One month and Adon has six different visitors. Each one leaves with a small wooden chest and a grim look on their face. As for me, I stumble through more lessons with Adonis who eventually gets better at teaching. I also stop using my cane, the wound in my leg nearly healed.

Having the mobile freedom means I spend more time outside and eventually Adonis shifts his morning routine to join me one my walks. He asks more about me and eventually I cave and tell him about my life. About when I was ten and was taken on my island and away from my parents and conscripted as an army messenger. All thirty years of my life I tell to Adonis. It is a bit cathartic and I hadn’t realized I needed it.

We swap stories of where we were and how we felt as one by one nation after nation fell to the empire. We’re outside enjoying the most of the noon sun, the cold air battling it’s feeble rays when I tell him about Valhym.

“I thought they would win. Their army is terrifying, crazed warriors screaming with bloodlust and showing no fear. They would crash through the Soli ranks like wild boar and for five years I thought it was only a matter of time before they won and the tides would turn.”

Adonis nods. “I remember. It was the first time the Soli nobles' belief that they were naturally superior was shaken. That my peers considered that maybe our conquests weren’t divinely blessed. I got in quite a bit of trouble with one of the Primus priests when I suggested that perhaps our conquests were a mistake and that Primus was on the Valhym’s side.”

I whistle, the Soli clergy were incredibly zealous which didn’t endear themselves to people, even their own.

Adonis’s face darkens. “Of course when news of the High King’s defeat came, all the progress disappeared. It was like it never happened. People who were beginning to question what exactly they were defending or what the cost of their war and greed was just forgot. They were more than happy to go back to blissful self-ignorance. It was the most disheartening thing I’d ever experienced. Like the last hope the world had was snuffed out.”

I stare at him. How could a man in such a different position have felt the exact same way?

“That’s...exactly what it felt like. The day after the High King fell was the day I first attempted to escape. There didn’t seem to be a point anymore, no one was going to stop the empire and free my people—not that there were many left to save.”

Adonis reaches out and without looking away from the bare swaying trees, takes my hand. To my surprise, I let him. He takes a deep breath.

“What happened to your people and the countless others the war affected is wrong. I’ve waited twenty-five years to say that openly. The Solis Empire is wrong. It’s corrupt and greedy and brings out the worst in people. It turns a blind eye to injustice and actively suppressed hope. But I’m still here and you’re still here.”

He turns to me grinning, his eyes sparkling with something that makes my heart beat faster. “We’re going to stop the empire and anything else that is wrong with this world. We’ll free your people and my people and anyone else who’s lost hope. If the rebellion can’t do it then we’ll make our own.”

“You’re crazy,” I say but I can feel the smile on my face and for the first time in months I think that maybe it was worth the pain to stay alive.

Adonis let’s go and laughs. “Maybe I am. I’d rather be crazy than Lord Adonis Killex any day.”

“So who are you now?” I ask amused and Adonis rubs his chin where he’s let a nice layer of stubble grow.

“Hmmm, obviously I’m never going by Killex again. Do you think I should get a new name?”

I shrug. “Maybe? Or maybe just change it a bit, shorten it to something a bit less Soli—like Adon.”

“Adon,” He repeats the name and nods. “That’ll do.”