***

Night was upon the city as eerily silent as the one before. Guards both city and Keep patrolled the walls, maintaining the protective flames. Not even the few typical animals like a stray cat or crow dared draw near the blaze.

Suddenly, a pair of gleaming teal eyes brought a guard to attention. Only one Chohtah imp appeared instead of the normal group, purple and chittering, and a city guard readied his sling to startle it away from the light’s peripheries. But before he loosed, the imp glanced behind, chittered frantically, and vanished in a swirl of purple haze. The stone passed harmlessly through it. Once it was in the ground, however, the dry grass distorted. The silver-blue figure passed over with the grace of a tiger circling its prey, once again backing off as the runes shimmered dimly on the wall.

The guards who had dragged Ilanlan from the inn strolled down the same main way, spying a splotch of blood from his wound. They were elated anyone had finally put him in his place. Ever since the end of the war, he’d been causing disturbances and arguments in the market and his friends were barely able to restrain him. He and his group were one of the only two northerners still trading with the Capital, as a man his size was practically necessary to survive what the Borderlands had become after the Scorching. Many southerners had avoided his stall, but often a sugar glazed Uttaran starfruit was too tempting to avoid. When the guards came to an alley further down the main way, they had paused and summoned up the courage to check it again. The night before they found the corpse of one of Ilanlan’s friends splayed there, the clanless porter, hidden under a few tarps. He was blackened, like a fully rotted fruit. It was a matter quickly taken over by the Keep guards. One was there in bronze scales, double-checking as the city guards were, but they found nothing new and all moved on.

As soon as the sun had set, Dhanur had gone to the inn for her nightly visit, leaving Janurana to rest or enjoy another bath if she wanted.

But Janurana did no such thing. She stood behind the front door, listening to the city, catching every smell, waiting for the world to quiet as a tiger would wait for their prey to look just busy enough to strike. She slipped outside when she caught the seventh person’s snoring. As she did the first night in Dhanur’s house, Janurana leaned against the closed door of her host’s manor among the sparse violet light of the moon, even though it took up the majority of the sky. She kept her parasol close to her heart, between the embrace of her breasts. Her hands tightened around and caressed the fabric for its tactile comfort and relief. With an all–encompassing preparatory breath, she surged onto the back alleys once again to begin her hunt.

The target was seared into Janurana’s mind, and her course was set, changing only to avoid any guard she saw, but she wouldn’t travel alone. Behind her, a wisp of smoke followed unnoticed.

Janurana knelt at the side window of the inn. She surveyed the room and came upon the final unfortunate soul from last night. She reeked of sugar even more than the night before. Janurana could hear her fingers peeling from her cup, sticky with the glaze from the fruits they were supposed to sell. Instead, the lone northerner had eaten every single one herself. Janurana bit back her tears. Loss was nothing new to her or anyone, but a mercy killing to those who hadn’t asked for it was too much. She fell to her knees, skittered behind a cluster of urns to stay further out of sight and rubbed her parasol.

‘Neither of them would make it home,’ Janurana reasoned. ‘They’re wounded. They wouldn’t make it through the Borderlands. Unless they range the roads. No, the clans hate each other. They won’t help another. Probably.’

The last word smacked against the side of her skull from the inside and she met it with a smack on the same spot, cushioned by her untamable hair.

‘You have to eat. You have to eat. You. Have. To. Eat.’

The Fish Clan sat with her back to Dhanur, who had, once again, slumped over her drink.

She would have been denied service that night if Dhanur hadn’t groaned at the innkeeper to let the girl have a drink and accept her shells. When he still wouldn’t, Dhanur paid for the northerner’s drinks herself and shot her a remorseful look. Dhanur had tried to offer her a seat at her table, but neither of them knew enough of the other’s tongue and the Fish Clan woman retreated to hide at the table she was at the night before. From time to time, the Fish Clan would peek over, making sure their attacker wasn’t coming at her again, debating if she could convince the northern woman to help, and hoping no other southerner was coming to finish the job.

When the Fish Clan looked up she would grab her leg and seethe. The porter was the one who knew how to wrap bandages properly so her own haphazard job had already bled through. She had no idea where her friend had gone. He had said he was going to see if he could find a tarp for them to sleep under and never returned.

After finishing her drink, she summoned up the last of her strength and pushed herself from the table. She could barely hobble to the door, instead bracing herself on one of the support beams before pushing off that as well. Dhanur got up, staggering herself, but wasn’t able to offer a hand as the Fish Clan bolted away as fast as she could.

Janurana, in a single, silent motion, leapt to the roof of the Inn.

She waited, lying prone, clutching the dusty edges of the roof. Not a single person sleeping there so much as twitched at her presence even as the bricks cracked, her fingers digging in with anticipation. The scent of blood had smashed through her apprehension causing the thrill of the hunt to course through her. The dust rained down on the northern woman but she barely noticed.

She limped away from the inn as the Innkeeper and the other patrons began making jokes at her and Ilanlan’s expense. Even in Daksinian, she could tell what they meant. Her face contorted into a scowl and she cursed and smacked her leg.

“Should have been stronger,” she said in Uttaran, curling her fists. Each slap made her waver but she forced herself to endure it.

The few townsfolk out and about added their own japes under their breath as the Fish Clan passed, but one didn’t need to know the language to tell when someone was laughing at them. A passing guard noticed and sighed. She rubbed her head under her bronze helm and jogged over. But like Dhanur, she couldn’t offer any help as the Fish Clan bolted into the maze of alleys.

The guard rolled their eyes and said, “Light shine on you too.”

Janurana followed it all like a specter, tracking her smell, gracefully leaping from building to building with a single step. She casually slipped past the pots of pea plants and occasional northern fruit bushes, over the communal gardens, and between the many citizens sleeping on their roofs. Not every home could afford the cooling skylight of Dhanur’s. Those she passed didn’t even flinch, as Janurana noiselessly drifted by. All the while her posture remained immaculate, and her parasol resting on her shoulder, unopened.

The translucent blue figure beyond the walls perched itself atop an ancient tall tree far from the walls with Janurana’s form in its sights. Focusing on her, it too failed to notice the smoky wisp following her every move.

The northerner’s wound finally became too much. She collapsed between two lower class homes in a gap barely big enough for a person to walk through without twisting, cursing in the northern tongue for spirits to haunt the whole of the southern plateau, for the warriors who survived the war to fall in the next one, for the Daksinian Light to fade to shadow below Uttaran spears and axes all gave Janurana the cover she didn’t need.

Janurana dropped from above. The noiseless descent of a nebulous shadow. The dim moonlight masked the executioner. Her parasol sat as the ax, but the killing blow was from concealed blades. Two shining implements of death extended and gleamed in her widening maw.

‘I’m so sorry,’ she thought.

Janurana pounced.

All the while, Dhanur stayed at her seat on the same pillow as every night. It practically had her name stained onto it, as the oil from her maintained leather had left its mark. She had laid her head flat on the table as she was oblivious to the world. Her bow and quiver sat beside their master, ready for action like last night. When the Fish Clan had left, Dhanur shut out the world, drifting into her own head. She hadn’t even noticed someone knock over her bow and warily place it back where it was, instead only moving to take another sip or order when her cup emptied. Her mind, however, raced.

‘Couldn’t help the northern girl. Now I wanna help Janurana. Why’d I go to that stupid temple? Just ugh,’ she complained to herself.

‘It isn’t like you knew these things would go badly,’ her inner voice replied.

‘Just wanted to clear my dowsing head and now it’s worse. Stupid little, ugh, Light lost woman.’

‘Oh, please. Assuming you’re speaking of Janurana because why should you be clear about your words, if she’s strong enough to survive Outside stupid isn’t the right word.’

‘Fine. Just…’ Dhanur rolled her head. ‘Annoying then.’

‘Pausing during each sentence? Someone’s having a hard time with their words.’

‘Shut up!’ She screwed her eyes tight and sipped her beer.

‘Yup, keep drinking. That’ll shut me up eventually.’

‘Why the Dark did I even help her?’

‘Sure, sure, you’d sleep great if you left her to a vengeful northerner. You helped for the same reason you paid for that Fish Clan’s drinks and wanted to offer her a place to sleep too. There was nothing you could do there but you can do more for Janurana.’

‘But what if she does work for the gwomoni?’

‘Then they would have killed you earlier, or sent Gehsek to slit your throat while you slept. It seems a tad overly complex to use this girl. I think she’s fine. Didn’t we go over this?’

‘Just, brings up stupid stuff.’ Dhanur pulled a chunk of yeast cake from her beer that had made it through the filter. ‘I dunno.’

‘You do know.’

‘I don’t.’

‘You don’t want to.’

‘That’s not a bad thing!’ She picked up her head and dropped it back onto the table.

‘It kind of is. That’s why you’re here.’

‘Seeing someone… I don’t like being reminded… She does look like Aarushi.’

‘Running from what you endured isn’t helping. It never has.’

“Fine!” Dhanur shouted aloud as she finished her drink in a defiant gulp. The innkeeper fled to the other side of an urn.

‘Agree to not run and then keep on running.’

‘I don’t. Want. To think about her!’

‘You know, a high class woman acting like that shows up looking like Aarushi. Maybe it’s a sign. Maybe you can try again!’

‘No. She’s just a dowsin’ puppet now. Her mind’s gone.’ Dhanur shook her head. ‘Stop changing topics!’

‘I’m just saying maybe the Sun or Spirits or whatever are here for you now. It could be a sign. Maybe her puppet masters are losing their strength. Maybe she’ll stay lucid this time. It can’t hurt to try. The rest of the army still remembers you as one of the best. They’ll let you inside.’

Dhanur started to take another gulp, but her cup was still empty. She tightened her grip and resisted the urge to call for a refill.

***

Lord Hegwous popped his neck as he stretched out the kinks from his day’s sleep. Still covered in his floor length black cloak he blended into the shadows of the night. He looked out of his chamber’s window into the distance, peering past the walls of the city, up to the clouds, and at the swirling violet moon above. The vortex covering its surface was slowing, indicating a new moon was coming.

Gehsek’s armor somehow gleamed in the dim moonlight, contrasting sharply with his lord’s apparel. The commander too still wasn’t sure if that cloak wasn’t just the Lord’s most beloved blanket since his bed was stripped. He dared not ask, instead silently waiting among the piles of messages and records inscribed on clay tablets scattered about. The rest of Hegwous’ chambers weren’t much neater. The Lord had taken the highest tower for his own, which Gehsek thought was a personal slight against him so he’d have to climb so many stairs every night to bring Hegwous his breakfast.

Gehsek placed his Lord’s breakfast on his cluttered work desk and grimaced at the only half drunk goblet he’d brought last time. Gehsek kept the reports of the silent Outside and silvery blue figure to himself rather than burden his Lord.

“Hegwous. You have to eat,” Gehsek said.

“Any news from the north?” The Lord asked as he rolled his shoulders.

“No, sir. It seems them destroying the last bridges across the crags in the Borderlands keeps them from advancing as it does for us. That’s the best I can deduce. We’re still struggling to rebuild the spy networks from Upavid’s death. Doivi has taken over much of their operations, unfortunately and she is less than cooperative and rebuilding the networks Upavid ran is basically out of the question. But our scouts are ranging as best they can and keeping an eye on Vatram and its passage into Uttara.” Rigid and with cape billowing in the wind, Gehsek’s posture put the Lord’s sleepy slouch to shame. “Regardless, I don’t feel we could advance through the jungle without a catastrophic loss to our forces.”

“Deiweb sent back most of their army in the Borderlands. Have we not dealt with their magics and spirits enough?” the Lord asked, sighing. His stretching made useless as stress tensed him up again. He held out his hand and Gehsek quickly gave his lord the cup of diluted blood he had brought.

“Of course,” Gehsek spoke quickly, before Hegwous suggested using Deiweb again. “But even with the Light Ascetics’ help, I doubt we could make much progress. The Uttara’s forest barrier holds the rest of their spirit allies. They would probably be able to withstand another of Deiweb’s Scorchings. There’s only one route through, allowing them to be far more concentrated and mitigating any advantage in numbers as we’d have to struggle through the dense jungle. Getting an army across the gorges and canyons and then through the forest would be too easily seen and too easily cut off. I suggest we focus on consolidating what we already have. Frankly, Hegwous, I fear sending men off. We already send enough men to scout the north and patrol our roads. We’ve already lost too many smaller cities and farm towns in the Scorching. The governors are still furious. Even being away from their cities and warriors, if any of them were to… It would have to be put down quickly. Uttara isn’t going to attack any time soon.”

“Have they begun infighting?”

“Again, my lord. We’re trying without Upavid. I’ve heard rumors of discontent but the Macaque Clan still holds onto power.”

Hegwous scoffed, shaking his head before stroking his gem. “I wish the houses here would be like the north’s clans.”

“My lord?”

“The rulers there can simply raise their forces and fight for supremacy. No scheming. No assassinations, taxation arguments. Simple.” He fidgeted. “The Gwomon won’t like this, having an army that size so close to our capital, even if it is bottled up when they arrive.”

“We’ll be fine, Hegwous. That’s why we have our plan. The northerners will tear each other apart soon enough.”

“We need their ports too, Gehsek. How else are we going to connect with the Gwomon? They’d be here by now if they didn’t have to go by land through the Rivers. And we must mitigate the threat.” Hegwous slouched further still not having taken a sip of his breakfast.

Gehsek placed his hand on the Lord’s shoulder. “We’ll be fine. We can’t do anything yet but neither can they.”

During their discussion both men failed to notice the wisp of smoke lingering in the window until it popped to life. Both leapt back in fright. Gehsek drew his sword as the darkness under the lord’s cape gave the vaguest semblance of legs planted for a battle.

“Pfft ha!” Deiweb held his sides as he laughed.

Gehsek sheathed his sword with a weary sigh as Hegwous smoothed out his cloak like a frightened cat’s tail.

“My lords,” Deiweb began, the corners of his mouth twitching with mirth as he addressed them. “I tracked the woman you mentioned. She’s clearly one of you. She’s fed twice. I believe you’ve been informed of this by your guards, no?”

Lord Hegwous closed his eyes and tried to take a deep breath, but a stifled shriek broke from his lips as he collapsed to the ground, shivering, spilling his goblet.

“My lord??” Gehsek knelt and placed a comforting hand on his shoulder again. “Surely she’s mad from living in the Outside for so long. Surely?”

“Of course,” The lord said breathlessly. “No one would believe one bedraggled, homeless Kumari about anything.” Hegwous forced a pathetic smirk.

“And she seems to be lodging with a warrior.” Deiweb tapped his chin again, looking up coyly, then shrugged. “A dhanur living in the upper portion of the city with clay red hair.”

“Please, don’t toy with me.” The Lord shook as he clasped his chest and dragged his hand down his face.

At the mention of the dhanur, Gehsek narrowed his eyes dangerously and clenched his jaw, the scar on his cheek glinting slightly with his movement.

“No matter,” Hegwous continued. “No matter. We have Aarushi still. Dhanur’s been compensated and should know better than to open her mouth. No one would believe a single word she says with all the time she spends drinking anyways, fame or no fame… She’ll think the Outside has driven the girl mad, they’ll go their separate ways, and we can kill the Malihabar girl once she leaves the city.”

“I wish you luck with that, my lord.” Deiweb hardly contained his mirth. “I’m certain neither of these women have the gift of free will. I’m sure the dhanur with her previous defeat and penchant for honor would never try to help a homeless noble girl who’s clearly fallen from grace and so resembles the lover you hold hostage. I’m positive the noble girl would never seek the assistance of her kind. Perhaps it is best to just leave them be without taking a single precaution.”

“Alright!” Lord Hegwous pressed his bony fingers into his temples, Gehsek nearly cradling him. Deiweb casually looked around, wondering who could be the recipient of the hateful glares from Gehsek. The Lord took in a deep, deep breath. “Alright. That’s fine. In case they come here, purge Malihabar from the records. Switch the guard shifts and place the new hires on public duty. They won’t have history with Dhanur. The loyal guards remain on internal duty.” He struggled to take in a breath and addressed Deiweb specifically, “Once their search is moot they’ll leave, and then kill them.”

“Now that sounds more fun.” Deiweb smirked and bowed once again, extending his hand. “To your health.”

Gehsek scowled at the puff of smoke soon sailing off into the distance. “My lord, why don’t you stay in tonight? I’ll see to your orders. You still have plenty of time before the Gwomon arrive.”

“The new moon isn’t far away, Gehsek,” Hegwous said.