The sun had set, leaving the stars the responsible of shining its dull glow upon the lands. The woods were busy with wildlife that night—it was warmer than it had been. It was a sort of warmth that came before a storm. An odd humidity had taken to the air and so it sweat rolled down Mott’s face as he sat in the confines of his stuffy tent. Alaric had joined him for some time as they discussed what they had learned. They talked in hushed tones although most elves would not be able to understand them anyways.

Outside, most elves had retreated to their homes for the night to rest and perhaps sleep—as elves required much more sleep than a man. A few elves sat around scattered fires in the clearing in the center of the acre of land known as Brymeria. Father Nhed had not summoned Alaric for once, but he was not in his own tent this night and so he knew there was a chance his servant elves could not find him.

Mott had finished explaining the joys of fishing amongst elves and how pure the water was. He had not fished out of clean water for years—not since the black ooze had arrived into the Draining Sea like a plague and contaminated Splitter’s River. Alaric had seen the effects as well—their cleanest source of water was soured and all of Osknia had suffered for it as of late. He wondered what had ensued in Osknia since his disappearance.

Loud frogs croaked loudly along the brush at the bottom of the surrounding hillsides as Alaric pondered aloud to Mott. “I wonder if Thorck has Osknia under his thumb by now. My lands have likely already been pillaged and burned. My people must be wondering what the fate of their lord was.”

“It’s likely they didn’t have time for wondering. The Skadjans were gon’ put the entire land to the torch and start new. I heard it from some Skadjans who bought raw sea scab off me about a week or so before we took you.”

“You think they had already burned Khudril to the ground by the time Thorck Drenyork reached Brindvale?” asked Alaric.

“Of course,” said Mott.

“A part of me hopes they held off the Skadjans. Maybe a resistance formed amongst the Nine Kingdoms—maybe they’re still fighting and it’s not too late,” said Alaric.

“Wishful thinking,” said Mott. A fly had gotten inside the tent and it buzzed loudly around Mott’s face. He swatted at it with his hands, clapping to try and squash it but he caught nothing but air.

“It is the only option. To hope…to wish. You still want to go back?” asked Alaric.

“Eh…this place is growing on me. There is a sense of peace about this place I’ve never felt elsewhere. Besides, we don’t even know if we can make it back,” said Mott.

Brooding on Mott’s words, Alaric’s head was turned by the sound of rambunctious laughter outside the tent. He peaked his eye to a hole in the tent’s rear and saw Ralo, the elf who gave him lessons with a bow, dancing around the fire with a mask on his face that looked like a raccoon mixed with a monkey. A group of ten elves sat around watching and drinking an elven ale that was so sweet it had made Alaric throw it right up the first time he had it.

“Mott…there is something I have learned from Father Nhed that I think we should—”

“—he is not your father. He is not a man. Yet, you call him father still. Just call him Nhed like he asked,” said Mott. He raised a mug of sweet elven ale to his mouth. Some of the ale dripped down his whiskers and soaked his chin.

“This is serious, Mott. Put the ale down, you’ll want to remember this come the morning. I was talking with Nhed and he told me about these wights they seem to be so afraid of…” he paused to check if Mott was still following. Mott gestured for him to continue. “These lands used to be a much grander place; I imagine. You know, before the wights. Think about how small Brymeria is and how few elves there are—and yet—they have so much joy. It is almost effortless. That is why I was shocked to learn of an elf who strayed from their traditional upbeat culture and eventually became a dark lord.”

“People love to throw that term around—dark lord, or whatever. Doesn’t mean much. Just means a lord wanted to have his way and his people weren’t in tune with it,” said Mott.

“No. This is different. His name was Golomoth and he’s still out there. I think there’s a connection here, Mott. The wights…the elves…the black ooze. I just don’t know what it is yet.” Alaric went about explaining all that Nhed had told him about the history of the elves and the moment things turned for the worse. Mott no longer drank from his sweetened ale, but he listened with somber eyes. He told of Golomoth’s demise and his transition into a lost soul and how the Headless Horseman haunt the further reaches of Corpsia. Mott was not so accepting of the notion that the Headless Horsemen encountered a greater foe than they—for Mott hardly believed that the Headless Horsemen existed at all.

“What makes you so sure Nhed isn’t speaking out of his arse? He’s as old a being as I’ve ever seen. His mind is likely far gone,” said Mott.

“I don’t think he’d be lying when these elves are confined to this small piece of land. If the wights were really a hoax, then why wouldn’t the elves expand across the land?”

“Maybe there are more elves. Did you ever think about that? Have you even seen a wight yet? This land, Corpsia or whatever they call it, is much bigger than we know, I’d imagine. You ever think about that, Alaric? If anything, I’m willing to go out and explore once I’ve got my feet under me. I don’t think I shall live here forever. We are not elves, after all.”

“We are not elves. But we are one of their people now, Mott. Have you not seen how they’ve welcomed us? They’ve treated us better than any human I’ve known—”

“—treated us well? Is that what you call that, that,” Mott stammered, searching for words. “The time that Arokas put you in the ring with that elvish twat Elfwin…you think that was meant for you to be honored? They wanted to humiliate you, to have a laugh. You and me…we’re just entertainment for a group of sorrowful elves who have been abandoned. The wights don’t exist, Alaric!” Mott had grown passionate by the end.

“I guess we feel differently then,” said Alaric, crossing his arms.

Mott pushed a loud breath out from his chest, looking around the tent for something to change the subject. “You see the she-elf? She is mighty fine, I do reckon. Or maybe it’s been too long since I’ve properly been to a brothel. Might be I’ll have to sneak into her tent one of these nights—”

“—no. You won’t.”

“What? Why, you already inside that?” said Mott.

“Don’t disrespect the elves, Mott. If they are to avoid their race becoming extinct, then is falls upon the shoulders of Galiria. She is the only female left.”

“Since when did you learn name of the she-elf? Hold on, are you actually in there? Because if you’ve already claimed her then I can scour the rest of the lands for my own she-elf. I don’t mean to remain childless the rest of my life—even if It means bearing a half-elf!”

“Shut up, Mott! You mustn’t speak so loud or the elves will hear you.”

“Hear me? They don’t speak the One Tongue. Unless you are worried about Nhed standing right outside my tent, in which case I will gladly bare steel for listening in on my conversations. These elves aren’t invincible, you know.”

“Well they’re damn well near it,” replied Alaric. “Have you seen them fight? Elfwin was the weakest of them all and he nearly killed me.”

The sound of elves shouting their final words before returning to their tents echoed in accordance with the sounds of night. The sound of firewood being dislodged was soon the only noise coming from the clearing where elves gathered at night. Mott finally successfully clapped the fly, crushing it between his palms and showing Alaric with a large grin spread across his dark face. “They’re only like that because they have to be. If they’re fighting wights like you claim, then I reckon I’d be a warrior with a longsword as well. Just happens I’m better with a fishing spear than a sword. You on the other hand…you’ve grown up to become well versed in demanding things and getting what you want. Must have been nice while it lasted. I don’t think we’ll ever seen Osknia again.”

“If there was a way to get here, there is a way to return home. I know it,” said Alaric.

“Let’s leave, Alaric. The elves can’t force us to stay. I want to see for myself what the rest of Corpsia is all about. Might be there’s other humans on the other side of this land. We can’t know until we find out,” said Mott.

“I’m not leaving. Not now. I’m a part of these elves’ lives now. You do as you wish, Mott. I’m not coming with you,” said Alaric. Mott stared him warily, but It was a look Alaric hadn’t seen in those eyes since he had first been captured by the smugglers.

“You think any of the other survived?” asked Mott.

Alaric breathed deeply, looking down at his feet and making a thick line with his toes. He made it into a square with the end of his big toe and then erased the entire dirt drawing. “It’s a miracle we even survived. The One God protected us. I shan’t imagine he spared Tillet or Heliot. They were nothing but smuggler scum.”

“Smuggler scum? Is that what I am to you? I’m just a piece of scum who lives along the coast like the barnacles that sit on wet side of a rock while you live high and noble in your mighty castle amongst one of the richest lands of Osknia. You know, we weren’t great men, but we did what we had to. A smuggler is not a smuggler because he chooses to. We are men who have been disgraced. Abandoned. Banished. Hurt. Our families murdered—”

“—well I still don’t know where my mother is. Both my brothers left decades ago to try and find her and never returned. I watched my father waste away into a haze of fog and madness. I lost my whole family. Being a lord and having riches doesn’t ease your problems like a special cure. In fact, the happiest men I ever knew, were men who knew how to do more, with less.” Mott finally locked gazes with Alaric, whose eyes had swelled with tears, but they never did come. Mott felt his own eyes becoming laden with tears. “And that is what I have begun to understand about the elves…is that they are happy, even with just this,” he waved his arms before him to signify all of Brymeria.

“Perhaps one day I will be gone from this place. I do not know when, nor how. But I will go quietly, and I shall leave you be. Until that day, I will cast my nets and earn my lot down by the riverbanks with the other elves. This place is not my home. My home is in Osknia, by the Draining Sea and at Rivertrade, and I mean to return some day.”

The two reflected in silence. Eventually, Alaric left without a word. His head was hung low and his mind was numb. He found his cot in the same place it always was. He dropped onto his cot, closing his eyes and falling into a deep sleep in no time at all. He did not wait for Galiria, for he had no desire to speak to anyone.

He awoke at random, and he could not have said why. It was still dark, and he heard no movement outside. The sound of an owl hooting sounded louder than the frogs and Alaric listened to its rhythmic hoots until they finally slowed and then stopped. Somehow, he could feel someone’s eyes on the head of his back as he lay. He turned onto his back and lifted his head, finding Galiria head poking through his tent flaps. She did not say a word but instead she waited, that curious look across her face.

“What?” asked Alaric. She did not reply, just staring at him. He rose from his cot, pulling a thin coat over his linens and then his cloak. He grabbed his scabbad up from its place beside his cot and pulled his boots up his legs. The sky was spitting a cold rain as they ran. Galiria led him farther than usual, beyond their spot and past long plains and through thickets of woods. They came to a rocky place where jagged rock jutted up all around a small square of uneven ground. She lifted her bright brown eyes from the polished metal of her blade.

“Practice,” she said.

Alaric nodded, sleep still in his eyes. “I don’t know if I am up for it today, Galiria.”

She cocked her head, confused.

“No sword,” he said. He put his sword down onto a rock and sat on a round boulder that was large enough for both of them to sit side by side. Their feet hung over the boulder as they sat. They said nothing for a while, just listening to the odd noises of the night. Birds chirped to each other in the trees and critter smaller than the grasses chimed their nightly songs from their hidden places amongst the reeds.

“Sad,” said Galiria.

“Sad,” said Alaric.

“Come,” she said, grabbing his hand as she leapt from the boulder. She led him down a stony path along the steeper end of a hill. The went down into its gulley and up another hill, running through a meadow where yellow grasses rose to their hips. She was much faster than he, so she tugged him along, encouraging him with her words from her own native tongue. They ran by a graveyard of dead trees and burned vegetation, then through a field of cotton and lilies, and finally through a forest where the wet leaves and dripping moisture from grand oaks dribbled over their heads until they came to a vantage point at the top of a ragged mountain where the trees no longer grew and a dusted layer of snow crunched underfoot.

Galiria waved a hand across the landscape below. “Home.”

“You lived there?”

She nodded. “Wights. Big fight. Many deaths happen.”

Down below were the ruins of a castle with walls as tall as the Great Tree of Brymeria and borders are wide and as long as the eye could see. Watch towers stood all along the ramparts like crows keeping guard. Great keeps and fortresses were scattered in heaps of crushed rock and timber—leaving one to imagine what great stronghold it had once been. Mysterious mists and white wisps of steam still twirled like mini tornados from certain spots within the ruins. Further enchanting was the sight of pinks and green that polluted the night sky where blackness should have been. The odd glowing light pierced the sky above like a spilled drink.

Alaric’s breath caught in his throat when he saw the bodies of impaled elves hanging from the ramparts, drifting in the wind like a doll. Their cloaks fluttered out from under them as they would stay away from the castle walls and then be drawn back in by their stakes. An elf with a large gold crown lied strewn to the top of the castle’s highest point, his arms and legs penned to the stone tower by spear tips. His eyes were gone, and his feet were missing.

The two now sat with their legs dangling over the edge of the cliff rock, reflecting on the ruins below. Alaric had never known a castle to span its outer walls so far. The architecture was foreign to him—blue stoned walls and marble white ramparts guarded a central castle that was larger than even the magnificent stronghold Creppenhal, where King Eyowen had reigned as lord of Brindvale and King of all the kingdoms.

Galiria stared at Alaric now, who slowly turned to meet her stare. He always became shy when she stared, as if somehow self-conscious about his own being. She squinted through bright brown eyes, her long nose almost running over her top lip.

“What?” he asked.

“Hu-man,” the word came ponderously from her lips. “Is better? Where you come from?” She had improved vastly in the One Tongue since Alaric had begun to teach her.

“No. Men are bad. Most, at least.”

“Are you…bad man?” said Galiria.

“It depends who you ask. I was a lord of a great land. It is called Khudril.” Galiria had watched the words form on his lips.

“Khudril,” she repeated carefully.

“Yes, Khudril. Although, my land was taken by other bad men. It’s kind of like the wights and the elves, except, it is only men where I am from,” said Alaric.

“Men fight men, why?”

“Because men are bad,” said Alaric.

“Elves bad, too,” said Galiria.

“You think elves are bad? How?” The two stared out across the vast expanse of land polluted by ruin and rotting corpses—yet the stars shone brilliantly overhead and the pink glare from the stars cast an incredible light downward.

“Elf want me. Use me,” said Galiria.

“Use you? How?”

Galiria hid her tears, twisting a cluster of twigs around between her fingers anxiously. She had not needed to say another word before it dawned on Alaric. She was the only she-elf left, and there was a need to repopulate the lands with elves.

“No more elf, soon. My fault.”

“It is not your fault, Galiria. It is not fair to expect that from you—”

“—men try,” she cut him off. “Many hurt. Too strong, many are.”

Alaric pieced it together in his head. He was speechless to help. She was hidden away like a treasure, but there were elves who felt that it was justified in using her for sex—claiming there was justification for their lust. It became clearer to him why she had been so desperate to steal away in the night. Men could not find her if she was not in her tent.

“You do not fight these elves?” asked Alaric.

She shot him a glaring look, “Cannot fight. Kill elf—bad.”

“You want to kill them?”

“One of them,” she said.

“Who?”

She sniffled. “Arokas.”

A shiver ran through Alaric’s body. He had seen him approach Galiria many times when there were gatherings in the clearing. He was the strongest elf, and he was arrogant. He was the one who had boosted Alaric’s reputation out of spite—knowing of the humiliation to come if he were to demonstrate his lack of fluency with a blade in his hand.

“He is a bad elf,” said Alaric. He rose from his seat along the edge of the cliff rock. “Come on, let’s start walking back.” Galiria was standing still until Alaric turned.

“Leave. Never back.”

“You want to leave? But Galiria, the wights—”

“Osknia,” she said, defiant.

“You want to go to Osknia?” asked Alaric.

They two began walking. The ruins of the great castle of the elves soon disappeared from sight.

“Osknia is far from here. I do not know how to return,” said Alaric.

Galiria had no response for him. They continued on in lowered spirits. Alaric had already met a new low earlier, and so the new gloom he faced had dragged him deeper. He thought about Arokas and a new hatred grew inside of him for the Elven warrior. There was tension between them—and now he feared what would come of him if it were revealed that he spent long nights beyond Brymeria with Galiria. She had proved fierce some with a sword—teaching Alaric the way to handle a sword like an elf.

He now knew why she had wanted to learn the One Tongue so badly. She wanted to leave Corpsia and start new, but she had never known where. Now it was confirmed by his arrival to their lands that there were indeed faraway lands—and she meant to find it. He was the token she needed to help her get away. He let himself daydream for a time as they walked. He envisioned himself restored as lord of Khudril, sitting upon his throne seat at Castle Hildreth with Galiria as his lady. Or perhaps, she would be a lord of her own land somewhere.

Then a thought landed into Alaric’s head that stirred his mind with great wonder. The elves were near extinct, forced to hide away in a secret gathering as the last to stand against the wights. But what if he found a way for them escape across the great seas, somehow arriving at Osknia. Near a hundred elves they had…but how far could a hundred elves make it in Osknia? They were far superior in terms of physical ability and wit. Yet, the Skadjans would not hesitate to strike them down—no matter the losses they suffered. He did not even know what the true Osknians would think.

For now, it was only a dream—a faint recess of thought at the back of his mind that he may one day return to. For now, he had new feelings to contend. The first was feelings of sympathy for Galiria. She was the most valuable thing the elve’s had—the means to continuing their race. And because of that, she was subject to abuse and likely rape. For the elves needed no further excuse to try themselves upon the last she-elf, doing it in the name of their race’s sake. And that is where Alaric had found a new feeling deep inside of himself, and it burned like the scorching heat of the darkest hell. At the wrong end of that contempt was Arokas—for he had hurt Galiria, and Alaric could not say why that had angered him so greatly.

As the two drew nearer to the elves’ best kept secret, Brymeria’s outer cover of thick treetops and cascading hilltops glistened with beadles of rain underneath the stars’ shine. They came upon the small clearing at the gulley between the two hills where they were accustomed to meeting on most nights so that Galiria could teach him how to wield a sword. Galiria drew to a halt by a small brook where rainwater had busied the stream, causing water to skip up along the raised pebbles that jutted out of the brook. Her pointed ears perked back, hearing a dreadful noise that had sent the even the smallest of night critters to silence. Alaric heard it too, looking from left to right in search of the direction it had come from.

“What was that?” asked Alaric.

Galiria said nothing. Her muscles tensed up defensively and her sword hand went instinctively to the hilt. The second shriek was closer now. Galiria drew steel. The hiss of the steel on scabbard was drowned out by another shriek. Alaric’s blood went cold and his heart raced wildly.

“Hide,” said Galiria.

“What is it?”

Galiria swung her hand over Alaric’s mouth and dragged him down into a ditch along the gulley they were standing in. Galiria dragged a branch of a fallen tree in front of them, concealing them partly, and then pulled her cloak overhead. Alaric did the same, finding himself short of breath and near panic.

The final piercing cry filled the air once more. The shrill cry was like the sound of a pig being steadied before its slaughter—only it was no pig that cried.

“The wights. They hunt,” said Galiria.