Captain Storm

Shregresha trudged through the jungle, still pondering why Kresh had been so insistent that Durkrag and her specifically go as the guards this moon’s trade convoy. She figured it was because Kresh wanted to ease Durkrag back into being more active in the clan, and that she was sent along to watch over him, but that didn’t explain why Kresh had been adamant that they and Shregresha’s war band be the ones to guard the convoy, rather than have Durkrag go hunting, or have them go follow up with Turrak to see how the pathway system was going. Shregresha had suggested both, and both were denied. If there was a specific danger Kresh was concerned about, why didn’t he tell her as much? If there was someone he wanted Durkrag and her to meet, he didn’t give a name or a description. Come to think of it, as far as she knew, Kresh hadn’t actually met the… merchants of the Brazen Coalition that they traded with. Was that it? He wanted to know what was going on from a highly trusted source, and didn’t say in case he was overheard by someone doing something crooked? Maybe it was some combination of everything? Maybe it was nothing specific? Shregresha sighed, took a deep breath, and tried to clear her head. She was overthinking it.

Then, it hit her! Kresh wanted her there to reinforce the terms of the Accord! Yes, it had been announced on the network, but making it clear in person was a better bet. And he insisted to bring Durkrag with her because he figured that was best for her and her son. But why not tell her?

Durkrag had spent the past four hours looking at an iguanar’s behind. Or more accurately, its tail. An iguanar’s long tail swept along the ground, helping provide extra stability and spacial awareness. The tail could also be used as a whip against attackers, although it was mainly a scare tactic, and it could also detach, allowing iguanars to escape even a dragon by leaving a writhing tail in the predator’s mouth. Durkrag knew all of this because he had spent every meal yesterday learning all sorts of iguanar facts from Jakagera, the youngest of the iguanar riders. Like him, she was on the younger side of those on this trip, just a year older than he was. Like him, she hadn’t earned a title yet. Unlike him, this was the first mission of bigger importance than just hunting or driving off goblins she was on. Unlike him, she was very bubbly and fascinated by giant iguanars. It wasn’t that Durkrag disliked the animals, but he didn’t share Jakagera’s enthusiasm about the behaviors and bodies of them. He didn’t need to know how long it took an iguanar to digest its food, nor how many teeth an adult could have, and while some information, like an iguanar’s speed or that it could bite through a medium-sized tree trunk were interesting, there were other things he didn’t need to know. Things that walking at the end of the tail gave him enough knowledge of, well before Jakagera added extra details.

Durkrag tuned out Jakagera as she talked about the dietary requirements of an adolescent iguanar, and focused instead on the bronze-headed ax he held. It didn’t feel right at all in his hand. His normal weapon, a long ax weighted with a stone hammer behind the blade, required two hands to wield effectively, so he’d been outfitted with a bronze ax, a sturdy weapon that was not made from one of his kills, but was still something he had ‘earned’. On his other arm, he had nothing. If he still had a forearm, he would’ve strapped a shield or maybe a blade to it, but with everything below the elbow gone, it was too awkward to weaponize.

Durkrag felt half-naked without a weapon that he was comfortable with, and slipped the ax back into the stiff leather holder on his belt. At least he had a bundle of javelins on his back. While it had taken some adjusting of his technique to get his balance right again, one only needed a single hand to effectively throw a javelin, and he was a good shot with them. In many ways, they were the more effective weapons he had, considering the duty to stay put and guard the convoy, the javelins would allow him to strike down animals or ward off raiders from a distance. Not that he hoped to fight, but it was reassuring that he wouldn’t be helpless if he had to.

It was late at night out on the prairie of Thunder Junction when a hooded figure walked by a Freestrider ranch. They made a single noise, a piercing bird call, and in response, a lone hawk awoke and flew from her perch, landing on the hunter’s left shoulder. The hunter tucked their hood behind their left ear, and a beak pecked at the stubble on their cheek. In response, they fished a piece of thrinax jerky out of a compartment on their belt. Despite being months-old, the smoking, salting, and spicing that Clan Tol Angata did to the meat meant that aside from being tough as boots, the jerky was wholly edible.

The hawk let out a sharp Caw! and pecked the hunter once again, this time hard enough to break the skin.

“Ow, that hurt, Greywind,” Bromley Macpherson said, rubbing his cheek, “But you don’t need to worry, I’m never going to disappear like that again.”

Greywind let out a softer, gentler screech, and nuzzled her head behind Bromley’s ear.

“Now, let’s go hunting.”

JH-3a didn’t know what they felt was regret. They understood regret in the abstract, the feeling that one had made the wrong choices, or hadn’t made the right ones, and they didn’t like where they currently were: wearing ill-fitting akki armor, sweating buckets in a muggy jungle, and being eaten alive by mosquitoes, but didn’t put together that their drive to find the person who killed their creator, the destroyer, was what had led them to this situation. They didn’t consciously. They couldn’t let themselves.

What they could let themselves think about was the fact that they were hopelessly lost. It had been days since they went through the Omenpath, and they were still no closer to their goal. They had maps of Kamigawa, they knew some of the terrain in Jund, the route from the Omenpath to the dragon cave, but they had no way of tracking the destroyer. The plan had not been well thought-out, and although they had some knowledge of tracking implanted in their brain, most of it was for a different environment, and much of it was tactics of how to use people to find people within a city. So, what it left them with was walking alongside a river, hoping they’d eventually find someone, show that person the face of the destroyer, and get pointed in the right direction. It was not much, and they knew it. But JH-3a had committed themselves to a course of action, and did not know how to stop until they were dead, other commands were issued by a superior, or the task at hand was done.

The weather around the Maelstrom always set Shregresha’s teeth on edge. The last two times she’d been near the relative center of Alara, she hadn’t had the luxury of being consciously aware of that. Both times she’d been exhausted and in pursuit of dangerous enemies, or, closer to the Maelstrom, in active combat against hordes of enemies. The first time, she, Kresh, and a war party who’d mostly passed on since then were hunting Sarkhan Vol, and in the company of Ajani Goldmane, who sought vengeance on Nicol Bolas, only to get caught up fighting the draconic planeswalker’s army of undead. The second time, all of Tol Angata, and most of the rest of the clans were waging a grueling campaign to push the Phyrexians out of Jund. She thought zombies were the most horrific things she had ever fought, up until she was knee-deep in blood and rust, putting her sword through the head of an iron-plated viashino, only to have it not die, and have to hack through the torso with a dull blade while keeping the snapping jaws at bay. So, the last couple of times, she hadn’t been paying much attention to the ever-shifting winds or the wild fluctuations in temperature or the miniature storms that formed and dissipated in seconds. Now, she had time to pay attention.

As the wind suddenly kicked up strong enough to force her braids up into the air and hold them parallel to the ground, she wondered how this would affect the Coalition ships. She knew that the giant sheets of fabric called sails somehow propelled the ships using the wind, but didn’t know how the fluctuations in the wind would impact the sails. She grunted as her braids and the shards of metal, bone, and scales bound in them slapped against her back, falling as the wind vanished just as sudden as it came. Shaking her head, she figured that if the Coalition had been coming for at least several months, they had a way, and whatever it was, she didn’t care enough to know. She had bigger issues, like finding something to tie her hair back and keep it down, so that it didn’t smack her again though.

After a few more hours of hiking, with Shregresha having used the first water break to tie her braids together with some spare twine, so that their combined weight was too much for the wind, the trade caravan emerged from the thinning treeline and sighted the Coalition ships, anchored several yards offshore of the inlet which fed the river that the Jundians had followed towards the Maelstrom. A few miles away, the glowing, churning ball of energy at the core of the Maelstrom back lit the ships, competing with the sun to illuminate the clearing. The merchants and pirates of the Coalition had landed smaller boats on the shoreline, and off-loaded some of the goods they were hoping to trade.

“Ahoy there!” an orc woman wearing a bicorn hat called as she sprung out of a hammock, and grabbed an ax that had been resting against one of the trees she’d been resting under. “I be Captain Tressa Laguna of The Tenacious, the toughest ship in the Parsec fleet, and the commander of this here merchant convoy. If y’all be the trading party we’re expecting, glad to see you! If you’re not, then ya better be on yer best behavior or just move along an’ save us the trouble!”

“Shregresha the Scale-breaker, senior war-leader of Clan Tol Angata,” she called out, “And we’re the trading party representing the human Clans. And, although there are no viashino currently present, our clans have struck an accord with several of the viashino thrashes, namely Manytooth, Pitch, Scorch, and Thorn thrashes. The terms of this agreement, the Accord of Hair & Scale, were announced on the communicator network a few weeks ago, but I am here to go over any specifics, and to grant you permission to do things like cut down trees for ship repairs.”

“Aye! Fortune smiles upon us, for the ships be in good repair, although who knows what tomorrow brings! Any goods you’d be wanting next time our ships pass by this way?” Captain Laguna asked.

“I’m not sure about next time, but the rest of the party might have requests. I personally am looking for something, potentially would need to ask for it to be made. I’ll ask about it after my people have set up camp. In private, if possible,” Shregresha said, having walked towards the captain, and lowering her voice significantly.

“Certainly! We can head back to me ship, anything specialty’s probably aboard, might even be able to show ya what yer lookin’ fer!” Captain Laguna said, looking up at Shregresha, a new experience for her, having to physically look up at a human.

Shregresha turned back towards the Jundians, who had begun to unload the iguanars and called out, “Not time to rest yet, gotta pitch camp, clear a fire pit, and set up a watch! C’mon, let’s get moving people!”

Durkrag felt out of place. As the rest of the trade caravan bustled about, unpacking iguanar saddlebags, tossing up tents, and swapping news with the pirates, he stood by the area they’d set aside for the iguanars, javelins ready, ostensibly keeping watch on the rear. He knew the only reason he’d been given this task was due to lacking a forearm, and not being able to carry or unpack things as easily as others. Jakagera was with him, but she was focusing on taking care of the iguanars, examining their feet and claws, and rubbing them down with rough brushes to clean their scales. She was still talking while she did it, mostly about iguanars, from what Durkrag was hearing. Or maybe she was talking to the iguanars, Durkrag wasn’t that focused on her. He was focusing on not focusing on the gnawing pain in the back of his head, the hunger that wanted to dive back into a peppermoss haze and have the warmth fill the hollowness. He wasn’t focusing on it. He was focusing on not focusing on it. But that didn’t seem to be helping.

He was snapped out of his brooding when he felt the light smack of a hard-bristled brush on his shoulder, and turned to see Jakagera holding it.

“Hey, I was asking you if you wanted to eat dinner with me! Did you not hear me the first three times?” Jakagera asked, her brows knitted together in a combination of concern and irritation.

“I, uh…” Durkrag cleared his throat, “I, sure. I have a feeling that my mom’s gonna be eating at the captain’s fire, so to speak, so it shouldn’t be a problem.”

Jakagera smiled wide, and Durkrag felt something flit through the hollow in his chest. He smiled back, his a bit lopsided and showing far fewer teeth, due to being several months out of practice.

Bromley had found the tracks of the clone pretty quickly after reaching the Omenpath to the Sokenzan Mountains, and he hadn’t lost them once. Whatever Dr. Zlovol had intended for the clone to do, they were pretty sure it hadn’t involved moving undetected through a jungle. In fact, despite the several days lead, on account of how long it took to get from Littjara to anywhere you could reach any part of Alara from, let alone get close to Jund, Bromley was confident they had caught up with the clone. Bromley had a decade of experience in Jund, the clone barely had ten days experience with life outside a vat. He was close enough that it was safe, well safer, to project into Greywind’s senses and spot the clone as she flew, rather than just have her patrol for dangers while he focused on tracking. Once he had that data, the clone’s exact position, he’d move in and hopefully take the clone down with the first shot.

He’d do that in the morning. It was getting late, and unless the clone was a lot cleverer than the evidence suggested, they had nothing to worry about. The tale that Bromley had read from the footprints was that clone was still clearly heavily armored, despite it slowing them significantly, and something causing them to stumble fairly often, probably exhaustion, pointed to them likely not having enough skill to figure out that they were being followed, albeit at a mile or two out. Besides, he’d laid some snares around the camp, and Greywind would be alert at dawn, if nothing else.

Shregresha awoke in the captain’s quarters to the sound of shouting. Next to her, wearing a nightgown, Captain Tressa Laguna was hurriedly buckling her boots. Shregresha stood and stretched, her back always complained a bit after sleeping in a bed. Beds were comfortable, but she’d grown accustomed to hard, flat dirt with a bedroll over it or a simple cot at most. She sank weirdly into these mattresses, and her back didn’t know how to handle the lack of support.

Shregresha donned her belt and the short-sleeved top she’d been wearing the night prior, stuck her feet into her boots, and dashed after Captain Laguna, who was wearing an eclectic mix of her nightdress, boots buckled only at the top, cutlass and harpoon pistol hanging from her belt, and the gilded bicorn hat she wore as a token of office. The captain’s slapdash appearance reminded Shregresha of what had been the one awkward part of last night: all the buttons, buckles, and layers that it seemed a pirate, er… merchant captain wore. Shregresha wasn’t used to dealing with any of that.

The two leaders burst onto the deck to find chaos onboard all ships, as well as the shoreline. The first mate hurried over to explain the situation right as the captain of one of the other ships called out, “Dragon-thing’s coming back for another pass! Fire at will!” While Laguna was in charge of the whole convoy, each ships’ captain still operated independently when it came to protecting their ship. The Jundians on the shore weren’t close enough to hit the monster with javelins as it swooped down, but the pirates let out a volley of harpoons and crossbow bolts from the deck. Those that reached the infernal dragon did little more than annoy it, and it shouted out, “Little insects with your little stings! I will crush you like the bugs you are!”

Shregresha’s mind cleared any lingering idle thoughts the instant the dragon spoke. Jundian dragons didn’t talk. Well, not those that were entirely dragons. It’d been over a decade, and she’d only seen him from a distance, but this creature had the same general form as the fell general of the undead horde she’d fought only a day’s march around the Maelstrom from here. It was the spitting image of Malfegor, the demonic dragon. Fortunately, it wasn’t as big as he was, but its wingspan was still wider than the ship’s width. Shregresha cursed under her breath. This was not the terrain for dragon-fighting. Too flat, too open, nothing to scale and get the drop on it, nowhere to hem the dragon in, no way to keep it on the ground if it decided to engage. And since this thing had at least some of the intelligence of a demon, it’d likely just strafe them with its fire breath until the ships burned to the waterline, and those on the shore had scattered into the woods. She began forming the scraps of a plan. It would be dangerous. It would be risky. It would be-

Shregresha’s world was rocked by a massive explosion. The dragon had just strafed a ship that had managed to fire a cannon at it, and unfortunately, the flames caught the fuel for the firecannons. The ship and its crew were reduced to cinders between breaths.

Laguna staggered back, not from the physical shockwave that slammed into her, but from the horror of what had happened. As her eyes began to glaze over, Shregresha grabbed her by her shoulders and shook her.

“Tressa, you need to order everyone to abandon the ships! Tell them to bring harpoons, crossbows, whatever you have and try to draw the dragon to the shore! Try luring it over there, use the tree cover, scatter, Meerama knows how to do this, just follow her lead!” Shregresha shouted.

“Me? What about yerself?” Captain Laguna asked, dazed.

“I’m gonna try something very, very, stupid,” Shregresha told her, grabbing hold of the rigging and starting to climb.

Durkrag had been awake for all of five minutes, and was already leading the warriors Meerama had assigned to throw javelins if the dragon-thing came within range. He had good aim, and Meerama knew him better than many of the other warriors, who were from different clans. Due to them not being in a good position for fighting a dragon, Durkrag’s standing order was to begin throwing after he hurled his first, unless the range was completely off, to launch at will and then scatter, using trees as cover when not throwing, and then resume throwing from a new position. It wasn’t a great plan, but unless someone got a very solid wing hit in, the purpose of javelins was to lure the dragon into fighting on the ground. Unfortunately, Meerama didn’t understand the difference between a dragon and a demon-dragon. She hadn’t been part of Kresh’s war band over a decade ago, and due to none of the Jundians actually fighting Malfegor themselves, few tales were told of the monstrosity.

As the pirates swam ashore, washed up clinging to floating casks, barrels, and the like, or in the case of the sirens, flew, Durkrag started looking for his mother. He didn’t see her, but he saw the captain she’d went back to the ship with, and, since the dragon wasn’t yet in javelin range, instead chasing down an unlucky siren who’d gotten separated from the rest of the pirates, he strode over to Captain Laguna.

“Where’s my mom?” Durkrag asked, sighing as he saw the look of confusion on Laguna’s face, “Shregresha, she’s my mother. Where is she?”

“Yer mom’s o’er thar, climbing up the rigging of me ship. Na sure why meself, but she’s the capable sort, she knows what she’s doing,” Laguna responded. “Are you Meerama?”

“No, I’m Durkrag. Meerama’s over there,” he said, gesturing towards Shregresha’s second. “But I’ll save you some time, order your warriors with ranged weapons to join us in harrying the dragon when it comes. Fire at will, scatter after each shot, don’t want to be clumped together for dragon fire.”

As Laguna gave the orders to the pirates, Durkrag squinted and saw the small figure of Shregresha scaling the rigging, then working her way up the main mast towards the siren’s nest, as the lookout was called by some sailors. He watched as she drew her swords, banging them together and facing the dragon, presumably yelling something. Durkrag had seen what had happened to the last ship engulfed in draconic flames. He would not watch his mother die.

Grinak Laotagar wasn’t the shaman Durkrag would’ve wanted to implement his plan. Durkrag would’ve much preferred his half-brother, Turrak, be the one to help make Shregresha’s scheme work, but he had Grinak instead. It wasn’t that Grinak was a bad shaman, just that his skills lay in the enchanting of items and the shaping of bone. Those were useful talents, and for the trading mission, meant he’d be very valuable, able to discern the magic on items acquired and enchant some pieces of jewelry to increase their value when sold. He also knew medicinal practices, and was a fine healer. Those were not the skills Durkrag required. Unfortunately, it’s what he had.

“Grinak Laotagar, I desperately petition you for aid in fighting the dragon. My mother is attempting to draw it to her, but I fear that it will just breathe fire on her from a distance, killing her and leaving us without the most experienced dragon-slayer here. I implore you to call upon the aid of a wind elemental to blow the dragon towards my mom when it approaches, so she can leap upon its back and hopefully kill it, and so that she doesn’t die. If there’s anything I can give you to help in this, I will. Blood, life-force, treasure, anything!” Durkrag pleaded, making direct eye contact with Grinak.

“I… I can’t make any promises, but I’ll try my best. It might take some time though, and I don’t know how much time we have,” Grinak said, preparing to enter a trance state and pulling off some of his bracelets as an offering for the elemental he intended to call for aid.

“I’ll see if I can give us some more time. It probably won’t be much, but I’ll try,” Durkrag said, mind whirling as he ran back to where the pirates and javelin throwers were loosely assembled.

“Who’s got the longest range weapon here?” he called out.

“That’d be this beauty,” one of the pirates said, unslinging a massive harpoon gun from over his shoulder. It had a long barrel, and unlike most of the harpoons, a scope made from a retrofitted spyglass.

“Could you hit the dragon at this range?” Durkrag asked, eyeing the odd weapon.

The grizzled sharpshooter brought the scope to his eye and trained it towards the dragon, adjusting the position until he grunted and said, “Aye, but it’s at the limit of tha range. It’s a coin flip, but no other gun could put you anywhere near it.”

Ignoring the unfamiliar metaphor, Durkrag simply asked, “And how hard would it be to hit specifically the wing?”

“That’d be… well, na very likely, ’specially cause of the winds blowin helter-skelter, but I’d reckon I could get it within four shots with a bit o’ luck,” the pirate replied, “But it’s a moot point anyways, only got the one harpoon on me, left the rest on the ship.”

“You three!” Durkrag called out, pointing at three other pirates, “Give this warrior your harpoons!”

Shregresha clanged her swords together and called out towards the demon-dragon, “This blade is made from the jawbone of a dragon! While you’re an ugly shit, your jaw looks perfectly serviceable to be turned into a true matching pair! My name is Scalebreaker, because I am strong enough to break the scales of a dragon! Fight me or flee as a coward!”

The fiendish dragon let out a rumble and bellowed back, sparks flickering in the back of its throat, “And what stops me from simply roasting you where you stand?”

“I have sangrite and can use it in such a way as to make me immune to heat!” Shregresha shouted, overselling the truth. While sangrite did make one more heat-resistant, flames would still burn her.

“And the wooden float you stand upon?” the demon said, smiling wide and readying its fiery breath.

Shregresha tensed her legs and crushed some sangrite in her palm. A standing jump towards the dragon was risky, but she might be able to do it. Better than burning alive, even if she missed.

Before either dragon or human could make their move, a harpoon flew from the shore and impaled the demon-dragon in the wing, barbed head shredding the sensitive membrane. The abomination shrieked in agony, but reared back to unleash an inferno from its jaws. A second harpoon flew past it, just under the wing, and it decided that trying to kill one human who couldn’t even reach it was less practical than flying over to the shore and incinerating whoever was shooting those harpoons. With some awkward maneuvering, the creature broke the shaft off the harpoon, an impressive feat considering it was all one piece of metal, and aerially limped forward with the head still in the wing.

The dragon made it all of ten yards before a third harpoon struck it in the underbelly. An involuntary gout of flame poured from its mouth, and as it began to fall out of the sky, a strong wind kicked up, and like a champion boxer driving their opponent up off the mat with a devastating uppercut, forced it towards where Shregresha was.

She was not one to look a gift thrinax in the mouth, and leapt from the siren’s nest down onto the demon, fortunately landing on its back. Her swords impaled it between where the kidney would’ve be for a human and the wings. Moving between wing-beats to avoid being blown off, she sprang forward, up the thrashing form, using the scales as an impromptu foothold, and landed at the small of the back, in between the wings. Normally, when fighting a dragon, anywhere on their back was, while still dangerous, better than being in front of or under them, since you were out of range of their claws and teeth, and only had to worry about them using their tail like a whip, something that not all dragons could do. Since this one was part demon and had a demon’s humanoid torso atop a draconic body, Shregresha knew to position herself in the one place that humanoid arms usually couldn’t reach on their own bodies, the point on the spine that you can never quite scratch unaided.

She stuck her most recent metal blade into the space between two vertebrae, a saber she’d recently acquired from a previous trading convoy with the Coalition, and bent the blade a bit to wedge it in there, ignoring how the flesh she stood upon shook as the demon howled in pain. Holding onto the saber, tuning out everything but the meat and bone around her, Shregresha went to work with the dragon’s jawbone she held in her other hand. It rose and fell like a butcher’s cleaver, except that Shregresha had to sometimes saw it back and forth to pull it free from the spinal column she was cutting. The teeth were hungry for blood, and as Shregresha hacked through the last nerve fiber, the attached wings failed completely, turning the spiraling descent into a plummet.

Fortunately, the winds and a bit of elemental intervention had pushed them away from the ship, so when the dead weight of the demon-dragon’s lower body smashed into the ocean, the waves simply rocked the vessel and caused water to spill over the deck, rather than breaking the masts and crushing the deck.

Unfortunately, Shregresha, her body bruised from the concussive force of the impact, now had to deal with a situation her plan hadn’t developed far enough to account for. She couldn’t swim. As the inert legs buckled underneath the wailing weight of the demon-dragon, the demonic torso began to pitch sideways into the water. Shregresha wasted valuable seconds trying to pull the metal saber loose, before a splash against her ankles made her decide to cut her losses. Stumbling and thrashing, she clambered up the spine, taking a few more seconds to reach below the rising water with her one remaining blade to slit the foul creature’s throat. She knew that while devastating, the wound she had previously inflicted would’ve only meant a slow death. She was a good hunter, and a good hunter always puts their prey out of its misery.

However, finishing the job came at a cost. As the water turned a murky red-brown with plumes of corrosive, steaming blood coursing into it, she found herself lacking anything to stand on, submerged up to her shoulders, and sinking. She flailed about, trying to keep her head above water, with little success. As she felt the cool water and hot blood rise alongside her throat, her body starting to sting, she took a deep breath, hoping her ability to hold her breath she’d honed to survive smoke and volcanic fumes would allow her to live long enough to get rescued.

Bromley crashed through the brush, running with a loaded crossbow in one hand and a machete in the other. He knew it wasn’t safe, but he’d overslept. He wasn’t in as good a shape as he’d been in before he disappeared off to Littjara, and the days of tracking and bushwhacking had caught up with him. Greywind currently had eyes on the target, and he was getting a steady stream of images the clone’s location in one corner of their mind while he focused on the trail of the disheveled youth that would lead him what they were seeing. He finally crested a hill, and saw the clone, just standing there at the treeline, looking at something on the beach in front of the Maelstrom. Bromley would find out what that was after he’d neutralized the target.

JH-3a assessed the situation in front of them and struggled to come up with a plan of action. They saw their target, the killer of Dr. Zlovol and would’ve moved in to kill her if not for the crowd of people around her prone form. There was also the issue that she was not moving, possibly dead already. And looking down at her was JH-3. The original, but without the improvements that Dr. Zlovol had granted him. JH-3a didn’t know what to make of that. The last moments of Dr. Zlovol’s life, which had been uploaded to JH-3a’s brain upon her death along with the directive to eliminate her killer, still showed JH-3 with the improvements made.

Further confusing matters, in replaying that ten seconds of data over and over in their mind to keep themselves focused on the objective, JH-3a had realized that while the killer was the last thing Dr. Zlovol had seen before she experienced indescribable pain and died, the killer was a good four meters away from Dr. Zlovol, and had her hands full fighting off moving cables. Well, if she wasn’t the direct killer, which still wasn’t known, she’d participated, and would probably know who struck down Dr. Zlovol. Still, what to do about the other people? Wait them out? Yeah, that was probably the only plan. JH-3a turned to go sit behind a tree and wait for nightfall.

Durkrag stood over his mother’s body and wished he wasn’t useless. He hadn’t been the one to pull her from the water, minutes after she went under. He couldn’t even swim. He hadn’t been the one to clear her airways of water and make sure she could still breathe. He didn’t know how. He wasn’t the one currently bandaging her body, applying a salve on the caustic burns, and muttering spells under his breath all at once. He wasn’t Grinak, who was a shaman. And being a shaman was much more useful than being a one-armed javelin thrower. Jakagera was standing next to him, and had grabbed his hand to hold, then let go and began to back away before he reached out to her, without even looking her way. Her squeezing his hand was anchoring him, preventing the despair from washing him out into the sea of melancholy and drowning him there. He craved some- NO! The only thing he craved was for his mom to wake up.

Suddenly, Durkrag and the rest of those assembled on the shoreline heard the thump of a body in armor hitting the ground, a noise most of them had heard before. Captain Laguna looked around and gestured at several of her crew to move in, and then said to Durkrag, Grinak, and Meerama, “I’m going to check that out, stay here.”

As she crossed the treeline, she saw her crew members standing over a body dressed in… Kamigawan armor? That’s what it looked like to her, although it didn’t exactly fit the person wearing it. She noticed the crossbow bolt emerging from between the plates over the shoulder, and belatedly raised her harpoon pistol, then scanned the jungle, something the rest of the pirates were already doing.

“Hello there! Whomever you may be, I have no quarrel with you. Walk back the way you came, and no harm will come to anyone else! I will be gone soon, and you will never hear from me again!” a voice called from somewhere deeper in the jungle, probably in the direction of those hills, Laguna guessed.

“How do we know we can trust ye? We can’t even see yer face!” Captain Laguna shouted back, scrutinizing the hillside to see if there was any movement.

“Because I haven’t put a crossbow bolt in any of you, despite having ample time to do so,” the voice called back, although now it seemed to be coming from up in a tree.

Captain Laguna knew that if the voice had taken time to reload the crossbow immediately after firing it, they would’ve just managed to, meaning if they had done so, she likely would’ve heard some strain from the voice. It was thus more likely that they had another crossbow, already loaded. And if they were carrying one extra crossbow, while unlikely, they could be carrying two. However, it was unlikely the shooter could remain hidden while firing, meaning that even if they managed two shots, they’d only take down one or two the four pirates, and rest of the them would be able to respond. It wasn’t great odds, and there were too many assumptions for Laguna’s liking, since there could be more crossbowmen who had simply stayed silent.

The tension was punctured when Meerama stepped past the treeline and asked, “What’s going on?”

An exhausted groan could be heard from the bushes. A groan in a voice that sounded familiar to Meerama, although she couldn’t immediately place why. What she could place was the crossbow bolt sticking out of a familiar figure near her feet. She’d seen it sticking out of enough lizards and undead to recognize.

“Bromley?” she called out, tomahawks still in hand.

“Yeah, it’s me. Before I explain, where’s Shregresha? She deserves to hear this and if she’s going to find out, I’d rather be the person who told her than who hid this from her,” Bromley called, emerging from the foliage, seeming to materialize to the eyes of the pirates unfamiliar with the terrain.

“She’s… she’s in a bad way. Durkrag’s on the beach with her, and Grinak, the shaman, is tending to her wounds, but she was dragged out of a pool of dragon blood from the weirdest dragon I’ve ever seen in the middle of the lake. Did you not hear the explosions and the screaming?” Meerama asked.

“I did, but I had a job to do, and I couldn’t see anything. Thought it was just a skirmish around the Maelstrom, those still happen occasionally. Anyways, you should be there taking command until Shregresha’s better. I’ll be right behind you, just have to tie up our friend by your feet” Bromley said, having unloaded and clipped his crossbows to his belt, and dug a length of hempen cord out of his pack as he walked over.

“Heh! Nice try, but even if I did let you scurry away, how were you going to drag a full-grown person in armor and hide them?” Meerama asked.

“I was going to ask for a favor… from a cephalid who lives on the crime city plane,” Bromley said, a lopsided grin on his face.

“Well, we’re here now, let me help you get this fellow in an easier to tie up position,” Meerama said, reaching down to move the clone.

“NO!” Bromley shouted, stepping forward and reaching out a hand, still a few feet away.

But it was too late. Meerama, Captain Laguna, the pirates, and some assorted Jundians who’d followed Meerama saw the clone’s face as she lifted their prone body, and all assembled out a collective gasp.

“By the bloody names of me long-dead ancestors, tell me what in all the hells going on!” Captain Laguna shouted, “I just talked to that lad, but ’e had warpaint on and only one full arm!”

“Who in the boiling seas of the planes are ye!” she yelled, pointing at Bromley with her harpoon pistol.

“I thought the random dragon attack was going to be the most confusing thing of the day, but this is more baffling, albeit fortunately less disastrous. It is less disastrous than one of my convoy’s ships exploding, right? This isn’t some stupid cosmic timeline magical bullshit, is it?” Captain Laguna ranted, her powers of deduction only telling her so much. She was the only one of the pirates to notice that the clone didn’t have Durkrag’s war paint, and had figured out the armor was from Kamigawa on sight, but that context didn’t help explain the situation.

“No, it’s just cloning nonsense… I’ll explain everything, but we should tie the clone up now. The tranquilizer on the bolt should last about an hour, but reactions aren’t consistent and who knows what alterations the mad scientist who created this clone made,” Bromley said, not moving.

“Mad scientist… You mean that dead vedalken bitch?” Meerama asked, not sure whether a yes or a no would be worse.

“Yes, and… wait, Durkrag’s here?” Bromley asked, his brain finally catching up to the full implications of what Captain Laguna had said.

Laguna and Meerama both nodded.

“Of course he his. By the fucking thrice-dammed angels, fate has a very nasty sense of humor; this is the scenario my involvement was supposed to avoid!” Bromley said, swearing harsh enough to upset a hardened Jhessian sailor, and a Sighted priest to charge him with blasphemy. But, since none of those around him were Bantian, they didn’t catch the specific severity of the curse; they did not have beliefs that much involved angels, let alone spoke to the inherent abomination that a dammed angel would be. They just understood he was angry, and vaguely pissed at the powers-that-be.

“So, I’m gonna tie up this clone, call up an octopod gangster, and disappear. It’d be for the best if you all forgot about this, I’m not gonna fuck up Durkrag’s life with something like this until I’ve had a chance to talk to Shregresha about it, which is gonna have to happen later,” Bromley said, as he began tying the clone’s hands together behind their back.

“Why not just kill the clone?” Laguna asked, lowering her harpoon pistol.

“That wasn’t the job. The client didn’t want the clone dead without a chance to speak with them first,” Bromley said, his hands winding rope around the clone’s arms and torso to limit their mobility.

“And who knew about this situation to hire you?” Laguna asked, her harpoon pistol no longer pointed at Bromley but still in hand.

“I have no clue. I don’t ask questions unless I find the job distasteful, and this job was just a simple retrieval mission that would help protect some old friends,” Bromley said, bold-faced lying.

“Now, I’m sure you have better things to do than gawk at me tying up a person, and we don’t want anyone to get suspicious about what’s taking you so long and coming to investigate themselves, so I suggest that you head back, assure whoever else is on the beach that nothing serious happened, and we go our separate ways for the foreseeable future,” Bromley said, beginning to fashion a frame to lash the clone to, which would allow him to drag the much larger person easier than trying to carry or drag them without support.

Laguna turned to Meerama, whispered something in the Jundian woman’s ear, and then both motioned for their respective groups to head back towards the beach, talking quietly to each other about what Bromley had said, attempting to deduce the nature of the client.

So lost in conversation, Meerama almost walked right into Durkrag, who was rooted to the spot, mouth open in horror, eyes wide with fear.

“Tell me, tell me it isn’t true. Tell me I misheard, tell me I got it wrong, tell me that something else is going on, something other than that vile vedalken having made another weapon out of me!” Durkrag pleaded, grabbing Meerama’s forearm as tears formed in his eyes.

Meerama didn’t say anything. She couldn’t say anything. She simply wrapped Durkrag in a hug tight enough that he felt it on his ribs.

Bromley regretted. It wasn’t the passing thought that things would’ve been easier if he’d stayed gone, the regret ran deeper than that. Bromley regretted leaving in the first place, and having abandoned Durkrag, Shregresha, and Turrak to face Dr. Zlovol alone. Bromley regretted coming into their lives at all. They would’ve been better off if they’d never saved his accursed ass. Bromley regretted stealing that fruit, the mango from the crate on the docks, just unloaded from Topa, back at the tender age of five. He’d gotten away with it, disappearing like ghost before anyone noticed, and that act had sent him down the path of lawlessness, murder, and villainy that brought misfortune to everyone around him. It left his parents heartbroken and shamed, damn near every pirate or thief they’d ever ran with was dead or doing time, and the squad he’d joined up to run away from that life had gotten eaten by a dragon. He should’ve known their luck would catch up to the Jundians who’d been his closest friends and allies, bordering on another family for him. That’s why they left them, and everyone else they’d met when it became clear that Bant was hunting him still, and now Esper was too. He didn’t want people getting wrecked in his wake again. But he came back. They couldn’t stay away from the people they cared about, even though that was the best protection he could offer them.

But they couldn’t leave. This mess was their responsibility, and if he wanted to change, he had to start taking responsibility. But they couldn’t stay. That would just bring more misfortune, more misery from the twisted claws of fate.

Not for the first time in their miserable life, the hunter considered ending the hunt. For good. The only thing that stopped him this time was that it would simply hurt those around him even more. And since that was true, leaving would do much the same. No, he had to take responsibility, and that meant staying here, guarding the clone in this Coalition supply tent. Until Shregresha was stable and awake, and he could tell her about the situation.

Bromley squeezed his hand into a fist hard enough for their fingernails to leave an indent on their palm, closed his eyes, and threw his head back in a silent scream. There was something else they had to do to take responsibility. Telling Shregresha was important, but he also had to tell Kresh. And unlike with Shregresha, there was no reason they couldn’t talk to Kresh right now. There was no reason to protect the fiction of the client. Meerama had figured it out after a single question from Laguna. All Bromley had to do was call him.

Kresh knew he was old. Kresh had been feeling his age, and he’d seen horrible things happen to people. His people. He’d seen them burned alive by dragon-fire. He’d watched them bleed out in his arms as he carried them towards a healer. He’d listened to the screams of a man as the killing magic of Grixis ate through his body, layer by layer, the man screaming until his vocal cords had withered to ash and blown away in the wind, but the man hadn’t died then. Kresh saw his beating heart inside his ribs, after the muscles over the bones had rotted, and only when the skull disappeared and the spinal column with it, did Kresh know the man had passed. He’d been witness to all these horrors and more. The Phyrexian invasion alone would’ve been enough nightmares for a dozen lifetimes. Despite that, his heart hadn’t hardened completely. He felt like he’d been stabbed in the gut when he heard about Shregresha’s injured state from Bromley. It wasn’t a pleasant sensation, nor one he was unaccustomed too. He felt a numbness growing in his chest, and the beginnings of a state the felt like shock.

While he and Shregresha hadn’t had time to be close in years, they’d been friends once. He’d seen a master warrior’s drive and fight in her when she was an upstart teen trying to make a name for herself in Tol Hera, and taken her under his wing. She’d had some sort of hero worship thing going on towards him for the next few years, but by the time he was known as one of, if not the greatest warriors among the clans, she’d grown up and become his right-hand woman. Without her emotional support, he probably would’ve never broken away from Tol Hera and founded Tol Angata. He’d had ideas, he didn’t like the way Javid was doing things, but he didn’t see any way around it other than potentially fighting the man to the death. While Kresh was renowned, he knew that Javid only lacked his own reputation because no one had fought him in a duel in over ten cycles. Javid didn’t need to prove himself, being the leader of Tol Hera, so he challenged no one, and those who had challenged him after his claiming of Clan Leader had all died quickly and brutally in the ring. It was Shregresha who convinced Kresh that his vision for a society was worth risking not only his life, but the stability of the clan for. It was her asking to train against Javid during sparring sessions that allowed him to observe the way the old man fought without giving away his own measure. And when he’d won, she’d been the first to publicly join Tol Angata. In disputes with other clans, she’d been his champion, wrestling the other clan’s champion to submission, a way of proving strength without overthrowing another clan. She’d been his protegee, then his friend and equal, and for the past two decades, his second-in-command.

While his worries were largely about the fate of the clan, the growing pit in his stomach was not. He was scared for a friend, and there was nothing he could do to help her. He felt his heartbeat quicken, and sat back down on the stool in his hut, only coming out of his thoughts when he heard Bromley’s voice calling his name.

“Kresh? Kresh? You still hearing me? Connection still clear?” Bromley called from his end of the communicator.

“Yeah, just processing the news about Shregresha. I’ve known her pretty much her whole life, and I’ve seen her come out the other side of plenty of scrapes, but never hurt this bad. What was Grinak’s prognosis about her lungs again?” Kresh said, looking at Bromley’s face on the communicator screen, wondering if his eyes were that red and puffy as the hunter’s.

“Her lungs are surprisingly okay, only minor damage. Apparently, even after she passed out, her muscle memory held her wind-tube sealed for at least another minute. It’s the rest of her breathing parts he’s more concerned about. Nostrils haven’t stopped bleeding, even after he tried a skin-seal-spell, and if the burns in her mouth are any indication, she’s going to have trouble talking if, —when she wakes up, and he doesn’t know how long it’s going to last,” Bromley said, looking as miserable as Kresh felt.

“I’ll have Gruak Enagarr get on an iguanar and be there in a few days, but there’s only so much even he can do once scarring starts, I should I know. What’s the situation with the clone?” Kresh asked, trying to keep the worry about Shregresha off his face.

“In the United Army of Bant, there was a phrase that the enlisted used a lot, especially those of us who were in the Expeditionary Corps: ‘All is normal, all is fucked.’ That sums up the situation with the clone. There’s nothing critical or dangerous anymore, but everything is an angels-dammed mess. The clone’s tied up over there,” Bromley said, panning the camera towards them, “but Durkrag knows and so does Meerama. The Coalition captain freaked out at the sight of the clone, was afraid the clone was the result of something to do with time travel. There’s probably a story there, but I doubt it matters to our current situation. So, whatever your decision about the clone, the rest of the planes will probably hear about it eventually.”

Kresh rubbed his temples.

“Look, I do not know enough about the clone to make a decision myself if I want to do it with any semblance of fairness. I think that leaving it up to Meerama to leave it up to Shregresha and Durkrag is my best call for the moment. Unless you’ve got a better idea. If so, I would hear it,” Kresh said.

“My input? I… this is well out of my league, but from what I can tell, we need to some way to have the clone understand…” Bromley said, trailing off to think. “Can you message Goro-Goro to send you the information on the clone? His people know the devices better than we do, probably can get it and send it on the network. You send me a copy, and I’ll have the clone read it. Maybe, if the clone understands that Dr. Zlovol saw them as a thing and not a person, we’d be able to begin teaching them how to be something other than a weapon of vengeance. This is pure speculation, and regardless of if that helps the clone, it won’t change Durkrag’s willingness to even lay eyes on them. And, frankly, the clone probably shouldn’t remain on Jund for their own sake. They don’t know the environment, don’t seem to speak anything other than the Kamigawan dialect of planar common, and don’t seem to have any of the necessary skills for survival outside of a city besides fighting capabilities. Whether or not you consider them Tol Angatan, I think they’re more Kamigawan than Jundian.”

“Well, keep me updated, let me know when Shregresha wakes up, and hopefully, the clone no longer wants to kill her by that point,” Kresh said, wishing it was an acceptable time of day to drink some tukatongue mead and retire to a cot with some of his partners. Unfortunately, he had woken up to Bromley calling on the communicator, and the sun had only risen a short while prior.

“Will do, and I’m sorry. For everything,” Bromley said mournfully.

“What are you- It’s fine, you did your best, didn’t have a better opportunity to get the clone, just bad luck where it happened,” Kresh said, pinching his brow and closing his eyes. He didn’t really get what Bromley was talking about, but he knew when someone needed encouragement.

“I- I could’ve done more, I could’ve done better, I could’ve pushed harder, could’ve been there months ago, could’ve helped Shregresha fight the demon-dragon, could’ve cleared up the mess with Bant instead of running like coward,” Bromley sobbed.

“It’s in the past now. Can’t change it, just gotta move forward. Every day is a new fight for survival, don’t focus on what you did, just make sure you do better in the future,” Kresh said, his face a stony mask. His true thoughts about Bromley disappearing were ones that he wasn’t voicing without being face-to-face with the hunter, but he didn’t blame them for what happened in their absence either. Kresh doubted that their presence would’ve been enough to change anything significantly. “You couldn’t have prevented this, stop kicking yourself for it.”

“I- Ok, I guess. Please have Goro-Goro send those files when you can, it’s a long shot, but it’s all I can think of,” Bromley said, blinking tears out of his eyes.

“Let me know as soon as Shregresha wakes up. And we will talk more about your situation concerning Bant when there is only air between us,” Kresh said, signing off.

JH-3a… didn’t like being JH-3a anymore. The person who captured… him had showed him dozens of files. Their captor couldn’t read the files, for they were in a mix of Kamigawan, Ravi, and High Vedalken. While JH-3a could only read the first two languages, it was enough for him to feel sick to his stomach, and enough to know that they were true. The creator, Dr. Zlovol, wasn’t the benevolent master she’d programmed him to believe she was, the not-so-good doctor was a callous scientist who saw people as little more than experiments or tools. He was, by her reckoning, both. He knew he had been created, he knew it was for the purpose of fighting and killing, but he thought that he would be valued for it! They could hardly believe how deluded they had been! The thought that Zlovol would have respected them, cared for him, treated him like a person, all a lie! Apparently, a part of the programming hadn’t been uploaded before his release, the part that would make him believe the treatment that Zlovol considered normal was actually affectionate. Those akki had never intended to release him, but apparently, that accident was the best thing that happened to him. It… it recast his mission of vengeance. He didn’t know how to feel about JH— Durkrag, they didn’t know how to feel about Durkrag, the source. And, apparently, the woman he’d been trying to find and kill was the source’s mother. Biologically, his mother. He had the same half of her DNA that Durkrag did, save for some minor tweaks, mostly to compensate for translation errors in the copying process. The other person they saw directly fighting Dr. Zlovol in her last minutes was the source’s half sibling, for they shared a father. And, the other person they remembered seeing closest was also with the other Jundians. She had also played a role in killing the creator, by throwing a tomahawk into Zlovol’s back. He didn’t know what he was going to do about all of this, but he knew he didn’t want to be JH-3a anymore.

“How does one go about getting a name?” the clone asked Bromley, startling the hunter, as he hadn’t spoken at all in the past two hours of reading files.

“Most people get a name from their… parents, but plenty of people pick one for themselves. I’ve done both. Why?” Bromley replied.

“I do not wish to be JH-3a anymore, but I don’t know who I want to be. I want to have a name that I like, rather than just a designation,” the clone explained. “If I can simply pick one, then that is what I shall do. I do not know many names. If I hear one I like more later on, can I pick that name instead?”

“I’ve used multiple names throughout my life, and plenty of people pick a new name and start going by that name instead of their old one. It’s not something that’s locked in once you pick one,” Bromley said, putting a positive spin on his identity fraud.

“I will think more on this and decide on a name for now. Thank you for the advice. May I be freed now?” the clone asked.

“I’m not the person who’s in charge here, and I’m not one of the people you set out to kill. That’s who’s going to be making those decisions. Although, if you don’t want to kill them anymore, that will go a long way towards helping your case,” Bromley said.

The clone did not respond.

Durkrag was curled up in the fetal position, quietly weeping on his bedroll. His arm ached like it was still there, and while he’d dealt with phantom pains before, the added fact that his clone still had both arms broke something inside Durkrag. It was not fair! It was not fair! He’d been a prisoner and watched Dr. Zlovol turn his body into a weapon without his permission, then watched as his body attacked his family. Now, his body had been replicated without his knowledge and turned into yet another weapon sent to kill his family. It was not right! And he couldn’t even stop his nonexistent arm from hurting!

Wait, he could! Grinak was a shaman, and in his collection of potions and poultices, he likely had packed some peppermoss. Since Grinak was… elsewhere, there might be peppermoss just sitting in his tent. All Durkrag had to do was get up and leave his tent, and he could make the pain go away. He could get the warmth back again!

As Durkrag stood up, his tent flap opened and Jakagera stood in the entryway. He stopped in his tracks, and stared at her, brows furrowed, worry lines on his forehead.

“I- I saw what happened, and I can’t imagine how you’re feeling right now, but I’m here if you need someone to listen,” Jakagera said, her normally joyful energy absent.

“Why would you want to listen to me complaining about my disaster of a life?” Durkrag asked, trying to make her go away.

“Because you need someone to talk to, and you listened to me more than anyone else does. I love iguanars, more than most of the other iguanar riders, and I like to tell people about them. But I’ve gotten used to others telling me to shut up or talk about something else or to be quiet. You never did any of that,” Jakagera said, taking a step into the tent.

“I wasn’t really paying that much attention,” Durkrag said, taking a step towards the tent’s opening.

“You were paying enough attention that you mentioned when I repeated something to you, because you already knew it. No one who isn’t an iguanar rider had done that before. I saw you smile when I told you about their bite strength. You paid more attention than anyone else has,” Jakagera said, looking down at her boots.

“I…” Durkrag began, before trailing off as Jakagera lifted her head and looked him in the eyes.

“You ate dinner with me and then we cuddled last night, and when I took your hand to let you know you had someone earlier, you reached back out for me. If I’ve misinterpreted your actions, please let me know, but I think I care about you, and I want to be here for you, if you want me too, and if you care about me too,” Jakagera said, taking another step towards Durkrag, maintaining eye contact.

Durkrag collapsed into Jakagera’s arms, weeping.

Captain Tressa Laguna sat at her desk onboard The Tenacious, writing a report for Admiral Sussana, head of the Parsec fleet. It mainly detailed how devastating a single dragon was to the merchant convoy, and that if there was a likelihood of future attacks, then Alara would no longer be a viable part of the trade routes, which, due to the plane’s seemingly endless oceans off the coasts of Bant and Esper, was a sizable issue. With the Omenpath navigation tools the Coalition was developing, they could take advantage of temporary Omenpaths, provided they were large enough, and the expanse of water provided many opportunities for such Omenpaths. The regular Omenpath from Istfell to the headwaters of the Maelstrom, which was open once every three days, for about an hour each day, was the main point of entrance, and if no shortcut Omenpaths could be found, there was an intermittent one off the coast of Valeron used by both foreign vessels and Bantian merchants. It wasn’t consistent though, so ships often had to wait in its general vicinity until it opened. Still, it was a part of trade routes, the markets of Bant and Esper were profitable, and they were in talks with both Bantian and Esperite nations for letters of marquee. The Coalition largely was in favor of privateering; it was like piracy, but you could safely dock at ports of the allied nation for repairs and supplies. But, if the dragon attacks were likely to continue, it wasn’t worth the risk, even if the ships on this route were completely refitted with ballistae and lightning cannons, to prevent the firecannon fuel from causing a similar disaster as had happened this time, a single dragon could still burn the sails, alight the deck, and knock down a mast, all in a single pass overhead.

She needed more information, but her best source for something like that was currently unconscious and severely injured. She’d ask the second-in-command tomorrow, emotions were running high, and discussing such matters as if they were ever returning so soon could be seen as callous.

Thinking of things that could be callous, she should probably go and supervise the search for remains that was being carried out near the wreck. All hands were presumed dead, and while a sea burial was traditional, the water wasn’t too deep to make dredging impossible, some of those who’d known the deceased had volunteered to be divers and retrieve bones, and due to the horrific nature, the remains would be hard to identify without the magic of the Grim Fleet. Thus, the current plan was to fell some trees, carve some coffins, pack them with dried grass, place the bones inside, and take the shortest route back to Ixalan to have the bodies identified prior to the burial.

Tressa looked back at the parchment to see that the fresh ink had run where her tears landed on it. She wiped her eyes, set the quill back in the ink bottle, and went above decks to help with the recovery effort.

Grinak hadn’t felt mana exhaustion this bad since he had undergone the trial of the Shamanic Circle. He’d bargained with a more powerful elemental than he’d ever directly interacted with and since then, had been pumping life energy into a woman whose skin had been burned on over two-thirds of her body, and whose respiratory system had also been similarly burned. He was a good generalist healer, but specialized in first aid. From his training, he knew that one of the biggest risks when it came to burns was infection, especially fungal infection, and that there was no guarantee that life energy alone would drive out the infection. He had taken stock of his collection of talismans meant to ward off infection, only to realize that since most of Shregresha was burned, there was no good place to put them on her; the only areas not as significantly burnt were those where she’d been wearing clothing. Currently, he had settled on simply hoping that proximity would impart some effectiveness, but it was unclear. Fortunately, he had other methods to forestall infection. Some of his poultices could be applied, and one of the pirate’s medicine worker, called a surgeon, had an alcohol so strong the smell made Grinak’s eyes water, which would apparently kill most infections before they took root. Of course, since the sawbones’ first suggestion had been to amputate Shregresha’s left leg when they saw the intensity of the burns, Grinak took their advice at arm’s length. They didn’t know about the capability for healing magic to regrow and revitalize heavily damaged tissue. As long as the burns weren’t bone deep, which they fortunately weren’t, if Grinak poured his all into it, bandages were changed frequently, and Shregresha was otherwise healthy, some degree of recovery was possible.

Grinak muttered another incantation and applied another ointment to Shregresha’s face. She was strong, she was a living legend. She would pull through. She had slain the dragon, she deserved to bask in the glory of her victory. And, even if she didn’t, Grinak had given her enough medicine that she wasn’t feeling any pain. He hoped he wouldn’t be conducting a funeral ritual for Shregresha.

Thanks to @xenobladexfan for making cards and helping with design!

"He wasn't, no, but I heard Ileana say something nasty to Tulio," she said, crossing her arms. Guitirre made a low noise. Pelayo was one of his many sons-in-law, and Ileana was one of his grandchildren. He had come from an older, more established family where progression past antiquated mindsets was slower.

"What did she say?" Guitirre raised a brow.

"Something about him being bloodbroken," Mariela said with a scoff. "Something stupid. I don't think she meant it, she was getting upset because he was teasing her, but I still wanted to address it. But Leyre insisted, so..." she shrugged. "I am letting her handle it."

Guitirre sighed. "My heart, if you need me to step in --"

"I think we have it, papa," Mariela said, sounding a little tired. "It just... stings a little."

"Of course it does. Especially from one as young as she is," Celino said with an understanding nod.

"I was hoping we'd be past things like that," she said softly. Guitirre sighed.

"Old traditions and old habits will take a far longer time to die down, especially when those like us who live with the memory are here," he said. "But there is still so much progress that has been made. Don't let her little comments dig at you or at Tulio. I'm sure Pelayo will be understanding enough to deal with it." He kissed her cheek and gave her a reassuring pat.

"I just don't want Tulio to grow up fearing the truth about his parents," Mariela murmured.

"Ah, the lad is ready to begin his first assessments for squiredom. He's old enough to understand little needling words like that and will be ready to defend himself," Guitirre told her. "He's a feisty one already."

"He shouldn't have to," Mariela replied.

"If this were a more just world, you'd be right," the older man said, nodding. "But the very fact that he can even begin to mention that he has two wonderful and loving mothers and not put himself or you or the family into immediate jeopardy is a small miracle in and of itself. Do you remember what it was like when you first realized you were a homosexual?"

"Yes, but --"

"Do you remember what I told you about my being homosexual? How, already within a generation, the winds were starting to change?"

"But you didn't stay a homosexual, papa. You became normal," Mariela said. "You gave in to the pressure."

"In some ways I did, in others I did not," Guitirre acquiesced, tilting his head from side to side a little. "I do love your mother dearly."

"But what if you could have found another man?" Mariela asked. "It wasn't safe enough for you, so you gave in. You had to start the house proper." She paused. She had a strange look in her eye. "... have you seen other men that interested you after you got with mama?" she asked quietly.

"Now that, my heart, would be infidelitous," Guitirre said. "Whether I saw a woman or a man, I would never do that to your mother."

"I'm not saying you would necessarily," Mariela said, quickly shaking her head. "But... haven't you ever been out on campaign and you saw someone who made you hesitate, if only for a moment?"

"I have seen women of high beauty," he said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "A few of the smaller lords we killed tried to bribe me with beautiful women."

"Papa--"

"But men?" Guitirre tilted his head again. "Perhaps there was one or two, but I've forgotten."

"You've forgotten?" Mariela tilted her chin and raised a brow at him. Oh, she was definitely his daughter, all right.

"With how many lads and lasses I've seen over my long span?" He shrugged. "I hardly remember the women who caught my eye for a moment before I reminded myself of my wife who was also afield. Let alone someone who could've gotten me in plenty of trouble back then."

"But that boy you were with --"

"That was when I was still young enough to skillfully evade questioning, my heart. Something that people as young as Tulio will hopefully never have to actually worry about," Guitirre said with a small smile. "I was able to see my Marshal be married off to a good man, and soon I'll be there to see my own new grandson do the same. The only thing he has to fear is being with an orc, but I think the winds will shift again in time."

Mariela decided to let the topic drop for a moment. Guitirre put his arm back around her.

"Have you seen other women that made you think twice?" he asked.

"Papa."

"It's only fair, my heart," he said. "You were probing for my potential infidelitous ways, so now I am curious about you."

"Before I was with Leyre, there were many women who made my heart ache," she said with a wistful sigh. "If only they had felt the same."

Guitirre chuckled. "If only," he agreed with a nod. "That is the true heartache of being the way we are, eh? But you found a wonderful woman who seems to love you dearly in the end. Enough to not only marry you, but to raise a child with you. All of that was unheard of when I was still interested in men."

Mariela had a strange look in her face again. "You might still be interested in them, you know. I have never heard of a homosexual who truly became normal and didn't still wish they could be with the ones they really longed for."

Guitirre shrugged. "Even if I were, I am married and happily so. I love the family that I and Casilda have made together, even if it means disentangling you from your nephews or nieces from time to time before you all get into a bigger fight." He smiled and caught Mariela's smile even as she scoffed at him lightly. "I did tell your mother about this."

"How did she take it?"

"I think she's still adjusting to the knowledge," he answered, putting his arm back on the balcony railing. "She's still of that older mindset, you know. I have been working to assuage her doubts about my loyalty, and I think they've worked well enough. But she was quite shocked to hear it."

"I think I would be too," Mariela said, leaning on the railing. "You never came off as the type to be like that. I was surprised when you told me when I first told you. Then again, I suppose men like you had to learn to hide it well."

"Women too," Guitirre said with a shrug. "But, regardless, I can tell she wants to have a more thorough conversation about it. I might see if she wants to talk tonight. It'd be a good night for it, before we go forth and arrange for the officiating for Andres and his man."

"I can go get her if you'd like to talk about it," she offered, pushing herself from the rail.

"If you want to." Guitirre shrugged again. "I won't chase you out of here. Just remember, Mariela, I know it is still painful and I know there is still some distaste and vitriol, but try not to let it ruin you too much. I wish we were in a more perfect and safer world, but we are not. We're still far greater than we were, and we just need to keep trying to work at things. Alright?"

"I know, papa." Mariela's lips formed a line. Guitirre saw a wrinkle in her brow, but it smoothed out. "I'll go find mama."

"If you need anything, just let me know. I don't mind having a talk with Ileana or Pelayo," he told her.

"I will. Thank you." She gave her father a brief kiss on the cheek before she ducked back into the house. Guitirre watched her go, then turned his gaze back to the skies above. Ancient, forgotten tradition stated that each star was a soul of someone lost yet beloved. It was something from before the birth of the Church of Dusk proper. Celino didn't know how much he believed in it, but sometimes on quiet nights, he wondered if his parents were out there, shining a light on him and his own family.

How blessed was he to have it. A wonderful wife, beautiful children, healthy and hearty grandchildren, and now great-grandchildren. He had suffered few losses within the family in comparison to many others, another small blessing. He looked back towards his house, tracing the iron holdings and ornamentation over the door that led back inside with his eyes. More little ones would be running around soon. Some of them might even have tusks. There was part of him that had been revolted at the revelation -- the part that had dedicated himself to running them out to the seas to begin with -- but he had carefully quashed those feelings. They were no different to the ones his wife probably felt when she learned one of her daughters had no interest in men.

He saw his wife approaching and gave her a smile. She opened the door and joined him, her white gown flowing as she moved. There was a certain grace to her every movement that Celino found captivating. Her hair was partially braided, though some had been let down for the evening. She was among family, so she didn't mind. Celino held out his arm and the two embraced before he kissed her.

"Good evening, my most beloved," he said with a smile.

"My still-bleeding heart," Casilda said, taking his hand and intertwining their fingers. "Mariela said you wanted to talk about something."

"She and I just had a small conversation, and it reminded me that you and I might have some things we want to discuss," he said, leaning back against the rail. "Namely the revelation of my nature. I know it's been eating at you, so I'd like to be able to talk things over more fully."

Casilda tensed a little, but nodded. "I've been... doing a bit of thinking about that, Celino. Especially now with Ondina being traduco now, and getting he-- himself impregnated by an orc, preparing to marry him... it's been much."

"As I can imagine." Celino gently squeezed her hand. "I think I've found a priest for Andres, but I just have to work out actually getting him over to officiate things."

"Right," Casilda said slowly, stiltedly. There was a bit of a tense silence that followed. Celino rubbed his thumb over the back of her hand. "Do you still love men?" she asked suddenly.

"Casilda, I already told you--"

"I know, but... but I..." she sighed. "I spoke with some of my own friends about it, because I didn't know what to do while you were being dragged back out to the killing fields. And one of them said something that's been... bothering me."

"What did they say?" Celino asked, one brow raised while the other was furrowed.

"Do you remember our little agreement? That, while both of us were out and separated for longer than a year, if we needed to... do something about it, we could as long as we told the other what we were doing?" Casilda asked.

"I remember," Celino said carefully. "If you're worried that I got with other men, Casilda, I never did. I stayed incredibly loyal to you."

"I know," Casilda said, one hand worrying with the side of her gown. "Well, she knew about this arrangement because she was the one who introduced me to -- do you remember that captain I wrote to you about with the scars over his shoulder from a bear hunt?"

"Vaguely. That was a while ago," Celino said, scratching his short beard.

"That was her cousin," Casilda went on. "And... she pointed out to me that while I definitely took advantage of that arrangement from time to time, you never really did. At least, not that you told me of."

"I didn't feel the need," Celino said with a shrug. "I was incredibly dedicated and focused on my work. Perhaps a little too much." His brow furrowed. He raised a brow at his wife. "Where are you going with this?"

"My girl friend told me that it felt a little unfair, and that you might want to... experiment," she said carefully. "That maybe you never took advantage of it because you still needed to be like the rest of us, or that you repressed yourself."

"Oh, my heart," Celino said, shaking his head. "Don't think that I only did what I did because I was trying to hide."

"I know you love me. And I love you too, my beloved soul," she said. "Which is why... I think I want you to..." Her lips formed a line. "I want you to be able to... do what I did. Experiment a little."

Celino's brows rose into his hairline. "Casilda, you don't have to. I would be perfectly content if I never tried to see if those feelings persist."

"I know. But she also made me realize that I've been wrong about a lot of things, and I want to try making them right before..." she trailed off. "Just in case anything happens."

Celino looked upon his wife with an expression of utter love and understanding. He came a bit closer and she leaned against him.

"I do not think I would be able to do it with any here in Torrezon," he said quietly. "I am too famous, and it'd bring too much rumoring. Even if we make this agreement, plenty would lambast us for infidelity."

"We can travel the planes," Casilda said. "There's other outposts that are going to be established and expeditions to be led. I know you'll be going out on them."

Celino tilted his head a little in thought. Arturo's nephew had found someone on Kamigawa. Perhaps he would find someone he fancied elsewhere.

"If we make this happen," he said with a slow sigh. "I will always tell you first before I do anything. And I am giving you every right to tell me that you are too uncomfortable and would rather I not continue at any time. Even if we are just about to get comfortable ourselves, if you decide to call things off there, I will listen. I swear this to you on the blood of our family, and on my own head."

Casilda nodded. "I still have that little... communique you gave to me when you brought Andres around."

"Good. I'll make sure to keep mine on me, and if I see anyone, I'll be sure to let you know." Celino pressed his lips to her forehead, then trailed a few kisses down her beautiful face before he gave her a soft kiss. "I love you."

"I love you too," his wife said softly. "You've been very good to me, Celino. I just... want to try and return the favor."

"You already have, my heart," he murmured. "A thousandfold. You owe me nothing."

"I do owe you this, I think," she said, squeezing his hand again. "You let me be with a handful of others for a number of nights, I think it is only fair if I do the same. And if it never happens, then it never happens, but I want to... at least give you the chance to see if you really still are homosexual or not."

"I appreciate that, Casilda," Celino said, kissing her again. "I love you very much. Don't ever forget that. You are wonderful to me."

"I know," she said, returning the kiss. "I am just trying to get through all of this. I'm trying to understand."

"I know. It is very much appreciated," he said softly, gently nuzzling her. "And remember, if you want to revoke this at any time --" he held up his hand. "Done. No questions asked, no bargains made, no is no. My heart is still yours."

"Alright," Casilda said, relaxing a little. "I hope, if you do find someone, they are at least attractive. You seem to have strange tastes in things."

"Listen, just because I am experimenting with the new plants and things we've gotten from Ixalan and beyond, it does not mean my taste in all things are strange," Celino said with a soft chuckle. "You have to admit, the dip was good."

"It had far too much pepper."

"I liked the heat," he said with a shrug. "Do you not trust me to know what an attractive individual looks like? I married you, after all."

Casilda let out a soft snort and shook her head. Celino snickered and kissed her cheek.

"Well, it's getting late enough for some of the young ones. They'll probably want to say goodnight to their ancient grandfather before they retire," he said. Casilda scoffed and gently pushed him.

"You make me feel old when you say such things," she said. Celino raised his brows at her, which got him a bit of a glowering look. "I can just tell you no now."

"And nothing would meaningfully change," Celino said. "You are the one who proposed this, not me."

Casilda rolled her eyes, twining an arm around her husband's and dragging him back inside. Celino happily followed with a laugh as they went to rejoin the rest of the family. Immediately he was inundated by them.

"Granpa! I want to go into the training yard! But Auntie Luzia told me I had to wait! Can I go?"

"Hey, Papa, when you have a moment, can you recall your mastiff? I think she's trying to chew boots again."

"I think Pelayo was looking for you before Mama went to talk with you, I'll go find him."

"Hey, we're almost out of that little fish dish thing, but we saved you a little bit in case you wanted any."

Ah, to be surrounded and needed by his loved ones. With his time to rejoin the front for a more proper strike starting in just a few days, this was most certainly a wonderful way to end his brief allowance home. Plenty of his fellows would be doing the same before the assault in the coming weeks. He quickly moved about in order to placate his large and loving family, sharing smiles and laughs and giving out a few life lessons as he went for the rest of the night. Casilda drifted nearby, and he noticed that she seemed to be far more at ease now. Mariela and her wife were idly speaking with the rest of the family, both holding hands a bit more proudly and ignoring some looks from the other bits of the family. Celino would speak with them before everything winded down proper.

He didn't know. All he did know that he had to keep going. Keep… moving. Everything felt… distant. Not quite numb, simply not there. But he was walking, he thought. He had to climb at one point to get here, to see the sun again.

The sun…

He remembered chasing the sun. A different sun. A fabled one. Brighter than bright, one that would scour away sins and… and…

And now it was gone. That sun was gone, long gone now, but something else was here. Something… no, someone, yes, someone was here now, someone who was a savior, a savant, someone who could save them, someone who… who…

Who he… could not quite name. But the rose upon his armor was connected to them. To.. to her.

She? Was it her? Was it… oh, blessings of the… Why couldn't he…?

He paused. No. She was someone different. She needed to be found, to be made safe. No, no, the… the Blessed One did not require him, not now… not until he made sure others were safe, were alive, were not… not like he was now.

He had to move. To go, to find someone, anyone to help him. Help him find her, help him find them, the survivors, to understand what this wrongness was, to help him remember…

… remember who he was. Why he was moving the way he did, why he was the way he was, he needed to understand, to know, why didn't he know? How could he not know? He was of importance, obviously, but… but who was he?

He found one answer in the startled looks of the pale faces that stared at him as he finally broke through the high vegetation. It was stammered to him through frightened lips.

"Director?"

He responded with the only thing that came to mind;

"Where is she?"

The sight of a dead man walking was enough to unnerve even the most steely of paladins that still occupied Queen's Bay. The echo -- the spirit, the remnant, among plenty of other whispered names he had been accruing in his short stay -- wandered while someone was getting answers for him.

He knew his name now. Bartolomé del Presidio, the deputy director -- formerly -- of the Queen's Bay Company. Other aspects of his personhood were fuzzed, indistinct. It was the same feeling he had when standing too close to one of the braziers full of incense at a sermon.

Although, he noted, he could no longer smell. Or feel, really.

A set of finely dressed merchants approached him, all large, formless clothing with intricate patterning and impressive enough facial hair. One came forward, offering a low bow to him as he did so.

"We believe we have the information you are seeking, good sir," he said. "You seek the girl who came to us with the warning?"

"Yes," the spirit said, straightening a little. "Have you found her? Is she safe?"

"That we do not know, my goodly sir," he said, holding a rolled set of papers. The nonchalance in which he said it was infuriating. "All we do know is that the one you seek did give us the warning, which we did ferry to Torrezon shortly thereafter. It did not do us much good, however."

"What do you mean?" Bartolomé asked. He took a step forward. Some of the entourage stepped back. "What has happened?"

"You mean to say --" the merchant stopped himself, chuckling. Again, it was enough to rile him. "Of course you wouldn't, you've been deceased, my good sir. No, our home is at war once more."

"With whom?"

"With itself, of course," the merchant said, brushing out his thicker overcloak. Given the rising heat of day, Bartolomé was surprised he wasn't sweating enough to fill the Deoro. "As I said, the warning was too little, and too late."

Bartolomé was stunned a moment. He staggered a half-step, his mind whirring. So the schism has finally happened, he thought. The Church is cracking. My death meant nothing.

The merchant who approached him must've noticed how distraught he was. "We can assure you that your family-"

"What of them?"

"--has been very well taken care of by the Company," the merchant finished a little imperiously. "As far as we know, they are safe."

A little comfort. He squared his shoulders a little. Not all is yet lost. "Thank you," he said. He then looked to the open docks at one end of the settlement, casting his eyes at the horizon. The merchant was continuing to speak to him, but the words were falling on deaf ears. He was beginning to feel a pull, hard and distinct.

Come to me, something whispered to him. Rejoice with your kindred.

The merchant was trying to get his attention. He balled his hands into fists and took a step forward, disappearing into the open air.

A cavern, slicked with ice greeted him. Had he the flesh to feel it, he knew he'd be shivering. It was quite different to the warmer climes that he had trekked through just to make it back to the surface again.

At least there weren't goblins and gnomes and all sorts of myriad insects and other skittering creatures to greet him.

Well, that wasn't entirely true. There were plenty of other skittering things, but those things had wings and tiny eyes and were trying to convince him that they had a kinship.

He had been drawn here, and he wasn't alone. There were others like him. Spirits, shades, echoes.

They were being drawn like moths to fire. Something had called them here. Bartolomé understood what it was, and doubtless the others down here did too. It was the very thing he had died in vain to try and prevent from ever digging its claws into his home. But now it was trying to greet him and all the others with open wings, with promises of power and freedom, with promises of all things being right and proper according to his whims.

Heresy, blasphemy, and lies, all of it. But he would do as he did initially on that fateful journey into the Core of Paradise, into his grave; he would bear witness, be out of the way, be unassuming until the time was right to fight back.

The caverns were filled with thousands of bats. Demons lurked and moved among the shadows. They whispered in languages that Bartolomé should not understand, yet he did.

Welcome. Welcome, brother.

Welcome.

Freedom is at hand, brother. Welcome.

If he had a brain left somewhere, it'd feel as though something was snaking around it. He hid his intent as well as one could.

He saw traitors. Some of whom he recognized -- there was Albina, someone he served with on a handful of tours before the unification, alongside Fausto, not too far away from her -- and many whom he did not. He saw humans, some of them thralls, others nothing more than hapless peasantry that didn't have enough hands raised to protect them.

He had to keep himself in check. They would be mourned, and they would be most properly avenged. There was nothing good he could do for them now.

His eyes lingered on the traitors. Their bodies were warped, made wrong, blasphemies written into their very flesh now. They smiled and laughed as though they were not bringing ruin to their own home and people.

The main event was about to begin. Shadows and darkness gathered in the center of a massive chamber, and out of it came the incarnated form of butchery, savagery, and madness itself.

Welcome my children, it whispered to them all. Welcome to our new kingdom.

Screeching and cheers went up around the cavern, enough to be deafening. Bartolomé kept his face as neutral as he could. A good skill he picked up when he was becoming more accustomed to dealing with nobilites and merchants.

Soon, my errant daughter shall fall, and after her shall the people of the accursed sun, it went on. There was more chaotic cheering. Soon, very soon, all that light once touched shall be ours, as is our right!

Now that caused a stir. He could hear the beating of weapons on stone and fists on armor.

Privately, he formed the sign of the rose in one hand. He felt a few pairs of eyes staring at him soon after. He stared right back.

If we are to accomplish this, the whispers continued, then we will need strength. We will need only our most daring and strong for this conquest. That is why I call to you, as I call to all of my most worthy children.

More beating of weapons and armor.

Thanks to our hidden weapon, we know precisely where our erring brethren are going to be and how they intend to strike at us, the beast at the center of the cavern went on. My Antifex already has begun making designs for all of you. You will not be alone -- more will follow in the nights to come. We will stand as an army that is greater than any of flesh and metal that they can throw at us. We shall stand as an army immortal, an army of death, an army greater than any that this plane has seen before.

Something was creeping closer to Bartolomé. He remained standing and focused.

Is something wrong, brother? a demon asked, right in his ear.

"No," he answered. "Aside from you interfering with the words of our lord and master."

The demon pulled back, folding its wings in a display of apology, before it went on. If the thing at the center of the cavern noticed, it did not make a show of it.

There was plenty more grandstanding and encouragement and blood-stirring. The others in the cavern were eating it up. It made him sick. Surely, he couldn't be the only one who wasn't agreeing with this. But there were too many that were.

His mind began to click even as the Antifex began to speak. He was surprised at how... strangely normal she looked. Glamours? Did she reject the daemonification of the others? He was keeping track of locations she was outlining, of their own movements, anything and everything that could be of use later. They already had the compromised plans of the Legion -- how did that happen? The beast mentioned a 'hidden weapon'. Something to bring up later once he was out of here -- so he would return to the Legion with the plans of the enemy.

A draw wouldn't be pretty, but it was better than letting the enemy win. He had learned that several times while sitting on one side of a regicide board.

Some of the traitors were beginning to rally a number of the collected spirits to their sides. The demons were moving in to help. Bartolomé was going to be corralled like a sheep.

So he let them. Fleeing now would do nothing. He needed to remain beneath notice, and already he was worried he roused too much suspicion. He had to set things right. He had to make sure his death mattered. That was one of the most ignoble things to suffer; a meaningless and unremembered demise.

So he would wait. He would watch. And when the time came, he'd finally raise his arms in defiance to strike.

Revenant, they were calling him now.

Shade. Spiteful One. All sorts of titles he began to accrue.

Sometimes the names were spoken with reverence, other times with fear. He didn't care. All that mattered to him was the rebalancing of debt.

Bodies of traitors and the stolen and trapped essence of the dead and damned would be left by the gates of various bastions and at the walls of cities, as well as pinned warnings.

YOU HAVE TURNED ON YOUR FAITH, AND SO I HAVE TURNED ON ALL OF YOU.

REPENT AND YOU MAY YET BE SPARED THE WRATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS AND THE HOLY.

No one suspected him. No one expected him.

He was dead, gone, he was no great champion nor hero even in life. He was a paladin and soldier turned mercantile broker.

He walked the fields of his homelands by night, alone, going to where he felt himself being pulled hardest. From there, his job was simple; take as many as he could.

Unwinding the very aspects of the traitors, the ties to their heathen and debaucherous god, was made far easier when you were now formed as part of that essence. Tearing their very souls from their flesh had been a delicate and difficult thing to learn at first, but now he was doing it with a very practiced ease.

It was only a handful each night, but that was better than nothing. His heart broke when he realized the gravity of what he was doing, but he steeled himself against feeling such pity when they were the ones visiting destruction upon their home first. Of course, they wouldn't see it that way -- and they plead for him to listen to their perspective often -- and he found himself caring less and less as the nights wore on.

He made sure he had no witnesses. No one to linger, no one to breathe a warning and ferry it and get himself undone as he was doing to these traitorous bastards.

That was easy enough. He was able to make himself into a watchman and scout. The disappearances? Too many Legionnaires in the area. He fled at the first sign of them to give warning, but they would be gone by the time he retrieved reinforcement. He'd get chastised for his fleetfooted nature, of course, but never suspected of wrongdoing.

He spread himself as far across the continent as he could to avoid it for as long as possible. He knew it'd catch up with him, but he wanted to make sure the enemy would already have paid in droves by that time.

And yet, the whispers of a "revenant" still went up through the ranks. Some were worried the Blessed Saint had found a way to ultize echoes and shades in a yet-unknown manner. Perhaps she had been able to hijack a portion of their god's power?

Bartolomé wished that was the truth. Perhaps they had developed new techniques in regards to utilizing shades. He didn't know. All he did know was that he had to keep moving, keep working, keep spreading unease and fear in the ranks.

There was something more he had to do in order to properly atone.

The warning from Amalia had come too late, so he would ensure his own warnings came early. These, too, would be anonymous. Unsigned letters appearing on the desks of captains and commanders, as many as he could find close to where he had been "assigned", started turning up. Murmurs would travel up the chain fast.

In quieter nights, when he could wander alone, he sometimes heard the chattering and knew it'd be enough.

Even if no one knew it was him, he would be happy to perish with the knowledge his home would be protected and safe. That his family would be safe and sound.

That, wherever she was, Amalia would be safe and sound. That girl didn't deserve all of this, no more than his own daughter had.

Bartolomé looked to the sky that was beginning to lighten. Day was approaching. It meant the rest of the traitors would begin fleeing back to their darker and danker hiding spots, and that he would have to join them, too.

He looked at the tiny silvered jar he held, feeling the undying wrath and hatred of the latest victim of his own internal crusade from within. He took a step back and threw it over a stony wall, hearing it thunk off of a bit of armor. He was gone before the confused soldier could find the strange assailant.

He would be back at holy dusk, as he always would be. There were more souls to reap, more unheard prayers to hear, more hope to give to the hopeless. One bastard at a time, one night at a time, he'd continue for as long as he had.

He was trying to lead by example. But oh, this damnable thing. This damnable, damnable man. Why couldn't he just let go already? It made his mind and heart turn into tight knots. By the light of the Sun, Saint, and stars, he hated this.

Especially since he seemed like he was changing. There was regret in his words that hadn't been there before. There was melancholy and longing. But he didn't know if he could trust that damnable demon not to be fooling him. He couldn't.

And what made it worse was that he understood this. It made things feel genuine even when it could very well not be.

So why? Why? Why torment himself like this? He didn't know. He couldn't say. Or he could, but he was loathe to admit it.

How could he admit that there was a part of his heart and soul that longed for him nearly as much?

He couldn't. He wouldn't, because it could not be allowed to be true.

Yet it was. When Mavren saw him, that damnable and most pitiful thing, he could see the echoes of the man whom he had secreted away with for decades. He saw the years of secrecy and trust the two had built, and he saw the scars of it even in their small exchanges together. They were always the same sort of arguments. One trying to get the other to give in. Mavren had the upper hand, of course, and was trying to use that to nudge him in the right direction.

If he could repent, if he could fully and wholly forsake this god and admit that all he had done was just misguided and in vain...

No. He was just chasing a fantasy. He wouldn't, he was too devoted to that damnable bat.

But maybe he wasn't. Although he would speak with reverence, there was a greater devotion in his words when he would speak in the quiet hours of the night and share a memory the two had. Those beautiful, quiet, and intimate moments between them.

"It was our fifth anniversary. You were here, stirring everyone with your faith and devotion, while I was out afield, doing what we were told and believed was holy work. I still remember the letters you sent to me. I remember how surprised I was that they hadn't been read, especially with how eloquent you were with your wording. I kept them at my bedside on especially cold and lonely nights."

It dug at him worse than his hunger in the waning hours before the blessed madness of a Blood Fast. Saint and Sun, he felt like he was slipping back into that madness despite being relatively well-fed.

"I still have the gift you made for me when I was a century and a half old. Or, well... I did. I don't know if my old things were burned in the completion of my damnatio memoriae or not. I would not be surprised if they were. But I kept it in a chest hidden beneath my bed. Both it and the book of poems you made for me. A wonderful collection, Mavren. It inspired me to try writing my own, even though I never was the wordsmith you are. I suppose that is why you ascended to the position of Pontifex over someone like Theodors."

He hated his honeyed words. Long had he heard the silvered tongues of poisoned snakes throughout his lifetime, and he could always steel himself against them, their blasphemies, and their lies. And yet, that damnable little man stuck in that damnable little jar could still get to him. He hated it, he hated it, oh how he loathed it with every fiber of his being. He hated that he felt longing and misery, he hated that he felt the temptation to give in and embrace him one last time because he knew it would grow into many "last times" because of course it would and --

He clutched at his head. Maddening. It was maddening! He knew what the right thing was. Yet he couldn't do it, damn it all, he just... couldn't. There was still too much love there.

He remembered too well that final night between them, before all of this fell apart.

"I want to heal us. I want to help us, Mavren, we're suffering, we're starving, the stupid nobles are at our throats and Her Majesty is being more rigid than ever, but I think I have found something to help-- Just, please, listen to me -- the Saint has brought nothing but discourse and discord to our people, claiming we butchered her memory, but -- no, please, just listen to me, please, I know how we can be whole again. I know it, and I know it seems insane, but I am begging you, know that I come to you first because I love you and I want you to come with me. Please.

Please."

The look of desperation. Longing. Love. Fear. Conviction. Madness. Zeal. He saw every single aspect of him that night, and Mavren knew he had to turn away.

He had listened. He had let him rant and preach and rave, he spoke about that forbidden journal as though it held all the answers and wasn't anything more than the travelogue of a deluded man later canonized more for his acts of heroism and apparent piety rather than any holy theological writings. His writings had been redacted and sequestered with good reason, they were just... raving.

Yet that damnable book was what was being held as the ultimate truth. Mavren saw it for the falsehoods it had held, and now that damnation was hanging over all of them like the macuahuitl of the Sun Empire.

He should surrender the jar. Give it over to the condemners to deal with as they pleased.

But he loved him still.

And so his hand stayed.

He hated going around in circles like this. He let out a deep sigh, his eyes looking to that damnable thing. The man inside was quiet. He didn't rest. He didn't need to. But he still remembered Mavren and knew when he needed quiet.

He hated that. He hated that he still showed care. He couldn't trust him but he wanted to, he desperately wanted to. He just... he just wanted to let him out once just to end this game. Just to see what he would do. Just to see if his god would claim him or forsake him again or... or just... anything.

It had been weeks. Weeks of his resolve holding out. Weeks of not letting the dam break.

Mavren looked at the jar. The spirit within was looking back. He thought he saw something in his face. Acceptance? Hope? He didn't know.

Mavren looked back through the window over his desk. He drew the curtains. He stood.

He reached for the jar.

Still, the man within said nothing. No pleading tonight.

Because he already knew what was happening. He already knew that, in a sense, he had won.

Mavren's voice was soft. He didn't need to make threats, they had already both heard them at least a hundred times by now. He just... did it.

A soft, radiant purple glow enveloped his room. The jar was set aside. He knew the words to put him back, knew the way to bend and weave the power and conviction his faith had given him to slam him right back if he tried anything-

He felt the softest sensation brushing his face as the apparition reached up to cup his cheek. He knew that the confliction that had been destroying him would be more than apparent.

He looked into the eyes of his dead lover. He felt his heart melt just a little, his guard lowered but a fraction.

They came closer. Not a word was spoken. None had to be said.

Their lips met. It was strange. He had expected it to feel as though he were kissing the air, but... no. He could feel him. It was not like it was in life, but it was... something.

They pulled apart.

The candle burned beyond its first candlemark.

"It seems as though you have new tricks, old man," she said, fighting to have a smirk on her face instead of a snarl. Guitirre's armor had taken the brunt of the assault for him, and it was probably mightily dented, but at least he hadn't split his spine over the stone. "Couldn't keep up with just one arm after all, hmm?"

"At least I didn't go running into the wings of a heathen god," Guitirre spat. His dancing blade came up and pressed itself to her throat. "What a sad and sorry sight you've become, Vona. Too proud to admit mistakes as usual."

"Oh, please, do not start preaching to me," Vona said with a scoff. She grinned more easily now, all fang. "Besides, there's no means of death that I have to fear anymore. I can fight and drink as often as I please, without some sanctimonious do-gooders telling me all that I did for them was wrong." She tightened her grasp on his throat. Then, a number of bolts came streaking through the air, landing home right into the bones and tendons in her wings. Vona let out a yell of surprise, turning to see who had dared to wound her, and Guitirre took the opportunity to kick himself free, legs once more dissolving into mist as he took back to the skies above.

"And that is why exultation still remains superior," he said, leveling his blade with her. She snarled at him and threw herself towards the skymarchers who were retreating, still in formation, so that they could reload. Others were taking their place, but they were moving a hair too slow. Vona would be upon them.

Unless, of course, they were not being led by the fastest skymarcher on the damn continent.

Guitirre threw himself in front of the line -- oh, what a beautiful line they had maintained, by the Saint was he proud of them -- and caught the worst of her attack himself. He felt her blade sliding across his armored ribs and her claws gouging the armor on his other side.

"That's how you got Andreas, isn't it?" he asked, elbowing her in order to make space again. "You went after the others. She went to cover them. You exploited that. That's how it went, isn't it?"

Vona snarled at him and beat her wings to stir up the smoke. Guitirre rose higher in order to get away from it, shouting an order to his skymarchers as he did so.

"Keep ranks solid, leave yourselves room, don't do anything stupid," he commanded. He kept his eyes on Vona all the while, keeping his blade pointed toward her, watching her. He was going to let her be the one to take point and lead until she was too tired to do so. For all her godly strength, and that filthy looking halo that crowned her now, he knew she could still tire. Even if it was by a fraction of a degree, she could tire.

Vona dove again. Guitirre went to move higher until he saw that she wasn't going for him, but rather one of the bowmen with him, and he quickly got back in the way, dancing blade singing as it caught her own sword.

And then Guitirre felt a very deep pain in his side, accompanied by a tearing of flesh. He grit his teeth, and Vona pressed the advantage, once more grasping him by the throat.

"You could've let him die," she said with a laugh. "But instead you'll pay for the--"

The red rapier came through and sliced her clean across the throat, silencing her before she could well and truly begin. Vona's eyes widened, the smile dying off her face. Once more, Guitirre elbowed her to give himself space, blackened blood now staining her golden armor and breastplate. His red blade returned to his side, and the High Marshal knew better than to think this would kill her.

He got altitude, then he, himself, dove downward, blade ready to stab it right through her throat. Vona's wings were beating less steadily, and right as he stabbed home, he disappeared.

Then he appeared at her side, going for the soft spot right under her arm, striking and disappearing. The sound of clanging metal heralded another strike. Then another.

And another.

And another.

And another.

Faster. And faster. And faster. His dancing blade had taken on a mind of its own, keeping her sword arm busy enough that she couldn't stop each and every strike, even if she could turn just enough to feel Guitirre's mainhanded rapier sliding off her armor instead of getting a good blow.

Faster, and faster, and faster. He was practically blinking out of existence and striking, impossibly, from all angles. Vona's wings took the brunt of his assault, slowly becoming increasingly torn and bloodied under the attack.

Guitirre could not keep this up forever. He knew this. She knew this. But he needed to just keep it up enough to get her grounded.

And it was working. Soon, her wings were working less and less, becoming more and more useless. Even with the second grin across her throat, which Guitirre noticed even now was starting to seal -- taking the attention and energy from her wings, as he had hoped -- she was keeping up. He could hardly land a proper blow on her body, but she was gradually descending, until finally she decided to drop properly.

Guitirre fully manifested in the air above her, sweat now sheening his greyed skin, a bit of exhaustion in his eyes. He winked at her before he, too, fell with a catlike grace to the ground, getting himself into a proper stance, aiming his missing shoulder back and his sword hand forward.

There was naked hate in the eyes of the Antifex. But he also saw she was taking in the battle still happening around them, trying to gauge the extent of the flames.

And then she attacked.

She was all manner of a storm of fury, claws and blade raking in a strange concert that left Guitirre a little wrongfooted from the get, but he started to get used to the new pace. He still let her lead.

Yet, she was not beginning to slow. Not as he had hoped.

The slice across her throat was still wide and angry, but it was not as deep as it needed to be. That was going to cost him, he knew.

Up and up and over again, she struck and struck and struck. She kept pressing the distance and trying to close, even as the High Marshal practically danced and leapt in order to keep her away. He knew as well as she did that if she got in close enough, she might be able to finish him.

His limbs were beginning to feel a bit weighted. He felt the cost of his maneuver to get her down. But he brought her down with very good reason; not only to get her away from the skymarchers who were dealing with her smaller entourage, but also so his larger help could deal some damage of his own.

"I am so sorry for tearing you away so soon," he muttered. "I summon the silent blade. Stealth, rationality, and swift death. As Dokuchi aids Dokuchi, as human aids oni, so will you aid me. Rise," he spoke, fending off a crushing blow and jumping out of the way of her claws tearing through his armor again, letting his dancing blade give him the time he needed to bring his fist to his breastplate, "and make merry."

From the flickering shadows of firelight did he come, stepping right out of them as though he were moving through a doorway. It took little time for him to see who his target was, and he was on them, pressing the advantage of his unconventional weaponry in a foreign land to his greatest benefit.

Vona whirled around to face her new opponent, letting out a derisive laugh. "You're summoning demons now too?" she asked. "So we had heard. I didn't think you'd have it in you."

"He's no demon," Guitirre said, backing off and letting Zenkuro take the brunt of her attention for a moment, "he is an oni. A friend from distant lands. We've been making allies while you lot have been huddled in your dank caverns."

Vona and Zenkuro fought, and Vona was keeping the oni at bay despite being shifted now onto the backfoot. Black mist was gathering around Guitirre's legs as he prepared to begin striking at her again, but then he felt them seize and stop.

His blood was beginning to rebel against him. He could feel it beginning to boil in his veins. This was not a practiced craft that belonged to the church, no.

This was her doing.

A bolt cracked and splintered off his armor, and he more forcibly willed his legs to become mist. He then prepared a charge, and right before he could fully pull back, a hand was there, grasping at his armor, and throwing him right into the paved cobbles below. He felt something crunch, and pain bloomed across his face. Vona was able to get a kick at him before Zenkuro -- or perhaps the skymarchers overhead -- were able to press her enough to give him room to get up. Part of his vision in his right eye was obscured by the puffyness he saw on the edges. He shook his head, disliking the bit of wooziness he felt.

His dancing blade was still doing work, helping to try and flank the Antifex even as she continued to fight with the oni. She was scoring a few good hits from the look of him, but so too was he. He watched as she danced right out of his grasp on more than a few occasions, her wings now becoming more of a liability. He spat a bit of blood onto the streets before he started to circle her. He was going to start aiming for the wings.

He was going to carve himself a trophy.

But then, he felt that weakness, and he felt a cascade of something wet coming from both the gouge in his side -- which he had forgotten about -- as well as the new wounds in his face. His knees buckled and his attack faltered, only barely clipping the wing he had wanted. His vision swam and he fought hard not to go down entirely.

Zenkuro must've noticed, as Guitirre saw him pause, just long enough for Vona to make an excellent stab, her blade punching right through his flesh-that-was-not-quite-flesh in his arm. The oni let out a grunt, and Guitirre forced himself up, blade cleanly stabbing right through where one wing met her back.

"You should really have your god get you a proper armorer," he growled, tasting the iron of old blood at the back of his throat. Vona snarled and spun, her blow getting caught by Guitirre's dancing blade as he moved back, his other weapon clattering to the cobbles as he disengaged.

She went for him again and again, the dancing blade acting as his only means of defense while Zenkuro also tried to press and keep up. Guitirre could feel his body growing heavier, his movements slower, and Vona scored another good hit right across his face, narrowly missing the small unarmored bit between his jaw and throat.

Bolts started to fly. A good hail of them, trained expertly upon Vona as Guitirre moved and dodged as best he could. The oni was able to once more become the focus of her attentions long enough for him to make a scrabble for his fallen weapon while his dancing blade harried her.

He slid on his knees as he went for his weapon, and then his vision went white and he heard a loud ringing in his ears. He fell forward onto his hand, dizziness and nausea overwhelming him. She only got maybe two good hits, he thought to himself, what in the sweet fuck is this?

"High Marshal!" came a muffled voice off to his right.

"Someone bring a glorifier!"

Had he fallen overboard? Was this all but a dream?

No. He saw a blur of movement, gold and black, and somehow he was up and standing, his silvered blade matching that of the enemy, diverting it right before it could run one of his own right through.

"Still standing?" Vona asked. Guitirre spat again.

"You'll have to do better than a bit of blood sorcery to put me down," he said, though his words were definitely half-slurred. He could feel the oni's presence over his shoulder. Other Legionnaires -- proper ones, not traitors -- were beginning to gather, weapons trained on Vona. Guitirre shook himself out, his dancing blade returning to its spot at his shoulder.

Vona was surrounded. Both on the ground and in the skies. Other traitors were making valiant, though incredibly stupid, attempts to get to her.

"What a sorry damn sight you are," Guitirre said, keeping his blade pointed at her. "Choosing a bastard god because of what? Greed? Power?"

"We have been lied to," Vona said. "We were doing all of this in her name, and then she suddenly says it was all wrong. All of the blood we spent on her, all that we did in her name and honor, and she spits on it!"

"So you spit on your country? You spit on the people who depended upon you?" Guitirre sneered, wiping blood from his lips and spitting again. "Your family? Your friends?"

"They died," Vona growled. "They died, and we failed to properly punish their murderers. This is retribution that had been denied for half of a generation, Guitirre."

"So you think yourself noble?"

"I will never pretend to be such. Not as you and the rest of these ingrates do," she spat. Guitirre noticed a number bristling, and he subtly waved them off.

"So you admit to being a beast?"

"I care not for how you label me," Vona said with a scoff. Her wings spread. Guitirre noticed the tears had been mending. "Murderer. Betrayer. Call me all you wish, I do not care. I have found someone who appreciates my talents, and who will not force me to play nice with the sniveling weaklings I devour."

"Then you and yours will be starving within a decade," he said with a snort. "We need the humans, and they need us. I am sorry you never grasped such a basic concept, alongside that of deserved humility and the ability to admit wrongdoing. What a petulant child you are."

Her eyes narrowed. Blackened mist started to congregate around her, and Guitirre could make out reddened eyes in it.

"To all who blindly followed her," he said, raising his voice as weapons were loaded, ready to be fired upon her. "I tell you this now -- lay down your arms. Surrender yourselves, and your souls may yet be saved. Follow her, and meet your god in death. This is your choice, this is your first and only chance." He dared to take his eyes off of her, looking to the traitors who had been taken in by his own Legionnaires. "Surrender or die. These are your options."

A few had nasty words that died in their heretic throats before they could be fully uttered. Others were wiser and dropped their weapons, offering up their hands and bowing in a gesture of supplication.

My champion does not need your mercy, came a whispered voice. Do not expect for it to be given when next you cross paths.

Darkness consumed her, and in an eyeblink, the Antifex was gone.

"We should've captured her!" one of the skymarchers protested.

"She would escape no matter what we did," Guitirre told them. "We do not have the capacity to keep her bound. That was the doing of her patron's power, not her own. We'd have to limit his hold on her which is all but impossible unless we had a means of instantly transporting her to the capitol."

A number of the Legionnaires were still rankled, but others knew the High Marshal was right. Even with the five condemner-priests across the ships, with only two on his and no true expert in the newer binding techniques with them, it'd be a futile effort. Even then, she might bide her time, overhear where they were headed next, and prepare a greater and more coordinated ambush for them later on down the line.

Getting her to retreat was the best outcome.

The High Marshal let out a deep sigh, sheathing both of his weapons.

"Alright. You," he said, pointing to one of his Legionnaires nearby -- their face was getting fuzzed in his vision -- "make sure that the fires are dealt with. Zenkuro, I know I owe you greatly, and I will make up for it when I can reasonably stand without being underwater." He swayed a little on his feet. "And I am going to pass out now, so if you could catch me, that would be appreciated."

“You could take some of the paladins and draw the guards off, and we could get in down low,” she suggested, already in sync with his idea. They had fought together long enough for this to be natural for both of them. “Then we’ll already be inside when you circle back around and we can squeeze the life out of them.”

Cecurro nodded, trusting her call. “Then I’ll take three of the skymarchers,” he said, turning and sliding back down to the hidden side of the ridge. Vona wasn’t far behind. There wasn’t a question of which three that Cecurro would bring with him: the fastest they had in the unit. The perfect bait, in other words. “Sergio, Alondra, Vera! You three are with me. We strike at dusk.”

Always dusk. That was the proper way, after all. And if Cecurro had learned anything from being his grandfather’s prodigy, it was that things were done the proper way.

Prayers first. Blessing weapons, blessing armor, blessing paladins. Cecurro considered it a point of pride that he of all people could get Vona to wait until the prayers were done before heading off into battle. It was akin to honing the edge of a blade already desperate to be wielded.

Cecurro kept low to the ground with the three paladins he had called for. None of them charged yet. They needed to get farther from the rest of the unit first. Cecurro counted the steps and gave the orders quietly. Make a big distraction but don’t get hit. Simple. Easy. Surely the paladins wouldn’t be able to fuck that up. Once they were in place, he silently counted to three, then gestured for the distraction to begin.

The three paladins Cecurro had chosen worked together well as they took to the sky. Arrows and spells of fire flew towards them, but the former were bashed aside by shield or glanced off of armor while the latter was simply dodged. Sergio, Alondra, and Vera were good. They landed on the wall, blades flashing as the last light of day bled from the sky.

Cecurro stayed low, watching the defenders scramble to take down the paladins. His job was also simple: overwhelm and incapacitate the heretics. According to most rules of engagement, he should have been working in tandem with a glorifier who would be draining the strength of the enemy and healing the paladins with it. According to his own ego and the training he had dabbled in just to prove that he could, he would be just fine handling that alone. There were some bruised egos in the Order of Glory that would tell him to not intrude on their disciplines. Besides, the glorifier with their unit was still with Vona. So if Cecurro did a little healing...no one would bother ruffling feathers.

His hands and his faith did not waver.

But the paladins did.

Sergio became the focus as some of the heretics managed to bolster themselves against the fear that Cecurro was sowing through their ranks. He bashed away more arrows with his shield but took one to the other shoulder. Even from where he stood, half-sheltered by stone, Cecurro saw the man grimace in pain and fall back. Cecurro cursed Sergio under his breath and yanked the life force from a heretic that was trying to run. Sergio fell back enough to sheathe his sword and yank the arrow out before the healing kicked in, then drew his blade once more and dove back into the fight.

Cecurro’s gaze flit over to the other paladins. Vera was still holding her own, diving to strike and then retreating before the heretics could reach her with any polearms. She was targeting archers since the elementalists weren’t in view. Alondra favored a more brutal strategy: swoop down, grab someone by the throat, rise back in the air, and drop them from a greater height to dash them on the stone and wood that the city was using for defense.

Something’s wrong.

The thought struck Cecurro suddenly. He was expecting more mages wielding elemental power. But so far, only a handful of mages with fire alone were targeting the paladins. Where were the heretics who could use the winds to slam paladins down into the ground? Where were the ones who could drown a man on dry land? Where were the ones who turned the very earth against them and drowned them in stone? Even the fire mages seemed to be weak, sending small balls of fire instead of great conflagrations.

Cecurro focused as he sent more fear through the ranks of the heretics. He tried to seek out the bundles of power he had noticed, the ones that spoke of connections to the land and its elementals. He pressed forward, straining his magic more and more-

Something slammed between his shoulder blades.

Lightning coursed through him.

All he could do was let out a choked gasp before he dropped to the ground. His muscles were no longer his own. His magic snapped.

Even with half of his face in the dirt below, he could see the illumination of more lightning shooting up into the sky. He heard Alondra cry out in pain. He heard Sergio hit the ground. He heard Vera curse and shout to fall back.

Then another wave rolled through him and his vision went black.

Cecurro coughed louder than he expected to. The ache in his body was the first thing he noticed. He breathed just to use it to ground himself. He was cramped; he could tell that much. His back was slumped against cold metal bars, the temperature biting through his robes. His wrists were bound in front of him. His ankles were bound too. Rope? It was really sturdy if it was. Or maybe he was still weakened from the lightning.

Then he breathed in through his nose, and his heretical hunger flared. There was blood nearby. The blood of his fellow vampires. It smelled delicious.

He forced himself to open his eyes.

They weren’t by the coast.

The cave ceiling was only a few feet above where the metal bars ended. Even if Cecurro managed to reposition himself, he’d be stuck on his knees because of how small the cage itself was. There was a pool of liquid beneath Cecurro that he quietly hoped was just water. And his wasn’t the only cage carved from jagged metal and stone; as his eyes adjusted and granted him proper vision, he saw many, many more.

His throat seized on an old reflex that he couldn’t quite kill.

There was blood.

It was close.

It was dripping from Alondra’s body.

She was slumped against the bars. Her armor was dented and torn from combat. Her eyes were glazed over and looking at nothing. Blackened blood dripped from the deep gash across her throat.

Cecurro’s hunger snarled desperately.

He leaned forward to follow it.

Pain lanced through his body like a second electrocution.

He did not cry out. He had enough self-control to keep his voice under his command. Despite that, he slumped back against the bars of his cage as his strength gave out.

Voices. Cecurro went still and pretended to still be unconscious. He strained to hear whoever was approaching. He picked up fragments of two people having a conversation.

“...been a while since we put one of their priests in the pit...”

“...different robes...”

“...new entertainment...”

Pits. Cecurro had seen a few with their conquering. Gladiatorial arenas used in bouts of heretical shows of strength against wild beasts. Now, captured Legionnaires or glorifiers were forced to fight there. Condemners were typically just killed outright.

But Cecurro had been captured.

He cracked open an eye and tried to ignore how delicious Alondra’s blood smelled. If he could just get upright when those damn heretics appeared-

His train of thought was cut off by Vera’s scream, which devolved into gurgling. That wasn’t too far away. How deep into the mountain did these cages go?

And what had they been used for before they held dying vampires?

Cecurro tensed as footsteps drew closer. His hunger growled and made its presence even louder, but he himself didn’t. He was the grandson of Theodors Ayere; he did not snarl like a caged beast.

Two men. Both human. Both taller and broader than Cecurro was, closer in stature to the paladins. Both savage, heretical bastards that Cecurro would tear the throats out of.

Especially the one that knelt down in front of the cage and smiled. He knew this one as one of the so-called lords of the Free Cities. Edgar Storm.

He smiled. In any other context, it would have been described as either crooked or roguish. Right now, though, Cecurro recoiled and pressed himself weakly against the back of the cage. Edgar’s smile didn’t waver. “He’s a damn pretty one. Shame we can’t keep him.”

The cage unlocked. Cecurro’s words died in his throat.

The hunger was all-consuming.

The ground responded to the hunger.

No matter what he drank, it wasn’t enough.

Not after he ripped Sergio’s throat out with his own teeth.

Not after he drank from Alondra and Vera’s cold, still bodies.

Not after he fell upon his own captors and drank as many of them as he could.

Not after he found another group nearby and ripped into them, desperate for more blood.

Even after his soul burned and the world changed, growing darker.

There was a stone in his hand.

Then there wasn’t.

He kept moving, kept searching, but the hunger continued to tear him apart.

Until he finally sank his fangs into something with blood that was so sickeningly sweet.