I dreaded going to the garrison, but it had to be done. As I’m walking down the road, I keep thinking and remembering old battles; not of blood and bone, but of will and mind. My brother-in-law had never been easy to deal with, even as he was young and eager to prove himself, and it did not become easier once he eventually joined Ehris’ company. Our arguments in the past were never forgotten and oh, how I resented his rash decisions and humorless searches for danger at times.

He could hear and feel the wheezing as he fought to breath, each one causing him to cry out in pain but nothing ever left his lips. He could hear the clattering and fighting around him, the world had grown so much darker, he could barely even see his hand as it reached to clutch his fallen blade. Only to realize, it was but a rock. Knowing now that he had led this company of people who  gave him an inkling of trust, and he had not the strength to wield his own blade in their defense. 

Lusseriel was sitting at the entrance of the camp, just at the edge of the fireside’s light. She was facing the outside, considering her options, notebook in hand, drawing mindlessly plant shapes and dagger shapes on the page before she started to write.

“We had breakfast in the camp this morning and surprise, surprise, Tirnelion joined us there.

Tucked into a shadow behind the meadhall, Alweard was bending over a basin. He had surmised that, after the long journey across the Isen, his companions would neither think to find him there nor muster the energy to go searching in the first place. Now purple dusk was descending over Sedgebury; the air, once buzzing with river-town conversation, was still and silent. Yet the low light was a comfort now, for the surface of the water before him bore only the barest trace of his reflection.