[TT] Write a redemption story, no strings attatched.

...

The trick to a war is fooling people into fighting one in the first place. How else would a simple man convince his neighbors to pick up steel and thrust it into one another's chests and bellies? How else would one person's words be enough to raise flames and tinder on towns and fields- to rape and pillage with abandon?

For any who have experienced war, or the fear and suffering that comes with that immortalized tragedy- many would agree that only the ignorant or the damned would willingly walk towards such a fate. So far as Tom had seen of both, ignorance seemed far greater quantity than its counterpart.

For truth, every village nestled in the Western region within the Holy Provinces of Dotera has seen some level of war or strife in their time upon the earth. Not five generations back in history the land itself was known as the Red Stone fields, and any farmer with a bison and plow will prove it to you. Hundreds of fragments, rusted scraps of iron and steel, the likes of which are churned up among discolored rocks and grit to be piled high for scrap to trade at the village blacksmith come festival.

Recent times though, of those who came after the terrible strife and horrors of the last Dark War, past the eras in which men fell beneath one banner of faith to border as one beside the black lands of the far west: The people of the Red Stone fields have all but forgotten their heritage. Peace remains in the stead of war, a precious and allusive trait that only the oldest recognize as true beauty.

Old Tom was one to appreciate such calm and welcoming times. The seasons may have passed him by, but he had traveled far from the village of his youth and seen more than most because of it. What was once a boy of ideals, returned a different creature; Worn and tired, but also less ignorant than he'd left all those years before. Peace, to Tom, was a thing to be respected and cared for by a gentle hand.

Such men as himself were rare, for not many would willingly leave the familiar for a simple sake of adventure and thrill and even less make it home again. Be it trials of coin or danger all the same, Tom had done just that- joining with his grandfather's sword barely on the cusp of manhood in order to work beneath the mercenary guards hired along the trading companies of the Faith's roads. His humble beginnings to see the world.

From the guard, to the armed service of a noble house, to a soldier on the frontier of the northern provinces- Tom had seen the world of men. From a distance he had even seen the world beyond, past the borders of relative safety. His eyes had peered into the shadowed and clouded skies, seeking the faintest outlines of those black scorched lands of darkness that lay distant. A realm of hatred and toil, ruled by the distant but mighty fortress of the immortal soul: The Mage of death. Bordered as it was, Tom had even fought in skirmishes against the stray Orcish beasts that wandered out from those territories; creatures filled with bloodlust and rage, each seeking to prove their worth among the wild tribes in trophies and skulls. Battles by the hundreds, the dozens, and once- the thousands. Wars without name, built upon foundations of bloody sacrifice.

He had fought, and he had killed.

Tom had been to the black, and stood beside it.

Small and quiet as the battles might have seemed from a distance, the lesser wars of the Borders were still there in his mind's eye. Late at night, when Nan slept soundly and the hound settled down by the ashes of the fire, he might lay away and listen to the shouts of dying men. The clangs of armor and steel, the screams of violence- all would echo as the ragged scar on his arm might burn. On the worst of nights Tom might even smell the blood, the filth and soil that once soaked it, to mingle with the rest of the unremembered dead that lay around him.

As the wind howled in the distance, Tom could remember the beating of drums, the smoke and flames, and the final breaths of a friend, raggedly run out to silence as they stared at him. It was how he knew, and knew for certain:

The trick to war, truly, is fooling people in fighting one.

Wood walls stood heavy on his every side, as he stared at the dying fire among the stones. The graying hound kicked softly, rising chest following the ever familiar rhythm beneath old Tom's watching eyes. Raised from a pup, its ears had long since failed to alert even the loudest of nuisance, but he loved it still. To his left, a thick door of iron and oak held itself with bar dropped on hefted catches, locking the pieces shut as surely as if it were one with the walls, but his hands still rested on the sword in his lap, and the sheath was long since removed.

For young boys seeking adventure, war might sound a fanciful thing: Of ballads. and legends. and heroes. Up close though... up close, Tom knew different. In the fray of battle, the man one thought he knew as himself, was a far and distant figure to the terrified and lost soul that remained alone. Youth should not know such things; only the old.

"Bolt your doors at night, and dust off your sword if you've got one." Those words echoed in his mind as surely as the embers cracked and flared in the drafts. Behind thick walls and a barred, heavy door, Tom waited. While he waited, the guilt grew as if the water in a bucket- filling beneath a softly leaking roof. While he sat in relative safety, a man that bordered the line between friend and stranger was waiting for a screaming and terrible death without complaint, knowing full-well what it meant. Knowing more things than a man his age should know.

The chair creaked as Tom rose, body of muscle worn, but not lost to the constant battle of passing time. The young man had warned him, yet had asked for nothing. Not shelter, not safety, not weapons: Instead he had given genuine trust.

"You were a soldier once, right?"

As the Saying of Dotera stood: Once a soldier of the Faith, always a soldier, but those words held little weight beside the question that floated on in his mind as he stared at the door. His ears alone listened to the growing howl of wind and far-off trees. Quiet as the night began, it grew to a tempest in the late hours, and nature's violence was upon the air. No rain, no storm, only gales of cold and gust.

"CRACK" A distant sound ripped through the air, like thunder of the ground- the power of magecraft. "CRACK, CRACK, CRACK"* More rang out after it, and the distant screeches of agony began to rise up from the distance. Horrible voices Tom knew as certain as the weapon clutched in his hands: Goblins.

The young man hadn't lied in the slightest then, light have mercy. Tom had taken a step towards the door before he'd even realized, and the creaking of boards beneath his feet gave no chance of hiding the motion. Behind him, Nan slowly sat up on the bed of cloth and fur, worried look piercing the shrouded room as surely as a Lord's blessing. Tom felt it rest upon his back as he froze in place, worry and stern anger digging into his shoulders.

"You told me you were done with that steel, Tom." Her voice reached out over the quiet room, edged with a fierceness he both loved and feared. "Promised me the night we were wed, you were done with' it."

"I know what I said woman." Tom replied quietly, sword still in hand, not turning to face her. The metal gleamed pure, even with its lack of polish and care: A glowing edge in the dark room. "I know."

"You're worried 'bout the boy then. I know, I can see it. Known since I first laid eyes on him." The harshness in her tone dropped away, but the strength of it held with a fever seemingly few could possess in age. "That youth has been nothing but trouble since he came to this village, but he looks just as Peter did when the two of' you left off on your grand journey."

Tom stayed in silence, the heat of her gaze burning as surely as the heat of a flame, but she spoke no further as he set the blade to sheath on the leather at his hip and approached the door. Slowly his muscles bulged as the bar was lifted away, and he stood on the threshold; wind whistling with pressure and strength just beyond as it opened.

"Aye." Was all he said, clothes rippling in the stream of wind that forced itself past. "I'm not sorry." He turned to catch her gaze, eyes meeting as she smiled from the bed. "Not for this."

The wind howled and roared, before the door slammed it to silence.

[TT] Write a redemption story, no strings attatched.

...

She kept that smile until the door closed again, before letting it drop. Tom was the same as he had ever been since his return. He'd left the village only to come back changed in small and quiet ways. Seasons came and went, but she fell in love with that stubborn mule of a man- even when his temper flared. Stubborn faults he might possess, Nan knew him as dedicated.

Honest and truthful, he never broke his promises. Not even the smallest ones. Tom was a man of his word.

"You utter fool." Her whisper met the ears of none but the deaf hound, whose quiet whimper lifting up from where it lay. Nan rose to take a seat beside it in her chair by the fire, hand falling down to rest against the dog's worried cheek- two curious eyes glowing in the embers and coals of the fire. Together they watched the tiny flames dance.

If it mattered enough for him to take out that wretched sword from its resting place of cloth and wood...

If this mattered enough for Tom to break a promise, this mattered enough for her to forgive him for it.