“’Eternity is one gigantic corpse. We take our turns weeping and grieving, while great men do great things.’ So I heard as a boy from my mother, who surrendered to the earth’s whims. This world is a broken one, a suffering one, and she knew it – but what could she do? I never accepted that – even before I found Myself in the world’s gates.

I became Myself and I took the world in my own hands. But for all the power I might wield, I understood that the world was broken. The world, once mine entire, long ago slipped from my grip. No longer will you weep and grieve. You will be my instrument, and you will achieve eternity.”

-Aivor’s declaration to the soldiers

244 YT: At the cusp of Winter

The end of the year approached rapidly, with the Seventh Festival a fresh memory in the minds of Kivv’s residents. Hilda’s heart still was lifted a little from the excitement, from the dancing through the streets with arms about the city’s greatest tomes. The music, far below and behind, echoed in the ears of her imagination. On her shoulder sat the falcon, silent sentinel over the southern reach of the Vale. A paperback book, still a little warm from the presses, was held between Hilda’s fingers.

The first snow had yet to come to the Vale, at least this far north – and the river flowed as fast as ever, its surface as yet undisturbed by the cold. Hilda could no longer hear the river. Once, she could have sat atop the wall and listened to the faint babbling in the distance. Now, she strained and heard nothing. But the falcon told her, all the same, that the river still ran.

Though the snow hadn’t come, it was nonetheless cold. It would have been colder still – perhaps too cold for Hilda’s taste – if not for the comforting arm around her shoulder. Lucian stared out to the south as well and leaned into Hilda’s shoulder. She kept the brim of her hat pulled low over her eyes and her coat wrapped tight, clasped in the front. “You know,” Lucian said after a long silence, “this might be the last time we get to sit up here for a while.”

“I know,” Hilda said. “But let’s not ruin it.” The tension in her jaw was strong. She did not wish to embrace it, not yet. Perhaps for just one more afternoon, she could be a normal person again.

“Oscar’s been talking to the Wypsies,” Lucian said. “Ever since he woke up. Weeks now. Have you seen him?”

“I haven’t,” Hilda replied. “I’ve been distracted.”

“Don’t worry,” Lucian replied. “You don’t need to worry about it. The Wypsies are going to help us. Some of them don’t want to associate with Oscar, even though they’re following leaders who’ve come at the call of others who heeded him. It’s kind of a strange thing to witness – they won’t talk to him, but when he says something to one of their kings and the king turns around and repeats it to the rest of them, they all listen to the king, even the ones who won’t hear a word Oscar says.

“It’s about the principle to them,” Hilda said quietly. “But at the end of the day they know that helping the city is their purpose here.”

“It satisfies their honor more to take orders from a king who takes orders from an exile, than it does to take orders from the exile himself.” Lucian’s voice sounded a little on edge, his eyes narrow and disapproving when Hilda glanced up to meet them.

“Let them do things their way,” she said. “Oscar won’t really mind the insult, I’m sure. I wish he could have justice too, but we need to think of the larger problem.” Then she shook her head. “But not right now. Right now I just want to rest.”

“Everyone wants to rest, Hilda,” Lucian said tersely. “But none of us can. Adma scouts are saying that the army might be here within days. They’ll besiege us if they can. They’ve been harrying the Invictans all along the way, but there’s a limit to what they can do. We’re dealing with powerful people here, and they want us all gone.”

“And we are as prepared as we can be,” Hilda said back. “Haven’t you talked to Aleks? Preparing the defenses is all he’s been doing since… can’t you give him a rest, too?”

“Only half of the weapons systems we lost have been restored.” Lucian let out a slow breath, not steady or smooth at all. There was an obvious tension in his lungs, a tension that couldn’t be released with gradual constant breath, but in fits and starts. His hands clutched the rampart behind him tightly, unconsciously.

“And he has been doing all he can.”

“I suppose so,” Lucian said with a slow sigh. “I suppose so. I don’t mean to be hard on him. I think it’s finally getting to me.” The next breath he took in was quick, shallow, but he let it out slow like he wanted to hold onto it, and his lungs didn’t want to let him release his grip on it.

Hilda leaned over and put an arm around Lucian’s shoulder, as he had done for her. “I know,” she muttered. “Just don’t take it out on him.”

“I worry about him. Kamila at least has fire, though I worry it’ll burn her up too in the end. You have understanding. He has… disconnection. Without that layer between him and everyone else, it’s like he’s unfocused, like he can’t engage…”

“And so? He has done enough for one life already, and he’ll still do more. Let him be. If he needs his space, let him have it.”

They sat for a while longer, there on the walls, before Lucian slowly stood up, disentangling himself from Hilda. “Do you smell that?”

Hilda stood up as well and sniffed the air. She heard the rattling of chains inside her mind and reached out for the Reaper’s Gift. There was no confluence of paths, no tangle of chains, only a single braid of them – strands of iron each made of endless links wrapped around one another like a fivefold helix. She could not pull on it because it pulled on her with a titan’s might.

“I smell fire,” Hilda said even before the acrid stench of it had gripped tight around the hairs in her nostrils and woven its way through her brain.

“That’s right,” Lucian murmured. “Fire. It’s the army.”

“Or the Adma,” whispered the falcon to Hilda. “Some say they’ve been burning the land before the Invictans, to prevent them from taking spoils of the earth.”

Lucian’s hand rested on the hilt of one of his knives, under his coat, and he looked out at the horizon – a horizon Hilda could not see for herself. “Lost in the autumn of memory, stripped of roots they’ll say you never had,” he muttered.

“What’s that?”

He continued to stare for a while before registering what Hilda had said. “Oh, just an old line of poetry.” Lucian turned to the back of the ramparts and motioned for Hilda to follow. “They are days away, but we should still stay off the walls for now. The actual sentinels will tell us when the enemy is near. Kamila among them. For you, it’s time to prepare.” Lucian started to take a breath as though he was going to speak again, but Hilda interrupted him.

“And you? You and Kamila are both…” Hunters. The word hung in the air unspoken between them.

“I’ll be with her in the field when the time comes. But until then…” He came close and wrapped an arm around her. “Let’s go somewhere safe and not think about awful things.”

They walked for a few minutes before Hilda turned and said: “What were you going to say earlier?”

Lucian sighed. “Do you know what Antonin said to me when I told him about the Adma’s reports from the countryside south of us?”

“I haven’t seen Antonin outside of practice for a long time,” Hilda said. “He doesn’t speak to me, except to teach.”

Lucian shook his head quietly. “When he heard about the Invictans’ burning of Carakhte, when he heard that the Emperor had been there and was with the army, he stood up and walked to the window behind. It’s the smallest window in the monastery, or one of them. And he leaned forward to stare out the window at the little tree outside. You know that apple tree behind the monastery, the one that blossoms but never seems to bear fruit?”

“Yeah.” Hilda glanced up at the sky – clouds were gathering and it looked like it would begin to snow soon, but the air was still cold and empty for now. “We keep it there out of respect.”

“Well, he took a look at that tree and he kept staring at it for a long time. For a moment I thought he hadn’t heard what I said, and then he turned around and he said this one thing to me before he left.” Lucian let out a slow, quiet breath, closed his eyes, and muttered under his breath as though he didn’t want to hear the words himself: “He said, ‘the gentle mad god has come to kill us with his love.’”