Fahrenn was gorgeous in the first rays of sollight. Sarah had rarely seen the massive city walls from so far away before, and never in the morning like this. Its etched walls of red, impossible to miss in the desert even at night, glowed passion and romance. The silver-lined peaks of her father’s castle were lost within all of that color.

Had it only been two months since she’d been gone? Had it always had such a glow about it? It couldn’t have gained a glow like that in such a short time, and yet from inside the walls that beautiful glow wasn’t so noticeable. She looked across the carriage at Tyr with a smile she didn’t know she was wearing, but which didn’t last very long either. She’d insisted he ride inside for a bit each day, hoping he would recover faster than walking all that time. Tyr was looking at the same red as she was, but he was only looking, nothing more.

He had improved little in two weeks of travel, and Sarah feared that he would never recover. But there had to be hope. Nevyra had said the future was uncertain, but two weeks was hardly any time at all to recover - especially not two weeks of travel. So, she let him rest, and tried not to speak to him so that she wouldn’t remember why she wasn’t speaking to him.

“It’s beautiful,” she said to Guard of Death, whom she’d taken to speaking with despite his silence. Sarah had found him an excellent sounding board, and insightful when he felt like being so.

“It’s meant to be. Monsters fear beauty.”

“I would’ve thought they feared nothing. The most powerful wyverns I’ve seen are not that beautiful.” She shook the image of the Rathalos out of her head. “They’re terrifying.”

“To you, yes. To them, beauty is poisonous and treacherous. Terror is just a form of beauty out in the world, Young Princess.” He nudged the hilt of his axe as he rolled his shoulders back. “Something royalty seldom knows.”

“We are not all the same, you know.”

“No one is.” He grabbed his axe and stopped her with his other hand. “But you all die the same.” A Black Diablos sprung up out of the sands as if on cue, barely thirty meters from them. Sarah, now more than used to the interruptions, turned towards the Plesioth carriage when a second Diablos, this one tan with a single horn, burst through it from below. Tyr’s body was tossed high into the air, and Sarah felt time slow down.

His body looked as small as any of the other carriage pieces, but it didn’t shine in the light like they did. From where she stood, he was just a rumpled form a few dozen feet above an angry Blos. A rock, a pebble, a stone, a dot, a speck could’ve been larger than him and held more life. Soon, like a stone, he would fall and shatter against the Blos’s hammer-like tail, or be skewered by its last horn.

It all happened faster than she expected, reality often did, but the Blos’s screams left her barely able to function beyond her eyesight. Tyr fell, smacked hard against the titan’s crest, and then rolled off to the ground below. In the sand, he stumbled for a moment, ducking almost on cue below a quick backwards kick as the brute wyvern readied its charge. Then, somewhere beyond the echoes of the ringing in her ears and the faint clattering of heavy armor, Sarah swore she could hear Tyr’s blade break the straps that held it in its sheath. The Aptonoths carrying his cart were sprinting away towards the city.

The wyverns barely noticed at first as the swarm of hunters came at them, weapons drawn and swinging for the kill. They were too busy clashing with each other, charging through the sands and tearing at each other’s hides with their tails and horns. Despite how broken he looked, the single-horned Blos was the more fearsome of the two. He slammed the blackened female while Sarah tried to remember all she knew about Diablos and their tendencies. Why they would fight each other instead of the hunters, but before she could remember there was another piercing roar that consumed her very being.

Only Orion and Jaruk seemed unfazed by the roars, while Tyr seemed particularly affected. Tyr was also obviously a shadow of himself. His attacks bounced off the thick hides of the Diablos, and he was much slower than the other hunters when it came to reaction times to dodge or attack. Sarah knew that most of it had to be his condition, but at least some was the desert. The Firias Desert wasn’t easy to hunt in, or so she’d been told. In fact, Tyr would’ve been killed if it hadn’t been for the others - that much was obvious, even to her.

Sarah was never certain why the wyverns never seemed to notice her. Maybe she just wasn’t enough of a threat to them. Maybe she was simply too far away. It was likeliest, she thought, that they were too occupied with the fight to notice something so far away. Carefully and slowly, she pulled back an imaginary bowstring and aimed for the black beast in the distance. “Know your distance. Know your target. Know you’ll hit.” She let the imaginary arrow fly, but couldn’t picture it hitting the Diablos, even as it flinched from one too many blows to the head.

Tails, blades, and bodies swung through the flurry of flung sand and blood, making it nearly impossible to see anything below the wyverns’ wings. It was like watching a parade coming through the streets from her room. She knew that below the impressive displays there were people moving and operating levers and buttons, but she could never see them. The only difference here was the tightening in her stomach at every human shout, and the all-consuming roars which rooted her to her spot.

Then, the darker Blos disappeared, and a trail of sand flew up as it raced off into the distance. Some of the haze drifted away with the disappearance of the large beast, but only enough that she could now make out a crumpled black figure on the ground. Although there’d been a few battles along the road, and many of them had been intense, never before had Sarah seen someone actually fall. She stepped forward, trying to recognize the downed guardsman. Before she knew it, she was kneeling next to the body to pull away the helmet. It was Orion, and he was still alive.

“Where are your potions?”

“P… pouch. Side.” He coughed a bit of blood, spattering Sarah’s dress. Sarah, more deftly than she realized, flipped open the small side pouch and grabbed two vials with a thick, green liquid inside. She forced him to swallow, and the moment the potion hit his stomach, Orion’s whole body was revitalized. Sarah did the same with the second vial, and before she could even close his pouch, Orion was sitting up on his own. “Thank you,” he said lowly, reaching for his dual blades. “You’re better than the Felyne Rescue Squad.”

Whether or not he meant it, it made Sarah happy to be of some use. She helped him to his feet and turned just in time to see the single-horned Diablos let loose a cry of rage and despair. Orion was on his feet and in front of her almost as quickly as the potion had worked. There was a disquieting comfort in knowing that so many people would throw themselves in front of a charging wyvern for her. Even as she thought about this, those same hunters brought down the devil-like Diablos, and Orion visibly relaxed.

Sarah took off across the sands to find Tyr. She had to make sure he wasn’t dying, or actually dead. To her relief, he was being clapped on the back by Molin and Jaruk. He’d done well in his condition, but his clothes were in tatters and he was bleeding from several large gashes. Everyone but Guard of Death seemed in good spirits, except Tyr. He had on that same blank expression he’d had since Nifila. Jaruk handed Tyr a few potions as she came closer.

“Nice work. Broken Man, wasn’t it? You ever fought one of those before?”

“Never,” Tyr replied, gulping down the potions one at a time. “Was that a Monoblos or Diablos?”

“Diablos. Both of them.” Orion cut in and, after one look at the scattered shards of the carriage, sighed. “I guess we’d better gather what we can salvage and run home. If we’re quick, we can make it home before nightfall. That means you lot!” There were no questions asked, or objections given. The guards set to work while Sarah tended to Tyr.

As she looked around for something clean to wipe the blood away, Sarah knew that the potions were already stemming the blood flow to his injured areas and boosting his physical strength back to normal. His body would heal to near perfection whether or not the blood was wiped away, but she didn’t want to risk infection with his weakened chakra. By the time she gave up and ripped off a few centimeters of her knee-length skirt, the blood had already clotted thickly.

Carefully, she dabbed away the blood and made sure that he got new clothes from the wreckage. It wasn’t much besides a vest and a new pair of blue pants, but it was much better for everyone than the scraps he’d been left with. Then they were off, jogging across the desert together towards her home. She, of course, wasn’t allowed to carry anything, but there wasn’t much to carry anyways.

They had to stop and rest far more often than anyone would’ve liked to allow Sarah to catch her breath, or for Tyr to do the same. Every step that brought her closer to home was also one the group had to worry about. All they could to do was outrun the sudden eruptions of crustaceans or wyverns if they were going to make it back alive. Without the rest of their supplies there was a slim chance more than half of them would make it through the ice-cold desert night and the nocturnal beasts that thrived in that cold.

Even though she could barely keep running without panting, the silence of footstep after footstep in the sand got to Sarah. On their next rest break, she asked if there was anything they could do to fix the problem, and the guardsmen readily agreed there was.

“It’s not something you’ll be able to fully appreciate,” Orion said to her before they began jogging again. “But it’ll be noise, at least.”

“Hunting monsters day and night,” the Captain called out, each syllable landing on a footfall.

“No one else would have the might.” The guards all responded in unison, and Sarah would’ve laughed if she hadn’t needed the breath to keep herself going.

“Serve me up some Daimyo.”

“When we’re done we’ll get some mo’.”

“Nothing like a capture quest.”

“’Cept going home to get some rest.”

They volleyed this way for so long that Sarah didn’t notice how tired she was until she nearly collapsed from the fatigue. Tyr, directly beside her, managed to grab her arm before she could go too far down. “We should give their voices a rest,” he said.

She leaned against him for support before she knew what she was doing. “Yeah.” So close to him, she noticed for the first time just how muscular he really was. For someone of his size and physique, Sarah would have only expected him to be toned, not quite so strong. Every inch of his chest and arms was firm to the touch, and yet he gripped her so softly that she wouldn’t have known otherwise. She was so entranced that she forgot to pull away.

“Princess,” the Captain coughed.

Startled to the point of a blush, Sarah backed away from Tyr so fast that she stumbled and nearly fell again. She caught herself this time, and bowed her head. “Right, I think I’m better now. We should continue.”

Because Fahrenn was so large, it never seemed to get any closer, even as Sol flew across the sky. It was only a few hours till solset, and the city covered most of their forward view, but they still couldn’t make out the main gates. Luckily, the chanting was keeping everyone in high spirits, and the only wyvern threats they’d seen were at a distance easily avoided. Sarah’s muscles ached, but she pushed through so she wouldn’t slow them down even further.

As day turned to evening, and Sol burned an even deeper red than it had at dawn, the entire world burned. The walls, the sand, everything without a color strong enough to keep became crimson. They were more than an hour from the gate though, and temperatures were rapidly falling. When they stopped to rest, Sarah shivered and Tyr hugged her unexpectedly. He was warm despite how thinly dressed he was.

“Wh-what are you doing?” she asked, flushing and trying to pull away despite the comforting embrace.

“You need warmth. None of them can help with their armor on.” This seemed reasonable enough. “Besides, I’m cold too. We’re helping each other.” Sarah would’ve never guessed, there against him, that he could even feel the cold, but she believed he wouldn’t lie to her either. So, she nestled herself a bit closer and every guard watched Tyr like a hawk to make sure his intentions were pure. Some of them were more than happy to have an excuse to watch the princess anyways, but all tightened their fists whenever Tyr tightened his hold.

For the next hour, they continued this way. All anyone had was cool drinks since their supply of hot drinks had been lost in the attack. So, as much as anyone would’ve loved to give the Princess an excuse to stay away from Tyr, they had none, and the gate was just one more jog away now.

“Home is so close now,” she whispered to herself, forgetting about Tyr’s proximity for a second. “Everything I left behind…”

“I can’t imagine how you must feel,” Tyr whispered back in her ear. Sarah nearly leapt out of her skin.

When she regained herself, something which took a bit longer than she would’ve liked, she said “I’m sorry. I didn’t even think of… I’m sorry.” Hoping no one would see her, Sarah turned her head and bit her lower lip. There was a lot more waiting at home than her father and her old life.

“I’d like to say there was something to forgive, but it’s okay.” There was a hint of warmth behind his words, or maybe she was just imagining it, but Sarah wished the words meant something more than they ever could. There was a roar, so loud that Sarah shuddered from its echoing through her soul. The Black Blos was back.

Sarah didn’t see it, but could hear the stomping behind them. She was still paralyzed, and now she was going to die without even facing her killer. When her feet left the ground she felt no pain, and couldn’t see a thing besides the inside of her eyelids. Was her death really so instant that she hadn’t felt it? Then she felt the world flip and heard the sounds of metal on carapace behind her. There was also an odd pressure behind her knees that was keeping her feet from the ground. It was Tyr. He had her in his arms and was watching the battle intently. They were so close that she felt the rush of wind from the Blos’s tail swipes. Tyr never flinched, and rarely blinked.

She couldn’t help but study his face as he watched the fight. There was so little there to gauge emotion through, but somewhere behind those eyes of blue and hazel there were shards of his former hunter’s spirit desperate to get out. How she recognized them as such was anyone’s guess. Even when the Blos screamed again, Tyr didn’t drop her. The pain in his head was excruciating at that volume and distance, but he didn’t cover his ears even as his knees buckled.

However much of a surprise the Blos may have given them, it was still weakened from earlier in the day. The guards were weary, at a loss for stamina in the icy desert night, but sheer numbers and the ability to switch out members made up for their lack of staying power. After a short while, the darkened Diablos fell into a heap, and Guard of Death lit a signal for the Guild balloons once more. As he did, Sarah found herself on her feet. “Sorry to grab you like that. There was no other way to save you.”

‘It’s fine,” she said, rubbing a bit of heat back into her legs. “We’re close to home now. Well done everyone!”

At the gates to the city, Orion knocked loudly, presented a few forms, and they were allowed inside through one of the smaller doors built into the main entrance. Inside the walls it was bright with glowlamps hung in the streets. There were people everywhere, still conducting business, and some just starting their day. Nighttime here was so vastly different than night in Nifila where the town went quietly to sleep with Sol, and woke with it too. Sarah breathed in the mix of desert spices, tanned hides, and sand, and felt all of her weariness drown in a sea of familiarity.

No one recognized her, which was a bit off-putting, but when she remembered her state of dress and the missing carriage, the surprise was all but gone. Of course no one thought that she was herself. She didn’t look like a princess at all, even if her face was the same. Rather self-aware, she pulled the hem of her skirt down as best she could and hid amidst the guards on the trip back to the castle. People cheered and hollered at the guards, excited by their return, but perplexed as to who this new couple was they were guarding.

At the castle, Sarah’s sister and father were waiting for her. King of Fahrenn was an impressive man who could’ve easily passed for a Wyverian if it weren’t for his round ears. His hair was darker than both of his daughters’, and so was his skin. Her sister, who introduced herself as Stunning Princess, seemed enthused to be reunited with her sibling, and even moreso about Tyr.

“My, my, little sister. Short skirts and scantily clad personal servants? What did that village do to you?” She winked at Sarah and led her inside. “Father, I’ve got to get this one inside and away from prying eyes.” Before anyone could object, they were out of sight.

“My daughters,” King of Fahrenn sighed. “So, who is this? I don’t remember my daughter mentioning a new servant, needed as he might have been out there.”

“He is Broken Man, King, a former hunter from Nifila who has come here to begin a new life. Your daughter has suggested that he be let into the guard so that he might make a better life for himself and protect your family in the process.” Tyr eyed the Captain as he spoke. He’d left out much, but he’d also said just enough.

“Broken Man?” He sounded skeptical. “How exactly did he come across a title like that as a hunter?”

“His chakra was broken, King.”

“Broken?” he asked loudly. Apparently, he was above formality in his own castle.

“By a silver Rathalos,” Tyr said, catching almost every guard off-guard. “I’d never fought something so strong before. I was angry and attacked when I should have run.”

“I see.” King of Fahrenn stepped forward and placed a hand on Tyr’s shoulder. “I’m sorry Broken Man, but I thank you for your honesty. You’ve a place in the guard if you need it. My daughter’s recommendation, as silent as it might have been, is good enough for me.”

Down the halls and in a locked chamber, Sarah was preparing for a bath while her sister lay with her hair falling off the side of Sarah’s bed. “You can’t possibly expect me to believe that you don’t have something going on with him. He’s gorgeous. And you say he’s a hunter too?” Stunning Princess had always been predictable. A month away and the first thing on her mind was a pretty face.

“Tyr has fallen on rough times. I took it upon myself to help him because I can. Isn’t that what father has taught us to do?”

“Tyr?” her sister asked, rising up from the bed with a new enthusiasm. Sarah winced at her carelessness. “That can’t be his title. What would that even mean? That means that…” Her face broke into a grin and she laughed. “You call him by his name!”

“He insisted on it,” Sarah said, adding quickly. “And he never really gave me a title. Everyone called him by his name.”

“Of course, of course,” Stunning Princess said, and Sarah knew that she had fooled no one, “but you can’t tell me you haven’t noticed him, at least. A blind Elder Dragon could fall for a body like that.”

Sarah slid into the ornate purecrystal tub and sighed in relief at the hot water around her tired limbs. “Aren’t all hunters that way, Adaline? You should marry one if you’ve such a liking for them.”

“Maybe I’ll steal Tyr away then, since you’ve no claim on him,” she teased.

“How could I?” Sarah whispered to the water, submerging herself up to her neck before her sister entered abruptly. “If that’s what you both want, I’m sure that Tyr would make a fine husband.” This time she was louder, clearer, hoping Adaline hadn’t caught her previous comment.

“This game isn’t any fun if you don’t play along, Sarah.” Adaline knelt next to the tub with a frown. “But I suppose you don’t have to worry about who you want to marry, do you?”

Closing her eyes, Sarah slid down fully into the bath and tousled her own hair, removing all the sand and accumulated grime. She didn’t want to think about her own marriage, especially not after a day like the one she’d had. When she surfaced, Adaline was still waiting for an answer. “Yes. He’s attractive. Is that better?”

“Incalculably. Now, I want all of the details on your trip, and don’t you dare skimp out on anything involving him.”

If either of the girls had bothered to look out the window, they might’ve seen Tyr passing below with the other guards on their way back to their base. Guard of Death, as was his custom, had gone off to report their trip’s kills to the Guild on his own, and Tyr somehow knew the barracks wouldn’t be his first stop, no matter how much his body wanted sleep.

“You need to be inducted and initiated before you can even step foot in our base,” Orion explained. “The trick is, the Commander is the only one who knows what the initiation is going to be for each person. Some people say she makes everyone’s up on the spot, but it’s never failed to find good guards and keep out the bad ones. It also keeps recruits lined up at the door, I’ll tell you that. Young and old, people are curious.”

Tyr stopped short of the door as the other’s entered, though Jaruk and Molin stopped with him to wait.

“You’re gonna be fine,” Molin said with a short nod. “The way you took down that Los when we first met? You’re a shoe-in.”

“I didn’t do it alone,” Tyr said.

“Not alone, no, but we did mention your capabilities in our report when we returned.”

Tyr didn’t know what else to say to them, so he busied himself with studying his surroundings. An old habit, but one that had saved his life more times than he could count. The guard base was elevated above most of the city, and his view stretched out to include the almost endless desert that surrounded them. Everywhere in the city there were lights and smells and sounds, but beyond the wall there was silence and stillness. Though he tried, he couldn’t tell the difference between what might have been a wyvern or some large cactus like the ones he’d seen on their trip. The red of the city, soft in the moonlight, only furthered the dichotomy between civilization and the brutal world they all called home.

Molin and Jaruk had been saying something, but Tyr only noticed it when they both suddenly stopped.

“You Broken Man?” At first, it was nothing more than a rough female voice, but as Tyr followed Molin and Jaruk’s eyes downwards he saw a Melynx with granite whiskers. Tyr was with-it enough to nod, but nothing more. “They woke me in the middle of the night for a half-dressed, fully silent stick in the mud without the chakra to face down a drome, much less a real wyvern?”

“I can fight.”

“Right.” The Commander took one look at the other guards and, without so much as a word, they both saluted and hurried off. “Look, I don’t care if the princess personally recommended you and the King offered you a position in my guard. I don’t care that you saved those two from Confident Twin’s ego. I don’t even care about whatever it is that brought you here This isn’t your village. Here, things turn black. Sol burns everything, darkening hides and hardening souls. You don’t go out there and hunt. You’re the hunted.”

“They hunt people everywhere,” Tyr said, quietly.

“Yeah, but out here they’re bigger and badder than anywhere else. A Black Blos will gore you in a second without any warning. Black Tigrexes come raging through minor sandstorms to take out entire caravans. Every now and then a Black Grav will hunker down from the volcano and blast away a chunk of the city wall. And on one of the islands out there,” the Commander gestured out to the rather distant glistening of the sea to the south. “There’re legends that an ancient elder dragon called the Raviente sleeps beneath the sands.”

Excitement. Fear. Curiosity. He felt none of them, and in their absence he had only that infinite emptiness. It was like listening to someone rattle off ingredients to his breakfast instead of describing wyverns he’d never seen. “What does that mean for me?”

Whatever else she was, the Commander was unfazed by Tyr being unfazed. “It means that until you prove yourself to me, you’re gonna be scrubbing the barracks and doing recon work. You will wear Battle armor every second of every day. If I ever see you out of it, I’ll personally show you why they all salute when I walk by. If you earn your Dark Metal equipment, then maybe you can go out on a real hunt for the kingdom and earn yourself some real armor.”

“And weapons? Do I get issued a blade, or can I keep my own?”

“You can keep your own if you like, or take some of the greenhorn equipment from the barracks. Just make sure you don’t lose whatever you take, and don’t be surprised if someone else has it tomorrow.”

“I’ll use my own.”

The Commander grunted and turned away. “Go ahead, recruit. Go get yourself outfitted in your gear and report to the barracks for some sleep. From here on out, I’m ‘Yes, Commander’ to you, and nothing else. Got it?”

Tyr wished he could be sad or jealous, or whatever he was supposed to be at the Commander’s arrogance. He couldn’t emote that desire though, could barely feel the urges except for an inkling in the bottom of his stomach, and that was assuming it wasn’t just the hunger. “Yes, Commander. I do.”

“Good, then get going.” Tyr stood for a moment, unsure of where anything was. As if on cue, the Commander called from inside, “To your left, third building on the right. Don’t make me tell you again.”

Tyr found the barracks without a problem, and when he entered to see over a dozen half-dressed men and women he shut his eyes. He wasn’t embarrassed – he wasn’t really anything – but he knew he was supposed to close them all the same. If letting others see your undergarments was no longer an issue in the city, adjusting was going to be more difficult than he’d already assumed. Climbing Captain, apparently having just returned from the baths, clapped him on the back and chuckled at his emotionless face.

“You can’t keep them shut forever, you know.”

“You underestimate me.”

Orion laughed, and pushed him forward. Tyr’s eyes opened automatically so he could catch himself, and found himself face to chest with a rather tall, busty, and noticeably shirtless Wyverian woman.

“Hey,” she said. “You’re the one they picked up with the princess, right? The one who saved the Twins?” Tyr focused all of his attention above eye level.

“Tyr.”

“Motherly Guard,” she said, more kindly when she looked at his eyes. “You’re not well. Are you sure you’re ready for your training tomorrow?”

“Is it supposed to be hard?” His flat tone couldn’t possibly convey what he was still failing to feel.

“Your first training will be against the Rhennox,” Molin replied.

“I’ve never heard of it. Is it a local species?” Tyr asked.

The guards all laughed. “You could say that. Ever heard of the Rhenoplos, New Guard?” Another new title. Something he knew he didn’t like, and yet nothing. When he shook his head, they laughed again. “Well, you’ll find out tomorrow. Here’s a tip for you, don’t get hit.”

“What sort of advice is that?” Jaruk asked with a grin.

“That’s professional advice,” his compatriot answered.

Motherly Guard sighed and put a hand to her forehead. “Boys will be boys, eh? You just get some rest and try to feel better.”

“I don’t know if I can sleep just yet.” Tired as he was, Tyr couldn’t sleep so close to so many people. He’d have to be truly exhausted to fall asleep here. “Am I allowed to walk around the city?”

“Really? Almost everyone else hit the bunk as soon as they got in. Yeah though; you want some company? A guide maybe?” Motherly Guard asked.

“I’ll be fine by myself. Thanks.”

Tyr didn’t make it very far on his walk. He found a quiet place between buildings and sat down to clear his head. There were only a few things he’d ever wanted in his life, and the past few weeks had brought him so far away from all of them that he wasn’t sure if he could ever achieve any now.

He wanted sadness, he knew that much. There should have been more of it in the darkened alley, full of tiny cracks and scars formed over years of the desert’s abuse. He should have wanted revenge, or pity, or comfort from these strange city lights and these foreign people who surrounded him. Instead, there was only a longing for that longing, and nothing more. It was wrong in his mind, and wrong in what was left of his soul, but not enough to make a physical difference.

His broken chakra was something he’d have to get used to. Fighting had been more effort than he’d ever remembered it being. He could barely swing his katana at times, and he could forget about actually channeling any power into it. Even when he’d been young that skill had come so naturally to him that he’d never known the difficulty most hunters must have faced when picking up the art of the longsword. He’d been born to use the katana, and now he’d lost everything but the memories.

Where were his emotions? He’d asked himself that question every day since he’d woken up, and still he didn’t know. They had to be out there in the world somewhere, he just couldn’t access them. Some part of him imagined that was where wyverns got their rage from, some place that stored lost or unfelt emotions, but such ideas were foolish. Everything had its own emotions, except for him.

“There you are,” a vaguely familiar voice interrupted his musings. Adaline sat down beside him in what Tyr could only describe as a thin dress without looking too closely. “I went looking for you at the barracks and they said you’d gone out. I didn’t think I’d actually find you.”

Befuddlement wasn’t an emotion, and Tyr only knew that because he could still experience it. “Why were you looking for me?”

“If you’d prefer the reason that I gave the guards, I’m officially here to thank you for protecting my sister and welcome you to the city.” She gave him a coy smile and a wink. “Truthfully though, I’m here to get to know you.”

“Why the interest?”

“Sarah hasn’t ever brought such a handsome and talented hunter home with her before.” Adaline scooted herself closer and leaned against him. “It makes me terribly curious.”

Instead of moving away like he’d thought he would, Tyr sighed and put his head back against the wall. “Alright. Ask away.”

“What weapon do you use?”

“Longsword. The Katana class, specifically.”

“How long have you been hunting?”

“Almost twenty years now.”

She whipped herself around with surprising speed, straddling Tyr. His eyes were instantly open. “Do you find me attractive?” This close, it was far more obvious that the purple dress was thin enough to give an appreciative look on the princess’ undergarments and her slender figure. She was amply curved and had dressed to accentuate all of her best features. All this he soaked up in the instant before he turned his head away. “Is that a no?”

“What is the problem with you people?” Tyr countered.

“Excuse me?”

“Everyone I’ve met in this city, you flaunt about as you please without regard for modesty the moment Sol goes down.” He did his best to sound bitter, or sad, thinking one would be right. Neither came through, and he wasn’t certain which would have been more right. “A bit of mystery goes a long way.”

“There’s always mystery with me,” Adaline said and gently kissed his cheek. “Don’t you ever forget that.” She was up on her feet before he knew she was moving. “I like you, Tyr. You’re honest and easy on the eye. We’ll see each other again soon.”

For a while, he just sat. Sarah must have told her his name, he reasoned, but she’d said it with none of the same hesitancy of her sister. She was quick enough to take him surprise, though he imagined that a Kut Ku could have done the same thing at that moment. Had she really gone to the guards in that outfit to ask after him? He couldn’t guess, but the only other possibility seemed improbable at best. He would have noticed a charm.

From the shadows just beyond Tyr’s contemplation, Adaline watched him for several minutes before heading off home. She’d gotten what she came for, and made up her mind about a few things that Sarah hadn’t mentioned. “One day the world will know his name,” she whispered to herself as she slipped back into her room, “and when people tell the stories, I’ll be the one beside him.”