_______

Head spinning with exhaustion, Davir darted between overturned tables strewn across the floor, boots crunching glass and brittle wood, through the thick coat of smoke choking the tavern. Heron led the way, his elbow obstructing his nostrils.

They pushed past the tumult that had erupted: patrons rushing out of the establishment, and the holders scrambling undertow to quench fires sparking from falling lanterns with whips of blankets and water spills.

As soon as he stepped onto the outside cobbles, Davir aimed for the first abandoned horse he set his gaze on. An agitated dark mare tethered to a lantern post across the street.

Heron followed in silent agreement, mounting and claiming the reins in an agile turn of the knotted leather threads around his palm.

A hand caressing the mare's flank, Heron persuaded her into a trot, breaking into a gallop before the owner caught on the theft. He rode. Out of the borough, and back on their trail to the tavern, straining his arm muscles as much as he asked from the reluctant mare.

Once in the forest, the gallops cadence waned into a trot. The sound of his breath came to Davir's ears faintly. Around, no sign of the riparian to reclaim the mare. The plummeting rush seemed to finally allow unpleasant thoughts to permeate.

"She served in the royal domain for three seasons," Heron said. "She told me her family is waiting for her in the region of Tholos."

The heir's words were like a forced attempt to make sense of the nurse's treason.

"Perhaps," Davir commented, "or the attack is the completion of a conspiracy from within the royal domain. It means, this far, the threat to the monarchy has been severely underestimated. If you expect for an answer from the traitor, she could have you decapitated first, I'm afraid."

If the nurse's treason was indication of the schemes of the capital's rebellion, major threats to the heir's health awaited. Worse, they were so unpredictable, they had the stamp of approval of the ruling council to reside within the barricade of the royal domain.

If the nurse's failed attempt was a good reference, it seemed killing the heir within the monarchy's siege was ruled out, whether because the risk of failure or because the rebellion couldn't claim the heir's death without a dead body to account for it.

"The mines at the Malay borders are strictly secured by armed guards," Heron said, "There shouldn't be stoneflingers among the rebels. Unless the miners in the border are supplying the minerals without the mining chiefs noticing it."

Davir wondered if it was voluntary that he avoided the evidence. If the thought of nobles aiding the rebels organize was unbearable for him.

"I'm incompetent on the subject," Davir admitted. The worse thing about existing with a fragmented mind was that some memories where easily accessible, while others were locked away from his grasp.

Davir could locate the Malay border up north, but the mining activity developed there was a foreign concept to him.

"In case there mining chiefs are involved," Heron added with hesitation, "the ruling council must be informed as soon as possible. But both my father and master think I am asleep in my chambers right now. Of all people, I should be the last to know."

"I am already acting against the orders of the guard to keep you within the ramparts. Being unable to tell where I was a week ago delegitimizes my word in front of the ruling council," Davir said. "I'll end up being both the whistleblower and the culprit, in case Lord is suggesting I denounce a potential treason of mining chiefs."

Davir refused to be the heir's patsy. If he had ties with the rebellion prior to his week in the royal domain, the heir and the ruling council would be the last to know. His survival depended on keeping utmost discretion.

"Weigh the stakes carefully," Davir said, "primes what you fear the most. Keeping appearances or preventing a threat to the monarchy."

Feeling Heron's hands quaking, Davir claimed the reins.

From the final portion of the Ceri valley - where vegetation became sparser, pines conceding terrain to head-tall shrubs of robust branches - the edifices of the royal domain appeared as lights floating in a dark sky.

In the air, a faint fetid smell lingered above the shrubs, intensifying as the trot progressed. Among the tangle of knots of the rein's handles, Davir's hands stirred involuntarily. As if his body had perceived fear his mind could not catch on yet.

Ten paces ahead, the pungent grew in intensity. Its density in the air became palpable. Like it rained foul-smelling particles, depositing bitterness in the mouth.

Somehow, the air chilled, the stir of his hands spreading up his arms. Tangible fear took over.

Davir felt the vessel in his chest open again. This time he could stare directly at its darkness and bottomless depth. It threatened to swallow him whole.

Panicked, he attempted to shut it with a long inhale but the pit remained open. It had gained a life of its own and spilled energy erratically. Dark veins appeared and vanished in flashes on his face, each time painful like an ephemeral wound.

He clutched the reins tighter. Clenched his jaw. Gritted his teeth. Anchored himself tighter on his horse. Still, he was shaking.

A rush of wind painfully escaped him, wafting across the surface of the shrubs lining the road. He froze, eyes wide. Because he knew.

"What is happening?" Heron questioned.

Even the horse refused to advance. Davir knew. Five trots ahead, lay the source of the putrid smell: a fresh corpse.

His attempt to swallow down the fear failed. He dismounted the horse, Heron stalking behind him after securing the horse to the nearest tree.

He cracked through twigs, digging into the shrubs. Eyes scanning for the empty pile of flesh stripped of all trace of soul.

A pale leg stuck out in the darkness, blue at the articulations uncovered by a torn green dress, scratched and bruised where it crossed sharp branches. Then a limp arm. Her hair was a shredded dark blanket whose threads were tangled with the shrub's intricacies. The eyes were white, turned up and the mouth frozen into a shout of terror. The flesh was unharmed, there was no blood spilled, but the body was hollow and empty from the inside. And she smelled awfully like death.

"Ancients have her soul," Heron said, then muttered a prayer with a trembling timbre. "How did you know?"

"I —," Davir huffed. How did he know? He shook his head. His vessel was shrinking, swallowing all the raw energy it had released. He was left to the weakness of his limbs, the dullness of his senses. He'd found himself disarmed to resist against the pull leading him to the corpse. Still, strangely, Davir ached to reach inside the vessel again. For reassurance? "We should leave."

"You're out of your wits," Heron pushed past Davir, getting a long and silent sight of the body. "We cannot leave her here. But first, you must come clean about what you know."

"I spent the night following you, as you rebelled in the city if I should remind you of my innocence."

"Be careful with your tone," Heron warned, dark eyes made darker by the faint light. "I will get Master Salmior. It's useless to flee. If you're not here at my return, I'll charge myself to send guards hunt for you in the three regions and execute you with a blade of Balkan in front of the court of Ceres."

Davir considered his options and reached the conclusion easily. He'd rather be cornered between a dead body and a clergyman and his pupil, than a dead body and the Nation's guard. Granted, the former could lead to the latter, but he reckoned killing the heir there wouldn't do him any good either.

"You have my word," he said.

Heron mounted the horse and climbed the final slope to the high lands.

______

He pushed the mare to its limits, galloping up the slight slope leading to the top of the highlands.

He flashed to the image of Davir's pale grey eyes clouding into a bottomless black. The feline-like agility as he impaled the rebels in the tavern. He'd attacked callously, killed without hesitation.

In his attempt to understand Davir's nature, Heron had left all his assigned historical and cultural readings pile up.

He'd read through all possible diseases that could render a person immune to cold. The answers he'd gathered were partial. The questions he was handed were ever more complex. He'd been awfully off track.

The guard's origin remitted something far sinister.

And now, underneath all the uncertainty, his mother's voice screamed too. Heron felt his body constrict at the thought. It had never been a lung disease. She had been murdered. By rebels. Within the walls of the royal domain. He was next.

The Ancients meant for him to rule. But how was he meant to govern a people that despised him? The world was spinning around him, his thoughts were caught up in a tangle of fear of all the unknown. And Heron was struggling to keep his grip firm.

At his arrival, Heron didn't miss the surprise of the guards keeping the western entrance of the domain. It took the soldiers atop the barricade several inspections before the door screeched open, his passage urging bows from the soldiers he brushed past.

He galloped straight to the western palace and mounted to the third floor. He knocked on Master Salmior's chambers door. Salmior opened the door at his fourth knock. The old man's unwelcoming stare seemed to crawl on Heron's skin.

"Lord," Salmior said, his face creased with surprise, "come in, please."

The clergyman strolled along the dark carpet stretched neatly on the floor. Heron followed, rehearsing what he had to say in his head as he gazed around the room.

High up, at the spots where there had been windows in the past were blocks of rocks bunched up so tightly it was impossible for sunlight to touch the carpet.

As a traditional man, Master Salmior despised the burning of white crystal dust. A single fire-lit candle clung to the wall, illuminating the dim chamber with a faint spot of light, so close to shelves saturated with books, it caused Heron's skin to tingle with angst.

Master Salmior already wore his religious dark robe for the morning prayers in the main chapel of the domain, but he appeared to be in no rush.

"You're fortunate I'm late for the prayers. But I need to be with the other clergymen right afterward to lead the mass." The master flumped on an armchair and exhaled. "What brings you here, Heron dear?"

Heron steeled himself and explained everything. Stuttering, and breaking off when he needed time to gather his thoughts. But he said everything. About the tavern, about Amyra and the body in the forest trail. But words to describe his discovery about Servyna's death escaped him.

The old man listened, his face twisting into a grimace always uglier than the latter. When Heron finished, Master Salmior stood, appearing as tired as Heron was.

"Spirits, mercy," he sighed. "I swear I'm not young enough for all of this," he said. "Ron, dear, if I ever resign my position in the clergy, you'll know whose fault that is. The Ancients are my witness." He shut books spread above his desk, then scoured his drawers to his drawers to find cords and a dark blanket which he handed Heron. "Lead me there."

Salmior rushed Heron outside the chamber as he crumpled the blanket into a ball in his hands. Heron conducted Master Salmior to the stalls where they took a chariot. The old man drove into the forest, following Heron's lead.

Davir was there, in a characteristic guard stance, legs slightly parted, hands tacked behind his back and head held up-high. Master Salmior eyed him for a long time, without saying a word before turning to Heron.

"Where is the body?"

Heron gestured to the bushes. When the master first looked at the fresh corpse, he stifled a gasp, his strongest fist traveling to his chest as he muttered a prayer. "Ancients have her soul," he said, then gestured to Heron. "Stay back, Lord."

Davir joined the master to fetch the corpse, incredibly agile and precise in breaking through the right branches to free the limbs. Master Salmior stepped back and watched him finish the work and transport the body to the chariot, devoting his full attention to him.

Heron wondered if Master Salmior suspected it too. If he knew of the potential ties Davir had with the supernatural arts.

On the ride back to the domain, Heron shared the wagon with Davir, who alternated his clear gaze between the body rolled beneath folds of blankets and Heron.

Davir carried the body to the clergyman's chamber, then was coldly dismissed.

Pupil and master were alone.

"The rules exist for a reason," Master Salmior said. "You can't be such a fool to only realize that with a blade to your neck in a forsaken city tavern. I shouldn't have to remind you that you have a responsibility toward the Ceri. Getting enlisted to the guard with honors end of this Drought — you missed military school because of your mental frailty. You should at least show more interest to compensate for that fact. You are expected to be Warlord." He sighed." Ancients, we are doomed."

He shook his head, then spoke with a calmer, more lamenting tone. "None of your duties include leaving the domain with servants, fighting revolutionaries in the night." The master scanned the body on the ground as if to make sure it was real. "Finding dead bodies. . .I will be optimistic enough to hope you understand finally," he sighed.

Master Salmior spent a long moment lost in his thoughts before he spoke again, "Perhaps we have protected you more than we should, Lord. It seems natural that you cannot take your responsibilities with due seriousness when you have never seen the devastation of violence. You must forgive me for it, my Lord, but you cannot even honor your mother's death."

"You're being extremely unfair to me," Heron protested. "I hurt every day. I won't allow you to say that to me." He ached to say that he knew. She hadn't been sick. I know they rebels killed her. The court had failed to protect her.

"That's so?" Master Salmior said. "Then it's a pity you don't do nearly enough to honor her memory," he said.

Heron gritted his molars, his eyes burned. His jaw was trembling. He pushed back the tears. He never thought he would ever despise his master.

"I will help you," Salmior announced, "I will take care of the body. For one reason: to keep your father from getting to the bottom of what happened in the city. I am not acting out of altruism towards you. I didn't instruct the heir for ten years for you to be dishonored just one season before your enlistment and crowning as a prince. My reputation as your Master is at stake too." Salmior grew reflective. "My guards will report the nurse's treason to the crown. Lady Zuna has a lot of explaining to do about her nurses."

"And the illegal stoneflingers?"

The realization struck Salmior. "Right." In his agitation, he tucked his hands behind his back and walked in circles, muttering things to himself.

"The only thing I can do for now is send men to investigate the mining chiefs in the Malay border. Brigadier Kerm in the city will take care of the illegal wielders there. If the king and the Guard consent, the Nocturnal Guard will be patrolling around the domain starting tomorrow."

He was pensive for a while, as if he considered carefully his next words. "Something I planned to mention later, but since you are here. The Owiny have chosen one of the daughters of their royal family. The news came from your father yesterday at night. I'm certain you don't want any of this, but when your father calls you to announce the news, you'll behave properly for once, please."

Heron nodded. "Of course."

Salmior nudged Heron's shoulders with forced cheer. "Elana yma i," he said her name as if he was tasting honey on his tongue. "A beautiful young woman, you will see. She will be here in three days. You should go rest now, Lord."

Heron didn't go to sleep. He read the Onus of Healing, in search of a clue about Davir, unsuccessfully still. He ended up reading his mother's bibliographies instead.

All the authors agreed on the cause of her death: lung disease caused by long exposition to cold winds during the last storm. She had died as a heroine, as she had left her chambers to fetch one of her servants who hadn't found refuge before the doors of the palaces had closed during The Chill.

Said servant had survived, despite her old age and having been exposed to the cold winds longer than Servyna. Her infection was contagious. Thus, Heron never had the right to visit her during her supposed illness. But his father, who reported her state to Heron every night hadn't catch said infection.

Heron paced around his room, trying to make sense of the situation, of the sorrow and betrayal. Eventually, all of it invited liquor in.