"Meya! Meya, wait!"

Maro scrambled out of his chair, but Meya was much closer to the exit. He had taken barely two steps before she sent the door crashing back into its frame with a resounding bang. Knowing Meya and her rare yet vindictive temper, he knew it was futile to pursue her. Especially when it was about Marin.

"By Fyr, Marin. Now she hates you for life."

Blowing out a disgruntled breath, Maro collapsed back to his chair and raked a hand through his hair. Before any of his remaining siblings could offer a consolation or a remark, however, an unfamiliar calm, cool voice pierced the silence.

"It's you, isn't it, Deke Armorheim?"

Everyone simultaneously whirled around to the young man who had spoken, he who claimed to be Silvan Joplund, then to the accused farmer boy.

Deke had gone ghastly pale to his trembling lips, which were pressed hard together. He looked as if he wanted nothing more than to go invisible and reappear in Crosset a week earlier. But the truth was already evident in his eyes.

"It's you, Deke?" Maro could barely manage a hoarse croak. Deke whipped around on impulse, then back as if slapped hard, wide eyes darting about, and Maro felt his heart seizing up. "You've lain with Marin?"

"All this time! Why haven't you fessed up?" Marcus demanded, fists clenched and face red in fury, then bolted up and snapped, "You left her to deal with all that alone while you're enjoying the Fest here!?"

Marcus's fist slammed onto the table so hard his utensils bounced and clanked about in the plate. Deke cowered even lower in his seat as Myron stared, pale and speechless with shock. Morel, on the other hand, was uncharacteristically solemn.

"Is it true, Deke?"

Draken finally spoke. Unlike Maro and Marcus, his voice was steady, strong and calm, yet undercut with a spine-chilling, simmering fury. And, true enough, when the lad remained tightlipped, he exploded.

"Is it true, Deke?"

"Yes, Dad."

Deke confessed at last in a passing attempt at mouse language, his back curled like a babe in its mother's womb, which was probably what he would've dearly loved to turn into right now, especially as his father decried at the top of his lungs.

"Of all the things!" Draken bolted up and paced about, arms flailing to help vent his fury, "What in the three lands were you thinking? Or you weren't?"

Draken whipped around to Deke, who started in fright and shame. He squeezed himself into the corner of his chair furthest from his father, who marched back then jabbed a trembling finger repeatedly at his face.

"You know what your poor mother went through. What you yourself went through. You're damning Marin and your child to the same fate, and you're running away and cowering like a coward! My son! A coward!"

Draken spat the words up at the ceiling, as if protesting the gods that be for plaguing him with such a spawn. It was likely that unfiltered disgust in his voice that spurred Deke to explain himself,

"I'm five years younger than Marin. I've no idea how to provide for a child." His words shivered as hard as his shaking head. He looked up at Draken, eyes red-rimmed and beseeching, "And Meya hates Marin! What am I to do, Dad?"

"Only the right thing, Deke!" Draken rolled his eyes at the Heights with a derisive grin, then glowered at his flinching son, "But are you a man enough for that?"

The echoes of Draken's voice faded away into silence as father and son locked eyes, one of freezing rage and the other of paralyzing fear, then Draken delivered his ultimatum in words cold as icicle dew.

"Unless you want to disappoint me even worse, don't wait for me to tell you what you should do now."

Deke looked up and met his father's gaze, his eyes hardening with resolve for the first time since entering the room, or perhaps ever since this whole ordeal began.

"Here, lad. I'll be right beside you." Jason, ever gracious, ambled over with an understanding smile. With a warm yet firm hand on Deke's shivering back, he and Jezia led the troubled young father to the door, which closed behind them with a barely audible snap.

As if the strings holding him up had been snipped, Draken plummeted, his head in his hands. Maro laid a consoling hand on his shoulder, a gesture of forgiveness Draken felt he did not deserve.

"I'm so, so sorry, Maro. I was an irresponsible man. And I raised my son up to be just like me."

He whispered through brimming tears and jittery fingers. Maro shook his head, sniffing back tears as well.

"It's not your fault, Draken."

Draken clasped his roughened palm over Maro's less weathered hand, patting it gently. All through the wordless exchange, Silvan Joplund's silvery eyes kept watch on the fair-haired farmer. At long last, he poised his hands and steepled his fingers, disturbing the scene with a serene address,

"Now that that has been dealt with, let's cut the pretense and get down to business, shall we, Draken Armorheim?"

The Crossetians whipped around, eyes bulging. They had just fully acknowledged the presence of the three outsiders around their table.

The mysterious boy creaked up a slight smile as his gaze zeroed in on Draken, who had just remembered his initial worry, now that the family feud was out of the way. The boy cocked his head a little to the left.

"You remember me, I believe?"

Even as his eyes remained paralyzed at his old foe before him, Draken could feel numerous blue and brown eyes focused on him from several different angles. Resigning himself for his last, he took a deep breath and nodded heavily.

"Yes, I do, Lord Coris Hadrian."

There was an ominous pause, then the room erupted.

"Coris Hadrian?" Marcus exclaimed. Myron stammered and pointed with a trembling finger,

"Th-th-th-the one you kidnapped in the Famine?"

"The very same." Lord Coris replied in his place, serenely observing their horrified stares as he flourished a hand to re-introduce his companions, "This is my brother Zier, and my betrothed Arinel."

Marcus and Myron blinked at the now brown-haired Lady Arinel, then exchanged swift looks. Maro had more sense of priority, however.

"Does Meya know, my Lord? Has she summoned us here on your orders?" He laid his clenched fist on the table, wide brown eyes and brown freckles standing out on his pallid cheeks. Coris glanced at him, then cocked his head.

"Yes and no." He leaned back in his chair and clasped his hands, "I believe she does know about our history, but isn't counting on me recognizing Draken, and vice versa."

He extended two paralleled indexes to indicate his erstwhile kidnapper, who shook his head, eyes wide.

"What is going on, my liege? How have you come to know Meya?"

"It's a complicated and astonishing tale. One that makes me secretly glad Farmer Hild couldn't join us this evening." Coris replied, his eyes downcast, then his smile vanished as he met Draken's apprehensive gaze.

"Arinel's entourage was held hostage by Nostran Greeneye mercenaries looking for a certain Hadrian possession. Meya assumed Arinel's identity and wed me in her place to spy on me, but she had a change of heart, alerted me of the plan, and together we drove the mercenaries away. Yet, I'm sure this is far from over, so I have Meya remain in the masquerade to assist me."

For a beat the Hild siblings plus one Armorheim father figure gawked at the storyteller, then Maro eked out in shivering words, looking incredulous.

"She—she wed you, my lord?"

Coris imagined himself rolling his eyes as he blew a soft sigh and nodded.

"Yes."

"And did she—I mean, did you two..." Morel pointed a finger at the door, then held up another finger and waggled them between Coris and the door. Coris's sigh was becoming impatient.

"Yes, we did. Multiple times." He added just for the sake of it. Ignoring the Hilds' flabbergasted reactions, he closed his eyes tight as he tamped down his fit of pique then turned back to Draken, "You have guessed why I am here, I presume?"

Draken clenched his shivering, clasped hands as he gritted his teeth. As the children watched with bated breath, he bent his back and touched his forehead to the tabletop.

"My lord. If it is my life you want, I am willing." His body was shaking, yet his voice was steady. "All I ask is safe passage for Jason and the young ones, and that you spare those under my command that night."

"Draken, no!" Maro gasped, aghast. His hand shot out to grasp Draken's shoulder, but his eyes were on Coris, as wide and fearful as those of his younger siblings.

Coris studied the dread in the faces of the peasants as they stood in solidarity with their good friend. Six years ago, he would have proudly regarded it as proof of his formidableness, but thanks to what happened in Crosset that day, he felt nothing but guilt. And he welcomed it.

"Farmer Armorheim. Draken." Coris began, willing his voice to be tender and his gaze to be sincere. He leaned forth, and Draken instinctively flinched back. It was a mark of how repulsive a creature he had been, that a man who kept a dragon hidden for six years was intimidated by him. Nonetheless, he forged on,

"If I had intended to take revenge, I would have done so the moment I reached safety six years ago."

The peasants relaxed. But only slightly. Coris lowered his gaze as a bitter grin twisted his parched lips.

"Yes. The old me would have done that." He mused, then tilted his head,

"But I know I was never in actual harm. Even if I were, you were doing it under your bailiff's command, with your family's survival on the line. When I understood that, I forgave you."

Coris looked up. And so did Draken, in utter disbelief. Maro's hand on his shoulder relaxed, but had not left. None of them seemed inclined to respond just yet, so Coris continued,

"That is the reason I am here." He tapped a long, pale finger lightly on the wood, eyes aligned with Draken's, "You are saved by the same peasant girl who saved me. I made a pact with her that night. You and your men's lives, and bread for her brothers and sisters, in exchange for safe passage to Truncale."

The young nobleman drew away and fell against his backrest, looking suddenly grim and withered,

"I resolved to find her and reward her, but my memory has betrayed me." Coris's eyes were fixed upon thin air, as if watching his lifeline eroding away before him, sliver by sliver.

"I don't have much time left. When I saw your name in Jezia's letter, I knew this might be my last lead."

"I swear by the honor of Hadrian that no harm will come to anyone involved." Coris's grave pledge reverberated in the tense air. He lowered his hand, but his eyes remain set on Draken's, "To show good faith, I shall tell you what I remember first."

Coris's eyes wandered as he rifled through his shattered memories, then he noticed the flickering flame of the smoldering candle at the center of the table. He saw the past through flickering eyes, feverishly alternating between Draken and Krulstaff occupied with their altercation, and the feeble lamp in Draken's hand, as he felt the noose burning against his neck loosening in Krulstaff's. Should he seize it before making a break for it?

Taking a deep breath, Coris began his tale...