. It was fading fast. As strong as it was, the realization and culmination of all the pain

and sorrow and stress in her life threatened to be stronger.

A blazing pain went through her chest, and then suddenly it all stopped. The same

deadness, the same blank internal void that she had felt the past few days returned. In place of

the frustration, sadness, pain, and hope was simply… nothing. Somehow this was even worse,

and yet at the same time, not as bad.

She fell asleep from utter exhaustion.

And so silence fell back onto the forest, her stifled sobs replaced by the deep, even

breathing of her sleep. The rest of the forest stood as it had been: the huge, black trees spaced

nearly equal distances apart; the ground covered in an uneven layer of dark green and brown

leaves and shrubs. The moon rose in the sky, and a dim silvery shaft of light found its way

through the high, heavy canopy to rest on the pale girl’s face. Soon it made its way off, and

darkness returned to cover the scene until morning.

She woke to the sound of the birds. From every side they sang their songs – a quiet

chorus, disjointed but in perfect harmony despite its objective randomness. As she stood to start

her journey for the day she froze as she saw that the birds were not the only change in the scene

from the night before. The previously heavy, pressing black presence of the forest had been

replaced by a scene of brilliant verdant green undergrowth and gleaming golden sunlight. The

canopy above shimmered, emerald leaves interlaced with gold streaks of sun and shade that

constantly shifted as a soft breeze set the leaves dancing. The huge trunks of the trees,

previously looming and dark, now glowed from within, their light red-brown bark almost

copper-colored. Their enormous trunks, widely spaced as they were, stood as massive pillars

holding up the vaulted ceiling of the canopy. She hadn’t noticed the life of the forest in the

darkness of the night before. She looked down at herself, and felt ashamed at her appearance in

comparison. Streaks of blood, multiple deep cuts in her leather armor, and a layer dirt and grime

covered her in filth. She leaned back against the tree trunk, closed her eyes, listened to the birds,

and took a long, slow breath. Somehow, she felt at peace. She felt the horrors of the previous

day receding from her. They hadn’t gone – but the peace of the forest had at least briefly

overwhelmed them.

It occurred to her that the Warrior had found all this when she left. The stress and

general insanity of her life needed to be left behind, washed off in the unending natural beauty of

the world. She walked a while through the woods. Perhaps she could find a stream, wash off all

the blood and dirt from the day before. She spent the rest of the day wandering the forest,

basking in its warm gold and emerald light, and washing herself clean in its streams. Just


52

resting, relaxing, and enjoying being away from the world that had consumed her for so many

years.

Following the silhouette of the mountains on the horizon, she walked for weeks through

forests and plains toward the peaks. She didn’t ever want to deal the world she had known again.

She foraged and hunted for food as she made her way across the countryside, eventually making

her way to the lush upper forests of the mountains. There she searched for a spring, and, upon

finding one, started work on a shelter. Over the months it progressed from a lean-to with a hatch

roof made of the local grasses and random branches to a more solid hut made of fallen trees. The

daily work of running her life – hunting, boiling water to purify it, repairing her shelter and

improving it – kept her focus away from the loss of her friends. Sometimes it would come back

to her, mostly at night as she stopped her work to wait for sleep. She could feel it as the sun

went down, the darkening of her feelings, the incredible weight and tiredness that came over her.

Had she been able to see herself, she would have easily seen the slump of her shoulders and long,

tired look of her face. But she rarely cried. Over the few months it took her to bring her home

into shape, she cried two, maybe three times. It wasn’t so much that she felt sadness at the loss

of her friends, or at anything else in her life really, just a kind of regret and tiredness. It

consistently dragged at her, but when she was working she could push it out of the way. So she

worked. Not that the work stopped her from feeling the tiredness and regret, it just kept her from

thinking about it or focusing on it – and it got more work done than any other attempt at internal

peace. The best way she could put it was that the work buried the tiredness for as long as the

work lasted. And so she worked for months on end.

On the last day of the fifth month, a light snow fell on the large meadow where she had

constructed her shelter. She had spent the day collecting the harvest from her traps in the lower

regions of the valley below her, where it had not snowed. As she stepped out of the tree line, she

stopped and gazed at her house from a distance. The sun had already set, and the low light of the

moon reflected dully off of the snow. The scene glowed faintly blue with the reflected light – it

seemed that more light came off of the ground than from the sky, which was filled with stars

above her head but faded into the clouds as it neared the mountain peak. The moon, from behind

the trees that she had just stepped out of, cast a pale, icy glow over it all. The front of her hut

loomed black against the ghostly expanse of the meadow, and the loneliness of it all suddenly

struck her. Only, it wasn’t just loneliness that the scene brought to her. The sharp pang of the

emotion was softened by something else… something she couldn’t quite name from experience,

but somehow it felt right. Like things were how they were meant to be, alone there with the

silence of the snow and the night. She didn’t know what it was, so she shrugged off trying to

name it and just let the feeling stay.

She walked to the center of the meadow and sat down on a large rock, and looked back

over the way she had come from at the moon. It hung gently in the crystal clarity of the frigid

mountain air. Again, the feeling of loneliness came back, softened by that new, previously

unknown feeling. She sat and stared for a few moments, then headed into her hut, where she

skinned, cleaned, and stored the game she had gathered from her traps. Afterward, she went


53

back to the doorway and stared out at the moon again a moment before going to bed for the

night.

* * *

She was back on the battlefield. Blood ran through the grass, streaked her blade and her

armor. She drew her longbow and stood on a small hill, dropping an enemy troop with each

shot. She turned to see Death and Doom fighting a woman, who was desperately holding them

off. She shot at the woman, who turned as she fired the arrow, her mask falling off. The woman

was Aracelia herself, who fell at Death’s feet. Death turned and grinned at her. The woman’s

voice echoed in her mind… ‘I told you. I told you all you had to do was lose yourself, and then

you would have all the power in the world to kill others. And now you’ve done it. Defeated

yourself and everything you ever stood for. Loyalty was your greatest source of strength, your

defining trait, and now you’ve betrayed your mistress… and therefore yourself. Betrayal. It will

haunt you; destroy you; drain you of your strength inside – regardless of whether it is you or

someone else doing the betraying… Remember, you can never be the same girl you were before.

You’ve killed that part of you.’

Aracelia woke, shivering and sweating, the dream suspended in her waking mind in

perfect clarity. She had the nightmare almost daily, almost every single time she had slept since

the battle. But that ending was new. Before, it had just been shooting the arrow and seeing

herself fall to her own shot. She had discarded it offhand as pointless. But the chilling voice of

the older woman was new, and horrifying in a way she had never known before. How much of it

was true? The part about her greatest source of strength being loyalty was true… it was what

had kept her through her torture and imprisonment in the jail cell with the man. She had felt

weak and lost when she had felt she had lost her auxiliaries due to the uncaringness of the

Warrior, questioned her loyalty to the woman. She had again lost her drive to fight when she

realized that Doom and Death had truly betrayed the Warrior, and lost her drive to live when she

had killed all three of the other Harbingers remaining. Maybe she was nothing without her

loyalty. Maybe she had lost something so important to her identity that she was not herself

anymore…

But what did it matter? There weren’t any people around to see her as no longer herself.

Only she knew what she was now. Perhaps it was time to make a new identity. And not fool

herself this time. Not base it on something that could only exist when she had people to rely on.

Yet… that had to be a part of it as well. She couldn’t cut out most of her life and pretend that it

did not make a difference in who she had become. She had been a Harbinger. She had been a

servant of the Warrior. She had lost everything in the struggle between the Harbingers. That

would not change, and its effect on her would not change. But who she chose to be in the time

she had left could change, and she could choose to value new ideals over some of her old ones.

It wasn’t too late to change that. There wasn’t anyone around to stop her.

A few weeks later, she decided to try to summit a small nearby peak. The going was a

little rough, and she had to build make-shift snowshoes out of brush to make it through, but she

did make it. The whole expanse of the south stretched out before her, cities and the rivers they


54

sat on glimmering in the distance. As the afternoon lengthened, she was treated to a spectacular

sunset, with every imaginable shade of red, orange, gold, and purple filling the huge sky before

her. She built a snow cave and spent the night in it. The following day she made the trek back

down. It took most of the day to find her way back to her meadow under the fresh layer of snow

that had fallen during the night.

When she arrived, she found a group of soldiers standing in the field. Quickly, she slid

behind a tree and took a harder look at them. One carried the banner of the warlord whose army

she had deserted. She looked around. There were about a dozen of them; she could take that

many if she needed to – but she wasn’t sure that she would necessarily have to fight them. The

house meant little to her; she could go find another meadow and build a new one, leave these

men in peace and simply move away again. She did think it odd that they had bothered to try to

find her, let alone that they succeeded in doing it. While she was thinking this, the door to her

hut opened, and what she assumed to be their captain walked out. He yelled something to one of

his men, who came forward and put a torch to the brush roof of the hut. Within a few moments

the entire structure was ablaze. Taking this as a cue to leave, she turned from her tree and

headed for the lower valleys.

The game there would be fresher anyway.

The rest of the winter had passed uneventfully, with a return to her daily routines of

hunting, building, cooking, and sleeping. When spring came around and the upper forests and

meadows started to thaw, she moved once again to a more remote location on the mountainside;

not the same meadow as before, but a similar one. She simply left her hut in the lower forest as

an outpost, and started her routines all over again. From time to time, her old friends or the

warlord and his men would cross her mind, but mostly she just went about her daily tasks

without thinking too much. At times she had to direct herself away from thinking about the

people she had left behind, especially the Warrior and the man she had met in the burned town.

Thinking about Death or Doom certainly was painful, but because of what they had done to her

and how they had tried to manipulate her. With the Warrior and the man, it just seemed like she

had let them down somehow, caused their deaths not just in the immediate battle but by leaving

them in the forest. When this happened, she redirected herself – focusing on her work instead.

Yet, as it had before the incident with the warlord, this seemed to be more of a containment

method than a cure. The feelings were still there, just pent up inside, constantly begging for

attention but being ignored. And she did ignore them. She ignored them for months and months

on end. And so, while she was aware of it on a subconscious level, she didn’t truly notice or care

that the emotions were slowly building, becoming more powerful: more potent resentment,

heightened frustration, deeper sadness. She didn’t notice the songs of the birds so much, or the

glimmering of the quiet mountain streams. She didn’t listen to the sound of the wind flowing

through the grass or watch the butterflies dance among the wildflowers. She paid no mind to the

emerald glow of the sunshine in the trees. She consumed herself wholly in her work. There was

no time for anything else. The memory of the soft loneliness, softened by something new, was

left behind in the old meadow. She didn’t realize that she hadn’t chosen a new ideal, one of

peace, but rather had continued her unending drive to work and improve that had sustained her as


55

a Harbinger. And so, little by little, without truly realizing it, she worked herself back into the

quiet internal sadness and pain that had been her company for so long.

Then, one day – as she stood on the rock outcropping that hung above her hut, staring at

the night sky – she felt that odd loneliness again. The quiet realization that she was alone, totally

responsible for herself yet for only herself, came back to her. She took a deep breath, and laid

back against the trunk of a tree. Suddenly she became aware of the background noise of the

alpine forest at her back: the quiet humming of insects; the fluttering of nighttime birds; the

distant howling of the wind as it travelled through frozen valleys of stone and ice. A nearly full

moon hung glimmering in the sky, and all the stars were out – not a cloud from horizon to

horizon. Beyond those quiet background noises, all was silent. She bathed in the silence and the

peace of the night. It was as if, suddenly, all of the pent up tension inside her was allowed to

release. She simply felt relieved, as if everything that she didn’t know she had been holding in

was suddenly flowing out of her, and had no idea why. A small bird flew by the edge of the

outcropping in front of her, and after it passed behind the ledge she looked down over the

meadow below. In the dim blue light of the moon and stars, the grass was a soft grey, the small

pond a navy blue. The wildflowers’ colors were dulled, blending in with the night around them.

Another wave of relief swept through her chest, and the tension of the long months drained out

of her. She sat back against the tree, sighed, and fell into the first peaceful sleep she had had in a

very, very long time.

She woke at the rising of the sun. It came over a ridge to her far left; the valley she

looked over faced almost directly south. She watched as the dull grey light brightened to a deep

violet, then crimson, then finally to a brilliant orange before the full light of day came on. The

change it brought on the meadow was incredible. As the sky brightened, every color in the

valley came to life. The wildflowers shone with every color of the rainbow, the small pond

turned a deep, rich sapphire, and verdant green patterns danced across the swaying grass in the

strong sunlight of the new day. The sight took her breath away, and again, she felt everything

inside her relax. As the sun came fully into the sky, she finally knew what she needed. Most of

her life had been devoid of beauty, encompassing only work, stress, duty, and death. Work was

distracting and constructive, but only compounded the stress of her life into something greater.

The beauty of the world, on the other hand, served no constructive purpose... and perhaps it was

because of this – the fact that it existed only because it did, and served no future incredible

purpose and required no work – that it was the only thing capable of truly taking away and

absorbing the pains and frustrations of the world. The world could use a little more beauty, she

thought. And she needed to recognize it when it appeared, and let herself be carried by it. So, as

the sun rose higher in the sky, she leaned back against the tree behind her again, and spent the

day doing nothing but basking in the beauty of the world around her, leaving the work to be done

another day. And, for the first time in her life, she felt at peace.


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(An untitled poem, also from Adam Taylor’s collection)

The sun sets; green turns to grey.

A heart is broken,

Light fades, ending the day,

Grief goes on, unspoken.

The night lays heavy and dark,

Pain destroys the soul,

Stars are merely a distant spark,

Not enough to fill the gaping hole.

The night drags on, the moon sets,

Tragedy threatens life itself,

Light fails totally and darker it gets,

An indicator of failing health.

The darkest hour comes just before dawn,

Pain and sadness take all remaining strength,

The misery drags on and on,

Death approaches at the end of the length.

Then dawn breaks and gold gilds the grass,

The soul gasps for air,

Brilliant light turns flowers to painted glass,

And the heart breaks free of death’s cold stare.

Millions of colors coat the scene,

Peace, beauty, and rest were the key;

Nature provides the beauty, cloaked in green,

As sorrow recedes, the heart can fly free.

The night has ended,

Love finds a home again,

The heart can heal and live on…

The sun has risen again.


57

A Note from the Narrator:

Starting with Part V of the prologue, we have been relying mostly on the testimony of an

Adam Taylor, a friend of Aracelia, the Harbinger of War. From here the narrative becomes

much less fictitious. The dates and occurrences of the events are certain, as are most of the

details. Large portions of the text are transcripts from the hours of interviews I had with him,

with only minimal additions of my own in places where his testimony disagreed with my other

sources, or where his testimony was incomplete. I leave it to the reader to decide whether they

trust Mr. Taylor as a source. Unless Aracelia herself is found – which I doubt she will be, since

Adam suggested that she doesn’t wish to be found – he is the best authority on her life. So,

without further ado, we will switch from the resurgence of the Harbingers – the central event of

the prologue – to the main event. What follows is the story of the fall of the High King, from the

perspective of those who overthrew him.

Your faithful narrator,

Gallivandalid.


58

Dawn


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“A righteous war fought by hateful people is the same as a hateful war fought by righteous

people – the end result, regardless of the justification, will be hate.”

-- Adam Taylor, 4th Interview


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Part I

Chapter 1

She worked the garden outside her cabin, as she had for so many years. Frost and snow

came and went, the rain fell, the sun rose, the flowers bloomed. Time passed by. And through it

all, her mountain refuge had gone undisturbed since that first time that the soldiers had come to

seek her out. Her past had rapidly faded into the mists of memory, and she felt it should remain

there. Simplicity, she thought; food, water, and warmth fulfilled her better than anything she had

left behind. The blood and fire of her past had crumbled away into and been consumed by the

soil and snow of her new life.

All around, the mountain meadow stood quiet, but in its silence it teemed with life. The

flowers and gardens of her summer home high on the mountain’s alpine slope grew in their

terraced rows, and farther away on the forest’s edge the great firs raised their branches to the sky.

A little creek that she had diverted from the snow melt pond to flow through her gardens gurgled

on its way down the rocky bed she had built for it. Everything sat just as she had prepared it

over the years, with little unfinished projects sitting here and there. Down in the forest, birds

fluttered between the trees, and everywhere flowers grew in abundance. Over the ridge, the wind

howled, but by her little home, built in the back of the valley just before the ridge, the air stood

still.

A number of miles down the valley, where the creek turned to a stream, stood the home

she kept in the fall and spring: a solid cabin, built from the firs of the forest, surrounded by a

field where she raised crops. The crops expanded well beyond the edge of the clearing; she had

simply stopped clearing trees when she had gathered enough wood for the cabin. Within the

opening grew the crops that needed more sun; meanwhile, under the boughs of the firs hundreds

of other plants grew, carrying berries, nuts, and roots she could use. Every two weeks or so in

the summer she would travel there to check on the crops, but she preferred to spend her summers

up in the beauty of the ridge. Her most secluded shelter, the highest in the mountains, and by far

the most beautiful: she much preferred to spend her time here.

Finally, at the foot of the valley, where the snows stayed manageable in the winter, stood

her winter home. Thick wooden walls stood a few meters from the edge of the cliff that ran

along the edge of the river basin. Inside stood stocks of nuts, dried fruit, salted meat, and other

foods meant to last through the winter. She kept her winter hunting gear here as well. Together,

she felt, her homes not only reminded her of her work, but also of her newfound peace. So many

years had gone by, and only once had anyone driven her out. Only once had someone forced her

to change her life again. Since then, she had the freedom to build, the freedom to create, the

freedom to make something for herself.

So it had stood, and so it would continue to stand: a little piece of paradise, built in the

back of the wilderness, as far from anywhere as she could go.

* * *


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As she walked down the little dirt path on one of the terraces of her garden she stopped to

stare out over the valley below. And for a moment, in a habit that she made a point of enforcing,

she stopped to drink in the beauty of the land she had made her home. She considered the years

of work that had gone into shaping the gardens: deepening and fertilizing the alpine soil to make

the gardens grow more fully; diverting the little stream; eternally clearing back the bear grass

from where it shouldn’t grow. But on that day, as she stood, a long buried memory flashed back

into her mind.

A man, walking down a long dirt road, came to a burned out city. She watched him

come, wondering what he would feel when he found what had happened there. Though she had

never seen this man before, he struck her as… lonely. Yes, that was the best word for it. He

struck her as a good man, a righteous man, but tired, hurt, and alone. With the intention of

making him open up to her just a little bit, she had joked with him; she just wanted to see what

was on his mind. To uncover what had brought him to the burnt out city that had so recently

been bustling with life. She didn’t think he looked quite distraught or panicked enough to have

had family or friends in the city. So she joked. Threw a charred stick at him. Asked him

questions. He said was looking for a friend… another traveler. She had jokingly said that

maybe they had come looking for the same person. Perhaps it would have been better if that had

stayed just that – a joke, rather than the unfortunate reality it turned out to be.

She shook herself out of the trance she had slipped into and started walking briskly down

the path again. Thinking about the past wouldn’t do any good. Too much time had gone by, and

what had happened had passed long ago. Despite this, after a few moments she found herself

sitting by the little snow-melt pond, staring into her reflection and pondering why the man had

had the bad fortune to stumble upon the worst group of traveling companions in the world. He

hadn’t known. He couldn’t have foreseen any of it. And then he found himself locked in a

chaotic world where he had to choose between stumbling forward blindly, or dying.

They had met up again in the prison below the governor’s mansion. The guards had

arrested him for the ‘crime’ of recognizing her, and she had surrendered to them after helping

her old mistress escape the city. When the guards discarded her into their shared cell, his first

question had been, ‘Are you alright?’ The man barely knew her, and yet felt more concern over

her health than over his own imprisonment. Not once in her life had anyone ever put her welfare

first in their minds, even for that short of a moment. And she had just bounced along, giggly and

happy to the point of near insanity – or at least the appearance of it. She didn’t know anymore

whether the insanity had stayed an act or turned into the real thing. Perhaps it didn’t matter.

She shook herself again. Surely she had better things to do than reminisce about the past.

Perhaps she had to… check all the mud sealing between the planks on her house. Or double

check the waterproofing on the thatching. Something. Why, she wondered, did her old

memories come back to bother her just as she had almost finished the hard work of building her

new home? Maybe she didn’t have enough work, she thought, maybe the thoughts would go

away if she could find some more to do. With that plan in mind, she resolved to start a new

project the next morning. Building a new bridge over the stream father down the valley or

extending the terraces farther along the edges of the hillside seemed like a worthy task.


62

Something, anything she could come up with to keep her occupied would work. Hunting fit the

bill pretty well too. And then, once everything wore her out, she could fall asleep in the

afternoon sun. Anything to stop more memories.

Yet as she thought all of this, her walk slowed again and she stopped, leaning against the

side of the hut, staring into the forest…

Standing at the edge of a cliff, she stared up into the pouring rain.

She stood and shook her head, but the images kept coming.

Running through the forest, she tripped and fell in her haste, landing on rocks where she

lay sobbing again..

She tried to go to get more water from the stream to put on the fire to start dinner, but

only succeeded in sitting down at the waterside again, bucket in hand.

Taking aim and putting an arrow through the Warrior’s throat.

She desperately stood again, knocking the bucket over.

Doom putting her twin swords through the man’s lungs.

She picked up the bucket and went to work on the house, singing and yelling to keep her

mind focused on the task at hand, or anything else in the world immediately around her.

The time had not yet come to relive the past. And it never would come. Not if she could

help it.


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Chapter 2

The next day she started the trek down to her winter home, thinking that it might need

some refurbishing after laying dormant for several months. Starting from her home on the alpine

ridge, the trail wound down the valley alongside the stream. She had gone into the forest as soon

as the sun had broken above the ridge that morning, hoping to reach her fall home by dusk. It

occurred to her that because she had chosen to follow the stream, the downhill hike felt much

more pleasant than the uphill one along the same path; the path almost exclusively went downhill

along the gradually sloped valley. Coming back up, she thought, would test her endurance

significantly more. Then again, she almost never did the full hike from her summer home to her

winter home in one straight trip. Usually, she broke the trip in half between the start of spring

and the end of spring, but the whole thing would probably take three days, with the second

night’s stop at a small campsite she kept along the trail between the fall and winter homes.

Stopping a moment, she tried to calculate how long the trip would actually take, but then

shrugged and kept walking. How long the trip would take didn’t really matter so long as she had

something active to do.

As she made her way down into the valley, the undergrowth thickened. The bright white

light of the alpine ridge faded into the rich golden light of morning in the mountains, and then, as

the sun rose higher still, into the rich green light of summer in the deep forest. Trees rose ever

higher around her, stretching out to the heavens, blocking out the sky and coloring the light as it

passed through their boughs. Rich golden trunks stood in all directions, unbroken in their lines

along the smooth floor of the valley. Undergrowth, large and small, carpeted the whole of the

valley beneath the trees; berry bushes stood here and there, smaller shrubs covered much more,

and the rest lay under a thick layer of moss even where no other plant could grow. Through it all

shone the brook: a bright lace of silver winding its way among the trees in its shallow rocky bed.

Later in the day, the light changed, the shadows moved, but the beauty of the valley stayed.

Even as evening fell, and darkness drew on, the peace remained unbroken.

She drew close to the house. After almost twelve hours of walking down the valley, she

had come to her second home. Everything stood as it should: the solid cabin sat in its place,

surrounded by fields of crops. Trees surrounded the clearing; the valley sheltered all. As the sun

had not yet set, she went in and, after a brief rest, found her hunting gear. Setting out to one of

the best hunting grounds, she managed to come back with a brace of rabbit before dark. Once

she had eaten, she slept. The day had gone exactly according to plan.

* * *

In the morning she woke later than she had planned. Already high in the sky, the sun had

long burned the cool dry air created by the shadow of night away into the hot, muggy air of the

forest in summer. Luckily, she hadn’t slept in any later than noon, so she still had time to make

it to the next camp. She decided to hunt along the way to the midway camp if she could, and,

after a simple breakfast of nuts from storage and berries from the surrounding forest, she set out

on the path once again. The middle portion of the valley made for slightly easier going than the

upper part, though neither, especially on the downhill, provided any particular challenge. From


64

the cabin, the next day’s journey to the midway camp led across a basin that held a large snow-

fed lake. All around the edge of the lake the terrain lay fairly flat, levelled out by years of silt

flowing down into the basin with the snowmelt and settling as the lake slowly lowered in level

during the summer. As she made her way through the tall grass that surrounded the lake, she

noticed a group of deer on a peninsula jutting out into the lake.

Some time later, she kicked out the ashes of her little fire and wrapped some of the

leftover meat in the deer’s hide. Curing the meat would have to wait until she made it to the

midway camp. She didn’t like to admit it, but she had always felt the lake provided too much

exposure for a campsite; even though she had never seen anyone else in the valley, she couldn’t

bring herself to stay on the shore for the night. Something about the easily visible opposite shore

bothered her. Pushing the thought away, she got back on the trail. Hiking the rest of the

afternoon brought her to the cutoff that went further into the undergrowth to her hidden camp at

the head of the lower end of the valley. Beyond the camp, the terrain grew much rougher as it

descended to the major river valley below. In the shadow of the first of the large rock outcrops,

hidden in a thick stand of undergrowth, stood her midway camp. After making her way through

the brush, she set up another campfire, roasting some of the remaining meat while preparing to

smoke the rest. Once she had eaten the roast meat, she put the rest over the fire and went about

setting up camp. Later, after the rest of the meat finished cooking, she placed it in a woven bag

in the camp which she then slung from a tree some distance from the camp. With everything

done, she went to sleep.


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Chapter 3

Shortly after the sun rose she set off down the trail again. Past the midway camp the trail

began a steep, winding descent into the larger river valley below. For the first time on the trip

the trail diverged from the stream; while the trail wound around, the stream cascaded over the

edge into a deep pool on the valley floor. After walking the short initial decline along the lip of

the edge, she adjusted her pack and stepped onto the narrower part of the trail that from here on

out consisted of little more than a dust streak in the broken rock and low shrubs of the slope.

Occasionally the path wound its way through stands of trees where the slope levelled some, but

for the most part the little trail sat exposed to the sun. For a moment she stopped and thought

with distaste about how awful the trek back up to her summer camp would feel when she finally

decided to return. Before this she had almost exclusively done this walk just before snow

covered it for the winter or just after it thawed out, in significantly cooler weather. Climbing the

ridge in the heat of the summer appealed to her very little. But the hesitation only lasted a

moment. She started walking again, and spent every step focused on how awful the

corresponding step back up would be. While not the most pleasant train of thought, it still kept

her mind off of anything else.

Halfway down the slope, she realized she had started focusing too hard on not focusing

when she slipped on a loose stone and almost stumbled off the trail. Falling backwards, she

landed on the hard shale on the uphill side, cutting her hands and forearms. She winced and

stood back up, looking at the cuts. After inspecting them, she decided they looked relatively

harmless. They could wait to be treated until she got down to the pool at the base of the

waterfall. So she started off again, occasionally stopping to wipe little streams of blood off her

arms. The cuts certainly bled more than she thought they should. Stopping to look at them

again, she noted that though the rocks hadn’t cut very deep, they had given her plenty of little

cuts deep enough to bleed. Looking up, she saw she had come close to one of the rare patches of

trees, so she walked over to it and sat down on a mossy rock in the little grove. Pulling some of

the moss off of the rock, she moistened it with water from her water skin and used it clean up the

excess blood. Once the cuts were acceptably clean, she pulled out the long, thin leather strips

she kept in her pack and wrapper her arms and the palms of her hands. While better suited for

binding deep cuts, and therefore overkill for such little injuries, they did the job just fine. So she

set off again, committing herself to focus a little more on the trail in front of her, and less on not

thinking about anything important.

But no more than a few steps down the slope, she found her mind wandering…

Why did she call the things she didn’t want to talk about important? They shouldn’t be

important. Out here, nothing was important. Only survival and remembering the beauty and

tranquility of the world mattered. What had happened in her life years ago didn’t matter – or, at

least, it shouldn’t matter. At the very least, it didn’t merit being called important in comparison

to the other activities that constituted her daily life. All that mattered in her life at that moment,

right then, was making it another step without slipping. After that, making it down the slope.

After that, getting her wounds fully cleaned at the pond. After that, making it to her winter

cabin. After that, getting repair work done around the cabin and doing whatever else needed


66

doing. Nowhere in the foreseeable future did her past matter. Just the task at hand. Nothing

more, nothing less.

Her thoughts cut off when she realized that her mind had once again wandered enough

that she had walked off of the main path onto one of the craggy outcrops that jutted out of the

hillside. Coming to the end of one of the massive stone slabs, she stood facing outward toward

the valley below. In front of her the outcrop ended and the slope fell several hundred feet

straight down in an impassable cliff. Far beneath, the larger river’s flood valley curved up

against the wall she stood on, forming a hundred-meter-wide rocky basin that stretched from the

foot of the wall to the forest on the other side of the valley. In the center of the flood basin the

river lazily flowed, low in its banks, fed by only the late summer snowmelt. The rocky scar of

the basin wound its way down the valley, levelling out into a more gently sloped floodplain out

beyond the foothills in the distance. For a moment she stood and took a few deep breaths, letting

out the stress she hadn’t realized had been building within her, and centering herself again on the

beauty of the valley she called home during the winter. Realizing that she didn’t get to see the

river that much when it wasn’t frozen, she paused to take a longer look. She had always been

overawed by the way the river cut its way through sand and rock to carve out the valley.

She still loved the summer valley more, though, for its gentleness and isolation; she loved

it for being more removed and idyllic. But the raw untamed power of the river basin appealed to

her as well, though in a different way. The valley high in the mountains where she spent the

summer stayed peaceful, beautiful, and silent the whole summer – silent, that is, save for the

songs of the birds and the occasional rustlings of the small animals that lived up on the ridge, or

of the deer down in the forest. The river valley, on the other hand, sprawled between the ridges,

untamed and uncontrollable, yet constant and predictable. The river determined the shape of the

valley, and occasionally in the woods she would find old flood basins where the river used to

flow before it broke itself a new course during an unusually strong flood. Where the higher

valley felt untouchable and unchanging, the river valley felt rough, with the river constantly

reshaping its walls and its pools.

For a few more moments she stood silent before travelling onward again.

Down at the pool at the base of the high waterfall she stopped to clean and re-bandage

her wounds. After she finished, she ate some of her cured meat, and huckleberries from a stand

of bushes by the pond that had ripened early. Having done so, she continued down the path that

once again ran by the stream as it made its way down toward the river. She easily made it to her

cabin by late afternoon, and went out hunting again. In the evening, she made herself dinner and

smoked more meat, putting her full stock in the storage room in the cabin. With everything done

for the day, she went to bed.


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Chapter 4

As it turned out, the winter cabin had plenty of things that needed fixing. The next three

days passed in a non-stop effort to fix every structural instability of the cabin, as well as to

completely waterproof the walls and roof with a mortar she prepared from the sand and clay

dredged from the river valley walls. She spent time hunting as well, to gather meat and leather,

but focused mainly on the more consistently physical work of sealing up the cabin. In the

evenings when she ran out of mortar she went out and sawed felled trees into wooden planks; she

hoped to expand the firewood shed into a full room sealed away from the weather. Perhaps she

would also make a new door to the inside of the cabin so she wouldn’t have to slog through the

snow to get more wood in the winter. There was plenty of work to do, plenty of improvements

she could think of, and all of them took a satisfyingly large amount of time and effort. By the

end of the third day she had fully reapplied the waterproofing mortar on both the shorter sides of

the cabin and gathered a large enough pile of planks to start looking at expanding the shed.

Everything was running smoothly.

On the fourth day, she decided to do something a little different. With most of the prep

work done for the cabin, she wanted to test her hunting skills – but there was more prep she

needed to do before that could happen. Going into the little back room of her cabin, hidden

behind a shelf in the store room, she retrieved two medium-length blades, and her longbow.

These had kept in fairly good shape over the years – though she had been forced to make a new

longbow occasionally. The armor that she wanted, on the other hand, needed to be repaired and

replaced consistently, as it did now. She spent the rest of the morning boiling large pieces of the

thick, nearly black leather and pressing them into appropriate molds to re-make a full set of

armor. Once this task was completed, while everything was cooling, she set about making more

black dye. She pulled together all the rusted metal she could find, and put it into a sealed jar of

vinegar which she kept in the back of the storeroom. By the time she had finished this, the

newly-made hardened leather was cool, and she set about the work of sewing together all the

necessary buckles and joints. At the end she placed the whole outfit in the main of the cabin.

The mask and hood that she crafted for the armor, though, she left behind in the storeroom.

For the rest of the day she stayed in and around the cabin, alternating between short runs,

easy exercises, resting, and eating. She took stock off all her arrows, choosing the best of the old

steel-headed ones and crafting new wooden ones from pre-prepared shafts she had made over the

last summer up on the pass and left in the store room. With everything in order, she put on the

new armor, shifted her quiver so it was comfortable, and set out as soon as the last light faded.

She had forgotten the feel of the heavy armor. It was stiffer than she remembered the

original being, and it flexed slightly less in the joints, as the leather was of poorer quality, but in

large part it felt the same as it always had. Smooth. Like she belonged in it. Taking a few

minutes before setting out in earnest, she practiced all her old skills. Moving silently even on

ground covered in dry brush. Blending with the shadows. Drawing and firing the massive

longbow with no more than a whisper. As soon as she was certain she was ready, she melted

into the undergrowth.


68

Within an hour she found a promising trail. A larger animal, probably an elk by the size

of the hoof prints, had gone through some time around dusk. Following the tracks, she made her

way up the valley toward the mountain for a mile or two before the tracks turned and went up the

ridge. For a moment she considered turning back – the ridge was steep, and going up it quietly

would be time consuming and tiring. But after a pause she shrugged and started up the hill. It

wasn’t like she wouldn’t have time to rest the next day. And while an elk might take a few shots

to go down if she missed the windpipe the first time, she wasn’t too concerned about it getting

close enough to actually hurt her.

As she climbed the slope, something kept bothering her. She wasn’t entirely sure what it

was, but something felt wrong. She stopped. Maybe it was the armor… she hadn’t really been

thinking about the past times she had worn it. For the past years, she had only used it for hunting

larger game, but before that… no, she thought, it wasn’t worth thinking about. That wasn’t it.

Or, at least, that shouldn’t be it. The first time she had worn it hunting, yeah, it had bothered her.

But not since then. No, this was something else. It had to be.

As she was thinking, she heard the unmistakable crack of a branch broken underfoot from

behind her. Drawing her swords, she spun and faced the darkness behind her. Listening closely,

she scanned the trees for the source of the sound. The forest stood still, the night hanging heavy

between the trees, obstructing sight and muffling sound. Tension welled up inside her,

threatening to overwhelm her as she stood as still and silent as the darkness that stood between

her and the source of the sound. It built, and she panicked, unsure of herself. A dozen thoughts

roared through her mind:

Maybe it was just some little forest creature that had made a noise and then run off.

Maybe everything was fine. She could just continue her hunt, or head home. She just had to set

off. But then again… maybe it wasn’t nothing. Maybe another person was out here and had

followed her. What would she do? What did they want, following her all the way out here in the

forest? And in the middle of the night? She was armed. Surely they would have seen that. But

if they could follow her in the dark when she was doing her best to be unseen and silent… they

would have to be just as good as her. Or better. She couldn’t fight someone that good. She

wasn’t sure she could fight anyone at all, at least not any person. And even if she could bring

herself to fight another person again, would her skills be as good as they once were? She hadn’t

actually fought in years, only hunted. And even then she only hunted herbivores, and from a

distance. What if she couldn’t do it anymore?

Her thoughts shattered as the first wolf pounced out of the woods, jaws bearing down

towards her throat. She spun sideways, slashing it across the side during the movement. As it

fell to the ground, whimpering in its final moments, the next came. And the next. What felt like

an eternity later, she slumped to the ground, exhausted. The smell of blood permeated the air.

The ground was saturated with it. The once silent night was filled with the soft whimpering of

the whole wolf pack as they each breathed their last on the ground around her. In the middle of

the little clearing, surrounded by death, she sat and stared at the ground. Collapsing sideways,

she lay shivering on the forest floor.


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Almost an hour later she picked herself up and started walking back to the cabin. But

before she got there, she lost her both her way and her will to make it back that night. She found

a thicket in the undergrowth, cleared a small den, covered the front back over with brush, and

slept until morning.

By noon the following day she was back on her way to the cabin. She wasn’t happy. But

then, she wasn’t sad either. She just… had to keep moving. That was all. Just get back to the

cabin, clean herself up, put away the old gear, and keep working. Everything else would follow

after that. She added the last night to the list of things to not think about. How easily killing had

come back to her after so many years of only killing for food… even self-defense felt odd.

Especially since she had killed so many wolves. Another shiver ran through her. This definitely

counted as thinking about it. And that wasn’t allowed by the nature of the list of things not to

think about. Besides, the cabin was just ahead. She sighed and looked down, and almost fell

over at what she saw. There were four sets of footprints leading out from her cabin and back

toward it again along the path near her cabin that she had started on the night before. Only one

set was hers.

* * *

She crept up on the cabin carefully. Sure enough, three men were sitting outside,

inspecting her stock of lumber and the old wood bucket she used to hold the mortar.

“Well, someone was here as of yesterday. This mortar is still a little damp, and all this

wood is fresh-cut. What do you think, seventeen?” One of the men said.

“Hell if I know. You’re the tracker and whatnot. All I can say is we’ve found a fully

equipped cabin in the woods that’s still under renovation. I’m pretty sure that that usually means

there are people nearby,” one of the others responded.

The third spoke up. “Uh, guys, I know this is interesting and all, but what if the people

who live here, you know, come back? I don’t think one person could do all this alone. And we

don’t want to be caught on their front step when they get here.”

The first spoke again. “Look, Thirteen I don’t know what you want me to do. We can

keep wandering this wilderness in hopes of… well, who knows what we’re even looking for out

here, or we can see if these people are friendly. I mean, if they’ve been out here since before the

war, maybe they’d be willing to take us in. Grow their little community a bit. I mean, what’s

our other option? We’re looking for refuge, and we’ve found someone’s. I say we stay and wait

until they get here.”

The second one, apparently called seventeen, looked up at that last remark. “Seven, sir, I

don’t know about that. I mean, what if they do know about the war? Old Zero, or whatever his

actual name was, is dead now, but anyone who remembers him isn’t likely to forgive us. Maybe

we’re better off if we just keep going.”


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Thirteen spoke again: “Yeah, look Seven, we can’t just stay here to meet whoever’s been

living out here. Besides, they probably don’t want to be bothered anyway. I mean, why else live

all the way out here? And again, why do we have to keep using our code names?”

“Because we aren’t out of the clear yet. And because I say so. We may have gone

underground, but One will get us all back together some day. It’ll work out. People hated Zero,

not us. But until then, we’re out here, and we’re staying anonymous. For the people who knew

us. The rebels could track down my friends and family, but they can’t track down Seven-C’s.

Seven-C doesn’t have a family. He’s just a number and a letter. But I suppose you’re right

about the people who live here. Let’s get out of here.”

As they stood up, she noticed they were unarmed other than low power hunting bows. At

this point, she was just a little too curious. She hadn’t heard anything from outside since she had

come in, and all this talk of a war, and needing code names… it was familiar. She stepped out

from behind the corner of the cabin, nocking an arrow and readying it to be fired.

“Well, the ‘people’ here are actually just me. Who are all of you, and why are you here?”

she said. “What’s this war, and who are you running from? Go ahead and sit down again. I

won’t hurt you unless you try to hurt me. If any of you go for those little toy bows, you get an

arrow from a real bow right in the throat. Let’s talk.”


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Chapter 5

The three men slowly sat back down on the log they had been using for a bench, putting

their hands out in front of them. She released the tension on her bowstring a little and leaned up

against the cabin wall. After a moment of looking at each of them carefully, she spoke:

“I suppose the first question that needs to be addressed is who all of you are. But you

answered that yourselves a moment ago. You’re Seven-C,” she said, nodding at the first man,

“you’re Seventeen, and you’re Thirteen. Not that those names actually mean anything. But

they’ll do.”

One of the men shifted in his seat, but quickly settled when she shot a glare at him.

“So then the next question would be why you’re here, but I heard that too: you’re all

running from a war that it seems you lost. So you’re either deserters or survivors, or both. Since

you said someone called One, your leader I assume, would call you back, I’d have to guess that

you’re survivors. The next question, then, would be who are you running from, but you

mentioned rebels, and well, that would point to you having lost the war to these rebels – driving

you into hiding. Is all of this correct so far?”

A tense moment went by, with none of the men even making eye contact except for the

one called Seven. He, however, said just as little as his companions.

“So then the only question I have left is what was this war? What was is about, who was

it between? As long as you’re out here, you might as well talk.”

The three men looked at each other a moment, Seventeen and Thirteen clearly unsettled,

before a reply began tumbling from Seven’s mouth

“I suppose it’s my job to be the mouthpiece of the group. Well, you were mostly right.

I’m Seven-C, and these are Seventeen-C and Thirteen-C. We usually just leave off the C,

though, since there’s no number repeats. We had to flee when the rebels killed our leader, Zero.

No letter there, just Zero is what he called himself. He wasn’t the best man, I’ll admit that.

He… almost certainly deserved his fate.” He took a deep breath, noticed the way all three others

were staring at him, and then continued more slowly. “But the rest of us? Well, the rebels didn’t

stop when they’d ended the old government. I think they’d originally planned to stop, but

unfortunately for everyone involved, their old leader disappeared right about the time ours did,

and their new leader declared that every member of the old regime, and everyone connected to

them, should be killed. So One, the second in command of our army, ordered us all into hiding.

Some are still in the cities, but most of us have scattered into the wilderness. We just want to

keep living. So here we are.”

He stopped and swallowed sheepishly, apparently embarrassed, before regaining his

composure and returning to silence.

Seventeen looked down at the ground and began speaking in a low voice. “We don’t

even know where One is right now. The war is over, really. We’re out here in the hopes that


72

they can’t track down our families if they don’t know who we are or where we’ve gone. That’s

why we still carry the code names.”

The one referred to as Thirteen looked up at her, then quickly away again. “You’ll let us

go, right?” He said. “We just want to keep going. There’s no reason for us to stay here and

bother you.”

She took the arrow off her bowstring and put it back in her quiver, but stayed leaning

against the cabin. “Well, I’m glad you’ve chosen to be upfront about it. I suppose I could let

you go. I’ve been out here since before your war, whenever it started. If you don’t mind my

asking, how did the rebellion start, and when? I haven’t really had any news since I came here.”

Seven shifted uncomfortably in his seat as the other two looked at him. After a short

pause, he took another deep breath and looked up, more resolved this time than the first.

“I suppose I have to answer that, since I was there in the first battle. Be aware, it’s a little

bit of a story. I was in the army of a King at the time, but even he took orders from Zero. I

didn’t know it at the time. Zero had been pulling the strings for a while. When the man spoke…

no one could disagree with him. He could rally anyone to any cause, even if we knew in our

hearts what he wanted was wrong. He just… he had a way of moving the whole crowd at once,

even if he didn’t convince a single individual on their own. We all felt that he had convinced

everyone else, so why not just join in? Anyway, he gave a private speech to our King and his

court at some point, and managed to convince them to start forcing the poor into military service

to increase their military power. There were… other measures as well. At some point, a nearby

warlord gathered the armed peasants together and started marching for our doorstep, thinking

that the King was behind it all. We were so sure of victory… the King had tracked down an old

friend, a woman called The Warrior, who had trained us, and who had planned out the battle

strategy and trained the recruits.” He paused, just a fraction of a second, as recognition flashed

in his eyes. But even as soon as it had happened, he regained himself and continued, “But there

was something we weren’t prepared for. The warlord had found the other remaining Harbingers,

and brought them out to battle too. The battle itself was chaos, but at the end, the King was

dead, the Warrior and two of the remaining harbingers were dead, and the last missing. Both

armies were devastated, and the rebellion turned to guerilla warfare for a time. But as Zero’s

influence spread, so too did the rebellion. Soon enough, everyone was fighting for one side or

another. And we lost, in the end. As we probably should have.”

She stood still throughout the response, heart racing. If he had seen the Warrior, seen the

other Harbingers… she was wearing the old armor style. Not the signature hood and mask, but

all the rest. She caught herself, though, and spoke back without missing a beat:

“Why do you say you probably should have lost? Excuse my forwardness, but that’s not

a very normal thing to say when you’ve been fighting for your life against people who want to

murder your families.”


73

Twelve and Seventeen looked down at the ground, but Seven kept staring at her, as if

deep in thought. It made her uncomfortable. Thankfully, Thirteen soon looked up to answer her

question.

“Zero did some terrible things. Made the army do some terrible things. Sorry, but none

of us really want to talk about it. It’s best said that the rebels were right to rebel, and that Zero

deserved his death. The rest of us, though, shouldn’t be hunted the way we are. It all ended with

Zero’s death. One wants us to go in a different direction. He just wants us to live.”

Seven looked away and stared off into the distance. She looked at him a while, but he

didn’t notice her. She turned her attention to Thirteen and Seventeen.

“So the numbers, then, they’re like ranks? Lower numbers mean higher rank?”

“Yeah. And the letters too. The A’s are considered more elite than the B’s, and so on.

No letter means high command. Almost no one’s left from the top through the high B’s. Mostly

C’s through E’s left. And we’re all so scattered that we really only keep the numbers to keep our

actual names hidden. The guys in the cities have fake names, but for everyone out here it’s

easier to just keep the ranks.”

“And you don’t know where One is?”

“No. No one does. We get messages occasionally. There are messengers in charge of

keeping track of where we are. Other than them, no one knows anyone else’s position right now.

Safer that way.”

“Huh. So what do you plan to do now? I won’t keep you here if you don’t want to be

here. And, well, I’d rather stay alone. I like my cabin the way it is, with just me.”

Seventeen looked around nervously and said, “Well, I’d certainly like to be on my way.

It’s Seven’s decision though. He chooses what we do and where we go, ultimately.”

Seven jolted out of his trance at the mention of his name. He looked at the two men

sitting next to him, then at her, uncertainty written on his face.

“Well, boys, I hate to stay in one place longer than we have to, but we need to stay here

just a little bit longer. Based on her armor, I’d say this woman is the long-lost last Harbinger.”


74

Chapter 6

In a heartbeat, she had nocked an arrow and drawn, stepping away from the edge of the

cabin. She backed up several paces, arrow pointed at the ground at the men’s feet. She stared at

Seven, eyes narrowed. He looked at her calmly, with slight concern only barely showing in his

eyes, and slowly raised his hands to just above shoulder height. After a few seconds, Thirteen

and Seventeen followed his lead, a look of fear and bewilderment on their faces. For quite some

time, no one moved.

During the silence, she became aware of how hard she was breathing, how panicked she

felt. She took a few deep breaths, slowing her pulse and calming her nerves. Her hands stopped

shaking. She never broke eye contact with Seven, who still sat calmly next to his two

companions, apparently unconcerned by the whole ordeal. The two stared at each other, not

moving an inch. The other two men, for their parts, were looking back and forth between the

slender woman in black across the clearing and their leader, waiting for something to happen.

Yet nothing did. Whatever was going on between the two, Thirteen and Seventeen didn’t have

any insight on it. The quiet evaluation of intention and of threat presented passing back and forth

between the two motionless figures went straight over the heads of the less experienced soldiers.

Finally, Seven took a deep breath and continued speaking:

“You aren’t going to shoot me, are you? If you were going to, you would have done so

right away. You could have had an arrow between my eyes within two seconds. But you didn’t;

you just nocked an arrow and drew the string. So you don’t want me dead, which means you

want me alive – at least for now. Am I right?”

War levelled her gaze at him, drawing her chin closer to her chest, but did not respond.

“You want something from me,” he continued. “Maybe you have questions. Maybe you

just want to know what I want. Go ahead, ask whatever is on your mind.”

She looked at him a few seconds more before responding. “Well, you’re right. But I’ll

just send that right back to you. You wouldn’t call me out and risk being killed without a reason.

You definitely want something too. You have a question for me. What is it?”

He chuckled uneasily, without breaking eye contact, and said, “Well, naturally I want to

recruit you. What’s left of our people could really use your help defending themselves. But I

figure if you’ve been living out here since the start of the war, you probably don’t want to come

back. I’d say you left on purpose. If you’d wanted to be part of a war, you would have stayed.

It says something that you came all the way out here to get away; it says you looked for solitude

much more purposefully than even we did. Is that right?”

War nodded and he continued:

“We’re running from a threat. You’re either running from something else, or you’re just

so fed up with the world that you can’t take it anymore. So I can’t make you come back. But if

you would… you’d be a great help to a lot of people who desperately need good help.”


75

“Well… you’re right,” she said after a moment, “about many of the things you’ve

guessed. I did come out here to get away. And I don’t know if I want to come back. I suppose I

rather like it out here. As a soldier, you might appreciate what I mean when I say there’s been

enough death in my life to last me this lifetime plus several more.”

She paused, waiting for a response, but when it became obvious that none was

forthcoming, she continued.

“So… no, I don’t want to go with you. And trust me, when I let you go, don’t get any

ideas of coming back here with friends and trying to force me. From what you said, I can fairly

certainly say you don’t have enough friends left to survive the attempt.”

He laughed again in an unsuccessful attempt to break the tension. “Well, at least you’re

letting me go. I had hoped you might. And don’t worry, we won’t be back. This place…

you’ve put a lot of work into it. It’s an impressive amount of work for one lone person. Frankly,

I wish I had somewhere like it. It’d be nice to get away from all the war and death we’ve seen…

well, if you’re sure I can’t convince you to come with me, I’d like to take my friends and go.

There’s no reason for us to stay here otherwise. We still have farther to go until we get to our

assigned hide out.”

Hesitant, she lowered her bow. “Yeah. I’m sure I don’t want to go. I hope you all can

find somewhere safe. You should be able to. If you want an easy way to the next valley over,

follow the river bed up the valley until the next turn, then go uphill. There’s a saddle on the

ridge in the back of the corner of this valley. It’s the gentlest slope to the lowest point in the

ridge. I don’t know much past there.”

“Thanks for the tip,” he said, nodding to his companions. “I guess we should be on our

way.”

She still didn’t remove the arrow from the string, but stepped back to lean on the cabin

again.

“Good luck.”

* * *

Before they had left, she had shared some of her supply of smoked meat as a show of

goodwill, and then walked with them until they were a significant distance from her cabin. Then

she had left them. The three men walked in silence for some time before Seventeen broke the

silence.

“What was going on there, Seven? That whole conversation felt… odd. Like you two

weren’t real people. You looked relaxed, but didn’t feel relaxed at all. You acted casual, spoke

casually, but it wasn’t casual. What was that?”

Seven sighed and looked at the ground. “I’m not sure. I had to ask her to come with us.

If she joined up with us, we might actually stand a chance of living through the rest of the war.

If you can even call it a war anymore. I guess I felt like if we have even one more person, we


76

stand a better chance of not getting wiped out. Especially someone as skilled as a Harbinger.

You guys weren’t around back during their last streak of battles. They were unstoppable. Not

that that’s even what matters to me. I just want my friends to still be alive when I get home. I

guess I thought she could help with that.”

Twelve looked over and said, “Well, yeah, we were all thinking that. But the silence, the

stare down, they were weird. And then the conversation you had. It was weird too. Like there

was something else going on other than what was being said.”

Seven kept staring at the ground. “Maybe I’m a little jealous. She’s set up out here, safe.

Even if she’s found, she can handle anything. Us, if we’re found, we’re in bad shape. We have

nowhere to stay, we’re not great hunters, we don’t have a very good supply of food. I was

thinking about how much I want to have a life like she has. Away from this war and all the

worries it’s caused. She doesn’t have a family to worry about. If she has friends, she’s not

bothered by not having seen them. She doesn’t need to worry about coming home after exile and

finding everything she had loved gone. We do. So yeah, I acted a little weird. It’s hard to

negotiate for your life when there’s a lot going on in your head.”

They kept walking along the cliff above the river bed. Seventeen looked out across the

deep, rock filled gash in the land, staring at the low flow of the late summer river down in the

middle of the cut. Silence fell over the group again until Thirteen spoke up.

“I don’t think it’d be that nice to live out here. Yeah, I’d be away from the war, but

alone? I couldn’t do it. I’d have to live forever not knowing whether my family has been found

out. Or maybe I’d be out here because I know they had been. I don’t know which would be

worse. I wouldn’t want either. I’d rather be back fighting,” Thirteen said. Seventeen grunted an

agreement.

Seven looked up into the trees overhead, around at the undergrowth, and then returned his

focus to the ground in front of his feet. “I know what you mean,” he said, voice barely above a

whisper, “but at the same time, I’ve seen a lot of battles. It gets you down eventually. Being

totally away from it would be great. Yeah, I’d rather have my family safe and with me first. I’d

stay until I could have that. And if they were gone, I wouldn’t stick around. I’ve seen more

battle than I’d ever wanted to. At some point, you just have to get away. I’m almost to that

point. If I had to bet, she’s seen more war than I ever will, and she started seeing it younger. I

can’t blame her for being out here. It’s what I would want if I had nothing else left. An end to

the fighting. Peace. Not worrying about anything but living and building. It sounds…

amazing.”

“Well, I mean, that’s what we’re out here to do, isn’t it?” Seventeen asked, “Live and

build for ourselves for a while until we’re called back?”

“Yeah. It’s the being called back part that I’m not looking forward to. If the stakes

weren’t so high, I’d rather just stay out here. It would be so much better than going back to fight

again.”


77

Dusk had nearly fallen by the time they had climbed up to the saddle on the ridge. The

three men set up camp for the night, and continued on their way the next morning.


78

Chapter 7

After seeing the men off, she circled back around to her cabin, trying to take her mind off

of the meeting. It had been so many years, she thought, since she had seen anyone else.

It was highly unlikely that she would see anyone else up here again. At least, not for a

long time. If she hadn’t been down in the river valley, she wouldn’t have seen the men at all.

They would have seen the cabin and eventually left, as they had been preparing to do when she

had arrived. Had any other people ever found the cabin? If there ever was traffic through the

river valley, it would be during the late spring, summer, or early fall when she was living in the

higher valley. Certainly no one had ever gone up there. And no one ever came by in the winter.

What if when she was gone in the summer other people regularly found the cabin? What if her

presence – not specifically traceable to her, of course – was better known than she thought?

She shivered at the thought and kept on walking. It was odd to think about other people

finding her abandoned winter cabin and poking around near it when she wasn’t there. At least

she kept the storeroom concealed and locked. That one little bit of paranoia might have turned

out to be worthwhile.

Arriving at the cabin, she took stock of what still needed to be done. The wood for the

new extension to the woodshed was ready, but the extra time talking to the men and seeing them

off had dried out the last of her mortar. She decided to go make more mortar, come back, and

start the extension after she had eaten dinner in the evening. The trek back from the woods and

the encounter with the men had taken out enough of her day. The rest was needed for work.

As she set about her tasks, she got back into the routine she had established. She spent

very little time thinking about anything but the task immediately at hand. Other thoughts were

easily brushed aside as she focused in on doing the labor in front of her with as much attention

and craftsmanship as she could muster. The work itself didn’t even need anything special. It

didn’t need to be done well for any particular reason. A roughshod job would have done just as

well as a very carefully done job. The difference was that a careful job took all of her attention,

and that’s all she really wanted. The harder she worked, the more focus she put into doing

everything as carefully and as beautifully as she could, the more she was able to ignore

everything else. It was a sort of meditation for her. A meditation where she could get lost in

smoothing out the mortar in the grooves between the larger logs that made up the cabin. Where

she could silence her mind while she stirred the mortar until it was perfectly uniform in texture

as she made each fresh batch down at the riverside. Where she could get lost perfectly placing

each spike that held together the beams on the wooden shed. The work didn’t need to be done

perfectly, but she needed to do it perfectly. It was the only thing she could still do way out here

in the wilderness other than think. It was the only thing she allowed herself to do. And so it was

something she had mastered.

That evening, just before dinner, she headed out to check the traps she had laid during her

first hunt down at the winter cabin. She found two rabbits and a large mountain jay. Yet again

she spent the evening cleaning and smoking one rabbit, while roasting and eating the other and

the bird. As darkness fell, she worked on the woodshed, and once it was too dark to see the


79

makeshift hammer and nails clearly, she went inside and slept. The next day passed much the

same.

* * *

On the second night after meeting the men, she awoke to the sound of many footsteps and

lowered voices outside. She crept over to the door and listened. There were many, many more

than the three that had been there earlier. A dozen, maybe – maybe more. Hurrying into the

storeroom, she put back on her armor, strapped on her sword belt, slung on a quiver and picked

up the old longbow. As an afterthought, she went into the armory and retrieved two long curved

knives, which she sheathed just above the swords on either hip. She hesitated, then picked up the

mask lying on top of the table in the back room. She put it on, and pulled up her hood. Standing

in the deep shadow inside the storeroom, she waited. The voices alternately moved up to and

away from the door, occasionally disappearing entirely. Through everything, she stood

absolutely still and silent, waiting.

Finally, she heard a man’s voice distinctly say “One, two… three” followed by a loud

multi-pitched exhalation. Shortly thereafter, there was a shuffling sound, and something crashed

against the barred door. Thump. And again. Thump. The bar started to split inward, and the

door had a visible inward crease down the center. She nocked an arrow to the string and waited

for the door to come down.

When it did, the first few men stumbled inside almost immediately, staggering as if

surprised by the sudden lack of resistance inside the cabin. They started fanning out through the

darkened cabin, first coming across her bed. Several of them went out of her line of sight as they

crossed to the far side. Still she waited. As one of them walked toward the storeroom, she

pulled back into the darkness at the back, by the entrance to her little hidden armory. Two men

made their way into the storeroom, feeling their way around the shelves toward the back. She

slipped up against the back of a shelf and let them walk past her, all the way to the back of the

nearly pitch black room. When they had made it all the way in, she pulled out the daggers,

glided behind them, and slit their throats. Despite her best efforts, the one on her right made a

slight thudding sound when his head collided with a shelf as he fell to the ground.

“What’s going on in there?” Someone called from outside, “Did you find anything?”

She picked her bow up again and made her way to the door to the storeroom, breathing

deeply to calm her nerves. She nocked an arrow, rounded the corner, and put an arrow into the

neck of the man standing just outside. She nocked another and took out the man next to him

before he could even react, and then the man standing next to her bed. By the time the others in

the room had recovered and realized that something odd was happening, half the men in the

room were dead. Of the remaining three, two tried to run over to see what was happening in the

dark on the other side of the room. They didn’t make it. The third shouted and tried to run

outside, calling for help. Though he almost made it to the door – she thought the other two were

the more immediate threat – he didn’t make it either.


80

She nocked another arrow to her bow and stepped forward, moving toward the door,

prepared to fire if anyone came inside. Sure enough, two more men came in, swords drawn. The

first fell as soon as he appeared in the door frame; the second jerked back and turned to run

before an arrow lodged itself in the base of his skull. She strode to the door, waiting a moment

to listen before going outside. There was rustling in the bushes on the downhill side of the

clearing, as if someone were trying to force their way through the underbrush. But there was

only enough rustling for it to be one man. Putting her bow down on the floor, she drew her

swords. After another moment, she spun outside, planting one sword squarely in the chest of the

man to the left of her door, and moving to parry the inevitable blow coming in from the right.

Another moment and all was still again. She looked around, and then, leaning back in the cabin

for a moment, retrieved her bow and set out to silence the rustling in the bushes.

Once the last of the intruders had been dispatched, she gathered their bodies and laid

them in front of her doorstep as a warning to any of their friends who might still be nearby.

Then she ran inside, tore off the mask and hood, laid down on her bed, and cried until

dawn.


81

Chapter 8

She was still awake when the sun rose the next morning. She hadn’t slept. When she

hadn’t been crying, she’s been sitting, staring into the darkness, trying to ignore the blood on her

bed, the blood on the floor, and the blood on her hands and body. She had forgotten what it was

like to sit in a pool of blood knowing none of it was her own. In all her years in the wilds, she

had never had to kill except for food, and now two nights in a single week had been consumed

by slaughter. For so long, she had escaped being haunted by her past, only for the shadow of

death to rise again as soon as she was found. All night, grim thoughts danced through her mind:

No matter how long she hid, no matter how far she fled, no matter how separated she felt

from her past, as soon as she was found by even a single person, death followed. Never her

death. Always the death of others; always the death of many. She could escape without a single

scratch, but those she met, those she encountered, always died. They never escaped wounded.

They never lived past meeting her in battle. She would live, she would go on to fight in even

more battles, but those she fought… they fell where they met her. Always. Something in her

wouldn’t allow her to die, wouldn’t allow her to fall. Something made her kill ruthlessly, easily,

without hesitation. She was no better than Doom. No better than Death. She too killed without

thinking. She too killed without remorse. She felt bad, yes, but she was so much more centered

on herself. She didn’t mourn the men who died. She didn’t think for a second about what their

deaths would mean to their families, to their friends, to them. No. She sat here, thinking only

about how their deaths affected her. How they reminded her of her past. How she felt about

herself after killing them. About what their deaths meant about her. She was selfish. She was a

murderer. And she was still just as broken as she had been years before, when she knelt on the

cliff edge after watching her friends die. Had she even cared about them? Had her sadness

been for them or for herself? It had been for herself. It had been because she didn’t want to

think about going on without them. It had been because she didn’t want to deal with the reality

of what she did to others, what others felt when the Harbingers came and ended the lives of so

many. What others would feel again now that she had killed again. Eleven men laid on the

ground outside her cabin. If each of them had families, if each of them had any friends… how

many people had she just condemned to the sorrow and brokenness she had felt at the death of

her friends? How many people had to suffer because of her? Who was she to put her own life

ahead of the suffering of so many? She was selfish. She was terrible. She was evil. The families

of those men deserved to have their loved ones more than she deserved to live here, alone, in the

wilderness. Her own happiness couldn’t outweigh the happiness all the people still connected to

those men. And yet here she was, alive, while their blood saturated the ground outside her door.

She was no better than Doom or Death. No better than the Warrior. No better than any of the

men Seven had talked about, the men who tracked down families and friends to kill them. If

anything, she was worse, because she personally had taken so many lives. So, so many lives.

She couldn’t even remember them all. They meant so little to her, over the years, that she didn’t

even know who or how many she had killed.


82

And so she sat, frozen, consumed by her own thoughts, all too aware of the blood on the

floor, the blood on her bed, the blood on her hands and body, as she waited out the night,

sobbing.

* * *

Midmorning the next day she was still sitting on her bed, staring at the floor. Her tears

had long since dried, but the thoughts hadn’t gone away. Still the past haunted her, still she felt

the pain of the death she had caused. She heard someone outside. She didn’t move. She didn’t

care. Let them come, she thought, let them take their revenge for their fallen friends. Let them

end the nightmare that had returned to her life. The wilderness was no longer safe. Nowhere

was safe. She might as well be done with it.

The sound drew closer, and she heard someone moving the bodies outside, and then a

man stepped through the door. She didn’t look up.

“Well,” a familiar man’s voice said quietly, sadly, “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. I

saw that first battle, the damage you and the other Harbingers caused to the army. Eleven

Hunters couldn’t take you out.”

She looked up. Seven, bloodied, with a slash mark across his face and a bandaged left

arm hanging in a makeshift sling, was standing in the doorway, a look of immense sadness on his

face. He looked outside, then around at the blood all over the room, then at her.

“You really did a number on them,” he said. “As I said, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.

I guess I thought that after so many years out here you’d have lost a bit of your touch but… well,

it looks like the best are still the best. Sorry I couldn’t get here to warn you. I had to stay until…

well, until I could find Thirteen and Seventeen.”

“Well,” she said sullenly, “where are they?”

“They’re, uh, they’re… dead. We scattered when the Hunters ambushed us, and they

came after us. It looked like Thirteen managed to take one down with him, that’s why there are

only eleven here, but they got him. They captured Seventeen and got him to tell them about you

before they killed him. I… I could hear the screams from where I was. I got away, but only

barely. I just wish I could have saved them. They were mine to take care of, and I failed.” He

looked down at the floor and was silent for a while.

She stared at him in silence. She didn’t want him to be there. Listening to more stories

of death and failure wasn’t really what she wanted to do at the moment. There had been enough

of that already.

Eventually he spoke up again. “Hey,” he said, “I’m sorry we lead them to you. They

were waiting for us in the next valley over. They must have gotten to one of our superiors and

decided to catch us out here where we wouldn’t have any help. I, uh, I don’t have any right to

ask you for this but… will you help me bury Thirteen and Seventeen? I don’t have enough

working arms at the moment to do it myself.”


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She glanced up at him. “Yeah,” she whispered weakly, “I’ll help.”

She stood up and they walked outside. After she retrieved a shovel from her tool shed

they started the walk to the next valley over. Most of the walk passed in silence, out over the

pass. It was nearly nightfall when they found Seventeen’s corpse. When she saw it, she nearly

vomited. Even back when she had worked with the Harbingers, she had never liked torture or

mutilation. She’s never had the stomach for it. She always tried to have clean kills. Kills where

the person wouldn’t even see it coming, if at all possible. This… This was the opposite of that.

Seventeen had suffered before his death, and even after the mutilation hadn’t stopped. She

gagged, but took a deep breath and stayed calm. It reminded her of Death’s kills. They were

always messy. She started digging. Seven helped where he could, but it was clear his arm was

in worse condition than she had thought it was. Eventually she told him to go sit, she would take

care of the work.

When she had finished digging he spoke again. “Thank you,” he said. “I couldn’t do it

on my own, or I would have. I… I wish we didn’t have to do this. He was better than this.

Young, yeah, inexperienced, yeah, but he had a heart of gold. He would never abandon a friend

or ally in combat. He stuck with people until the end. And I didn’t. He died alone when he

made sure no one else in his battles did. I failed him.”

She looked up from the hole, into his eyes. She saw the pain there, and thought again of

the families of the men she had killed, wondering what they would say about their loved ones to

their friends when they found out they had been killed. “I’m sorry,” she said, “I really am. It’s

hard to lose a brother in arms. I lost enough to know.”

To her surprise, he looked confused. “You lost friends in combat?” He asked, “When did

you lose Harbingers? Other than that last battle, when they turned against each other.”

Looking down at the ground, she sighed and held back a sob. Once she had collected

herself, she said, “We didn’t just meet each other in battle that one time. The first time, when the

Warrior first returned, two of the other Harbingers turned against her. I stood with her, and in

the conflict all of our… auxiliaries died.” She noticed his confusion and clarified, “The

auxiliaries were the lower rank Harbingers. The Warrior was our leader, then there was myself,

and two others. Each of the three of us had two sisters-in-arms we called our auxiliaries. In that

first betrayal, all the auxiliaries were killed. Then in that battle, the battle you saw, the other two

Harbingers, called Doom and Death, killed a man who had been travelling with us. Then I killed

the Warrior. And then I killed Doom and Death. That was the last battle I fought in before I

came out here. I’ve been trying to recover ever since. It hasn’t really worked.”

He sat quietly for a moment. Occasionally he went to speak, but each time he stopped

himself. Eventually, he said, “I’m sorry. I didn’t know. No one really knew much about the

Harbingers, except that there were fewer when they came back than when they left. And then

there were none at all. I suppose it makes sense that there was something going on behind the

scenes, but I never expected… I’m so sorry.”


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She shrugged. “It’s all in the past now. I just don’t want to see any more death. There’s

been enough.”

He came over and helped her lower Seventeen into his grave. Looking down at him,

Seven went to say something, but then stopped. He closed Seventeen’s eyes, and then closed up

the grave. They went on in the fading light, found Thirteen, and dug the hole for him in silence.

As they lowered him into his grave, Seven breathed deeply and spoke:

“I don’t want to see any more death either. There’s certainly been enough. But I can’t

stop now. I have to go back and fight again.”

“No, you don’t,” she said, “you’ve lost them, but you can stay out here. Live in this

valley, or one of the nearby ones. I doubt they’ll come out here again. Even if they do, if you

pick a high enough valley, no one will ever find you. You only have to come down lower in the

winter.”

He sighed. “Yeah, I could. But I can’t let this happen to any of the other groups. I have

to keep fighting so that this doesn’t happen to any more of my friends.” He looked over at her.

“I’d really appreciate it if you came with me. We need a fighter like you. We need someone

who can take care of herself. Thirteen couldn’t. Seventeen couldn’t. If you had been with us,

they might still be alive. Even if you don’t come, I need to go back to talk to Thirteen’s family.

Let them know. I’d really appreciate someone to travel with.”

She looked down at Thirteen’s body laying in the earth. If she joined the fight, she knew,

many more would die by her hand. But if she didn’t, maybe even more would die to each other’s

hands. Either way, there would be death. But maybe, just maybe, if she helped out, if she fought

again, there would be fewer. She started shoveling earth back on top of him.

“Yeah,” she said, “I’ll come with you. At least until you’re somewhere safe.”

With both of the men buried, the two set up a camp for the night and slept until the next

morning.


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Chapter 9

In the grey pre-dawn light, she heard Seven get up and walk around.

“Hey,” he whispered, “are you awake?”

“Yeah,” she replied, sitting up, “I’ve barely slept at all.”

“Thinking about yesterday?”

“Yeah. It’s been just a little bit of a transition from my nice peaceful life back into

insanity. Are you ready to get going or do you want to try to sleep a little more?”

“No way I’m getting back to sleep. Get your stuff together. Even with an early start

we’ve got plenty of distance to go today. And the next day. And, well, a few more days after

that.”

She grunted in agreement and got up, packing up camp in a matter of moments. He, for

his part, had already packed up while he had been walking around before he had spoken. Still in

the dark, they set off climbing back over the saddle into the valley where she lived. By noon

they had made it back to her cabin, where they stopped for food and so that she could gather all

the things she needed. He went out to hunt and scrounge for berries while she packed what she

would need for travelling into a wood frame hide backpack she had made a few years earlier.

While he was gone, she changed out of her bloodied Harbinger armor into a light deer skin

hunting outfit.

As long as she had time, she thought, she was going to go about this in the most level-

headed way possible. She didn’t need everything from the cabin, and she didn’t want to be too

weighed down for the trip, but it would be a week at least to the nearest road, and ten days to the

nearest city if they couldn’t hitch a ride once they got to the road. The Harbinger armor would

need to be cleaned before she could pack it, and it would need to be hidden in the bottom of the

bag. Her knives she could carry on her, but the swords would be best off strapped to the pack,

and the bow and its arrows strapped on somewhere she could reach them if she needed them.

Other than that, one or two more hunting outfits would work until she could reach the city and

get something a little more normal looking. She would need food, though she could always hunt

or scavenge, plenty of the mountain berries were in season. And she would want as many of the

new waterskins as she could carry. He would need a few of those too. His waterskin worked

fine, but he seemed like he could use a new one, and a spare as well. She could supply those,

there were quite a few lying around that she had made during her busy work.

Looking around, she took stock. That was about all she could think of for needs for the

journey, as long as nothing particularly terrible happened. She already had a bedroll and little

one-person hide tent. All that remained was to wash out the blood from the Harbinger armor and

fill up the waterskins. Then, once they had eaten, they could set out.

With everything in order and laid out to be packed, she went and sat outside, waiting for

Seven to come back. As soon as she saw him, she yelled across the clearing:


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“Hey, I’m going to go wash the blood out of my armor and get fresh water. I’ll see you

back here in a bit. Don’t eat all the food before I’m back.”

“No promises,” he called back, “And make sure you don’t get the blood from the armor

into my water,” he added with a grin.

After giving him a questioning look, she shook her head and set off. For a man who had

just lost two of his closest friends, he certainly was in a good mood. Then again, she thought,

maybe that was just his way of dealing with it. Heaven knows she must have seemed absolutely

crazy to the man that had been travelling with the Warrior. He’d met her in a burned down city,

where she’d made a terrible pun, and then after she’d been tortured she’d been downright

cheerful in her conversation with him. She decided maybe Seven’s reaction wasn’t so odd.

Certainly not as odd as her own. Pushing the thought out of her mind, she focused back on the

task at hand. Past matters aside, there was more work to be done right now. Perhaps even the

first work in years that actually mattered as more than just a distraction.

Down at the riverside, she got to work cleaning out the armor. The armor actually wasn’t

covered in that much blood for how much she had felt like she had had on her. In fact, it was

astonishingly clean. She’d been wearing it for more than thirty-six hours since the fight, so it

was to be expected that some had come off in all her movement, but even so, she was shocked.

She thought back to a few nights previous, how she had felt like she was sitting in a pool of

blood all night. How it had felt like she had blood on her hands for hours. How she had thought

that her entire body must be covered in blood. Yet here was the armor, strangely clean.

Maybe the stress of the night had just made everything seem worse. She had felt covered

in blood after the wolf attack too, yet, looking back, she hadn’t had that much blood on her

afterward. Why? Thinking back to her Harbinger days, she had never thought about having

blood on her. Washing blood out of her armor had been a routine chore, and she had usually

had much more on her than this after an extended battle. Yet back then, it had never bothered

her. Now even the slightest amount was unbearable. Had she been desensitized back during her

campaigns with the Harbingers, and years away had done away with the normality of it? Or, on

the other end of the same line of thinking, after years away had she lost her nerve? Would she

even be helpful to Seven and his friends if they ever got back to the world to try to help? Or

would she, having lost her nerve, be totally useless if they ever actually had to fight? What if

that happened? What if they got back and it turned out she couldn’t do it? She’d be giving up

her peaceful life in the mountains for nothing, and Seven and his friends would die anyway.

She paused for a moment at that last thought. The way she had thought of it disturbed

her. It was as if the only way for them to be saved was for her to go and find that she still had

the nerve to fight on their behalf and keep them from being killed. As if the only option that

didn’t end in disaster was the exact option that she had spent all her years in the mountains trying

to get away from. She had to go back and fight if she wanted them to survive.

But why did she care if they survived? She had never cared whether anyone survived,

really. She had killed plenty of people, including all three of the other Harbingers who had been

in that last battle so many years ago. She hadn’t even cared if her friends survived. For a brief


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time after that, she hadn’t even cared if she was going to survive. Why bother caring now?

What had changed that made it so important to make sure that people she had never met, other

than Seven, kept living? If she really cared about them, that meant she was a different person

than she had been all those years ago. And if she was a different person than she had been, if

she was now a person who cared about the lives of others, she wouldn’t be able to fight the way

she had been able to before. She wouldn’t be able to just go out and slaughter the way she had

with the Harbingers. If every death weighed on her as much as those at her cabin, there was no

way she was going to be able to fight another war. But if the deaths stopped weighing on her,

her whole time in the mountains would have been for nothing and she’d be back to being who

she was before she ever left to try to change her ways. She wasn’t sure which was worse: finding

out she had changed and couldn’t help the people she now wanted to help because she had

changed, or finding out she hadn’t changed and going back to slaughtering without any real

thought.

At this point she realized she had been continuing to clean a perfectly clean suit of armor

for at least ten minutes. The armor was waterlogged and scuffed from being washed out for so

long. She filled the water skins and set back to the cabin, resolving along the way to not worry

about who she was and whether or not she could help Seven and his friends until she had the

chance to find out for sure. Maybe it wasn’t the smartest way of going about it, she thought, but

at least she’d be doing something.

* * *

After she and Seven had eaten, they set out on the long journey back to civilization.

Since they had time to talk, she eventually decided to ask him more about the war:

“So you said a few things about the war the first time we talked, but I want to know

more. Who’s on each side, what they’re fighting for, why you’re being tracked down and killed

off systematically. You mentioned a couple of things earlier, but if I’m going to be fighting in

this, I need a lot more than what you gave me.”

“Well,” he said, “I’m not sure what I said earlier, and I’m not sure how much more I can

clarify. I was always a foot soldier. I didn’t get any sort of command until enough of us had

been killed that people started to see me as a survivor who could probably take care of a man or

two in the mountains. And, well, they were wrong about even that. Where do you want me to

start?”

“Who are the sides? Leaders, what they’re fighting for, why. Things like that.”

“Okay. So the group that you could call my side is currently a ragged group of survivors

trying to stay alive. But it wasn’t like that at the start. I think I mentioned earlier that we

probably deserved to lose the war. I still stand by that. I only fought because I was paid, and

because there were threats against the family of any man who left the army during the war. So I

stayed. Anyway, our formal leader wasn’t very clear at first, but eventually we found out the

whole thing was orchestrated by a man who called himself Zero. He came to power as a popular


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advisor to kings. He played off of fears and lust for power, putting forward a plan to crush

opposition forces and strengthen loyal forces by forced conscription.

“But that was just the first step. The conscripts regularly went through ‘loyalty

enhancement programs’, which were meant to keep order within the ranks. Lucky for me, I was

an old career soldier, so I didn’t have to go through them, but I heard stories. It was more or less

torture. Plenty of propaganda, but also forced physical labor, regular whippings for people out of

line, and occasional outright killings if the ‘teachers’ felt things had gotten out of hand. Needless

to say, most people weren’t too happy about it, but with all the power in the hands of people

dedicated to Zero, eventually even the kings didn’t have a say on what went on in their armies.

All people in charge of discipline, food rations, clothing, work schedules, you name it, they all

reported to Zero or to his personal group of ‘program advisors’. By the time a single king

realized how much power they had given the man, Zero controlled every official army in the

region by controlling our supplies and our daily lives. He just had all the right people in his

pocket to keep control even without the kings’ support.

“So he started killing off the kings, and each time he killed a king he would call together

the king’s old army and announce himself the new leader. The man was a great orator. When he

spoke, well, it was obvious why so many kings had listened to him. When the man spoke – even

if you disagreed with him somewhere deep down – you couldn’t help but be stirred by his words.

He could call a group to action like no other man I’ve ever seen. So he took control of the

armies, and once they had heard him, they came willingly. And he started to order even worse

things. Mass killings of ‘subversives’, mostly. But naturally the men often went too far. There

was a lot of looting by soldiers, sexual assaults on women, unlicensed killings written off as

‘field judgements on a person’s subversive status’ – a phrase I heard way too much. Terrible

things happened under the army’s watch with Zero in charge, and he promoted it all.

“So eventually, people got tired of it and started rising up against him. Local warlords

armed the remaining non-conscripted and gathered as many of the conscripted as they could

convince to join together until they had an army. You were there for the first of those battles.

Many, many more like it followed. At first, the rebellion was exactly what everyone needed.

Their old leader, a quiet, unassuming man, stood and spoke for an end to Zero’s reign and

everyone who had been oppressed under Zero started to gather around him. Unlike Zero, they

didn’t come because he was a great speaker or amazing leader. They went to him because he

was right. I would have gone, but my family lived in Zero’s capital city, and I was informed that

if I ever didn’t show up for roll call they’d be dead before I could come back and say I’d been

late waking up. So I stayed, and just tried to fight in the battles as little as I could. Eventually,

the rebels started winning. They gained a lot of ground, a lot of troops, and in the last official

battle I fought in, killed Zero in his castle in the capital. That’s when everything turned bad for

everyone.

“The old rebel leader, that quiet, righteous man, was killed by assassination. Other men

in the rebellion stepped in to take his place just a little too quickly, and the rebellion immediately

started working to consolidate its power. The new leader declared himself the High King and

moved into Zero’s old castle, which he rebuilt stronger than before, with higher, thicker walls


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and more men garrisoning it. He commissioned groups of a dozen men each he called ‘hunting

squads’ – those guys who attacked your cabin. The only objective of the Hunters is to kill off as

many of our men as possible. A few large battles later, our side had been reduced to no more

than stragglers, most of whom had gone underground. The new leader declared that the rebellion

wasn’t over until the last of the soldiers from Zero’s old army had been killed and their families

wiped out as well. It didn’t help that he created a ‘people’s council’ filled with his favorite men

from each city. The council decreed that he was right in his actions, and that anyone connected

to Zero or his army in any way was a threat to the rebellion. With the council under his belt, he

could seem to be a man of the people while still acting more or less unilaterally. So with his

creation of the Hunters, and the decree by the council to kill us off, most of what remained of the

army was killed. We didn’t have much left in the way of organization, but by the time we

recovered we had also lost most of the men who had corrupted the movement.

“See, I saw a lot of officers who tried to stand up for what they felt was right get removed

from their positions under Zero. Conscripts who disagreed just disappeared. Career soldiers like

myself who disagreed found ourselves blocked from advancing in rank, and we were joined by

our old officers who had spoken out. We ended up with a subclass of good men, most of whom

survived and are part of what we call the resistance now. The man we call One was the only

good man who survived the purges in the higher ranks, so he stepped in when Zero died and has

lead us since. He’s a good guy, and a good leader, but not much of a public figure. Mostly he

just hides and tries to coordinate all the other groups in hiding. And while we’re still losing men,

we’re not doing as badly as we would without him.

“So long story short, I guess, things haven’t changed much. There’s just been a switch in

who’s killing who. Before, it was Zero killing the rebels, with the rebels headed by a good but

quiet man, and now the rebels have their own dictator killing off our resistance, headed by One.

I hadn’t really thought of it that way before.”

She looked over at him. “So what you’re saying is that you’re part of an army that used

to do terrible things to people, and now the same is being done to you by the people that rebelled

against you, and you’re upset about it?”

He laughed. “Yeah, that’s one way to put it. I tend to look at it more as them taking it

too far, but if you looked at the whole thing as everyone in our army as guilty, then yes, we’re

getting what we gave. But not all of us went with Zero’s plan, as I said. And it just so happens

that most of us are left, because Zero promoted the more bloodthirsty men, and then the Hunters

targeted the higher ranks first. So, coincidentally, most of the men who are left actually

sympathized with the rebels until they decided to kill us and our families. You know, the same

threat that Zero used against us. We just can’t win, it seems.”

She nodded, then stared at the ground for a while as the two walked in silence.

Eventually, she spoke again:

“So what is it exactly that you’re looking for from me? If you’re badly outnumbered, I

won’t be much of a help in a battle. Even I can only take on so many people at once. And I’m

no politician, and not much of a speaker. And I’d be shocked if people were still afraid enough


90

of a lone Harbinger to call off a whole war just because one showed up. What are you expecting

me to do?”

He sighed. “I actually legitimately don’t know. I’m hoping to find One and have him

talk to you. He’d probably have an idea of how you can best help. Until we find him, I’m just

flying in the dark.”

“So you have no idea what we’re doing?” she asked.

“Other than trying to meet up with other people in the resistance…” he replied, “no, not

really.”

“Wonderful. Why did I come with you again?”

“I don’t know. You wanted to help?”


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Chapter 10

All in all, the journey to the nearest city took eight days. Seven were spent wandering

down out of the mountains, and on the eighth they convinced a caravan that they were fur traders

and rode to the nearest city. They spent the ride keeping to themselves mostly, brushing off

questions by saying they were tired, they hadn’t had a good haul that trip, and that they didn’t

want to talk much. Though it took some persuading, the men in the caravan eventually left them

alone and went about their own business. After the first hour or so they got used to the odd looks

the traders were giving them and just sat in silence, staring at the passing country until they

reached the city.

As they neared it, she realized she had forgotten how massive some of the cities in the

region were. She tried to think back and figure out what city they might be in, but she couldn’t

quite remember the names. What she did know is that she had been here before, and the last

time she had been here it had been significantly less fortified than it was now. The long years of

war since the last time she had passed this way had seen the walls grow taller, with more towers

and fewer gates. If she was thinking of the right city, the last time she had passed through here –

fourteen years or so, back in the Harbingers’ last run before the Warrior had left – the walls had

been little more than a large wooden palisade, enough to keep out wild animals and the odd

raiding group but now… The walls surrounding the main gate were well-cut stone, at least a

dozen meters high and several meters thick. Staring at the walls, she wondered how much they

had cost the townspeople, how terrible times must have become for the city she remembered

before to have put in all the time, labor, and money to build these massive fortifications.

Her thoughts were interrupted as the caravan rolled to a halt in the shadow of the main

gate. Soldiers came out of the guard post on the outside of the wall and started talking to the

leader of the caravan. Papers were exchanged, and the men in the caravan started lining up in

front of the guard post. One by one, they went up to the booth by the front door, presented their

papers, and were sent back to the caravan after a brief conversation. She heard Seven curse

under his breath, and when she turned to look at him he was climbing down off of the wagon

they had been sitting on.

“Get down here,” he whispered. “Those are rebel soldiers. I was afraid this might

happen. They’ve recently been setting up checkpoints at the city gates. They require anyone

going in or out to have papers saying who they are, where they’re from, what their trade is, who

their relatives are, and lots of other things. You get the idea. They want to be able to know

everything about you. Last time I was here this city was still opposing the checkpoints, but

apparently they gave in at some point. We have to get out of here before we’re called over.

Follow me.”

The two pulled on their packs and walked off towards the tree line outside the city. They

heard some of the men from the caravan calling after them, and while they ignored them at first,

they soon heard someone running up behind them.

“Where are you two going? I thought you wanted to go into the city?”


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Without turning around, she cheerfully called over her shoulder, “We have a cabin out

here where we keep our papers. We don’t risk having them ruined while we’re out hunting, and

we can’t get into the city without them, so we have our little place out here as a base. We’ll get

into the city tomorrow. Thank you for bringing us here though!”

With that, she focused her attention forward again but kept walking at the same steady

pace. The man’s footsteps slowed, stopped, and then she heard him start walking the other way

again.

“That was pretty quick thinking there. Too bad we don’t actually have a cabin in this

area, that’d be pretty convenient,” he said, half hopeful that she wasn’t kidding about having a

cabin in the area.

“Yeah it would,” she replied, “but unfortunately I don’t. So what’s the plan for getting

inside?”

“Well,” he said, “The rebels have always tried to gain favor with the poor by largely

staying out of their way. Not exactly preferential treatment, but they don’t do anything that the

poor might see as an extra burden. So if you’re not afraid of walking through the slums, there’s

probably an unguarded gate that opens into one of the poorer areas of the city.”

“Trust me, I don’t have any problems with slums. I grew up in one, and several of the

old Harbinger hideouts were in slums. They’re good places to hide. One question though. If the

slum gates are the only unguarded ones, that’s probably the gate they use for most of the… illicit

goods entering the city. Is there any way to get in contact with them? I used to have a few

contacts for when I needed certain weapons, and with any luck they might still be around.”

He glanced over, a look of surprise flitting over his face before he regained his normal

nonchalant expression. “Yeah,” he said, “there’s probably ways to get in contact with them.

You’d know better than I would though. So I’ll leave that up to you. But yeah, it’s definitely the

gate for contraband – which includes you and me in the eyes of the rebels. Be cautious, though.

The rebels know we use those gate for travel, and I wouldn’t count on the local smuggling

groups to be above selling people out to the new regime. Heaven knows they worked with Zero

and his people back when he was in power.”

She nodded. She had never really worked with the groups as a whole. There were one or

two people she counted on to get special-made weapons in from certain craftsmen outside of

town. But she doubted too much would go wrong. She just needed to find out if an old friend

was still in this city. If it was the city she thought it was.

Her line of thought was interrupted when he spoke up again.

“Why do you need to get in contact with these guys anyway? What are you looking for?”

“Well, there was a man who at least used to live here. If this is the city I think it is, that

is. He made the best serrated knives of anyone I knew. One side was a regular razor, while the

other was heavily serrated. Worked great for close, quiet kills and also worked as a saw in a

pinch. Though, I usually had to replace it after using it as a saw. Kind of ruins the knife. So as


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long as we’re fugitives, I’d probably better get some of my old stealth mission gear back

together. Also, if he’s here, he’d probably know where to find my other contacts. I could use

some of the stuff I left behind when I went to the mountains if I’m going to be fighting again.”

He nodded and kept walking. She stared and him for a while, trying to read him, before

shrugging and giving up.

If he had something to say, she thought, he should say it. Otherwise, if he was hiding

something from her, he probably had good reason. And if he was hiding something in order to

hurt her later… well, she was sure she could handle him.

* * *

By midafternoon they had found the gate to the slums. They had known it as soon as

they saw it. It appeared to be new construction, as if part of the wall had been a solid chunk

upon its original completion, but then part of it had been torn down recently and rebuilt to hold a

little gate. Where the main gates had been almost as tall as the wall with a gatehouse above and

thick iron bars holding it closed, this gate was little more than a doorway with a few chains and

wood planks lying by to secure it at night. Only foot traffic moved through, and that

infrequently. As she looked around, she saw mostly farm laborers coming in from or out to the

fields around the gate. The whole place felt as if it had long been ignored by even those who

walked through it on a daily basis. As if the people who used it didn’t think much of it, and

those who didn’t rarely even remembered it existed.

When they stepped through the door, she understood why it felt that way. The buildings

around the gate had clearly been designed and built when there had been a solid wall behind

them rather than a gate. The gate opened directly into an alleyway barely wide enough for three

people to walk side-by-side through, and the nearest path to the main street was two buildings

down on the closer side, three down on the other. The whole back alley was deep in shadow and

smelled strongly of the rotting wood of the old buildings lining the wall. A vague dampness

made its way into her boots as she walked down the alley. She tried not to think about it.

After the claustrophobic entryway, the dirt lane that made up the main street seemed

luxurious. Dust hung in the air from the constant movement on the road, invisible in the

shadows of the wall and the houses but obvious in the sunlight in the middle of the road. Few

people walked the street at this time of day, save some beggars wandering here and there and a

lone guard at the far end of the block. After they had walked past a few houses, Seven grabbed

her shoulder and steered her down one of the side paths between the buildings.

“There should be a marker somewhere in here that will tell us where to find the nearest

resistance group, assuming they’re still here. We just need to look at all the upright wooden

posts in here. There’ll be markings on one of them that I can decode into directions to the

nearest safe house.”

“How do you know it’ll be in here?”


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“Well, I might be a little off because we had to go over two houses to get to the main

street, but the rule is one row of houses back from the gate, there will be a marker post behind

the fifth house to the right. That would be this one, I think.”

The little side path opened up into a musty, dark common space between the last row of

houses and the next. Seven immediately went to work inspecting the wooden pillars on each of

the houses, while she stepped into the middle of the little opening. The ground consisted mostly

of old, dried, cracked mud, with little patches of moss in the crevices at the bottoms of the walls.

Again the air stank of the wood of the houses surrounding the enclosed space, and the even the

high afternoon sun couldn’t reach into the depths of the pit between the buildings. As with the

alley before, she felt trapped. After all her years in the forest, she wasn’t used to the closeness of

the spaces, the size and consistency of the wooden walls of the houses.

There was a difference between being alongside her cabin wall, nestled up against the

tree line as it was, and being alongside these walls. In the forest, though the undergrowth grew

close and pressed up at a similar distance, it felt more open. Here, the light never reached the

ground, even in the summer, blocked by the rotting shells of buildings that had long fallen into

disrepair. Out there, when something died and rotted new life grew from it; bushes from logs,

saplings from stumps. Here, the long-dead carcasses of houses still acted as what they had once

been; though the interior and exterior had both begun to rot away, people were still forced to

cling to them in their old capacity. Nothing new could grow from these as they fell into decay;

rather, their old purpose stayed with them forever. Here in the slums, old life did not die and

become a basis for new life, old life tried to hold on forever even though it had never truly lived.

Everything was stagnant here. No new life came forth, no new resources spurred new growth.

Everything simply tried to hold on to itself for as long as possible. And when a building finally

fell, the building that replaced it would be of even lower quality, and would fall into disrepair

sooner. Where she had felt life around her in the forest, she felt only stagnation and death

around her here.

Seven yet again interrupted her thoughts with a small grunt of recognition.

“I think I found the coding. If only these pillars weren’t so worn down, it’d be easier to

make out the markings. Give me a minute.” He paused for a little while. “There we go. We

need to go over two blocks, up three rows, and then down an empty well in a common space like

this one.”

“An empty well? Really? Isn’t that the most stereotypical place for an underground

hideout there is?”

“Hey, I didn’t choose the place. Yeah, I admit, I’m a little shocked no one has realized it

too. But it’s worked for them so far, and here in the slums no one’s going to bother going

through the work to remove it. So we just go with it. It wouldn’t make you think any better of

us if I told you the houses around it are abandoned, would it?”

“And let me guess, it connects to the cellars of the houses, which you keep locked?”

“Uh… well, yeah, actually it does.”


95

“You people are ridiculous.”

“Maybe a little. Come on, let’s go.”

They headed back out to the main street and followed the directions to the well. On their

way, they saw very few people. Again there was a beggar or two, and another guard on patrol,

but the streets were largely empty.

“Why do you think there are so few people out?” She asked.

“Well, if I had to guess, I’d say that this close to the gate almost all the people are farm

workers and they’re out working. Anyone who works in the city is going to be out in one of the

trade quarters, or the production quarters. Not much happens here, and everyone here is either

working all the time or begging. And, well, there aren’t many people here to beg off of, so the

beggars are out elsewhere too. It’s not that weird if you think about it.”

“I guess not,” she said.

After a few moments more they made it to the well. It was barely wide enough to fit

down, but when they reached the bottom it widened out a little more. Realistically, the well was

only about five meters deep. Set into one wall was a wooden doorframe. Seven walked up to it

and knocked on the door. After a moment, a voice came from the other side.

“What’s the password?” Asked the voice. She rolled her eyes.

“The High King eats lizard tails,” Seven said back, his voice sounding almost as

exasperated as she felt. “Is this really necessary? If I weren’t a friend, I’d be bashing the door

down with a dozen men at my back, not knocking politely.”

“Hey, the protocol’s not my choice. Come on in,” said the voice.

Seven went in first. They entered into a low earthen-walled hallway that, after a few

meters, lead through a hole in a brick wall into the basement of one of the houses. She still

couldn’t shake the feeling that the whole set up was just a little too cheesy. But once she was in,

she had to admit it felt plenty secret. Something about the lack of windows and the fact that the

one visible door was solidly boarded shut and blocked by furniture on top of that felt right for an

underground hideout. Still cheesy, but right.

The man who had spoken through the door turned around once they had all made it into

the room. “So, Seven, you’re back. Who’s this? And where are Thirteen and Seventeen?”

“Twelve and Seventeen are dead,” Seven said curtly. “This is someone we found in the

woods. One of the old Harbingers. She agreed to come back with me and talk to One, if we can

find him.”

The man looked at the floor. “I’m sorry to hear they’re dead. We need all the men we

have. But after a moment, he started laughing bitterly. “You think you found one of the

Harbingers? They’re dead and gone, Seven. I don’t know who this is, but if you found her in


96

the wilderness and she claimed to be one of them, she’s probably crazy. You should’ve left her

out there.”

She glared at him and took off her pack. Seven went to respond, but she put up her hand,

signaling for him to be silent. She pulled her bow off her shoulder and placed her quiver on the

floor next to her. She tilted her head a little and quietly addressed the man:

“How about I show you what I can do. You pick. I can either put an arrow one inch to

the inside of each of the nails on the boards on the doorframe over there, or I can put one arrow

straight through your eye.”

The man stepped back a little, then said, “I’d rather you go for the boards. If Seventeen

and Thirteen are dead, I’d rather not add myself to the body count.”

She pulled her quiver on, nocked an arrow, and did exactly as she had said she would.

She then put down her bow and went to inspect the arrows.

“I hope none of these got damaged in this stunt. I need these,” she said as she pulled

each one back out from the boards. “Do you believe me now?”

“Not entirely,” the man said, “But I’m willing to accept that you’re certainly good with a

bow. Regardless of who you are, we need fighters like you. There’s few enough of us left as

there is. So yeah. I think you’re a liar, but a good fighter. So I guess you can stay.”

She kept glaring at him, fingertips brushing the feathers of one of the arrows she had just

pulled from the door. Seven stepped in between the two of them, hands slightly out, palms

toward the floor.

“So, Thirty,” he said calmly, “where are the others? It can’t just be you down here.”

Thirty didn’t take his eyes off of her, but responded, “The others are out getting supplies.

There’s usually four more here. Two are at market, two are getting in contact with another

outpost to get updated orders. Speaking of, if you two expect to stay here you’re going to need

to bring your own food. We could provide for you, Seven, out of our supplies, but we’re not

responsible for random women you picked up in the woods.”

Her knuckles turned white as she gripped the bow tighter. She went to snap at him, but

Seven beat her to it.

“Well, I wouldn’t have expected you to be ready for me anyway, let alone me and

someone you don’t know. If I’d showed up with Thirteen or Seventeen we would have provided

for ourselves, so I don’t see why I wouldn’t do the same now. Just let me know where the

nearest market is, and we’ll go get supplies tomorrow. We have enough with us for today and

tomorrow morning.”

Seven half turned so his shoulders pointed at each of them. He looked over at her and

said, with an uncertain look in his eyes, “We won’t cause too much trouble here. I promise.”


97

She recognized what he wanted and put her bow down, along with the quiver. After

taking a few deep breaths, she went back to pulling the remaining arrows out of the door frame.

As she calmed down, Seven turned to Thirty.

“So what’s the situation here? I saw the front gate was under control. Are there any

other gates we can use? I mean besides the slum gate where we came in.”

Thirty’s attitude shifted sharply as he turned to Seven, becoming much less aggressive

and much more formal. “No,” he reported, “the slum gate is the only way in or out for us right

now. The main gates are under lockdown, as are the two trade quarter gates. The castle district

is totally blockaded, no traffic in or out except official business. There are regular roadblocks

throughout town, especially around the trade district. Our men can only get goods from the

civilian market in the residential district. We keep an updated map of roadblocks and patrol

routes in the room on the left if you want to see it. Our biggest problem in the foreseeable future

is a recent movement by the city’s ‘council’ to require papers to have access to the wells. For

this hideout, that’s not that bad as the order doesn’t apply to wells in the slums, but for our local

headquarters over in the residential district – well, they might end up walking all the way here,

and that would draw attention. We’re working on a solution. Hopefully the group getting our

new orders will have the plan from command to deal with that. Beyond that… there’s not much.

Enemy movements have been predictable, and roadblocks have been limited to high-traffic and

high-profile areas. We’re getting by and staying unnoticed, so that’s about all we can ask for.”

Seven nodded his head. “Thank you, soldier. By the way,” he said, in a lower voice, “I

in no way mean to take your command here. I know I’m technically the ranking officer, but

you’ve got more experience running this district than I do, and I won’t be here long. I don’t

want to upset the order if I don’t have to.”

Thirty almost imperceptibly relaxed, but she noticed his change in posture after Seven

had whispered to him. A little tension left his body, but a massive amount of tension left his

attitude as he walked away. As Seven turned to walk toward her, she asked,

“What did you say to him right there at the end that made him calm down so much?”

“Well,” Seven said, looking back to make sure Thirty was out of earshot, “I’m

technically the ranking officer in this district now. There might be someone at their command

that outranks me, but here I’m the lowest numbered soldier. I just told him I didn’t mean to take

his command away from him. I think that’s part of why he was so anxious when we arrived.

Any soldier, especially those who like to have authority, gets a little on edge when a superior

arrives with a person he claims is an important historical figure. I figured that he was on edge

because of that, and, well, I don’t want to be here very long, so I made sure he know that we

won’t be taking over.” He paused and took a breath. “I’m sure he’ll be nicer now,” he added

after a moment. “He was just nervous about our sudden appearance and probably upset that

we’d lost another group to the Hunters.”

She nodded. “Sounds about right. How far from being any sort of officer would he be if

it weren’t for the emergency?”


98

He looked over his shoulder again before responding in a lowered voice. “Well, frankly,

he’d be quite far. He’s not ready for any command at all, let alone the high stakes here. He’s too

attached to his authority now that he has it, and he’s not flexible enough for the situation. The

fact that his reaction on our arrival was anger rather than curiosity is bad news. I’ll talk to the

other men here when they get back and get a better picture of the situation. I don’t want to say

too much before then.”

She nodded again and answered, “Makes sense. He certainly doesn’t feel like any officer

I’ve worked with. Though, I really only had the Warrior as an officer, and then one of the other

ranking Harbingers later, called Death. They did all of the negotiating with outside military

officers. I just fought and did what the Warrior told me.”

A spark of curiosity flitted through his eyes. “You called her Death? Was that her title,

or more like a code name, like our numbers?”

She thought for a second. “I suppose,” she said, “It was more like your numbers. We

weren’t allowed to use our names. I think the Warrior knew some of our names at some point,

but she wasn’t around as long as Death or Doom. I don’t know if anyone knew their real names.

I never knew anyone’s name but my own.”

He hesitated a moment, and then asked, “If you don’t mind me asking, what was your

name? Or, your codename at least?”

She looked down at the ground for a moment. She took a deep breath, then looked back

up at him. “As long as you’re using a codename, I’m going to. I was called War. That’ll have

to do for you.”

He nodded. “Well, War, you should probably get to bed soon. I recommend eating, then

getting some rest. We’ll have plenty to do in the morning.”

She laughed, flipping her hair over her shoulder as she turned away. “Don’t get all

formal with me Seven. If there’s one thing I learned in the Harbingers, it’s that when you’re off

the battlefield you don’t have to be so strict with yourself – unless you’re training. But if you’re

at home base where it’s safe, it’s time to relax while you can. You never know when you’ll be

back out into the carnage.”

Shooting a puzzled look after her as she walked away, he too turned and left the main

room, entering the veiled alcove that Thirty had entered a few moments before. Silence fell over

the hideout; a silence that held throughout the rest of the evening and into the following night,

broken only by the quiet conversations between Seven and Thirty as they looked over maps of

the city and planned out alternate routes to the market, to water, and to the local headquarters.


99

Part II

Chapter 11

When the following morning came, the other men from the hideout still hadn’t

returned. Seven and Thirty went out to try to gather information, leaving her alone in the

hideout. With nothing else to do, she started exploring the various rooms in the little

underground complex. The main earthen-walled room had four connected basement rooms, two

to the left of the entrance she had come in from the well, one to the right, and one in the back,

which was the smallest of the four and was curtained off rather than having a door. Also on the

right hand side of the room was the boarded off door which she had shot after Thirty had

challenged her. She had asked Seven about it, and he said that on the plans it showed that the

ground floor of the house behind that door had fallen into the cellar, and the whole house was too

unstable for the room to be used. He had explained that while it might be a little security issue,

this part of the slums probably wasn’t due for a rebuild any time soon, so they wouldn’t have to

worry about construction crews coming in and trying to clear out the rubble.

Overall, she was satisfied with the set up. There were several changes she would make if

she could, numerous improvements that could be made for security and sustainability, but for

just a few common soldiers, she thought, they had done well. The roof wasn’t in danger of

collapsing and there was space for even more men than they had. Most importantly, the location

was ideal. Looking over the maps of the city, she had noticed that this little section was perhaps

the least travelled area of the slums, and, subsequently, the most ignored. When she had time,

she would go see if she could scavenge building materials from the fallen building. The hide out

could use a more formal armory, and morale would be better if she could put together an actual

bunk room for the troops rather than having them sleep in bedrolls on the floors of the various

cellar rooms. Also, their food stores could be better organized. The more she thought about it,

the more she realized how poorly run the operation was. The location was good, and the

construction of the hideout was fine, but it was becoming increasingly clear to her that Thirty

wasn’t a very good manager. Not that that surprised her in the slightest, it fit with the image that

he had presented to her upon her arrival: irritable, impulsive, and generally driven by reaction

rather than thought. She frowned. She wasn’t going to be able to convince him to make the

changes that she thought needed to be made. Maybe if she could talk to the other men they

would listen to her.

* * *

Seven and Thirty came back midafternoon. When they arrived, they found the hideout

significantly tidier than when they had left. The earthen passageway around the door to the well

had been extended using earth dug from the center of the main room, and the door itself – as well

as the doorframe – had been reinforced, with a removable peep hole added. The pit that the earth

had been dug out of was shaped into a tiered square, with wooden benches put over the dirt to

create a central meeting area. The girl was out of sight as they entered, but the pile of supplies

that had previously been in the stock room and the rummaging sounds coming out of the back

gave a fairly clear indication of where she was. Seven smiled a little when he saw the evidence


100

of the work in progress, but Thirty gave an audible sigh of frustration and started to walk toward

the back of the hideout. Seven stepped forward and put his hand on Thirty’s shoulder.

“She’s just trying to help. That and keep herself busy. If you’d seen her cabin set up,

you’d know she needs to be working constantly,” he said.

“Well she needs to work on something that doesn’t mess up my hide out,” Thirty snapped

back. “She can’t just show up here and start throwing things around. We have a system here,

and it works quite well.” He stalked off to the store room, and a short yelling match ensued.

After a moment, War walked out of the room fuming and sat down in the corner of one of

the benches in the pit. Seven walked over to sit down on the bench on the other side of the

corner from her.

“Look, don’t give up on helping Thirty,” he said, in a sobering voice. “He’s in a bad

mood because both groups that left yesterday were captured and are being held in the castle.

That’s all four of the men under Thirty’s command. They’ll probably be tortured for information

for a few days, and then executed.” He looked her in the eye and continued, “Someone needs to

go try to get them out. It falls to him to try, but he knows it’s a suicide mission for him. If he

doesn’t try to go get them, and just writes them off as losses, he’ll lose his position.”

She shifted uncomfortably and replied, “Well, I’m not particularly excited to help him,

but if I’ll do it for the other men. What are you thinking?”

“Well,” he said, slowly, “I was thinking about how he doesn’t believe you’re a

Harbinger, and how he doesn’t trust you because he doesn’t know who you are. Between that,

and the fact that, frankly, only a Harbinger – if anyone – could pull off what we’re trying to do,

and…” he trailed off. “Look, you know what I want. It’s a suicide mission for us, but you might

pull it off. Will you do it?”

She hesitated. “I haven’t really done anything like that in… well, a long time. Will

Thirty even let me take his place? He seems like he’s too proud for that.”

He looked down at the floor and smiled. “I’m sure he’ll hate it. But my authority to

assign the mission to you – especially if I have it be a recruitment test – exceeds his authority to

volunteer for the mission. If I tell him to stay here in the hideout while you go out, he has to.

Otherwise, he’s in trouble for going over an authority and will probably lose his command. He

might not like it, but he’ll have to let you go.”

Half smiling, she glanced over toward where Thirty was repacking the store room in its

old system. “I think I’ll take the mission, then,” she said. The smile disappeared as quickly as it

came as she focused on the task at hand.

“What sort of defenses am I looking at? Can I get a map of the city and of the castle? Do

we have notes on the guard patrols? Where are – ”


101

He held up his hand, cutting her off. “Look,” he said, “I’ll just give you access to

everything we have. Then, while you’re looking things over, I’ll break the news to Thirty that

I’ve given both the mission and permission to see all of our secrets. I’m sure he’ll be thrilled.”

With that, the two of them walked to the curtained off area in the back of the hide out.

Once he had unlocked all the various boxes she would need to get into, he left the room. Shortly

thereafter, she heard Thirty scream something incomprehensible, followed by more yelling,

followed by the sound of a single punch landing hard. A very long silence followed during

which she became totally absorbed in planning her approach.

It looked like if she could get inside – a big if, as there were twenty four hour guards on

the high walls and only one gate – there was a servants’ area that ran throughout the castle itself.

After examining the notes about the wall guards’ patterns, she decided it would be easier to make

it in through the main gate, even with the blockade. The castle walls were even taller than the

outer walls, and they were well-lit and well-guarded. She decided to take the gate as seemed

appropriate when she got there. It was quite probable she could make it in during the evening,

when all the afternoon workers were heading out and the night workers were leaving. It would

provide the greatest amount of general bustle and therefore the greatest distraction levels for the

guards. Once in, getting into the servants’ area would be relatively easy; if she dressed right no

one would even question her.

Flipping through another stack of papers, she found herself impressed by one of the

men’s ability to take notes on just about everything. One of the pages, signed off by One

Hundred Five, contained a full description of the castle servant’s uniforms. Another page

included average time spent by the guards looking at papers at the gate, and how long the lines

were on average at each shift change, as well as several interviews with workers that suggested

that papers weren’t checked on the way out. Another had every detail of the difference between

officers’ and regular guards’ uniforms. She opened another box, simply labelled ‘miscellaneous

notes’, and found hundreds of similar pages. She flipped through a few stacks, but didn’t find

anything too useful. She’d have plenty of time to look through those later.

She got back to her main task. Locating the prison on one of the maps, she was excited

to find that the prison guard had their own mess hall inside the prison, and that it connected to

the servants’ area through a passage that lead between a nearby hallway and the pantry for the

kitchen attached to the mess hall. She silently thanked whatever idiot designed the servants’

areas to make this easy for her. At this point, her plan was fairly straightforward: either get

caught in the flow through the main gate, steal some papers, or talk her way in; then make her

way to the prison through the servants’ passages; kill or sneak her way to the keys and the cell;

and get the soldiers into servant uniforms and walk back out. Simple. Sort of. She still had a

few details to work out, but those were better decided on the fly when she saw what was actually

happening. Nothing she could plan here would account for everything anyway. Some things

would simply have to wait.

With everything planned, she decided to talk to Seven about getting the gear she would

need. A servant’s uniform and her long knives would work fine, so long as she kept the knives


102

under her clothes. The drawing of the servant uniform made it look like there would be plenty of

space to keep them underneath; the clothes were fairly baggy. In fact, she thought, she had seen

a servant’s uniform when she was reorganizing the stockroom. And concealed knife sheathes as

well; the kind that were meant to be worn under baggy leggings. She’d still check with Seven

before taking them, though. She walked out into the main room to find Seven sitting back on the

benches in the pit.

“Where’s Thirty?” She asked.

“Ah, you’re back,” he said, looking up. “Thirty is resting a little and getting over the

black eye I gave him. Did you hear what he said when I told him I gave you access to our

information stockpile?”

“No.”

“Ah, well, it’s probably better that way. It’s good that I told him. With your temper,

you’d probably have killed him. And I don’t want to lose any more men. So how did the

planning go?”

“I need a servant’s uniform from the castle and concealed knife sheathes – I know you

have both, I saw them earlier. I don’t suppose you have fake papers? You wouldn’t have

everyone sneaking around town if you did.”

“No, we don’t have papers, real or fake. It looked like command had been trying to steal

some in the reports I read last night, but no one’s gotten their hands on any yet, at least in this

town. As for the other things, find them and take what you need. It’s probably best for you to

get out of here before Thirty wakes up, if possible. When do you plan to leave?”

“Soon. I want to be at the castle before the afternoon workers change over to the night

workers at dusk. If I get going soon, I’ll be able to do it.”

“Then do it,” Seven said. “Oh, and soldier,” he said, smiling, “good luck, and thank

you.”

She nodded, and walked off to the store room, her pulse racing. As she went, she tried to

center herself, calm her nerves, and identify the feeling that was exciting her so much. It only

took her a second before she laughed to herself about how obvious the feeling was.

It was the feeling that it was that time again: time to see what she could still do.


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Chapter 12

Having geared up in the store room, she made her way out into the city streets. Dressed

in a standard castle servant’s outfit, her weapons concealed under the relatively baggy clothes,

she made her way down the streets of the slums without even attracting so much as a glance from

the street corner guards as she passed. Most of the guards, she noticed, hardly seemed to be

paying attention to anything. They simply stared off into the distance, as if either deep in

thought or extremely bored with their given posting. Possibly both, she thought with an internal

laugh as she walked past; the slums didn’t exactly seem to be the most lively part of town, and

the guards would have to do something with their time. After all, these weren’t the military

guards from the castle – these were just regular police. They were normal civilians with some

combat training and a list of rules to be enforced, not career soldiers. And as far as she was

concerned, staring off into the distance and thinking was probably the best thing they could be

doing. At least they weren’t trying to fill their time and assuage their boredom by causing

trouble.

Shaking herself, she returned her focus to the task at hand. Thinking about the guards

and their habits could wait until later; for now, she had work to do. The first major checkpoint

was coming up ahead, the one that blocked off the main road connecting the slums to the market

district. She didn’t intend to enter the checkpoint as there was another easily accessible route

that went around, but she wanted to see how a normal checkpoint functioned before she got all

the way to the castle. Even if the castle checkpoint was different, this would at least give her a

few minutes to rethink her approach before she got to the castle gate if the setup was

significantly different from what she expected.

When she rounded the corner onto the main street, she slipped into the alcove of the

nearest doorway, leaning against the wall as if resting. She took a deep breath, then put on a

look of idle boredom as she stared down the street at the checkpoint. At first glance, it was

exactly what she had expected. A wooden wall stretched across the road, with a small roughly

built building that she assumed served as a command post and jail standing on the left side of the

road. There were four doors in the wall: two for traffic coming out of the market, and two for

traffic moving in. Six smaller fences stuck out from the main wall to create four individual

pathways that held traffic in line for the first ten meters or so before and after the wall; the two

paths leading into the market had a guard posted at each checking papers, while the other two

paths were covered by a single guard making sure no one walked into the exit doors. The wall

itself, as well as the provisional command center structure, were nothing too special. Quickly

built from rough wood, neither would stand up against any significant force. An unruly mob

might not be able to bring them down, she thought, but any coordinated group would have no

trouble breaking through.

She stuck around just long enough to get an idea of how many men were in the building:

by her estimation, ten men at most ran the whole checkpoint. Six guards outside, four inside.

Again, enough to secure the checkpoint against almost anything unarmed civilians would be able

to do, but nowhere near enough men to stop a coordinated effort, especially if it were

unexpected. She looked up at the sun, trying to get a bearing on how long she had been standing


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there. Not too long, she thought; she still had plenty of time before the shift change. There was

certainly enough time to get a little better look at the whole operation. Leaning forward off the

wall, she started walking toward the checkpoint.

When she was a short distance away, a woman at the front of the line started yelling, as if

in a panic. She couldn’t quite make out what the woman was saying, but it looked as if she had

forgotten her papers – she was rummaging through her bag and pockets desperately. As she

started to run out of places to look, the guard at the door yelled something over at the guard post.

Two men came out and made their way around the fences to the front of the line, where they

stood talking to the man at the door for a moment before turning and grabbing the woman. War

was still too far away to clearly make out what the woman was yelling, but the meaning was

clear enough. The woman was innocent, and had simply misplaced her papers, and she was

afraid of what was going to happen. Briefly, War considered going to help the woman.

That woman was either an ally or an innocent being imprisoned for nothing more than

misplacing a piece of paper, she thought. No matter what, the woman deserved her help. And

she knew she could more than handle those men. But doing so would endanger the men she had

already agreed to save. In saving the other woman, she would brand herself a criminal, and

probably the woman as well. No matter how much she felt she should help that woman… she

simply couldn’t. It wouldn’t turn out well for anyone involved.

As she reached the end of her thought, the woman was taken inside the building, and the

door shut. The guard at the door pushed the woman’s bag out of the way, and continued

checking papers as if nothing had happened. The atmosphere among the people did not relax,

but the activity in the street returned to normal. War stood there for a few more moments

examining the cautious and weary looks on the faces of the other onlookers before turning to

leave. She still had to get through a checkpoint of her own.

* * *

She arrived at the castle gate a comfortable amount of time before the shift change. She

settled into a walking pattern that circled the three street blocks in front of the castle gate with

irregular enough frequency and consistency as to make herself as innocuous as possible. The

setup at the castle gate differed slightly from that of the roadblock: there were two walls rather

than one in front of the open castle gate, with the command structure built in between the two

walls. The walls were more substantial, built of solid tree trunks rather than wooden planks,

with a walkway built along the top of the inside of each wall. She couldn’t see the area in

between the walls very well, but it looked to be about a dozen meters wide, with most of the

space taken up by the fences that connected each of the six doorways in each wall – three for

traffic in, three for traffic out. She was surprised that the castle had more doors than the road

checkpoint. But then again, the castle had to move many people in and out in a short period of

time, whereas the market checkpoint had a relatively steady stream. So perhaps it made sense.

Resuming her look at the checkpoint, she noted that the fenced-in queueing spaces were

significantly longer than at the market checkpoint, and that they formed a sort of maze-like


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structure that wound its way to the wall rather than forming a straight line. The fences

surrounding paths coming from the exit did the same.

Overall, she thought, this checkpoint was much more serious than the last. Even a

coordinated group would have trouble making it through this one if it was fully functioning. It

appeared to have at least two men per line, including the exit lines – so twelve men on the

ground on each side – plus six men on top of the checkpoint walls, and likely a few more in the

command structure. In her estimation, probably thirty five to forty men. Plus however many

street guards happened to be walking past – there seemed to be substantially more of them on

this side of town. If she couldn’t get the men out of prison stealthily, they were going to have a

very hard time getting back out.

As workers started showing up for the shift change, she noticed one final thing: two right-

most doors were set into a larger gate, and there was a matching set of gates in the fences out

front that, she assumed, allowed wagons to enter the castle. It wasn’t an incredibly important

detail, she thought, but would make bringing the walls down easier than if they were directly set

into the ground.

She waited a little while longer, as she had planned, waiting for all the workers from the

last shift to clear out and most of the workers from the new shift to join the line before she

walked up. As she waited to get to the front of the line, she did her best not to look around. She

had to look as if this were her totally normal routine. Then again, it would also befit her to look

a little nervous, as she was going to have to pretend to have forgotten her papers inside, and she

assumed that most workers knew the penalty for not having papers at a checkpoint. Not that she

actually knew what the penalty was, but that woman she had seen earlier certainly made it seem

bad.

She reached the front of the line.

“Papers, please,” said the guard.

“I, um,” she stammered, forcing her voice into a range slightly higher than her normal

speaking voice, “I left them inside the castle. I just got off my shift and realized I didn’t have

them as I left. Could I… could I get inside and get them back?”

The guard looked at her for a moment, a stony look on his face, before replying.

“I don’t think I’m allowed to let you in,” he replied, “and certainly not at just your word

that you work here.”

“Please, sir,” she said, forcing a look of even greater concern, almost panic, onto her face.

“I need those papers to get through the checkpoint to get home. I come here every day, surely

you recognize me?”

“No, I don’t,” he said, “And I’m not paid to recognize the workers. In fact, we’re told

it’s better if we don’t. So I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to come with me to the command post.

Unless,” he said, lowering his voice, “Unless, that is, you can make it worth my time to let you

through.”


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Internally, anger flared up in her. Externally, she took a slight breath in and looked

down, bowing her head to make sure he couldn’t see the initial reaction in her eyes. As

disgusting as she found the meaning of his request to be, she had to take it. This was her chance

of getting inside. And once she was in, he didn’t have to get what he wanted. He could simply

be disposed of. His uniform would certainly be useful. He was about her size, too… So,

quickly regaining her composure, she lifted her head back up just enough to look him in the eye.

“Of course I can make it worth your while,” she whispered.

He gave a wicked smile, and turned to shout one of the other guards. “Hey, I’m taking

my break. This little lady needs a personal escort inside, it seems.”

“Whatever,” the other guard shouted back. “Just come back from your break on time this

time. Last time you took a break you didn’t come back all night and the whole shift got in

trouble for it.”

“Yeah, yeah,” the guard replied, “I’ll be back when I want to be back.” Then, turning

that abominable smile toward her again, he said, “Come on, I’ll show you inside.”

He led her through the checkpoint and then to the left once they were inside the castle.

He took her through a door that she recognized from the maps to be the entrance to the servants’

area. This was going well, she thought. Now she had to get him somewhere that his body

wouldn’t be found.

“Make sure we’re somewhere private,” she said quietly, as they rounded a few more

corners.

“Oh, don’t worry, I will,” he said.

A few moments later, they entered a small supply room. Before he could turn to face her,

she pulled one of the knives out from under her clothing and slit his throat, pushing him forward

to get as little blood on his uniform as possible.

“That’s what you deserve, you pig,” she muttered as he fell forward. She then proceeded

to remove the uniform from the body, checking each piece for blood. Despite her best efforts,

some had gotten on the shirt and the chest piece of the armor. Luckily, she knew she was near

the washroom, so she headed there. So long as no one saw the blood directly, she thought, she

would be fine. If they did, she’d say she’d heard there was an incident at the gate and a man had

gotten violent. Or she could fain innocence and say she had only been given the armor to clean,

not an explanation of why it was bloody. Either way, she would be fine. Everything was

working out.

Luckily, no one was in the washroom. She changed into the guard uniform, putting her

servant outfit into a satchel that she found in the washroom. She was fairly certain it was meant

as a small laundry bag, given the way it smelled, but it would do. Also of note were several

racks of spare servant uniforms. She made a mental note to come back for those once she had

the men out of prison. Slinging on the satchel, she made her way out of the washroom and tried

to get her bearings as to where she was. If she could get back to the entryway, she could find her


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way to the jail. And so, after only a few minutes of wandering, she found herself back at the

entrance and began her walk to the jail.

Along the way, she noticed how unclean the servants’ tunnels were. She took this as a

sign that the people working here were far overworked – if three shifts a day, working eight

hours each, couldn’t keep their own area in decent condition, it meant they were being

overworked elsewhere, so they either didn’t have the time or the will to keep their own

environment clean. Also, many of the underground corridors were poorly lit and narrow, with

low ceilings. Compared to the outdoor environments she had grown used to, it felt like a cage.

She couldn’t imagine how someone could work here. Yet people did. Every day. She

shuddered at the thought. City life had never been her favorite, and she was more than a little

glad that she was able to take care of herself out in the wild. She vastly preferred hunting and

farming for survival in the mountains to working in these cramped corridors to make a living.

Even if winters were hard out in the mountains, it wouldn’t compare to how hard living every

day in this dungeon would be for her.

But the sight of the prison kitchens forced her out of her thoughts. She had to keep

focused on the task at hand. She couldn’t keep slipping in and out of focus like that, no matter

how safe the environment felt. This castle was enemy territory, and she needed to be on her toes

no matter what. Walking across the dining hall, she became aware of several people glancing

her direction. No matter, she thought, so long as she kept walking as if she belonged no one

would actively question her. Everything would work out just fine.

As it turned out, she was correct. Despite a few odd looks and some whispered words,

neither any of the servants nor any the guards approached her as she made her way through the

kitchens and across the mess hall. Once inside the prison proper, she took stock of her situation.

The warden’s office was upstairs; he would have the keys. Only one hallway lead there,

and it would be guarded. She doubted the guards would simply let her through, so she might

have to fight her way in, but if she did have to fight her way in, she couldn’t leave any bodies

behind her. Any sign of fighting left behind would almost certainly cause someone walking past

– or, in the stairwell, anyone coming up to the office behind her – to raise the alarm. The best

approach would be to knock out the guards at the base of the stairs, or otherwise bloodlessly

remove them, and then bring their bodies upstairs with her as best she could as she made her way

to the warden’s office, always keeping an ear out for others coming up the stairs. If anyone did

follow, they would have to be dispatched as well. Then, when she got to the top, she could leave

all of them in the warden’s office once she had the keys. With any luck, she would be back with

the men before anyone had reason to go visit the warden. While perhaps not foolproof, she

thought, that plan would have to suffice. She couldn’t just keep moving the bodies with her after

the warden’s office, as she would be back in open corridors.

Hesitating, she tried to think of another way to deal with the problem of people walking

in, and then she realized there was an easy solution. She would have the keys. She could lock

the warden’s office behind her, and then lock the doors to the mess hall, and the outside doors.

With the prison locked down, she could simply remove any opposition inside and then rescue the


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men and head back out through the servants’ entrance in the kitchen once she had them all in a

guard uniform.

Again, not perfect, she thought. But then she shrugged aside that notion and decided it

was the best she could do on such short notice. Now all that remained was to execute it.

Coming to the door at the base of the stairwell to the warden’s quarters, she found it

under guard, as she had expected. What she had not expected, however, was that the guard was

seated in a chair in front of the door. Even less expected, though not unwelcome, was that the

guard was asleep. She chuckled internally, but then immediately felt a little remorse.

This man was so secure in his position that he was comfortable falling asleep on the job.

He probably came to this place every day and stared at a blank unmoving corridor, watching for

a threat that never arose. He probably toiled through all of it to bring home food for a family, to

secure a living for himself and others dependent on him. Yet because of her, because of her

allegiance to a cause that found itself struggling against not this man but his employers – whose

overall cause he might not even support – this man wouldn’t wake up from this last rest. What

did he do to deserve it other than be in her way? He couldn’t even fight back. Yet… she had to

do what she came here to do. It was too late to back out. And was this really any different from

what she had done back with the Harbingers? Sure, all of those people had usually had the

chance to fight, or at least to run, but they had all ended up dead regardless. This man was

simply meeting the same end without the intermediate steps.

While this rationalization felt hollow and insincere to her, she pushed the whole subject

to the back of her mind. There would be time for thinking and justifying, doubting and

questioning later. For now, she was on a mission, and there were other men she needed to save.

She broke the man’s neck with a swift twist of his head. Then she pushed the chair out of

the way, opened the door, and, drawing the standard issue guard sword from the man’s belt,

dragged his body into the stairwell. Shutting the door behind her, she began the work of

dragging the man up the spiral stairs while constantly looking out for more men above her or the

sound of people coming up the stairs from below. A few tense moments later, she found herself

at the top of the stairs with the warden’s door in front of her and a dead man at her side.

Surprisingly, the door was unlocked. Perhaps, she supposed, the warden felt that anyone who

made it past the guard downstairs was automatically a welcome visitor. Too bad the only time

the policy really mattered was when that assumption wasn’t true.

As she opened the door, the warden looked up from his desk. She found herself looking

not at a young muscular commander of the guard, as she might have expected, but an old man in

fine clothes with a pen in hand. He looked like he would be more at home in the court of a noble

than managing a prison.

“I assume you aren’t actually a guard?” He said. “Does that mean you’re here to kill me?

I would assume so. I’m bound by oath not to hand over the keys while I still live, so you must

be. If so, kill me quickly. You resistance types aren’t known for your kindness or mercy, so at

least give me the comfort of a simple death without torture.”


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She hesitated, wondering if it would even be appropriate for her to respond. She decided

against it, and walked forward in silence, sword in hand.

Who was this old man? Why was he the warden rather than a man at court? Wouldn’t a

guard captain make a better warden? Something was wrong here. But he had the keys on his

belt, and he had said he wouldn’t give them to her while he was alive. Yet still she couldn’t help

but feel this was wrong. Once again she was put up against killing an opponent who seemed

innocent. A man who wouldn’t even defend himself against her. It felt immoral. It felt wrong.

In all her years of combat she had only once killed people who had refused to stand against her

– that same fateful day that Death had betrayed the Warrior and killed her auxiliaries. They had

burned a town and slaughtered the inhabitants. That was the first time she had ever willfully

killed people who refused to fight her. And today came the second time. And the third.

Yet even while she was thinking this, still she advanced, her gaze cold and her face set in

hard lines. From the view of the warden, the woman advancing showed no signs of insecurity or

doubt: the look of the woman in front of him was that of a cold, seasoned killer. That image was

the last he saw.

Keys in hand, War locked the door to the warden’s office and made her way downstairs,

locking the door at the bottom of the stairwell as well. As she made her way through the prison,

she killed each and every guard she came across, not bothering to hide the bodies. When she

came to the mess hall – which was now empty after the evening meal – she locked that door as

well, and continued on her way through the prison, again killing each guard as she found them.

She locked the front door. She killed every guard on her way to the prison cells. And there, in

the last hallway at the bottom of the dungeon, she found the cell containing the missing men.


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Chapter 13

“You all. I’m here to get you out,” she said as she opened the door.

The four men looked up, looks of confusion and skepticism on their faces.

“You’re here to get us out?” One of them said, “A random guard is just going to let us go

free?” The others, though they kept silent, gestured that they shared the concern. She let out an

exasperated sigh.

“I’m not one of the guards. I took Thirty’s place in coming to try to rescue you. Good

thing too, I don’t think he’d have made it through. Now come on, we need to get you guys into

uniforms so we can get out of here.” She turned to leave. But as she did so, one of the men

spoke up again. These men were going to get on her nerves, she thought.

“Hold on a moment. There aren’t any women in the resistance in this city,” another one

of the men said, “the nearest outpost that has women is two towns over. And last I checked none

of them looked like you. Who are you?”

Frustration mounting, she turned and looked at him, gesturing impatiently that they

needed to follow.

“I’m a friend, at the very least. I joined up with the resistance a few weeks ago. A man

you all call Seven recruited me. Now if you’ll stop wasting time, we only have so long before

someone figures out the jail has been locked down from the inside. We need to be gone before

that happens.”

Once again, she turned to leave, and once again, one of the men tried to speak up. She

held up a hand to silence him, and, without turning around, said, “You can either come with me

now or stay in jail. I’m leaving.”

The men looked at each other, and then hesitantly followed. Shortly thereafter she had

them all dressed in guard outfits that more or less fit each of them. The disguise might not hold

out at the main gate, but they would all be in servant clothes by then anyway. For now, they just

had to get back to the washroom. That was the next step. She signaled for the men to follow her

and started making her way back to the mess hall.

If only the men weren’t so disorganized and slow. She realized that they probably hadn’t

eaten that day, and were likely tired and hungry, but still, they couldn’t be moving any slower.

Or making more noise. It was as if they were intentionally dragging their feet as slowly and

noisily as possible, scraping the steel-reinforced boots across the stone floor rather than picking

up their feet and walking. If they normally acted like this it was of little surprise that they had

been caught in the first place. She couldn’t imagine having only men like this at her command.

They’d be nearly useless, even in force. But that didn’t matter. She just needed to get them out

the front gate. And maybe their downhearted look would make them less conspicuous once they

were in servant uniforms. Hopefully. That seemed to be about all the chance they stood at this

point.


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They had reached the mess hall. She pulled out her keys and unlocked the door, opening

it cautiously in case anyone happened to be waiting for them on the other side. No one was.

Standing back, she allowed the men to file into the mess hall before her. She followed, locking

the door behind them again.

“Okay guys, you have ten minutes to find something to eat in the kitchens. Or until

someone starts knocking on this door. If there are any servants back there, send them in here. I

don’t want any of them killed, understood?”

“Understood,” the men mumbled, clearly impatient for her to release them to go eat. She

looked them over for a few seconds, taking stock of their appearances, and then let them go.

These men weren’t in good shape. They seemed tired, discouraged, and pessimistic: the

standard look of men who’d been fighting for too long with too little hope of victory. If things

didn’t swing in the favor of the resistance soon – and if these men were any indication of the

overall state of the resistance – there probably wouldn’t be a resistance for much longer. For

these men, the breaking point was only a few more losses away. Was there anything she could –

Her thoughts were cut short by the sound of metal clashing on metal in the kitchen.

Drawing her sword, she ran toward the sound. As she was running through the mess hall, she

heard a man cry out in pain, followed by a short silence, and then the clashing resumed, but at

odd intervals. As she entered the kitchen, it became clear why: a young girl, slight of build with

long brown hair – maybe sixteen or seventeen years old, by her looks – was standing in one

corner of the kitchen, holding the large iron rod used to move logs in the fire with both hands.

One of the previously imprisoned men lay on the ground, a large bruise forming across the side

of his head. Another man knelt next to him, tending to the wound. The other two stood

cornering the girl, lunging at her with their swords at odd intervals. The girl, for her part, easily

and almost gracefully parried away each of the attacks with the iron bar.

War was impressed. That iron bar would be incredibly unwieldy as a weapon, yet the girl

was handling it better than these ‘professional’ soldiers were handling their swords. By all

accounts, she thought, this should be an incredibly one-sided battle, even if the men were tired

and hungry.

There were two options, she thought: either these men were even worse than she

expected, or this girl was something special. Or perhaps a bit of both. She decided to put it to

the test.

“Men,” she called, “stand down. I’ll handle this. You all go eat.” She walked forward,

shifting into a dueling position. The two men stumbled backward out of her way, letting the girl

come out of the corner slightly.

“Okay,” War said, “I’m impressed by how well you handle that bar. But these guys

aren’t exactly in good condition; they’ve been imprisoned and haven’t slept or eaten. I’m in a lot

better shape. Let’s see what you can do.”


112

She moved forward, bringing her sword up from its resting position in a simple uppercut.

The girl moved the clumsy iron bar startlingly quickly and parried the blow. War let her first

attack bounce off of the reply and brought it around quickly to a cut at the girl’s side. The girl

twisted, bringing the bar vertical between her body and the blow, hands at shoulder height at the

top of the bar. Seeing the parry coming, War turned the move into a feint, flicking her wrist to

fake the incoming attack before shifting her feet and bringing her arm around for a cut at the

girl’s other side. The girl simply twisted at the waist, bringing her already prepared parry to

meet the attack’s new direction. This time, War let the full force of the attack swing into the bar,

as the blow wasn’t particularly strong anyway. The girl’s stance held. Pulling back for a split

second, War took her sword in both hands and brought an overhead blow down on the girl.

Somewhat unexpectedly, the girl – rather than pulling the bar up to try to block the blow

– spun sideways and tried to bring the iron bar into War’s side. The move was performed so

quickly that War’s actual battle instincts kicked in, and she herself moved forward to avoid the

hit before coming around in a reflex move to smash the flat of her blade into the girl’s fingers.

The girl dropped the bar and stumbled back, holding her injured hand.

War relaxed her stance as the girl backed away into the corner again, weaponless this

time. One of the men stalked forward angrily, but war put out her hand and stopped him,

motioning for him to go back to either helping the injured man or eating. This was her business.

“You’re fairly good,” she said to the girl, speaking in a soft, comforting voice. “Have you

had training? Or is this just what your instincts.”

The girl, a frightened and distrustful look still glowing behind her eyes, shook her head

and said nothing.

“Well,” War continued, “You certainly deserve a better chance at life than this place can

give you. I’m only with these guys until they’re out of here, and then I’m hoping to move on.

You could come with me if you don’t like it here. I can teach you to really fight, if you want to

learn.”

The girl stayed silent for a moment before responding. “I’d like to leave,” she said, “but I

have to stay here. I have to work here, just like my mother and father, or else we won’t be able

to feed my siblings. As it is we almost don’t make enough because the governor takes money

out of our pay for the care that he provides my siblings while we work. … I’d like to leave. I

really would. It’s terrible here. But I can’t go.”

War sheathed her sword and held out her hand. “At least let me make sure I didn’t

damage your hand too much,” she said, gesturing for the girl to step toward her. “I don’t want to

make it so you can’t work if others need you.”

The girl stepped forward and let War look at her hand. After a moment, War nodded and

said “It’ll be fine. It might bruise some, but nothing’s broken.” After a little pause, she looked

up at the girl and said, “You said the governor provides care for your siblings? Why does he do

that?”


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The girl looked down at the floor. “It’s not very good care,” she said, “It’s more like he

provides a place for them to stay all day, along with a lot of the other servants’ kids. They’re in

a big room towards the top of the servants’ area behind a locked door. No one even watches

them. But I suppose it’s one of the only places with windows. We have the night shift, so most

of the kids sleep, but they have the chance to play together there, and sometimes a guard will

come with an older servant who will teach them about the different tasks around the castle.

Frankly, I think it’s just an excuse to make sure the kids will be good servants once they’re old

enough.”

Nodding, War placed one hand on the girl’s shoulder. “I hope they’ll get a chance to do

more than just that. You, too,” she said in a low voice. “But I need to get these men out of here.

Is the passage through the servants’ are open?”

“Yes,” replied the girl, “but you should hurry. If the guards find out there’s a prison

break… They’ve been known to prefer destroying portions of the servants’ area rather than let

prisoners out. This wouldn’t be the first time a prison break has ended in them collapsing the

passage to the kitchen here.”

As if on que, the sounds of men hammering on the mess hall door came as the girl

stopped talking. She looked up, panicked, and said “You guys need to go, now. I’ll just hide in

the pantry and say I was chased in there. Get going.”

War nodded, and looked over at the resistance men. “We’re going, men. Get into the

passage, now.” The men hesitated. “What, what is it?” She asked.

“Well,” one of the men said, “Wouldn’t it be better if we made sure they couldn’t follow

us? I mean, as it is, they’ll get us cornered between two forces. They must know we went out

this way.”

“And?” War asked, “How are we going to make it so that we aren’t just trapped between

whatever obstacle we put behind us and the group coming around in front?”

“Simple,” the same man said, “We have to make sure that the blockage we put behind us

is either more distracting or provides us another way out.”

Another man chimed in, saying, “So we were thinking about it, and we might as well just

burn this place down. There’s nothing here we care about, and a fire will throw the entire place

into disarray. We’d have the guards off our backs for more than long enough to get back

underground.”

War froze for a second, unsure of what to say.

It might be true that there was nothing there that they cared about, but after hearing the

girl’s story… there was a room full of children somewhere here. A fire could easily endanger all

of them; innocent lives would be lost. All just for a distraction to use as cover for an escape.

The sound of cracking wood came from the mess hall. Now was a time for action, not

thought. War looked over at the girl, who had apparently heard what was said, and was coming


114

to the same conclusions. The girl lunged forward, trying to grab the iron bar again, but War

caught her and held her.

“I can’t let you guys do that,” War said. “There are too many innocents here. You’d be

killing off people who haven’t wronged you in any way, people who might just be trying to

survive through these times. How can you do that?”

“Easy,” the first man said. “The rebels killed our families and friends even though they

were innocent. A few families lost on the rebels’ part and on the part of their sympathizers here

will show we mean business and that we’re here for payback. Now, you’re either with us or

against us at this point. Are we moving forward or not?”

War hesitated. She had promised Seven she would get the men out of jail, and try to

bring them back alive. But this situation hadn’t been in the terms.

“Okay, here’s the plan,” she whispered to the girl, “They’re going to go through with this

no matter what I do. If we go now, can we get to the room where your siblings are before the

fire gets there?”

“I think so,” came the reply.

“Fine then,” she said to the men, “Go ahead. But wait as long as you can. We’re going

to try to get as many servants out as we can before the fire reaches them.”

“As if,” the man who had spoken before said, “We’re lighting it now. You’d best get

moving.”

War pushed the girl towards the opening, saying, “Go,” and picked up the loose sword

that the injured man had dropped. She looked each of the men in the eye and said:

“We’ll have a talk about this back at you base. Get out of here.”

And with that, she ran from the room.

She caught up to the girl within a few seconds. “Just take us by the most direct route.

We’ll tell everyone to get out as we meet them. By the way,” she said, “I brought you an actual

sword, just in case. Lead on.” The girl didn’t respond, but just kept running.

For a few excruciating minutes they ran down hallway after hallway, yelling to every

person they saw to evacuate the building. And then they ran past a window, and War saw what

she assumed to be the prison kitchen in flames, as well as the first portion of the wooden

structure outside. And that was when she realized the urgency of their situation: they seemed to

be heading to a large two story building set into the corner between the prison and the outer wall.

All the paths to the building branched out of the main servants’ complex behind them, so they

had had to run in a large ‘U’ shape to get back around to it, while the fire was not very far away.

Her suspicions were confirmed when the girl noticed the fire out the window and redoubled her

pace.


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By now, others had noticed the fire before them, and they had to push past people fleeing

in the opposite direction. The already cramped corridors were completely filled by the people,

making it almost impossible to move in the direction they wanted to go. A few times they found

themselves at a complete stop, even moving backwards as they tried to fight their way through

the stream of bodies. War could almost feel the girl in front of her getting more and more

desperate with every passing second. One of the times when they came to a stop, she ran into the

girl’s back and could hear her saying something under her breath.

“We just have to make it past the bridge.”

In the split second before they got moving again, War remembered one of the diagrams

of the servants’ area: there was a point where the lower floor of the building went underground,

while the upper floor connected to the building that she had come to assume was the child care

center.

If they couldn’t make it across that bridge and back before it collapsed, they wouldn’t

make it all.

War pushed past the girl. “Here, let me clear the path,” she said, drawing her sword. The

blade had the intended effect: every servant who saw it shrunk out of the way, allowing her to

pass. The going got a little easier after that, though not much, and it took a lot more focus to

make sure she didn’t accidentally hurt anyone. But it worked just enough. They no longer came

to a complete stop, and people didn’t run directly into her anymore. She hoped they would make

it in time.

They rounded one last corner, and War saw the bridge: the roof ended abruptly up ahead,

and there was a walkway open to the night sky. But she could see orange light flickering on the

walls at the end of the hallway, and the door on the other side of the bridge was ominously shut.

War picked up her pace some, but the girl shot past her anyway. By now the crowd had

cleared, and there was an open shot to the end of the hallway.

At least, there was, until with a massive cracking sound the close end of the bridge

collapsed into the flames, along with the first few meters of the hallway.

The girl ran all the way up to the edge and stood on the side, almost falling over before

War pulled her back from the edge. Black, acrid smoke billowed up from below, and War could

identify apart from the smell of burning timber the stench of burnt fat and grease.

Of course the men had burned the supplies of fat, grease, and oil. It only made sense. It

was a good fire starter and would guarantee that the fire would burn hot very quickly. Certainly

it was a risk as well, as a grease fire might burn out and only scorch the wood before anything

truly caught, but clearly that wasn’t the case.

As always, she shook herself from her reflection. How could she keep getting so

distracted in times when she needed her focus? She had to keep moving, anyway. She pulled

the now sobbing girl away from the edge, forcing her into an awkward half jog as they moved

away from the burning portion of the building. Behind them, War could hear more of each


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structure sloughing off into the fire below, and she could hear the fire spreading in the hall

underneath them. They needed to get out soon or they wouldn’t make it out at all. She

whispered a few words of comfort and encouragement to the girl next to her, telling her she

needed to keep going, that she had to just keep moving. That they could still make it out.

* * *

Quite some time later, they stumbled out of the entryway that War had entered early that

evening. Fire stood high against the night sky, engulfing much of the structure that had made up

the surface portion of the servants’ area. The majority of people were concentrated by the fire,

trying to keep it contained. A steady flow of people, especially servants, were leaving through

the unguarded main gate. War guided the girl that direction, and, once they were outside, put her

baggy servant’s uniform on over her guard uniform.

The girl had long since stopped crying, and simply stood there with an absent look in her

eyes. War sat the girl down along the outside of the castle wall, and then sat down next to her.

Neither spoke for a great length of time, until eventually the girl broke the silence.

“I want you to take me somewhere far away from this city,” she whispered, looking

straight ahead.

“What about your parents?” War answered in a low voice. “Don’t you want to find them

and let them know you’re okay?”

“And have to live in the shadow of my dead siblings?” The girl mumbled, still not

looking at War. At length she sighed slightly, saying, “No, no I’d rather not. It’d be too hard. I

don’t even know if they made it out.” She paused for another moment, and then continued, still

speaking in a low, monotone voice, “And I’m sure if I went back to the barracks where we lived

I’d never have a chance to leave again… No, I want to leave. But before we do,” she added, as

an afterthought, “I’d like to go talk to those men. Make sure they know what they’ve done.

What they’ve taken from me and from many of the other servants who never wronged them in

any way.”

War nodded, and then turned to stare off into the distance. “Sounds fair enough,” she

said. “But don’t take it out on everyone where we’re going. At least one of the men there isn’t a

terrible person. Oh, and if we’re going to be travelling together, I want to know your name.

Mine is Aracelia, though, most people call me War.”

“War?” the girl asked, the tiniest hint of a laugh breaking into her voice through her

gloom before her face clouded over again. “That’s an odd thing to call someone. But Aracelia is

a pretty name. My name is Dawn.”

“That’s an even prettier name.” Aracelia replied. “I like it. Now come on, I’ll show you

back to where you can find those men. I’d like to give them a piece of my mind as well.”


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Chapter 14

Seven stood up to meet the two as soon as they entered the resistance hideout in the

slums.

“Where have you been?” He asked, concern clear in his voice. “When the others arrived

they refused to tell me what had happened to you. All they said is that you ran off and they

didn’t see you again after that. And who’s this with you? What happened out there?”

“One question at a time,” War said, holding up her hand and trying to contain her

irritation. “We’ve been on our way here from the castle. Just the same as everyone else. This

girl is named Dawn. Your men killed her family with the fire they started in the servants’ area of

the castle.” She stepped closer to Seven and whispered, “I’m late because I tried to help her save

her siblings. We didn’t make it to them in time, and then barely made it out ourselves. So don’t

push her too hard right now.”

Seven nodded and stepped past War to address the girl. He pitched his voice lower and

softer than War had ever heard him speak as he said, “You’re welcome here so long as I’m in

charge. Which it sounds like I might need to be for a little while longer if what War says is true.

Which I have no doubt it is. Wait here. I need to go do some things.” He turned to walk away,

but turned around again.

“On second thought, War, take her into the first bunk room over there. I’m going to have

a little chat with the men. I want both of you to take the rest of the night to rest and cool off.

Then, in the morning when everyone’s a little further from this whole business, I’ll let you talk to

the men. Because while I want you to have a chance to… impress upon them the gravity of their

actions, I’d rather that not end in their deaths. So go rest, and we can deal with this in the

morning.” And with that, he finally turned and walked away.

War looked over at Dawn, who hadn’t reacted to anything that Seven had said. “Is that a

plan you can agree to?” She asked. “Because if not, we can absolutely ignore what he said and

go take care of it now.”

“I think I might as well sleep,” Dawn said, still without moving or changing her

expression. “As much as I want to go talk to them now, I’m not sure I have the strength to do it

right now. Let’s go.” She turned and walked into the bunk room.

War stayed in the main room for a while, sitting down on one of the benches she had

made in the pit in the middle of the room. Dawn probably needed a little alone time right now,

and she could stand to stay out here for a while longer before going in to sleep. She had some

things she needed to think about anyway. Things that she had wanted to think about earlier, but

that she hadn’t been forced to abandon in favor of getting to the task at hand.

What had happened first that evening? Was it the woman at the checkpoint? That

seemed right. She had left the woman at the mercy of the guards rather than helping her

because she herself couldn’t give away her presence yet. Had she just been out and about, not


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having to worry about future missions, had she been able to say that she would just help the

woman and leave town, she might have done so. But then, would that have been any better?

There were witnesses. If the guard tried to track down the woman after she broke the woman out

of the checkpoint, they probably would have succeeded. Even if they didn’t find her immediately,

so long as they had a description of her she would have been considered a criminal.

Realistically, being taken into the checkpoint probably meant imprisonment for a few days while

the guards tried to find ties to the resistance. If the woman was honest in her answers, and

didn’t have any ties, she’d be released. If she did have ties, she might be executed. But if she

had broken her out, the woman almost certainly would have been executed at a later date. So

doing nothing, even if it felt like cruel inaction at the time, may have been the right thing to do.

At worst, the penalty would be the same either way; but at best, she saved the woman’s life by

simply ignoring her. Or rather, she avoided causing the woman’s persecution and death.

Perhaps it was for the best.

So what had happened next? The conditions in the servants’ area in the castle. She had

noticed how awful they were. Well, that was sort of a moot point now. Most of it was ash, and

the rest probably at least damaged. Undoubtedly it would be rebuilt, but would that be an

improvement? On the one hand, the new building would most likely be cleaner than the old one,

as it wouldn’t have years of dirt, dust, and stains when it was first starting out. On the other

hand, though, she doubted the governor would put in the money and effort to build as solid of a

structure as before. For all its faults – and flammability – the old building had been fairly

structurally sound. The new building, especially if it were rushed, might be more dangerous

than the old one. But she couldn’t control that. Neither could she control that it had been

burned down. That choice had been taken away from her. So whatever conditions the workers

ended up in, for now the immediate conditions she had noticed would be gone. It was frustrating

to think that perhaps it would be even worse now, but that was something she couldn’t help. She

would just have to let it go. She couldn’t do any good by thinking about it.

Then she had come to the sleeping guard. She didn’t really want to think about him; just

the memory of walking up to him and twisting his neck made her sick to her stomach. In all her

years of fighting, she had never knowingly killed an opponent who had both been unable to

defend himself and had been unaware of her. Unable to defend himself, sure, she’d run into a

few of those. Unaware of her, yeah, that was the entire point of some of the night raids the

Harbingers had done. But both at once, and combined with the fact that he wasn’t even

necessarily a personal enemy… Actually, perhaps that was what was bothering her more. She

had killed men she had no personal quarrel with in order to save men who turned out to be more

actively against her than any of the men that she had killed to get there. Other than that guard

at the gate. He deserved at least something for his attitude and his actions. The sleeping guard,

though, had done nothing but get in her way on a mission to save men that were part of a cause

that she wasn’t truly a part of. She was here because she was sympathetic to Seven and his loss

of Thirteen and Seventeen. Not because she wanted to overthrow the rebels, not because she

really wanted to help the resistance. At least, she didn’t want to help the resistance now that she

had met it. Seven, Thirteen, and Seventeen had been good men, and the way that Seven had

described the resistance – protecting the few remaining survivors from tyrants – had made the


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cause seem good. But now that she was here, she had to question the character of the actual

movement. Thirty had turned out to be awful, and all of the men under his command were

equally awful.

And what had the warden said before she killed him? ‘You resistance types aren’t known

for your kindness or mercy’? That didn’t exactly paint the resistance in all that good of a light.

Granted, he seemed like a long term rebellion participant, given his age and position, and so he

would have been around back in the time when even Seven had admitted that the group that had

now become the resistance was doing terrible things. Back when they were in power and the

rebels were actually rebels. But again, if the men here represented the resistance at all, were

they any better than the rebels? The rebels were tracking down the families and friends of

resistance members, yes, but the resistance men were willing to burn down a building full of

innocents without thinking twice about it. That wasn’t precisely upstanding behavior either.

And finally that brought her to perhaps the most important question moving forward:

what were these men really like? When she had met them, they had been discouraged, tired,

hungry; barely able to walk properly. Then, just a little while later, they were steeled and ready

to burn down an entire complex to save their own skins. Perhaps their imprisonment had soured

their temperaments and tomorrow, or the day after, or after however long it took them to

recover, they would be more like themselves. Perhaps they weren’t as bad as they had presented

themselves to be. Even she had noticed that they looked to be at their breaking point. Maybe the

injury of one of their men by Dawn had lead them over that point, at least briefly. Maybe she

would be able to forgive them and move on. But then, maybe not.

Speaking of the girl, she had shown incredible resilience. Dawn hadn’t hesitated to

defend herself in the kitchen, hadn’t even taken a second thought about running back into the

burning section of the building to find her siblings, and then had held herself together for the

entire remainder of the night after they had failed. Whatever else she might find out about Dawn

as she got to know her better, she could tell that the girl had incredible internal strength.

Though, perhaps that wasn’t surprising given the girl’s background as a servant. She couldn’t

imagine that conditions were very inspiring, and that people were always watching. So while

tonight had been a particularly terrible night, Dawn managed to keep it together. Years of

keeping a straight face through mistreatment, years of keeping going through hopelessness had

come together tonight to keep the girl together as she made her way through the worst night of

her life.

She was, to say the least, very interested in Dawn. If the girl could keep her focus on the

battlefield the same way she had kept her focus in the kitchen, and if she could always work

through loss with the same stoicism she had tonight, she could become an incredible fighter. She

had certainly shown a natural aptitude for swordplay when she had fought her earlier. She

could certainly train the girl.

All these things were important to her because if the girl could be trained, and if the men

were decent men who could be trusted overall, she would consider continuing helping the

resistance. But if they turned out to be awful, she would still train Dawn, and take her – and


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perhaps Seven if he would come, though she doubted it – and leave. Go back off into the

mountains. Or gather others and try to start a little farming town out somewhere, somewhere

that they could have a community and defend themselves from the outside world. She didn’t

enjoy the idea of going all the way back out into the mountains to be with just one person. It

might drive both of them crazy over time. But three, five, nine, or more would work wonderfully.

If she could just find people to come…

She continued thinking long into the night, eventually retiring to the bunk room to find

Dawn already asleep. By the looks of things, the girl had sobbed herself to sleep. But that was

fine. She deserved the chance to release her stress in any way she wanted. It had been a long

night for her. And with that observation, War went to bed as well. Whatever would happen in

the morning could wait until then.


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Chapter 15

The next morning, War awoke to find Dawn still sleeping. She slipped out of the room to

find Seven waiting in the main room, slouching quietly with his elbows on his knees and his

hands in his lap. Glancing up, he beckoned for her to come sit by him.

“So, good news and bad news. Or all bad news or all good news, depending on how

you’re feeling I guess. The other men are pressuring me to kick you out, or they’re threatening

to make me leave as well. I suppose if they make me leave I’ll just go to command, and tell

them what’s going on here. I at least want to try that, either way. The men were rather…

unapologetic last night. It was disheartening, to say the least.”

War sat down next to him, shrugging. She thought about responding, but decided to ride

the silence out until he decided to speak again. It took a while, but eventually he continued.

“Look, I know the resistance is looking pretty awful right now. Burning down a building

full of innocents to secure their own exit as a first resort, that’s pretty bad. But I swear that’s just

these men. As a whole, the men I’ve worked with have been more like Thirteen and Seventeen.

Good men, loyal, with hearts of gold. Men honestly just fighting to keep themselves and their

families safe.”

He waited a few more minutes. Still she remained silent.

“I don’t know what else to say. I assume some of it is Thirty’s leadership. He’s clearly

unfit to lead these men, or any men at all. He’s aggressive: he refuses to compromise on even

the smallest things, and it seems like he wants to take the most extreme option every time. I

haven’t been able to get through to him. Honestly, I’m tired of dealing with him and I don’t

know what to do. He just doesn’t listen.”

Finally, both of them slipped into silence. She kept her silence in an attempt to make him

continue speaking; he kept his because he had exhausted everything he was willing to say out

loud. Silence stretched on for what seemed like an eternity, before they both were stirred to

action by the sound of Dawn moving around in the bunk room. When she shuffled from the

room, each watched her, doing little to keep the concern they felt from showing through to their

face. For a moment, she watched back, shifting her gaze from one face to another. Then she

spoke.

“How soon can we leave? I don’t want to be here any longer than I have to.”

Then she slipped back into the bunk room, and didn’t come back out. Eventually, War

turned and looked at Seven.

“We need to help her,” she whispered. “I’ve seen a lot of people in bad times, and

well… While she’s doing roughly how I would expect for a young girl who just lost her family,

anyone in that situation is going to need help. I just hope I can offer it.”

Seven, for his part, was just sitting there, staring at the open doorway.


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“She’s lost exactly what I’m fighting to keep,” he whispered back, his voice close to

breaking. “I suppose if there’s anything I can do… I’ll do it. I don’t care what it is. I’ll do it, no

questions asked.”

“Even if that means leaving everything behind?”

He paused. “Yeah. I mean, we’ve been fighting to keep our families safe from the

rebels. If we start tearing apart other peoples’ families… we’re betraying our own cause. I can’t

have that. I still want to swing by headquarters and at least let them know what’s going on here.

And that I’ll be leaving. I can’t leave without that. If they reject me, then I’ll know I’ll be gone

forever. If not, I may come back eventually. If they still need me.”

War nodded. “Well, pack whatever you need. We’ll be on our way as soon as I can get

her in shape to move. It’ll probably be slow going for the first couple of days. Best we can hope

for is to get out of the city and into the woods. Once we’re out, we can set up camp and one of

us can go hunting while the other make sure she’ll be fine. Does that sound about right?”

“Yeah. I’ll start packing. Most of my things are still together from getting here, so that’s

not too much of a problem. What about you?”

“Same here. I’ll go talk to her. Once she’s ready, I’ll come get you.”

She walked into the bunk room, leaving Seven behind. Dawn was sitting on the edge of

her bed, head in hands. War slipped beside her and sat down, laying her hand on the girl’s

shoulder.

“We’ll be going as soon as we have everything ready. How soon do you think you’ll be

ready to go?”

“As soon as you have everything ready,” Dawn replied, her voice low and monotone. “I

already said I don’t want to stay here any longer than I have to. Don’t worry about how much

work it’ll be or how far I’ll have to walk. I don’t care about those things. I’ll make it. The work

can’t be any worse than thinking about yesterday. It’ll keep my mind off things.”

“Yeah,” Aracelia whispered. “Work does that. Keep your mind off things.”

Dawn looked sidelong at her, a curious light in her eyes, but she didn’t say anything.

They both stared at the ground for a while, Dawn grieving, War reflecting.

Soon, they’d be right back where she had been when she had moved into the mountains

the first time. Alone, afraid, trying to come to terms with all the death in her life. Working to

keep her mind off of things. Establishing a routine to isolate herself from thinking about

anything but her daily chores and whatever special projects she could come up with. Doing

anything, absolutely anything to just keep going without looking back. It would be interesting to

see another person go through the same thing. Not exactly the same thing, though. She and

Seven would be there to help. When she had left the first time, she had been totally alone. Dawn

wouldn’t have to go through that.


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Overall, she was grateful that she could be there for the girl in some way. Whether the

girl would be willing to totally open up to a woman who had previously been a total stranger –

and a criminal, she had to remember that – and had stumbled into and perhaps accidentally

caused the worst day of her life. She supposed she would find out soon enough. An average girl

probably wouldn’t open up to someone so easily, but these weren’t normal circumstances. Dawn

would be alone in the woods with two people who were mostly strangers. Actually, that was a

strange thought. She herself had spent plenty of time out in the woods camping with a roving

band of warriors, but she had been with them a long time. Even when she had been new, there

had been eight other women, all dedicated to the same cause, not just two people who had met

barely two weeks beforehand. It would be difficult to strike the balance between accepting and

overbearing, but she would do her best. Eventually, she was sure, Dawn would be ready to open

up. And she would be there to help heal the girl just as soon as she was ready to begin her

healing process.

* * *

Dawn sat, tense and unmoving, until Aracelia stood up and walked out of the room. With

the older woman gone, she relaxed, falling backwards onto the bed, choking back tears.

Who were these people? Why had they suddenly entered her life and torn everything

apart? This woman… she had killed her way through the prison, let out resistance men, and

then abandoned those men outright to help her try to save her brothers.

As the image of the falling building flashed through her mind, she clamped down hard to

stop a sob and curled up a little tighter on the bed.

Her family was gone. It had been long enough that by now her parents would think she

was dead. She could still go back, but there would be so many questions as to what happened.

And if she told anything even remotely like the truth she’d be taken by the guards until she

revealed this hideout. And then the guards would probably burn this block to the ground,

destroying more families. There was no way out. She’d made her choice without even really

thinking about it.

She drew her knees up to her chest and hugged her legs, pressing her forehead into her

knees. It wasn’t time to cry again. Not now. She had to be ready to go again soon. Whether

she was sure of wanting to go or not.

So she couldn’t go back to her family now; she’d only endanger them. She didn’t want to

leave them. She didn’t want to go without saying goodbye, without giving an explanation. But

that choice had been taken from her by these people. And by herself. Aracelia had given her a

chance the day before to see her parents, and she had said no. Perhaps she had no one to blame

but herself for that one. The more she thought about it, the more that felt right. She had chosen

to abandon her parents; she had fled from everything; she had turned down the option to let

them know she was alive. All because she was afraid and just wanted to run. Because she

wanted to get as far away from everything as she could.


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She took a deep breath and rolled back into a sitting position, leaning hard on her hands,

which she placed on the edge of the bed. She took a deep breath and tried to calm herself.

That’s what she really wanted. To run away. To go as far from here as possible. Maybe

it wasn’t the best course of action; maybe she was being a fool. Maybe she was just a coward.

Maybe she was making a huge mistake and would hate herself for the rest of her life. But that

didn’t matter right now. For now, she just had to get away. It was all she wanted. And for now,

she was going to do what she wanted for once.

She had spent her entire life sacrificing her own wants for the good of her family. But

they were gone now. She felt terrible thinking it, but their deaths freed her in a way. While she

hated herself for saying that, it was true. She could go now. She could go outside the city, get

out of her daily routine, and just go somewhere.

She leaned forward, head in her hands, and cried.

Hopefully everyone would forgive her for her selfishness. For what she was about to do.

For her abandonment of them. For her self-centeredness at a time when she should be the most

selfless to help everyone else who had suffered from the destruction that the fire caused. For

leaving everyone – especially her parents – behind when she should have been sitting right with

them, holding their hands in her own as they mourned. But no one would ever be able to forgive

her. They didn’t even know she was still alive. And she would never be able to forgive herself.

Standing up, she wiped the tears from her face and took a few deep breaths, remastering

herself for the moment. It was time to go. Time to run from everything. Time to seal her own

fate. There was no way to come back from where she was about to go, and she knew it. And she

didn’t want to care.


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Chapter 16

When War returned to the main room she found Seven tying the final pieces of

equipment onto the outsides of three backpacks. As she approached he looked up.

“Ah, good, you’re back,” he said. “I think I have just about everything. We have a list of

things to bring for missions: look it over. I’ve gathered everything there, but if there’s anything

else we’ll want, we can probably find it in the storeroom before we go.”

War took a few moments to look over the list, then nodded and gave the list back.

“We should be fine,” she said. “The packs probably won’t need to last very long

anyway; once we get out into the deep woods we’ll be able to hunt and then everything should be

fine. I’m more concerned about getting moving soon than anything else. I want to be gone

before your men get back.”

“Understandable. Help me get all this stuff secured. Then we’ll eat and head out.” She

stepped forward and started checking the knots on all the packs. “Do you have any general plans

for what direction we should go?” he asked.

“Not really. I don’t think we should head all the way into the mountains, though. I want

Dawn to be able to leave and come back here if she so chooses. So for now, we just need to get

into the woods near here. Whatever happens after that happens.”

“Should we let Dawn choose where we go? I mean, I’m just leaving to help you guys,

and you’re leaving to help her and get away from the men here. She’s the only one with a real

motive to want to get away.”

“I’d like to let her choose, but she’s not very experienced. There are places that we could

go where it would be easier to survive – the forest, low mountain foothills – and there are places

that wouldn’t be so easy – like other cities, or the plains, or the deep mountains. On the one

hand, I think she should absolutely get a voice in what we decide, as this journey will mostly be

for her, but if we’re going to be taking care of her and ourselves, we might as well pick

somewhere easier to live.”

Seven nodded, staying silent for a moment as he retied a knot holding a bedroll to one of

the packs. “So we’ll ask where she wants to go, but make sure it’s somewhere we’ll be able to

survive without too much work?”

“That’s the basic plan,” War replied.

“I’ve suppose I should ask…” Seven started, before hesitating for a second. “I mean, you

haven’t spent much time with her either, but I’ve spent none. How do you think she’s holding

up? I wouldn’t imagine she’s doing well, but, well… Compared to other people you’ve seen – if

you have experience with this – how is she doing?”

Pulling one last knot into place, War stepped back and put her hands on her hips.


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“I’m not sure. She’s quite good at keeping her composure when people are around her.

Last night it looked like she sobbed herself to sleep, and I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s crying

now too. But when I’m around, she just gets really distant. Like she’s not feeling or thinking

anything at all. She’s trying to keep a wall up to keep me from seeing how she’s actually

feeling, and she’s good at it. She’s obviously not doing well, but if I didn’t know her family was

killed yesterday… I’m not sure I would be able to tell that it was something that serious.”

“What do you think it means for her in the long term?”

War snorted. “What do you think I am, a psychologist? I think she’s a strong girl. She’ll

do well eventually. No idea when, or how the journey to get there’ll be, but in my experience a

strong girl who takes some time to get away from things and put her mind to training herself in

something will come to terms with just about anything.” She paused for a second, then

continued, a little more softly. “Also, enough time will bury just about everything. I can’t say

that it heals everything, but it provides distance and distraction. Which, in the end, may be the

same thing.”

Seven quietly looked at her for a moment, a soft light of concern in his eyes. He took a

deep breath, as if to speak, but then looked down again and tightened a knot that had long been

tied. He knelt down, appearing to focus on the knot that War knew needed no more attention.

Eventually, he stood back up, and, still looking off toward the other side of the room, spoke

again.

“Well, we’d best get moving soon. If you’ll go get Dawn, I’ll get some food ready.

Once we’ve eaten, we can be on our way.”

He spun on his heel and strode past her, walking quickly toward the back of the hideout,

his face passive as he walked by. War watched him until he disappeared into the storeroom, and

continued staring for a second after he was no longer visible. Then she turned and made her way

to the bunkroom again, peeking quietly through the doorway before saying anything. Dawn was

standing by her bed, facing away from the doorway, her shoulders moving slowly up and down

with the rhythm of deep breaths. Stepping into the doorway, War watched silently for a moment

before stepping back out and calling Dawn’s name. Then she stepped back into the doorway as

the girl turned around.

“We’re going to leave as soon as we eat,” she said. “Come on. We have a pack ready for

you. How far do you think you’ll be able to go today?”

Dawn barely looked her in the eye for a half second before her gaze dropped to the floor

again. “I honestly don’t know,” she replied. “We’ll just have to find out, won’t we? Now let’s

go eat. I’d like to get on our way.”

War stood out of the way of the door as Dawn walked out. She could see the redness in

the girl’s eyes as she slipped past, despite the girl’s attempt to keep her face turned away. War

gazed after her as she walked away, then followed. She had been right. The girl was mourning

on her own, but refused to show any weakness in front of others. They’d just have to see how

the girl would act in the long run. War certainly hoped that Dawn would open up and be more


127

comfortable eventually. The question was just how long it would be until eventually happened.

But it didn’t matter. The time would come eventually. For now, it was time to return to the

eternal refrain of her life – there was work to do.


128

Chapter 17

The three companions slipped out of the hideout about two hours before noon. Dawn

seemed slightly uncomfortable with the balance of her backpack, so War switched with her. As

soon as War put the backpack on, she realized the girl had been right to complain: Seven had

packed the bag with significantly more weight on the right hand side than the left. After a few

more moments during which War repacked the bag in the musty little clearing where the well

stood, they were ready to head off. Seven checked his city map one more time for the best route

to the city’s resistance command center, and then started walking once he was sure of where he

was going.

“So Seven,” War asked playfully as they squeezed between the buildings out into the

main street, “what made you think that putting ALL the pots in the right side and NO pots on the

left was a good idea? And then strapping an extra blade on the right side as well?” A light

mocking tone slipped into her voice. “Surely you must have known that that would be

uncomfortable to carry.”

Seven merely grunted in response.

“And then you padded the left side with light linen clothes? I mean, heavy leather or

light chain armor, maybe, but linen?” She slipped up next to him and grinned mischievously,

jabbing him with her elbow. “It’s like you wanted one of us to come out of the day only able to

turn right.”

Seven glanced at her, raised an eyebrow, and grunted again.

War hesitated mid-step, switching directions to glide back to Dawn’s side behind Seven.

She looked over at the younger woman, smiled, and shook her head.

“Apparently he’s not in much of a mood to talk. How about you? Do you have anything

to say? Or am I going to have to do all of the talking for all of us?”

Dawn, who had been looking at the ground, glanced up at War and shrugged.

“It’s quite possible you’ll have to do all the talking. I’m not in much of a mood to say

anything either. You understand.” Her jawline set hard and she paused for a second, before

putting on a thin smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “The whole ‘my world just totally changed’

thing. I’d like some time to just walk.”

“If that’s what you want,” War replied. “I found it immensely helpful back when my life

changed forever to just… cut loose a little. Some would say I went a little… overboard in how

jovial I was.” She paused and laughed, remembering when she had been imprisoned after

reuniting with the Warrior. “One man even called me crazy. But hey, he was locked up in the

same cell I was, so what could he know?”

It had the effect War wanted. Dawn’s brow furrowed, and then she looked over at War

and raised an eyebrow. The sadness was still in the back of her eyes, but there was curiosity

there as well.


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“You were imprisoned? For what?”

“Smuggling weapons through the city. Well, sort of. I’d had a stockpile for a long time,

and I was trying to get them out. The guards caught us and thought we were smuggling a

weapons shipment INTO the city. Just a big misunderstanding. But they got violent, so I got

violent, and then I just managed to get an old friend of mine out of the city before I was caught.

It was a pretty fun day, actually.”

She could tell she had the girl’s attention now. This was good: anything to keep the girl

focused on her and not what was happening in her life.

“So,” Dawn asked, “what was the man you mentioned in prison for? Why were you in

the same cell?”

“Uh, well,” War stammered, “He was arrested for recognizing me. Funny story, actually.

He had run into me at a town that had recently burned down – where I had been because I

thought my friend might have been there during the fire – and then when he saw me he told the

guards he recognized me. And then they arrested him. We shared a cell because there was only

one cell in the prison.”

Dawn just stared at her for a moment. “What… what did you do before you showed up

here?”

War shrugged. “Recently, just lived in the woods. Before that… that’s a story for once

we get out of the city. Too dangerous to tell here. Someone might hear me and know the story.”

She moved forward, closer to Seven. “People do still know the story of the Harbingers, right?”

Seven nodded slowly. “Yeah, people know it. They probably wouldn’t believe you’re

one, but… yeah, it’s best if you keep it quiet. The rebels have a thing against elite clandestine

units that existed before them. I have little doubt they’d like the return of the Harbingers.”

“Hey, we weren’t clandestine. We burned down cities outright, usually. The Warrior,

eh, sometimes she liked the sneaky approach when she was on her own, but when all of us were

together, we usually just went for the direct assault.”

“Isn’t that really terrible tactics?” Seven replied sarcastically.

“Eh,” War said dismissively. “When you only have ten women, defenders aren’t

expecting a head-on assault. That’s when you hit the gate with a couple of bolts from a ballista

and knock down as much of the gatehouse as you can. Then, once you fight through the rubble

of the gate, you start burning things. Knocks the defenders off balance every time.”

Seven just glanced at her skeptically and kept walking. She wondered what had put him

in such a poor mood.

Dawn spoke up again. “So, you were part of a group of fighters that just… burned down

towns?”


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War shook her head. “Not really. Well, sort of. During our first run together, before the

Warrior went missing, we worked as mercenaries. After she came back… she’d changed a little.

She said she wanted to make sure people knew that the Harbingers were back, but she did that by

just sacking town after town. We burned four or five before she stopped just attacking for fun.

But we can talk about why that happened later.” She noticed Dawn looked especially fearful and

uncertain. “What’s wrong?”

“… Nothing,” the girl said. “I’m just thinking about… about all the people who must

have been lost in those fires.”

War nodded and looked at the floor. In a much more somber voice than she had been

using before, she spoke again: “Yeah. There’s a couple of reasons why I’ve spent the last

however many years living in the woods. But we can talk about that later, too.” She paused,

then looked at Seven. “How much longer until we arrive at the command center?”

“No more than a few minutes,” Seven replied in a halting tone. “It’s just a couple more

blocks.”

War quickened her pace and slid into place beside him. “Okay,” she said, in a lowered

voice, “It’s obvious something is bothering you. You don’t have to tell me, but I’d certainly

appreciate knowing if it has any bearing on what’s about to happen when we walk into that

command center.”

Seven clenched his jaw, his lips pulling into a thin line. He took a deep breath and shook

his head before responding.

“I’m afraid that the men came here ahead of us this morning and informed command that

either you, Dawn, or myself – or perhaps all three of us – is a threat to the resistance here in the

city. There’s very strict rules on secrecy and loyalty, and if they’ve said anything about either of

you being a potential problem, my request to leave off into the woods with you two could be

taken very poorly.”

“How poorly?”

“Possibly ‘we might have to fight our way out’ poorly. Depends on who’s in charge and

what kind of mood they’re in. Frankly, I’m not looking forward to the possibility of fighting

men who should be my friends.”

“But it doesn’t necessarily have to go that badly, right? I mean, I did break into the castle

and save those men’s miserable hides. Surely that counts for something in the eyes of the leaders

here.”

“As I said, depends on what they’ve been told and what sort of mood they’re in. By most

accounts, they should listen to me over those other men, but I’m also an outsider in this city.

I’ve never been posted here, and I probably never would have been. I’ve been through a few

times, that’s why Thirty knew who I was, but I’m not part of the permanent garrison. So I just

don’t have the trust of the men here.”


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“No need to explain, I understand,” War said. “The Harbingers were never ones to listen

to anyone outside of our ranks, and we weren’t in danger of being hunted to extinction. It was

just policy on our part. Well, sort of policy. The real policy was that we really only met people

outside of our group when we were in combat, so we killed most of them.”

“What nice policy,” Seven said. “I’m glad I never had to meet you and your friends.”

“You better be happy you didn’t,” War laughed. “You probably wouldn’t be around if

you had.”

“Probably not,” Seven sighed. “Okay, we’re here. Just squeeze through this gap between

the buildings here, and the backdoor into the house on the left is the entrance to command. I’ll

go first, send Dawn in behind me. There’s no one watching, right?”

The two glanced around, but the street was deserted. Seven hesitated a second, double

checking once more, then slipped into the gap. It was barely wide enough for him to move

through sideways. War gestured to Dawn to go in after him, then followed her once she was

inside.

The inside of the greenspace was rather small compared to the area that had contained the

slums hideout’s entrance. It didn’t contain a well, only six doors leading to the houses on the

sides of the block. The corner houses couldn’t be reached from the space.

“Hey Seven,” War called quietly, “What’s the purpose of this greenspace? Other than a

conveniently shielded area for thieves to break into the backdoors of houses?”

To her surprise, Dawn replied first. “The six houses on the sides of the block are

generally leased to extended families, close groups of friends, or large groups of workers,” the

girl intoned. “The four houses on the sides have sleeping quarters and nothing else. One of the

two on the ends will have multiple kitchens, and the other a well and storage space. The back

doors provide easy access to everything. The houses on the corners are generally leased

separately or are guard houses.”

Seven, who had turned around to respond, closed his mouth awkwardly and nodded along

as Dawn spoke. When the girl had finished, he looked at War and shrugged, saying, “That’s it,

as far as I know. The command post has been built underground beneath the kitchens building.

It has a tunnel connecting to the next house across the street, and doors into the basements of the

two closest bunkhouses. The block is owned by a wealthy – but probably anonymous –

benefactor of the resistance. Now come on, let’s see what’s waiting for us inside.”

Seven entered the house to their left, as he had indicated before. When they went

downstairs, they found the door to the hideout open and a sentry sitting on a stool. As they

entered the basement, he stood and stepped forward.

“You’re Seven, I presume? We’ve been expecting you. Come in. The commander

wants to speak with you. Those two, as well,” he said, gesturing towards War and Dawn.


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Seven glanced at War, who shrugged as he made eye contact. As far as she was

concerned, anything could happen and she would be prepared for it. In her experience, though,

when someone she didn’t know said they were expecting her, things usually turned out poorly.

But she wasn’t going to pass judgement on anyone before she had fully assessed the situation;

guessing before she had enough information also usually turned out poorly. She turned and

smiled reassuringly at Dawn as Seven entered the hideout behind the sentry.

“Don’t worry,” she whispered to the girl as she passed through the door behind Seven,

“Everything’s going to turn out alright.”

Dawn shook her head, and War saw her shoulders and back tense. The girl was ready for

a fight, and felt one was coming. That was good. A little preparedness never hurt a fighter.

Paranoia and jumpiness, however, could. War made a mental note to include pre-combat mental

conditioning in the girl’s early lessons once they got out into the forest. With a little direction,

the girl could be good at sensing combat situations and gauging fights before they started. After

all, she seemed to already have some natural sense for the abnormal, even in situations she’d

never been in before.

War’s thoughts were cut short once she made it through the passage into the command

center proper. All of the men from the slums hideout, including Thirty, were lined up alongside

a desk at the far end of the room where an older soldier sat. Silence fell among the various

groups of men sitting around the room as Seven approached the desk. Within a few steps after

she had entered the door the only sound remaining was their dull footfalls on the dirt floor.

Seven arrived in front of the desk and stepped sideways, allowing War and Dawn to line up next

to him.

For a while, no one moved. The man at the desk stared at each of the three of them for an

extended period of time; first Dawn, then War, then Seven, and finally at War again. When he

spoke, he addressed not Seven, but War.

“You,” he said, his voice crackling a little, “you were imprisoned in a city near the great

divide almost ten years ago. You were caught smuggling weapons through the city. About two

weeks after your capture, the Harbingers – who were thought to be gone forever – attacked the

city and killed the governor. I was off duty that day, and arrived at the governor’s mansion too

late to stop your escape. Fortunately, that meant I was around to help put out the fires and get

everything back in order. I went from jail warden and torturer to captain of what remained of the

guard that day. I never forgot your face. The face of the woman who destroyed my hometown.”

He paused and took a deep breath, then continued; “I heard from my men that a lone woman

broke them out of jail and got a full description of you. I wondered if it might be… but I wasn’t

prepared for it to actually be you. Why are you here?”

War ignored the look of total confusion on Seven’s face and replied evenly, “I am here

because Seven and his men were attacked near my cabin in the mountains, and then I was

attacked by the Hunters who sought him. After killing those Hunters, I decided to join Seven

and help your resistance. When I arrived, I heard there were men in prison waiting to be

executed. As you clearly know, I’m very good at jail breaks. So I helped. They in turn decided


133

to burn part of the castle to the ground, at which point I tried to help my friend here,” she

gestured at Dawn, whose jaw was set in a defiant calmness, “save her family from the fire. They

didn’t make it, but we did. Is that all you wish to know?”

The old soldier nodded. “It is sufficient for why you are in the city. But why are you

HERE, in my hideout? Seven, perhaps you can answer this question a little better. Why have

you brought these two with you?”

Seven swallowed hard and kept his shoulders squared. “I’ve come to ask for permission

to leave the city,” he said, a little shake evident in his voice, “to go with these two and resign

from my duties as a resistance officer until the time for the last fight against the rebels.”

“And why,” the old soldier asked, “would you want to do that?”

Seven breathed deeply before replying. His voice a little firmer, he said, “I came to this

city with this woman to help the resistance. When I got here, there was an obvious need for her

skills, but we were met with nothing but anger and ill will from Thirty. Then, when the other

men returned from the castle they refused to tell me what had happened or where my friend had

gone. When she returned with this girl and told me all that had happened, I decided that the

resistance here – while it might need soldiers like us – is not the right environment for us to serve

the resistance, as it is clear that we will only be met with hostility and anger, no matter our

intentions or our subsequent actions.”

As he spoke, the quake in his voice grew less, and his shoulders relaxed a little. “It also

became clear to me that the moral compass of the resistance here in this city has been tainted by

anger and resentment, leading to questionable decisions that harm innocents in courses of action

that should be reserved as last resorts to be used in moments of utmost need. Burning the castle

was a poor decision when my friend had plans to remove the men by stealth.”

By now, his voice was completely firm, and his postured had relaxed to be confident and

fluid, rather than nervous and rigid. “And so I would like to request a release to go out on my

own and serve the resistance as I see fit as a freelance soldier, to travel where I see fit and with

whom I see fit, working in whatever ways I can to achieve the goals of the resistance without

being bound to a command structure or to a city.”

For a long while, no one spoke, though Thirty was visibly angry and clearly wanted to

speak. He kept glancing over at the man at the desk and pressing his lips together when the man

refused to even look at him. However much he wanted so speak, he did not so long as the man

did not grant him permission.

The old soldier, for his part, returned to staring at each of the three of them in turn,

spending most of his time with his eyes narrowed at Seven. Every time his gaze turned toward

Dawn, War felt the girl stiffen at her side. She was obviously trying not to break down in front

of the older man, and was doing quite a good job outwardly. War wondered how the struggle

was going inwardly in comparison to the girl’s stony face.


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Thinking about how the girl was composing herself made War turn to thinking about her

own composure. She hadn’t even been thinking about how she had been reacting to the

conversation, but after a half second’s consideration she dismissed the thought. Her face was

relaxed, and had been relaxed the entire time. Years of training on staying composed – followed

by years of not needing to show much emotion in the mountains – had left her naturally staying

emotionless in tense situations. She added staying composed to the list of natural talents the girl

seemed to have that simply needed to be trained a little better.

She turned her attention back to the conversation. The old soldier was now staring Seven

directly in the eye, seemingly in an attempt to break Seven’s composure. While the tactic might

have worked a few minutes before, Seven had pulled together his confidence enough during his

long explanation that wasn’t going to break now. His face was relaxed and emotionless, and his

body language confident, but not aggressive. War wondered how much of his look was trained,

and how much of it was his personality showing through. It didn’t really matter, but it might

give her some insight into what sort of man he was.

Finally, the old soldier at the desk spoke. “Seven,” he said softly, “what would you do if

I refused you permission to leave?”

“I’d resign and leave anyway, sir.”

“You know you can’t resign, Seven.”

“Then I’d simply leave, sir.”

“You know you can’t leave if you haven’t been released, Seven.”

“I know I can’t according to the rules, sir. But I would anyway.”

“And what about your family, Seven? The resistance wouldn’t protect them anymore.”

Seven hesitated, and the old soldier smiled. But then Seven breathed and replied:

“So long as you don’t actively expose them, they are in no danger. They haven’t known

where I am for several months, now. And my family has never had to be relocated; the rebels

simply haven’t touched them or even investigated them.”

“Which you surely know is very suspicious, Seven. How do I know you won’t just take

your family and leave to somewhere that neither the rebels nor the resistance will find you?

How can I know you won’t just disappear?”

“Because you know how hard it is to get a family out of a city these days, sir. You also

know I’ve had no contact with my family. That, and I’d have nowhere that I’d be guaranteed to

stay hidden, sir.”

“You don’t have anywhere, but your companion went from being recognized everywhere

to being completely missing for almost a decade. She certainly has somewhere.”

“Sir, I’m not sure what you’re getting at. Can I leave, or not?”


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“Well, Seven, let me answer a question with a question: if I ordered these men to stop

you from leaving, would you fight them in order to leave?”

Seven took a deep breath. “Yes, sir, I would.”

Every man in the room stood up as he spoke.

The old soldier at the desk leaned back in his chair.

“Prove it, soldier. Boys, keep him here.”

Before anyone else in the room could unsheathe their sword, Thirty had stepped forward,

sword already drawn, a blow aimed at Seven’s neck. He flinched in the middle of the motion as

a throwing knife lodged itself in his wrist. As his sword fell to the floor, everyone stopped

moving, their hands still on their sword hilts.

War placed her left hand on the old soldier’s desk, a second throwing knife already drawn

from her belt resting loosely in her right.

“Look, everyone, I admit I didn’t like Thirty that much, but I still don’t want to see him

dead. Nor any of you. You might think that you have a chance of keeping us from leaving, but

you don’t. I used to sack cities with a group of ten women. I killed a full unit of the rebels’

Hunters by myself when they attacked my cabin. Even if it was just me out of this little group

standing here, you probably wouldn’t be able to stop me from leaving. Certainly not with just

swords.” She paused to take a deep breath, as if considering.

“I’ll give you all a choice,” she said slowly: “you can either let us go peacefully, with

only this injury, or, if a second one of you draws your sword, this knife” – she picked it up to

show it off – “can find its way into your commander’s forehead. If you still decide to fight after

that, I can maim or kill all of you. Your choice.”

The commander started to stand up, but she raised the hand with the knife and he sat back

down. She looked around the room.

“What’s your decision?” She asked.

“You… you may leave, of course,” the commander stuttered. “Men, let them go. Seven,

you’re free to do freelance work, as you asked. Just… please, keep this woman focused on

killing our enemies rather than us.”

“Thank you, commander, I knew you’d see it my way,” War said mockingly, throwing a

sideways glance and a wicked smile at him. “Come on, guys, let’s go. You, in front of the door,

move out of the way.”

The men in front of the door stumbled out of her way as she strolled across the room,

uncertainty written across their faces. As she walked up the stairs, she looked over her shoulder

at Seven and Dawn.

“Well, that could have gone much worse. Could have gone better, too, but I won’t

complain too much.”


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Seven looked up at her, a distant look in his eyes. “I didn’t actually expect them to fight

me,” he breathed. “I knew it was a possibility, what with the strict loyalty codes, but… I didn’t

think it would actually happen.”

Dawn spoke up from the back of the group. “Well, given the only way I’ve ever seen

your resistance men act, I can’t say I was shocked,” she grumbled bitterly. “Frankly, I’m

surprised they didn’t all pull out crossbows and fill us with bolts before we could blink. Or just

light the place on fire as their first option.”

War laughed and smiled at the girl; “I take it you’re disappointed I didn’t do a little more

in there?”

“Given that they still refuse to show even a little remorse for what they did? Yes.”

Internally, War noted the girl’s anger and put away for reference that she would need to

work on managing internal emotions as part of the girl’s training on external composure. The

obvious intensity of her emotions meant that no matter how good she was at hiding the external

effects, she would still be prone to outbursts. Internal policing mattered too.

Externally, War shrugged and said, “After years of killing for no reason, I prefer to let

people off alive if I can. Eventually, it’ll make sense to you, too. Maybe not yet, and certainly

not now, but someday. Now come on, hopefully you’ll both feel a little lighter once we get out

into the forest.”


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Chapter 18

As they entered the forest, War was reminded of why she had fled into the mountains.

All around, the rich golden light of the midafternoon streamed through the outstretched

boughs of the upper canopy, coming through bearing the slightest green tint. In the strong light,

the trunks of the trees seemed to glow bronze, and the leaves of the undergrowth to shine the

color of the heart of a deep cut emerald. Where the air within the city had been stiff and stifling

– as stale as if it had been trapped within the walls of the city for as long as the inhabitants had –

the air in the forest breathed life into her as the wind danced through the trees. The moss which

carpeted the floor of the forest caught each step she took, embraced it, and then pushed it away

again as she continued walking, acting and reacting to her footsteps – where the flagstones and

dirt roads of the city had simply laid dormant under her feet. Somewhere in the distance, a little

river gurgled; in the city, the default background had been distant chatter or footsteps on stone.

With every step she took, she felt the anxieties that she hadn’t even realized she had been

carrying melt away into the quiet peace of the woods around her.

She looked over at Dawn to see whether the same atmosphere she felt was having any

effect on the girl. As she had hoped, Dawn was drinking in as much of the scene as possible,

glancing around in every direction, lips slightly parted, clearly focused outwards rather than

inwards. War turned her head to hide a smile. This was the first time she had seen the girl

looking anywhere but down all morning. For the first time, she felt glad that they had taken the

girl away from the city. If this first little encounter was any indication, being in this new

environment for a while would do the girl some good.

Seven, on the other hand, walked loosely through the trees, eyes on the ground in front of

him. Occasionally, he would reach up to hold back a branch as he passed, but for the most part

he strode through the brush without any sign of recognition for his surroundings. Unfortunately,

as she was behind him, War couldn’t see his face, and so couldn’t determine his feelings: he was

likely deep in thought, going over what had just happened, but there was a big difference

between simply reflecting, stewing, and accepting. And the distinctions between those

reflections could lead to him having rather different attitudes over the coming months.

Overall, War wasn’t concerned about Seven’s reaction to his departure from the

resistance. From her experience with him over the past few weeks, he seemed like a solid,

focused man, and – from his stories – one who had had many setbacks in his life. He would

come out of this fine, if maybe a little discouraged. She was, however, concerned about how his

initial attitude might influence Dawn’s impression of him. War needed the younger girl to see

Seven as the soldier she knew he was, not a moody old man whose life was falling apart. Their

journey would be long, and, at times, hard. Seven would need to fill his part of the hunting and

the cooking, and help War herself with taking longer watch shifts at night so that Dawn wouldn’t

have to watch alone her first few weeks. She needed a man who could pull himself together to

take care of others before himself. She believed that Seven could be that man, but without

knowing what he was thinking right now – having lost his first his friends and now his job – she


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couldn’t be certain of anything. For now, she’d give him his time and his space, but if this quiet

disconnection continued, she’d take care of it.

* * *

Dawn had never actually been outside the city. Once when she was young the castle

guards had taken her for a walk on the walls, and she’d been able to look around at the sprawling

landscape outside of the city walls that had enclosed her entire life. One of the guards, a kind old

man who had retired years ago, told her that if she and her family worked hard, and her little

siblings worked hard, maybe someday they’d be able to afford to go live somewhere outside the

walls. If they didn’t want to leave and live somewhere else, or couldn’t afford to, he said that

sometimes groups of servants would get together and go roam outside the walls, if they had the

Governor’s permission. He sometimes led these groups; he said it was nice to see people who

had been trapped in the city so long be able to run around in the fields outside where the air was

clearer. He had always told her that he used to live in a little farming town, but had been pulled

into the army as a young lad and taken to the city. He said he missed the little farm town he had

grown up in, but that he had fallen in love with someone here, and that they’d asked him to stay.

When the little war between that city and the next ended while he was still in training, he was

offered a job as a guard, and he had taken it. He hadn’t left since then, and he didn’t plan to.

Too many people in the city that he cared about, he said.

There hadn’t been a servant group allowed outside their daily routine since the rebellion

had started. Though a battle had never taken place in their town, everyone knew of the war.

First, the builders and the servants – along with anyone else who could be hired – were put to

work building up the walls; walls that never saw any battle. But still, the walls were built. Then,

there had been a long time of waiting. Men were called away to fight, and messengers came and

went from the Governor’s office many times a day. Eventually, the rebels blocked off the road,

and had threatened to let the city starve if the Governor didn’t surrender. The Governor ignored

the army, and word around the servants’ quarters was that he would rather let the city around him

starve before letting in the rebels. Almost a week into the standoff, when the food supplies

started to run low, guards came into the servants’ quarters and arrested more than a few people,

accusing them of being traitors. Most of them didn’t return. Then, more guards came, this time

following the lead of the man who would eventually become the Warden. The old man asked if

there was anyone who valued food and stability over the continued rule of the Governor. She

remembered many of the men going outside with him and heading with a growing crowd toward

the castle.

Later that day, the siege ended and the rebels entered the town without any formal

fighting. They installed a new Governor, remade the city guard, put new men in all the positions

of power, and then moved on to the next city. The rebel army had stayed in control of the city

for less than a week before they moved out. For a while, things had seemed like they were

getting better: food supplies were more easily accessed, there was more freedom to move about

the town, and the servants had less work than they had had under the old Governor.


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But then the work orders came in again: higher walls; newer, thicker gates; regular

checkpoints between cities and along major roads; new contraptions defending the castle. A new

work schedule came in, and pay rates dropped. Food in the city started being sent out to rebel

armies elsewhere. The new Governor was only ever seen in inside the castle, and even then only

in the presence of at least eight guards. Servants were no longer given days off, and were no

longer allowed any variance from their set schedule. She saw her family less. The old nice

guards that had given her tours of the castle when she was little disappeared, and in their place

were stone-faced men who at best pretended she didn’t exist.

Every day, the noose around her life had tightened a little more.

But more than she feared the stone-faced men in the castle, she feared the whispers about

the old government’s resistance men. She had heard that they killed indiscriminately if they

thought anyone was part of the rebels’ overthrow of the city, and that they were secretly hiding

in the shadows. Of course, she had heard that the rebels treated the resistance much the same,

seeking to find them out and kill them wherever they were hiding. In the end, she didn’t feel

they were all that different: both groups were violent men seeking to destroy everyone who

challenged their power.

And then she had met some actual resistance men. Along with the woman who she had

now followed into the woods, the woman who had turned on the men that she had just saved

from imprisonment and death. The woman who claimed to have a shadowy past filled with

violence and death, but who clearly felt more at home in the woods alone than fighting in a city

filled with people. She had met the resistance man who had abandoned the resistance to go with

them, and had been condemned by the resistance for it. The man who put his own belief as to

what was right above the commands given to him on pain of death for disobeying. There was

more to these people than they had said so far, and she knew it. Perhaps it was time to ask them

what it was that they were hiding.


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Chapter 19

For a few moments, Dawn worked up her courage. Then, when she felt she was ready,

she raised her voice and called out to War.

“So if I’m going to be travelling with you two, I want to know more about you.”

“What do you want to know?” War replied, shooting a sly smile over her shoulder at the

girl, who raised an eyebrow and retorted:

“Whatever you’re willing to tell me.”

“What if what I’m willing to tell you isn’t what you really want to hear?” War asked,

turning around to walk backwards while looking at the girl, a mischievous smile growing on her

face. “There are many things I could say, but only a few things I might say, if you don’t ask me

about the others. Besides, if I only tell you want I want to tell you, you’ll miss out on the things

that I don’t want to tell you – and those might just be more interesting.”

“But I didn’t ask what you want to tell me,” Dawn shot back, without missing a beat. “I

asked you to tell me whatever you’re willing to tell me. So if you’re willing but don’t want to,

tell me anyway.”

War nodded and thought for a second. “What, then, about the things I’m not willing to

tell you? Those are potentially the most interesting, don’t you think? And you won’t hear

them.”

Dawn shook her head and tried to decide whether the feeling growing in her chest was

annoyance or laughter – or maybe a little of both. Clearly the older woman was enjoying her

little word games and clarifying questions. They did, Dawn supposed, have plenty of time to

talk, and so this little back and forth wasn’t wasting any time. She was, however, getting

impatient, and she actually did want to hear War’s story. Noticing that War – who was still

walking backwards – was watching her intently, she decided it was time to reply.

“Well…” she said, “it seems to me that if you’re unwilling to tell me you shouldn’t have

to. At least, not right now. I figure if it’s really important for me to know now, you’ll tell me

now, and if it’s important for me to know eventually, you’ll tell me eventually. It’s not my job to

know your entire life anyway. I’d just like to know a little more than I know right now – given

that right now I know almost nothing.”

War’s smiled shifted from its previous mischievousness to sincerity. She spun back

around and fell in step beside Dawn. “That’s a good answer,” she said. “Well, I won’t tell you

everything now, because we don’t necessarily have time for that, but I will tell you some.

Specifically, you should know why I fight so well – and why I think it’s important for you to

learn to fight.”

Before War could continue, Dawn held up her hand. “Hold on. You think it’s important

for me to learn to fight? Why?”

War chuckled. “In due time, Dawn. In due time. There’s an entire story to tell first.”


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“See, almost fifteen years ago I was a poor girl, living in a small town out in the country.

We had heard tell of wars nearby, of cities being attacked and burned, of armies being raised and

destroyed. My understanding is that it was all actually fairly small scale compared to the most

recent war, as these wars were just precursor rumbles to that one. But more important than those

rumors of war was one rumor in particular: that there was a small, all-female unit of mercenary

fighters that no one could match in battle. They called themselves the Harbingers, led by a

woman who called herself the Warrior. As a girl who had grown up hunting to support herself –

my parents died from sickness in the winter when I was still young – I found the stories

fascinating, though I doubted if they could be true. What little I knew of war told me that ten

women couldn’t change the tide of any battle, let alone whole wars.

“But then, that summer, I was out hunting with two of my friends. We saw smoke start

to rise in the distance as we returned home from the woods, and ran back to the town. We found

it in flames, with every villager that could fight trying to hold off a group of women, all of whom

were dressed in full black leather armor, including hoods and masks. I managed to put an arrow

in one of their calves, but then another saw me and put a much better-made arrow straight into

my bow, shattering it. My friends and I grabbed some nearby farm equipment – I think I had a

shovel, one of my friends had a hoe, the other a rake – and we ran in. I’m actually not entirely

sure what happened after that. I fought the woman who had broken my bow for a moment, and

got knocked out at some point during that fight. When I woke, the town was rubble, but I and

my two friends had been moved outside to the women’s camp.

“When I came to I was confused. I was sure that the Harbingers had attacked us, but

there were only seven women in the group around me. And there were no stories of the

Harbingers taking prisoners; the stories all said that they always left small towns totally

destroyed behind them, and large towns in flames and ruins. So many thoughts flashed through

my head in that moment. Who were these women? Why had they spared me? What were they

going to do now? Why had my friends been spared as well? There just weren’t any answers.

“Then, one of the women came up to me. She told me she was called the Warrior, and

that she wanted to talk to me about the battle that had just happened. That she thought I showed

promise as a fighter for managing to injure one of her fighters and for being able to hold off

another for almost two minutes in heated combat. Confirming my suspicions, she said that this

group of women was called the Harbingers, and that they had a few vacancies that they needed to

fill. She said that my friends could come with me, that they would be my ‘auxiliaries’, and that I

would be known as War. She said she would train me to be as good of a fighter as the other

women in the camp – maybe even better.

“I asked her what would happen if I said no. She shrugged and said she would probably

let me go – though I might not want to leave, given that the entire army would be marching

through here soon, and they weren’t as likely to spare me. So there wasn’t really a choice. I

went with them, and my friends did too. I stopped being called Aracelia, and became War. The

Harbinger of War, specifically, but everyone just referred to me as War. For a while I simply

trained with my friends and with the others – my friends and I weren’t allowed to fight in the


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battles for a few months – until eventually we were called to fight. The battles went on for

almost a year, but then something I still can’t explain happened.

“We were fighting a battle to kill a fairly major king. He had been fielding armies

against our employer, and he had quite a few good strategists and tacticians, so his armies were

causing problems. Our job was to kill him and disrupt the chain of command. We were given

plenty of men, and we were up against almost as many. The siege outside lasted almost a week.

Once we broke into the city, there was hard fighting, but things were going well regardless of

that – until we hit the throne room. The Warrior and the Harbinger of Death, one of the other

two Harbinger leads, went inside, leaving the rest of us to hold the door against reinforcements

from the rest of the castle. I never saw the Warrior again after that moment. Death said the

Warrior ran away after refusing to kill the king. Death finished the job, and the rest of us kept

doing mercenary work for a while.

“After that, some time passed. Eventually, we all naturally drifted apart. Without the

Warrior, we didn’t have a formal leader. Death tried to take over, but my Auxiliaries and I never

really trusted her, since we didn’t know what had happened in that throne room. Doom listened

to Death, but kept her distance from both Death and myself. Eventually, we all split up into

different safe-houses spread around different towns. My auxiliaries and I stayed together most

of the time, but occasionally they went and stayed with Doom. It stayed that way for about four

years.

“Then one day I heard rumor that a town had suddenly burned down, that a whole city

guard had been massacred in the night, and the city gates sealed shut while the population

burned. I knew Doom hadn’t done it, and that Death was far away. So I went to see what had

happened, and it seemed that the Warrior had, in fact, done the deed. Either her, or someone

with the same skill and style as her. At that point, when I had resolved to go looking for her, I

found someone else instead. A man – not exactly old, but not young either, and very strong-

looking – wandered into the ruins. I joked around with him for a little bit, trying to figure out

who he was and why he was there. In the end, I decided he wasn’t important and left him.

“Unfortunately for him, it turned out that while he might have been unimportant, I

wasn’t. He was arrested for recognizing me while I was fighting some guards who suspected me

of smuggling weapons. That wasn’t actually what was happening, but it might have held up in a

court of law. I had found the Warrior again, as I thought I might, and I was trying to get her and

our weapon stores of the city when the guards caught us. Anyway, when he told the guards that

he had seen me in the ruins of the burnt town, they arrested him. Shortly thereafter I was

captured. I managed to get the Warrior over the wall and out of the city, but I was caught in the

process. The short version is that I ended up sharing a cell with him for a couple of weeks.

“Eventually, the Warrior returned for me, with my auxiliaries, Doom, Doom’s auxiliaries,

and a ballista in tow. The city was totally unprepared, and within a few minutes, the Ballista had

the gate down. The Harbingers more or less just walked in – some of the guards had fought in

battles against us before the Warrior disappeared and recognized our outfits. A large portion of

the guard went into a blind panic when they realized who they were fighting, and things didn’t


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improve when the Warrior and Doom started lighting fires in the city. The man and I were

brought to the front of the governor’s mansion to be given as a peace settlement. Unfortunately

for the guards who came to get us, they arrived back outside a little too late, and they found both

the governor and the captain of the guard dead. We were still let go, and we all left the city. The

whole affair took under an hour.

“After that, we were on the road again. We went around, burning towns and killing

governors as we saw fit, trying to restore our name to what it had been before the Warrior’s

disappearance. That lasted about ten days, maybe a little less. We were more or less on pace to

burn one city every other day; we would travel one day, sack a city the next. I found it

refreshing at first. By the end of the week it was routine again. I thought it would go on forever

and everything would be fine.

“But then one day, Death came back. And she and her auxiliaries killed my auxiliaries,

and Doom and her auxiliaries turned on myself and the Warrior. At the end of the bloodbath,

Doom and Death had fled, and no one’s auxiliaries were still standing. I collapsed and cried for

a while. The Warrior just stood there and stared off into the darkness. After that night… nothing

was ever really the same. I wanted to just give up, the Warrior was hell-bent on revenge, and the

man was just bumbling around trying to stay out of the way.

“Eventually I couldn’t take it anymore. I ran off, leaving the Warrior and the man

behind. It’s funny – I was in a cell with him for three weeks, and then I travelled with him for

almost four more, and I never learned his name. He just never mentioned it, and I never asked.

I’ve thought about that a lot since then. I didn’t even think about it at the time, but now it seems

so odd. Anyway, when I ran off I found out that Doom and Death had been tracking us, and they

caught me. They tortured me. They exploited all my losses and my fears. And they convinced

me that the Warrior was mad, and that she needed to be killed.

“Then Death received word that the Warrior had gotten herself employed by a king who

she had known from the days when the Harbingers were simple mercenaries. So Death signed us

up in the employ of an opposing warlord, and we went out to meet the Warrior in a full battle. In

the end, I killed both her and the man I had travelled with. And then Doom and Death as well.

And then I ran.

“I went into the woods, and I stayed there for nine years. I built myself a paradise deep

in the mountains where I was only found twice: at the very beginning, and at the very end. I

needed the time to work things out. Frankly, I’m still not sure if I ever succeeded in coming to

terms with my past. It still bothers me. But when Seven showed up, and I was attacked by his

enemies… well, he gained an ally. I remembered how I lost my auxiliaries, and I compared that

to how he lost his friends, and, well, that was that. We came to your town to have me sign up

with the resistance. I tried to rescue some resistance men from the prison, and you know the

story from there. Is that a good enough story as to who I am for you?”

Dawn simply nodded to herself for a moment, a distant look in her eyes. Eventually she

looked up at War and said, “You mentioned something about why I need to learn to fight at the

beginning. Why?”


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“Ah, yes, I almost forgot,” War said with a sad smile. “See, the thing is, I learned to hunt

because I had to when I was little. I was good at it naturally, and I had a need for it, so I learned.

Then, it turned out I had a talent for fighting at closer ranges as well, and then I was forced to

need it, so I learned. You’ve shown you have a talent for swordplay, and I want you trained

before you need it. Having to learn on the spot, the way you did back in that kitchen, it’s not

fun. It can be very dangerous. And in my experience, the best way to mitigate danger is to be

more dangerous yourself than the dangers you face. So I want to teach you to have the same

skills I have – the same skills the Harbingers all had.”

“You want to restart the Harbingers?” Dawn asked, a look of concern on her face.

“Not really,” War responded, shaking her head. “I have no intention of bringing back the

structure, or the wars, or the burning down towns bit. I just want to have a couple of people

capable of doing significantly more than holding their own in a world at war. Capable of doing

more than just surviving. I don’t want to see you – or myself, for that matter – kicked around in

this combat, or used for other people’s purposes. I want us to be our own group. Serving our

own needs.”

Dawn took a deep breath. “I… I’m not really sure I want to learn to fight,” she said. “I

don’t want to become like the men who destroyed the castle back home. I don’t want to be like

the guards, or the other soldiers, who take what they want and use force as a reason that they can.

And I feel like learning to fight makes me one more step like them. Especially since it sounds

like you used to be just as bad as them. Or worse.”

War nodded for a moment, and when she responded, she did so in a soft voice. “I don’t

mean to teach you to be like them. I used to act that way, and I don’t want to go back to it, ever

again. I don’t mean to teach you to hate others, or to not care, or to want to simply kill for the

sake of killing.” Her face clouded over, and she looked down. “Those are dark paths. Any path

that teaches you to disregard others, to hurt or to harm without regret, any path like that is dark,

and the end spirals down into an endless pit of pain and death – for yourself and others. So no, I

won’t teach you to be like them. If I train you – if you accept being trained – I will teach you

everything I’ve learned over the decade I spent in solitude about learning to put the darkness

behind you, and learning to do what’s best for everyone rather than what’s the most efficient or

the most beneficial for yourself. It’s a balancing act, especially in combat, but it can be learned.

Will you accept training?”

Dawn took a second deep breath, and then a third, and sighed. “Yes,” she said, after a

moment. “Yeah, I’ll take training. So long as you don’t start to sound like those men. If you do,

I won’t learn anymore. I don’t want to turn out that way.”

War smiled sadly. “Sounds like a fair deal. But it looks like it’s about dinner time. How

about we set up camp for the evening?”

Dawn agreed, and they, along with Seven, started the work of settling down for the night.


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Chapter 20

As they set up their camp, chatting idly about the events of the day, the sun began to set

in the west. Miles away, beyond the edge of the woods, the plains rippled with shadows as the

grass swayed in the cool late evening breeze. Ribbons of darkness swam all across the surface of

the golden expanse, save for the straight, narrow path of the road that ran from the gate of the

city. Here and there the amber waves gave way to bright orchards and emerald fields where

farms stood silent, brimming with the upcoming crop. Little figures that had fallen behind in

their day’s work moved down the road: all moved toward the city. As late in the evening as it

was, no one was heading out from the city into the countryside. It wasn’t a market day for the

farmers, and so all those who lived outside the city had already retired to their homes.

At the forest’s edge the long golden grass tapered away into the shorter, greener shrubs

that coated the ground beneath the darkening canopy of the trees. Standing in the area where

shrub and grass mixed were massive stumps, quiet testaments to the slow but steady

encroachment of the city folk upon the forest. Closer to the city the tapering area was wider,

with more stumps standing in a huge semi-circle carved into the edge of the forest; a huge semi-

circle filled with not only stumps but also more logging equipment and several shacks. Farther

away from the city stood a small mill, powered by the river running from the forest.

Deep within the forest along that same river they had pitched their camp, on the opposite

bank from the road that ran along the river toward the mountains. As the sun dropped below the

horizon, the shadows crept out from beneath the trees and stole their way into larger clearings.

Slowly, darkness enveloped all in a velvety embrace. Pleasantly cool air swept down out of the

hills onto the plains, chilling the hot summer day into a beautiful night. What few clouds

remained in the sky blew away with the fresh wind, and stars began to ignite, one by one, in the

darkening sky. Radiant oranges, pinks, and golds held the horizon to the last, not fading, but

intermixing with the navy blues and blacks of night to create ever new shades of purple until at

last nothing remained but the darkest of shades.

Down in the camp, a little fire crackled away. The three travelers laid around it, staring

up at the stars as they blinked into the sky. With each gust of wind, the fire danced and flared,

flinging shadows around the clearing. Seven laid on his back, silent, staring into the distance as

he tried to slip off to sleep. Across the fire form him, Dawn laid on her side, staring into the

flames, mouth moving slightly as she spoke quietly to herself. Between the two of them sat War,

who stared into the darkness outside of the camp. At length, she announced that she would be

taking the first watch, after which she stood up and melted into the darkness. Dawn watched the

shadows around the camp for quite some time after that moment, trying to find where War had

disappeared to, but she couldn’t catch a glimpse of the woman. She seemed to have vanished.

Dawn turned to ask Seven where War had gone, why she had disappeared if she was taking the

watch, and Seven opened his eyes and rolled over. He looked around for a moment, then pointed

to a spot in the darkness beyond the firelight and told Dawn that War was standing right there, in

the trees. Despite the fact that Dawn couldn’t see anything, it seemed that Seven was right, as

War stepped back out into the firelight from that direction to reassure her that she hadn’t left.

War told her that stealth was one of the things she would need to learn, then turned to Seven and


146

expressed how impressed she was that he could spot her in the shadows. Then she turned and

vanished into the darkness once again. As she left, Seven rolled over and fell silent once more.

Dawn’s mind began to wander. Despite her obvious company, she almost felt alone. All

her life, she had been surrounded by roiling noise and ever-burning lights, by chaos and crowds;

the contrast of the silence of the night and the loneliness of only three companions struck her to

her core. As she tried to sleep, she found herself disturbed by the lack of footfalls outside, by the

absence of drunken laughter, and by the lack of late night carts rumbling by.

There weren’t any streetlights outside, no guards carrying torches. For as long as she

had known, the light had always been outside, and the darkness inside; patrols at night meant

constant lights travelling past the windows, whereas in any time but the winter no fires were lit

indoors. And even in the winter her family and those they lived with could only afford a fire to

heat their home occasionally. Yet here, the light was inside the camp, and the darkness outside;

a darkness that seemed to hold nothing within it. She had never known anything like it before,

never known anything better characterized by absence and emptiness than by any noticeable

trait.

Yet…

The darkness was not completely empty. Or, rather, the environment around her was not.

Though she could not see, hear, or feel anything beyond the dim light of the fire, there was plenty

within the circle of light. The comforting crackling of the fire, the deep, rhythmic sighing of

Seven’s breath, and the roaring hurricane of thoughts within her own mind more than filled the

little patch of light with sound. Perhaps the sounds were not as powerful as those that pierced

the night in her hometown, but they still felt as if they left little room for any more noise – any

others would upset the balance of the moment. All in all, it was pleasant.

As she sorted through these thoughts in her mind, focusing on the crackling of the fire,

she slowly drifted off to sleep.

* * *

“Hey, Dawn, wake up.”

The girl rolled over and blearily looked about, confused.

“I… I can’t see anything. It’s not even light out yet,” she croaked, her throat dry.

“And the fire is out,” War replied. “That doesn’t help with seeing very much.”

“Are we moving out already? While it’s still dark?”

“Of course not,” Seven said from somewhere behind her. “It’s just your turn to take the

watch. War will be teaching you a few tricks for staying awake and alert. I, on the other hand,

would like to get back to sleep, since I had the middle watch. So if you two could quiet

down…?”


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“Oh, we’ll be quiet soon enough,” War said. “Come on, Dawn. Let’s go. You’ve got

plenty to learn.”

Dawn sat up and rolled out her shoulders and neck. Little bits and pieces of her were

sore – certain parts of her legs, her lower back, the tops of her shoulders and neck. But nothing

terrible. She glanced around, and found she could see a little better now that she was standing

up. It was still very dark, but she could make out the remains of the fire and the edges of the

clearing. War tapped her on the shoulder and motioned for her to follow. The two stepped out

of the camp itself, but stayed in the clearing.

“Okay, one of the easiest ways to stay awake is to keep moving. Really, we don’t expect

any trouble, so watching isn’t all that important. For most of the shifts, it’ll be dark enough that

it’ll be hard to make anything out anyway, especially after the fire burns down. Just stay focused

on listening for any odd sounds in the trees – regular twigs snapping or a lot of rustling. If you

hear anything you think is suspicious, ask me or Seven. We’ll be taking turns watching with you

for the first little while until you start to have an idea of what is and isn’t a threat. Does that

sound alright?”

At first Dawn nodded, but then realized that War probably couldn’t see that little of a

movement in the darkness, and sheepishly replied that it sounded fine. Almost as soon as she

had said that, War replied “wonderful”, and disappeared into the darkness.

“Don’t worry,” came her voice, “I’ll just be on the other side of the clearing. If you need

anything, just say it and I’ll be right over.”

As War melted into the night, Dawn once again became all too aware of the silence

around her. What had seemed so pleasant from within the dim firelight now pressed in upon her,

the silence and the shadows forming an impenetrable shell encasing her. When the fire died

down, its comforting crackling had died with it, and now that she had stepped away from the

camp, she could no longer hear Seven’s breathing. Beyond the occasional breath of wind,

nothing broke the silence. At some point while she had slept clouds had rolled in, and so neither

the moon nor the stars gave any light to the darkness.

Nothing she had ever experienced in the city would have led her to imagine that this level

of nothingness could exist. She simply froze in the face of it, unable to think, unable to breathe,

unable to move. She couldn’t see anything, couldn’t hear anything, couldn’t sense anything at

all in front of her. Tearing herself away from the void in front of her, she took a deep shuddering

breath and turned toward the remains of the fire, falling to a sitting position. Drawing her knees

up to her chest, she focused on the few still-burning embers, those last pinpricks of light in the

sea of darkness around her. War materialized out of the darkness next to the girl and knelt down

beside her.

“Are you alright?” She whispered.

Dawn simply took another shaky breath and closed her eyes. War moved from kneeling

to sitting, still facing the girl, and shook her knee.


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“Hey, what’s wrong?” She asked.

“I… I wasn’t ready for how dark it is here. For how quiet it is. The city was never like

this. It was always light, always noisy. I noticed it when I went to sleep, but then the fire was

going. I just focused on the crackling and drifted off. Now, staring into the night, focusing on

the silence for any change… I couldn’t do it. It’s so different here. So dark. So silent.”

She trailed off and took another shaky breath. War tried to make out what she could of

the girl’s posture in the minimal light. Her shoulders were raised, and her entire body was

shaking slightly – though she knew that from the hand she had on Dawn’s knee, rather than from

what she could see.

“Have you ever been afraid of the dark back home? When it was dark, were you ever

uncertain?”

Dawn let out something between a sigh and a breathy laugh.

“Everyone in the city is afraid of the dark. Or, well, not the dark, they’re afraid of what’s

IN the dark. There’s a reason we keep the streets lit all night as much as we can. The few nights

where a storm puts out all the torches – even the covered ones – there’s always break-ins.” She

glanced over her shoulder toward the trees and lowered her voice. “Even when the guards are

patrolling and the light is good we’ll find bodies in the darker alleys. I was never hurt but – I

knew people. And there were always more stories.”

War nodded and shifted her weight back, taking her hand off the girl’s knee.

“Well, I have some good news for you. There are no alleys here, no people, and nothing

that can get nearby without making a noise. So while the silence may be unnerving, it’s your

friend. You can hear everything that’s anywhere near us. If it’s silent, that means there’s

nothing, and there’s no reason to be afraid of the dark. Now, if you hear a noise, it’s still

probably nothing to worry about, but that’s why I’m here. To help you know what’s important

and what’s not. Okay? Seven and I will stay on watch with you until you’re comfortable. Does

that sound alright?”

Dawn didn’t respond. War waited a moment, then nudged the girl and repeated her

question.

“Oh, oh… sorry, I got distracted. I was staring into the embers and I remembered…” she

trailed off again.

“Remembered what, Dawn?” War asked, though she thought knew the answer.

“The day that my parents were… that… they were attacked one day. They came out of it

fine. But that made me think about my siblings. The fire that took them. That I’m out here with

the three things that have hurt my family.” Her voice was low and monotone, barely controlled.

She took another shuddering breath and trailed off into silence. She was still shaking, and her

entire body looked drawn and tense.


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“Three?” War asked after a brief pause, “Dark and fire are two, what’s the third?

Silence? I don’t see how silence could hurt you…”

“No!” Dawn shot back, suddenly snapping. “Darkness, fire and, strangers! People we

don’t know, soldiers and fighters we don’t know, taking us and making us do things we aren’t

prepared for and didn’t know were coming!” She leapt up and backed away a few paces. War

slowly rose to her feet, keeping her position by where Dawn had been sitting. She took a deep

breath and gave her voice a softer edge, trying to sound as comforting as possible.

“Dawn, I don’t mean to make you feel unsafe. I don’t mean to make you feel

uncomfortable. In fact, I’ve been doing my best to make you comfortable and secure in our

company. Maybe you aren’t ready to do a watch shift yet, even with help – maybe that should

wait a little while longer. But it’s a necessity out here, and something you’ll have to do some

day. And I need you to remember that you chose this life. I offered to take you home, back to

your parents, and you refused. You wanted to get away.” She paused. “Maybe right now isn’t

the best time for this conversation, but before we decide whether you should go back to sleep or

stay up for the watch, I need you to recognize that. That you chose to come out here, with me, of

your own will. I didn’t force you, and I warned you that it would be difficult. Can you do that?”

For a moment, Dawn simply stood still, eyes closed. War could hear her deep,

shuddering breaths slowly stabilizing. That was good, she thought. The girl was calming herself

down.

“You’re… you’re right. I did choose this. I knew it would be different, I knew it might

be hard. Maybe I chose wrong in the heat of the moment. But I can’t go back now. I won’t go

back now. Just… please, let me rest. We can talk about this when it’s light out. I just need rest

right now.”

“Then go ahead. I’ll take some of this shift, and then wake Seven for his part. You can

rest.”

Dawn took one final breath, then walked over and fell down on her bedroll. After a few

moments, when her breathing had stabilized, Seven rolled over and stood up. He walked over to

War and pulled her a little farther away from the fire. In a lowered voice, he said,

“You did a good job there. I wondered how long it was going to be before she realized

the choice she had made in coming out here with us, how crazy the decision she made was. Do

you think we should take her home, if it comes to that? I mean… that was a pretty intense

conversation, from the part I heard.”

“No, I don’t think we should take her back. She’ll get used to it. How much did you

hear?”

“From the part where she just about yelled ‘no’. And are you sure? I mean… I have a

few reservations here as well. We’ve basically kidnapped her, except that she said she wanted to

come. Her parents probably think she’s dead, we didn’t talk to them about it at all – she’s only

sixteen, War. Sixteen year olds have to have their parents agree when they first enlist in most


150

armies. Not the ones run by warlords, naturally they’ll take anyone, but the professional armies

always check in with the families for someone so young. I mean, we get recruits even younger

than that sometimes, but those kids are usually sent by the families anyway. It just seems wrong

for us to just take her and make her live with us in the forest.”

War hesitated. “I told her my story. You heard it too. As much as it may offend your

sensibilities for a pair of soldiers to take a young woman and teach her to hunt, fight, and

otherwise survive, it’s been the entire focus of my life. It’s how I learned to fight the way I do. I

was with several other women who had lived the same way. Dawn would be well-served to live

the same way, I think.”

Seven shook his head. “When I met you, you were living alone in the wilderness, and

had been for years. I don’t know what you think that says to people, but that says to me that

your past haunts you. That you wanted to get away from it. And now you’re going to put

another girl through it again for… what reason? Because she was grieving and wanted to get

away, and that’s a binding agreement now?”

“I… It’s not… Look. There were things in my past that I was running from, yes. There

were things that pushed me into the mountains, things that made me want to never return to

fighting ever again. But none of those had to do with the training I received. I was never afraid

of my skill, of what I can do. I was afraid of the women who had trained me. Trust me, I won’t

repeat their mistakes when it comes to training Dawn. I don’t intend to force her to fight tons of

battles, kill hundreds of people. I don’t intend to beat her, to try to break her, to openly kill her

family in front of her with my own hands.”

“Well you can’t do that last one because it was done for you by a fire. And you might

not do those things, but we’re putting her in a situation where the rest of her life will be defined

by fighting. My life has been, I know what it’s like, your life has been too, so you know what

it’s like. Are you willing to put her up to that life based on a rash decision she made while she

was in shock over losing most of her family?”

“Are you willing to take away the future she might have outside the city?” War snapped

back. “What was she going to do in there? Keep working as a servant in the castle, haunted by

the memories of her dead siblings every time she walked in to work every morning? That’s not a

good life. I just want to give her the skills she needs to hold her own in any situation that could

possibly be thrown at her.”

“I’m just saying I’m uncomfortable with this whole thing. She came with us out of

despair, and now we’re finding out she might be afraid of us.” He took a deep breath and

steadied himself. “We need better than one agreement on a whim. We need a plan, and we need

to agree on that plan – all of us. That’s all I really want here. A plan, and a solid agreement. Is

that okay with you?”

War closed her eyes and inhaled through her nose. “Yeah, we can do that. Tomorrow

we’ll take the day in camp to draw up a schedule for how our days will go, as well as a training


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regimen for her. Once that’s done, we can ask her if she wants to continue with us or go home.

Will that work?”

“Yes,” Seven said. “That will work fine. Now, how long do we have left on this watch?”

“About an hour.”

“Go ahead and sleep. I’ve slept some, you can take the rest of the night off. I think I’ll

rebuild the fire and start cooking breakfast. I’ll wake both of you up when it’s ready.”

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