We were to leave before morning. A group of fifty, Vincent was adamant that would be enough. I suggested only the best. And so we got only the best. Kal and Obrick and Sylas. Myself and Edwin. Vincent and the rest he’d take with himself. This should have been enough. And it certainly felt like enough as we all prepared for the trip. Taking rations and sticking them in large satchel bags on the sides of horses. Getting a few carts and latching them onto war-frightened steeds, clawing at the ash. We were in the city of Nightwaters, still securing it. Most of the civilians were rounded up and being herded into homes or into sanctioned camps. Everything was done orderly. Soldiers were captured, the death count was low. But what few bodies there were, were brutalized. Exploded corpses, flaming corpses still smoking from the cuts Vincent had done against them. Men sliced and burning still. Vincent’s own flaming blade still by his side and peeled halfway so you could see the plasma of his sword drawing smoke into the air. I never asked him what it was, what magicks were inside of that weapon.

Maybe after this scavenger hunt.

I came to a little bakery where I had the luxury of a large slab of wood. It was at the top of the city along the compressed buildings around the tree. A little door at the front and a sign with a loaf marked it at the front. Half of the building was interred into the tree itself, an oven designed by the crystalline substance through careful chipping. There were coals inside there, dead. I tipped over the slab and drew the flour off it. Went inside the shelves along the shop, right above fermenting balls of dough. There were a couple dried out loaves that I ate and stuffed inside a baggy. It was looting, though everyone had called it just spoils. Here I was grabbing sweets and breads and little steel boxes of tea and spices. Filling my baggy up before the trip. The bell rattled off at the front, I looked up and through a narrow gap spotted Lowell.

“Why didn’t you ask me to come?” He came in driving the dust of flour up to his face.

“Come where?”

“To hunt the prick down, why didn’t you ask me? Everyone’s going but me.”

“That’s right.”

He looked wide eyed and expanded his arms.

“What?” I asked.

“You don’t even look fine enough to go. Why the hell can’t I? I wasn’t hurt. I’m in great shape!”

“Not the point.” I said. “You’re not going.”

“Why?”

“’Cause I said so.”

“You’re not going to give me a reason?” He came up to the counter, looking through that gap with narrowed eyes.

“You’re not going.” I said.

“Then I’ll ask Sylas or Vincent.”

“They’re not letting you come either.” I said. “I told them to make sure you can’t come.”

“What’s your problem, Virgil?”

“It’s a dangerous trip. And it’s not one you should go through. I’m taking Edwin because he’s a good shot, and one good shot is all I need. Not two.”

“Who cares if it’s dangerous? I just got through war. War!”

“And you’re lucky you did!” I said. “We’re going across the desert chasing after some prick. We don’t know what the hell we’re going to run into. We’re not even sure we’ll make it back. If it were up to me, it’d just be me and Sylas. Vincent wouldn’t even be with us.”

“So you’re playing hero? Thinking you’re doing us all a favor?”

“Yeah. That’s right.” I said. “We just need one man. We don’t need to fight a war.”

“They’re going to hate all of you for it. They want to fight as much as anyone else.”

I stopped, bread in my hand. A pain in my chest. I tapped along the wooden slab.

“You have a future in that Capitol. Many of the men do.” I said. “A future with that young woman, right? Go to her.”

“And you? You don’t have a future?”

“My future is with Vincent. At least…right now it is.” I said. “And as such, I’ll serve him as I’m doing now. But you? Your obligation is to a young lady, is to something far better than the Flock. You understand?”

“I understand that I fucking despise you.” He said.

“Yeah.” I said. “I understand. Now go back to your ranks.”

He went quiet and stared at me. I didn’t pass him a glance, I just kept to stockpiling, listening to the stomp of his feet as he made his way out the door and to a busy street. Something behind me cracked, a little stone-bark from the girth of the tree falling like a shaving down on the floor.

Truth is, I was afraid the kid would die. Truth is, I wasn’t even sure all of us would make it back. We weren’t just chasing one man. It was more complicated than that, as things are. We didn’t have enough men to send out for our little operation, most of them had to be kept back to defend the city. As is the problem with a low-casualty siege. Having more enemies alive typically means the likelihood of a rebellion increases. And we were already struggling to keep everyone locked up.

Walking outside proved as much. As I threw the backpack over me, I looked to the streets and to the giant levels where the Crows had set scaffolds and cages and had taken to rounding up citizens and fixing whore houses and inns to accommodate them. The trouble of keeping the city together was already beginning.

Soldiers shoved them. The shoved back, everyone fit into a line and forced into their domiciles. Camps being worked on, bursting with bed for the injured citizens. Youths threw stones at the knights, receiving blows from the blunts of swords. The fights broke out to my rear, above. And I knew how it’d end. Death or submission.

It was hard to believe anyone could keep the city alive, especially since Vincent would be out. As far as I knew, the Sixth and Seventh were in charge and they’d need every man available.

It was a mess.

I thought as much on my way out the city, a streak of blood stained into the leather of my horse saddle. I pet my steed on the neck and met the others outside the bridge, my horse leaned over and drank from water and we watched the city. Old fires still burning somewhere inside, lending to the sky a long chimney of smoke like a vortex. A black sky cascading with dark clouds. A night looking as dull and bleak even as it entered morning. You could not see the blue, it was too deep in the dark of clouds. Vincent stood before me in his white armor. Sylas, Kal, Edwin, Obrick around us. They wore a haggard look, eyes gaunt and dark rings around them.

“We’ll get a head start.” Vincent said. “We can sleep tomorrow.”

“Got any idea where they’d go?”

“Yeah.” Vincent turned his horse. It began. “Kalussis. Far beyond the ridges of White Rock Canyons. We’ll meet them there.”

We followed. The Fourteenth nearest to him. Then the rest of the guards and whatever few men were rounded up. Most of them veterans, scarred all about them. It was like we were all riding from the sun, chasing after a night that was losing us faster and faster. I drew my cape closer to my neck and drank from a little tea cup. The caffeine struck me and I went bug eyed, turning my face away from the intense bitter taste. I threw a cinnamon stick in the cup and covered it, drawing my tongue out to the cold air.

“How many are with him?” I asked.

“Don’t know. Could be a hundred, could be a thousand.”

“A thousand?” Obrick asked. “There’s only fifty of us.”

“Fifty-one. Kal’s twice the size.” Lowell smirked. Kal slapped him in the back of the head.

I smiled though I wasn’t happy about any of it. I could feel nothing but the chill, though there was no cold in the air. Opposite really, a heat from the molting tar on stones far off burning a hole in the city still. The hot scent carried through the air, running in the water, forcing the fish away from the city they’d turn circles into for years possibly. And here I was in a tent not too far off, still at mercy of that heat of war. Preparing myself for another, feeling in me the burn. Though I laughed. Though I smiled. Though I armed myself with weapons, I felt nothing but a shake. My hand which kept a little quake. I caught myself as I bound a knife to my waist, my thumb pressing into the belt and nearly yanking it out. I grabbed my right hand with my left and breathed heavy.

“Hey Youngblood, I need you to help me get something.” Sylas said.

I looked up and turned my head slowly to the corner of the tent where Sylas was, my eyes kind of half on him and half entertaining the shake in my arms. I put them behind my back and blinked and nodded my head. The cut on my nose bridge expanding.

I walked out. Sylas followed. Vincent looked at us, a bit suspicious. We went into the night, men rested in the sand in pits around fires. Bodies on stretchers. A certain eerie calm amongst everyone, bandaged and injured, as they looked up to the night stars. You could smell meat. You could smell the alcohol. But there was no chatter or cheer, just an ease about the tents around the city. The lake behind us, some men skipping stones against its starry water.

“What do you need?” I asked. “We’re almost on our way.”

“Just need some help is all with a few bottles.”

“What?”

“Yeah.” Sylas said. He nudged his hand and we walked through the men.

We walked to the kitchen cart and opened the back, the damn door pried down and slanted in the sand. Sylas walked up. I looked around, wary about it all. But nothing was wrong. Old Chet was there, even. He jumped at the collapse of the back and looked up with his one good eye.

“The hell?” He said.

“Go back to bed, old man.” Sylas said. “I don’t need you. I’ve got him.”

“What’cha want ya old shit?” Chet said.

“I told you.” Sylas said. “Nothin’ from you.”

“Huh?” Chet raised his ear. Sylas nodded. I smiled.

He put the covers over himself and slept tight in his seat. I stared, impressed by the seconds it took for him to go back to deep sleep.

“I don’t know how he does it.” I said. “How can anyone sleep so easily at a time like now?”

“It’s easy when you’re that late into this joke of an existence.” Sylas walked over to the backside, to a large cupbard of jarred things.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean when you’re that close to death, it doesn’t really matter any more.”

“He’s got another decade in him.” I said.

“I bet he does.” Sylas said.

Sylas bent down and turned the knob. He opened it wide and took out a bottle by the neck. He took it out and looked at the label, squinting his eyes.

“Vicentius loves this stuff.” Sylas said. “Saves it for celebrations.”

“Then why are you taking it?”

“To celebrate. Of course.”

“Celebrate what? Victory?”

“Celebrate another day.” Sylas said. “We made it another day youngblood. Come nurse this with me.”

We sat leaning over a butcher block. Old Chet with a blanket over his body, rubbing saliva out of his mouth and turning his head to sleep. I had a cup of wine. Not too much. Just a bit of sludge to sip every now and then.

“Tastes good, right?”

“I think so. Yeah.” I said.

“You really got messed up in there, didn’t ya?” Sylas asked.

“Not more than usual.” I looked to barred windows. The stars were beyond the steel.

“Really should have switched. The backside was pretty easy.” Sylas said. “How was the fight?”

“The fight?” I sipped. “Not more than usual. Same thing. Just a man who wants to kill me. That’s all.”

“You’re meeting a lot of them more often, aren’t ya?” Sylas asked. “Almost makes you wish you were killing bulls and batmen and fish things. Don’t it?”

“What are you getting at?”

“This whole thing.” Sylas turned, put his elbows on the counter. “It wears on you like nothing else. This killing men business.”

“They’re easier.” I said. “Much easier than a Maelisaur. Much easier than a man eater or a basilisk. Very easy.”

“The fights are easier, I’m sure.” He said. “Or maybe that’s you talking tough. What you can’t deny is that it’s all tiring.”

I opened my mouth.

“You don’t have to say a word.” Sylas said. “I can read your face. You are exhausted, ain’t ya?”

“Of what would I be exhausted of? Of the sword swinging or the swimming or the running?”

“Of the killing, of course.” Sylas said.

I finished my drink and he poured another.

“Go ahead.” He said.

“I don’t want it.”

“Drink it anyway.”

I did.

“How do you feel about killing another man?” Sylas looked down at his cup, he swirled it and drank.

“What a fucking conversation starter.” I laughed. “How do you feel killing a man? What the fuck does that mean?”

“I mean. How easy is it? How is it?”

“It’s not easy. Never easy.” I said. “But I mean - I mean -”

“You have to do it. Or tell yourself such and such.” Sylas said. “Funny things we conjure in our heads to pretend things are alright, isn’t it?”

“I do have to do it. Vincent wants it so, so it is. We live and die for the king.”

“So you say.” Sylas said. “But I mean, you’re racking up the bodies. Aren’t you?”

“I knew what I was getting myself into. There wasn’t an inch of doubt going into this war. No one kept the suffering and the reality from me. I saw hell a mile away, and I walked.”

“Are you trying to be tough?”

“I mean why the fuck are you bringing this up right now?” I set the cup down. “A day before we go off.”

“I just want you to orientate yourself. You might be leading these men soon.” He said. “It can be any moment, any time. Any of us dying. That includes me. And the last thing I need is you shocked from war. How do you feel about killing a man? Are you okay with it still? Is any of this troubling-”

“All of it is.” I said. “But so what? I’m not going to fuck up anything. I ain’t got no problem killing a man, I’ve got so many under my belt that what’s another hundred?”

Sylas narrowed his eyes. He rolled his tongue inside his mouth. I scrunched my face, as if growling or some primitive thing.

“Life doesn’t matter. Men don’t matter. Not men like us at least.” I said. “I have seen how cruel the universe can be. The death it enacts impartially. I have seen it and I’ve accepted it. I can go at any moment. So can you. So can Vincent. I won’t be surprised, I won’t sell myself the idea that everything will be good for everyone, because it certainly won’t. I know…I know…thing can always go bad.”

“Alright.” He breathed heavy. “Alright. Alright.”

“I’ll kill as many men as I have to. Do what I have to. I will not break form or composure. That is my responsibility and I wear it wherever I go. At every hour.”

“For now. I guess.” He said. “There will be a time when won’t be able to. A time far, far in the future I hope. And when that happens I want you to break south. For your own sake. Go to the temples.”

“Not this again…”

“Go there. Learn from my teachers.” Sylas said. “Outgrow this…fucking band of mercenaries. Become something better. Please. You can’t be a killer all your life, youngblood.” He looked as if he wanted to say more. Or perhaps he had said too much. But Sylas closed his mouth and tucked his lips and left the bottle on the table. Old Chet had one out looking at us from the corner of the room, he closed it when Sylas caught him.

I tapped my finger on the table, narrowed my eyes. Sylas put a hand on my shoulder, clutching tight. Amicably. Then he left down the ramp of the cart.

I looked down at the table, staring at the striations in the wooden tablet.

“You want the rest, Chet?” I asked.

No answer.

“You can have it.” I said.