A hand-stitched leatherback journal, held shut by a tiny metal clasp with a small keyhole. The journal appears to have been recently restitched in preparation for an upcoming harvest season. Several entries have been scratched out, and strange instances of unrelated words, scribbled in a different handwriting, atop the original words of Willowbrim’s Entries

August 20th, 512

Fresh Conscripts from Ratchetspring: Camp population now at and a little over capacity, sits at 23 workers, 5 dogs, and Kinku's Ferrets. My tentmate is a sturdy hunter who's been sober for longer than my kids have been alive 

Game is plentiful and four of the hunters managed to tag an elk. The men (and women!) are in good spirits and about their work. It will be a IT good season. 

October 15th correction: above was logged based on expectations and not arrivals. No conscripts arrived with animals. We've never had animals besides our beasts of burden in camp. 

===

September 15th, 512

Sucessful harvesting of 6 loads.

Recieved 1 wagonful of supplies from Thunderfury at the Cog. Spirits are high. Potential personality clash with Kinsey and Soren. Will ATE keep separated. 

The dogs have been going crazy at night, something in the woods is spooking them

===

September 31st, 512

New Moon Celebration. The men *message  has been scribbled out completely, indiscipherable*

Soren came to me in a drunken panic, yelling about how something took his guard dog.

October 15th Correction: my age must be catching up to me, imagining dogs. The poor lad must have been upset about an incident in his boyhood and I misunderstood him in the din of the celebration.

===

October 3rd, 512

Early shipment to the cog. Porter is adorable lass. Would love to buy her a drink. 

Hunters report shortage THEM of game, will order extra food this week.

*Indescipherable, message is scratched out*

===

October 9th, 512

Looking through my logs, wondering if one IT of the men is playing tricks. These notes don't make sense. 

===

October 12th, 512

Work is slow. We're operating below capacity, and shipments ATE are barely being fulfilled.  We've need for a refresh I can't believe I thought we could do the work with so few hands.

---

October 15th, 512

We've got to order a new batch of recruits. In my carelessness I've ordered more cots than we need, and we're short on hunstmen. THEM A single hunter can only feed so many men. We might have gotten some bad ale, Men have been reporting terrible headaches lately. 

—

October 17th, 512

Someone spilled some rancid ale in the spare cot in my INFRONTOFME tent. Stain will never wash out. So strange IT working in an empty logging camp. Boredom WATCHES has me writing flights of fancy in my own journal, imagining ME company as I await SLEEP the resupply. I'll write home base for new workers and beasts of burde- 

*the writing trails off mid-word*

There truly was too much work for just two young women here on this property. It was all we could do to keep the place clean and the groundhogs under control. A massive pig sty with no pigs. Bales of hay for just two sheep. An animal-driven plow with no ox or ass to pull it. I hauled on my oversized muck boots and apron, securing them with fabric strips so I wouldn't be hampered by their size as I mentally plotted out the day. 

Our dairy cow, Drina, was still inconsolable. She cried out all through the night and continued to rush the pen gate when we entered the barn, panicked and straining at the wooden posts on her pen. Her udders remained swollen despite daily milking and nursing. Her calf, so tiny it could be a twin, did not leave its spot in the corner. The poor thing trembled despite the pleasant weather and blanket draped over it and its eyes remained transfixed on the groundhog-burrow on the other side of the barn. I sighed and made a mental note to cover it up before one of the animals stepped in it and hurt themselves. 

Come to think of it, I couldn't remember ever actually seeing any of the pests. After a few minutes, I was able to calm Drina enough to collect some milk and coax her calf into feeding. Running my hand through its shaggy brown fur, my eyes landed on the golden ring on my finger. I caught myself smiling softly, despite the throbbing in my temples. 

As I scrubbed the milk buckets clean, I planned how to best deal with the groundhog problem. I could try to use one of the bows around the property, but they were too heavy for me to draw to full. They were all wrong too, arrow rests on the wrong side as if they were made for an awkward-handed hunter. Same story as the wheat scythe, too, actually. Every damn tool on this farm was too big for me and my sister, built like they were made for some giant, left-handed man. I idly fingered the golden band on my left hand. --My thoughts fell on it as my headache surged and I realized I couldn't remember where I'd gotten it. Was it a gift from my mother? No, that was all wrong, the inscription on the inside had a name. 

My breath hitched. M.. Mar... Mark? Panic rising, I dropped the milk buckets. My mind reeled. The throbbing waves of pain extended down the sides of my neck. I tore the metal band from my finger, ignoring the sting, and felt for the indented letters. I could not read them through the tears. I choked back hysterical sobs and clawed at my eyes, trying to clear them. My blood was ice. I couldn't breathe. 

The memories flitted to life like sparks from an anvil and then disappeared just as fast, no matter how hard I clung to them. A kind face. A gentle laugh. A broad chest that quivered as he read his vows. Strong hands wrapped around mine, guiding a left-handed arrow into proper position on a southpaw’s hunting bow. Summer afternoons spent chasing the hogs we'd been gifted after the wedding feast- Then nothing. Gone like sand passing through fingers.

"Forever Always, Marcus & Lucille", it read. Then, something like the sound of fingernails nails against steel flooded my ears, louder than everything out the wild, desperate laugh-sobs coming from my throat. It was a terrible, nonsensical melody. It came from everywhere at once. No. It was always there. How had I never noticed? I threw my wedding band as far as I could and screamed. --

I woke up under a blanket with a warm towel on my forehead, my sister's hands on mine, stroking gently. I could still feel the chill of the damp soil on my clothes. I could still see the pale, wet, vaguely humanoid face with no empty eyes and far too many jagged teeth from my dreams. It smiled. 

"We should sell this farmstead and move to the city, Lucille. The work's getting to you. Getting to me too. We've barely got enough wood to keep ourselves warm this winter, much less the animals. and that damnable axe is too big for either of us to chop with any kind of speed. Terrible purchase, was that me or you?"

You could see the gears in her mind turning as she paused. Her eyes turned cloudy for just a moment as they welled with tears we both ignored.

"Hell, we've got a single sheep and a dairy cow, we could probably bring them inside to warm up with us. Doesn't speak well to our chances at market this season, though. Especially if you keep knocking half our milk stock over every time you have an episode."

My thoughts wandered as I answered her absent-mindedly. I couldn't shake the feeling of wrongness, the pang of longing in my chest, the sensation of emptiness in a deep place.

"- and we still don't even have an ox to hook up to that old plow. What are we going to do this spring with a half-tilled field that's infested with groundhogs?"

I fidgeted with my empty ring finger, half-expecting to find cool metal there. She was right. There was so much land to maintain with such few hands and animals. Why the hell did we buy such a large estate? What was the plan? Was there even one? More pain.

After an hour, I was able to push the headache aside and climbed out of the bed, pawing at watery eyes. Hazy, upsetting thoughts of the land deed sitting among my documents -with six names on it, no less- came and went; I had to be misremembering, because only three people lived and worked on this farm. Wait... Three? No, two people. Me and my sister. We continued the day's errands together, a somber quiet settling between us. I wondered if she was as sad as I was, but couldn't bring myself to ask. 

We split for our final rounds, and my last task was a check-in on Drina. The poor dairy cow seemed despondent. She was probably lonely, having an entire pen all to herself the way she did. It was a mess and she seemed to have spent some time thrashing around. She was probably in pain from her swollen udders. Her condition made no sense considering she had no calves. Wait... What -had- happened? She was pregnant at one point. But there was no calf. My temples throbbed. Was it a stillborn? Or was I misremembering altogether? The cow met my gaze with eyes full of fear that’d been buried by grief. Like she'd given up.

Across the barn, there was a drag path from Drina's pen to the groundhog-hole. It  looked as though my sister went at it with a shovel. It was partially collapsed with churned earth all around. Curious. I'd ask about it tonight

As we washed up for supper and bed, I recoiled from a stinging pain in my left hand. Sweat in a fresh wound. I inspected my left ring finger, trying to understand the raw skin there. There was a band of discoloration, like you'd expect from a long day half-covered in the sun. Or a long-worn piece of jewelry. My breath hitched. My headache threatened to return. I swallowed hard and pushed the feelings down. They made no sense. And if they made no sense, then I had to be mistaken.

Obviously, it must be from the rusted bucket handle and soap.

 And the pain in my head fled. 

Obviously it's not a tan line from a ring.; that would be silly. 

And the tightness in my chest passed. 

The very existence of that hunting bow faded from my memory, though it sat within my sight.

And then the calm came. It always came after I let go. 

Even the sharp sting on my wounded finger was plucked from my mind. 

And truly, letting go made more sense in the moment. It always did. 

Because, obviously, I'd never been married.

It almost sounded like a fried duck wing snapping under a bit of delicately applied force, followed by a whimper. Then suddenly I realized I could hear myself think again. As though a thousand crickets ended their chorus in unison; a sound so ever-present that it went beneath notice was gone. The song had stopped. Memories flooded back, first as foreign sparks of long-lost truth, then smells, sounds, and finally- faces. The dogs and barn cat, my cows, my father's ox. Seven farmhands, two of them my own kin. My husband. I could remember them. I could remember their names, favorite foods. 

I could remember our laughter and arguments. 

I could remember watching half of them die. 

Another pop, and the sound of viscous liquid pouring onto wooden floors. I stepped out of the hall to see my sister suspended three feet in the air, with thick ropes of blood-tinted slime pooling below her. She was held aloft by the finger-long teeth of a massive, bone-white, face with sunken features. Its black eyes were empty, endless pools with no discernable beginning or end. But as it turned to face me, effortlessly holding her limp body, there was no question of where it was looking. The moist flesh stretched over its cheeks peaked as it almost seemed to smile around Claribel. In a blur of motion, the six or seven feet of pale, slimy neck that stretched to the cabin ceiling whipped back into the hole it emerged from, taking the hairless, misshapen face and my sister with it. Until her legs caught on the broken floorboards, that is. Her body was jerked down once more before it snapped and tore like old sugarcane and disappeared into the newly opened pit in our dining room. 

The grits she'd cooked were still steaming. 

I don't know how much time passed. My vision started to swim as I stepped forward to stop my fall and remembered how to breathe. The flood of memories continued to pound into my mind;  freezing was all I could do to remain conscious, even as my hands began to shake and my heart threatened to explode out of my chest. I crawled to the lip of the hole and hung my lantern over it. It was half as wide as I was tall and deeper than the light dared to penetrate. Still slick with my sister's blood and whatever slime the creature was covered in. 

Scrambling to my feet, I rushed to my bedroom- no, the bedroom my husband and I had once shared- to confirm that I wasn't mistaken. My breath came in ragged pants as I peered into an identical hole in the floorboards there. One I'd walked past every day for weeks after my husband's blood dried around its edges. The bedsheets from that night sat bundled in the corner, caked with his blood, where I left them. Where I'd complained about the stain, then calmly removed and left them there. Despite what I'd seen that night.

I stood and spun, taking in the room with fresh eyes as I reached to fiddle with my wedding band. Gods above, I'd tossed it into the fields just this week, trying to remember him. And as my eyes settled on the mirror I had stared into every day this week as I brushed my hair, I saw it. Clear as noon sky, scrawled in my husband's blood and written by my own hand: 

"IT TOOK HIM TOO. YOU HAVE TO RUN. YOU HAVE TO REMEMBER. YOU CANNOT FORGET AGAIN." 

It resembled a half dozen other messages scrawled around the house that I saw and unwillingly ignored every day. I focused hard on the freshly uncovered memories from the night that Marcus was taken. 

I remembered how I - no, we- had run. I had grabbed my sister, who was similarly panicking and weeping. It had been clear that she also suddenly remembered everything this monster had taken from us over the previous few months. We had both run through the corn with nothing but the clothes on our backs. We'd gotten some distance away and hid, fearing forest wolves and watching to see if we'd be followed. In the distance, one of the heads had risen high into the air, twice the height of the barn it emerged from, suspended on a fleshy white neck. Another had risen to join it in the sky, out of the vegetable fields this time. Then another from the roof of the main cabin, and a fourth from somewhere near the latrine. They had turned their identical faces to the full moon and started singing, swaying in the cold night air and the sound began to massage its way into my mind. I’d felt my terror fade, then my grief. Then my thoughts of my husband- how he had loved me, how he'd clung to the side of the pit, how his scream had been cut off after he slipped from my grasp- flickered like dying stars. Then there was just a gap in my mind where he and his memories had lived. 

I shuddered as I returned to the present and contemplated the madness, no- the sorcery, that caused me and my sister to return after seeing and knowing what we did. 

Wait-- sister? 

My body was moving before I could realize what was happening as the sound -that damnable song- registered in my mind. I grabbed the axe of my husb- 

I grabbed my axe out of my bedroom and sprinted for the exit. And as I'd made it out into the cool night air, I could feel my headache mounting. Four  giant stalks of pale flesh towered over the estate, jutting out of holes in the earth and the massive heads of this creature from hell belted their ethereal song. I blinked and they were gone.

I howled at the top of my lungs to drown out the song and my fear as I rushed at the one in front of me. My eyes saw the target but my mind refused to comprehend it. Only fast-fading rage and sorrow drove my mad dash as I leapt clear of the doorway with the weapon in hand. 

I skidded to a stop and my body coiled; the blunt side of the axehead pulled back far enough to touch my far shoulder as my muscles screamed. 

I swung with everything left in me and felt the axe bite into flesh. Its blood splashed into my face and its song screamed into my mind and I blinked.

I was standing in the middle of the estate in my nightgown, ignoring a dinner that my sis..- 

I was ignoring a dinner that -I- just finished cooking, for no reason. I wiped my eyes clear of this green-black ichor that was covering half my face and pulled my axe free from its place in the air. And as the last of my awareness of the situation was stolen from my mind, I walked back into my home to eat dinner for two alone. 

I felt and ignored the hot breath of the massive face, inches from my back as I ate, because my mind could not accept it; the song would not allow it. Even as its hungry pants from behind blew my hair into my face a dozen times. Even as it pushed aside chairs to force its way deeper into the room and worked its neck around the table to stare at me directly. Even as its pale white face snapped and contorted in front of me, becoming a macabre facsimile of my sister's. My hands drummed and scratched anxiously on the table, to the point where my fingertips were sore. My mind could not hold onto why. No mind could contend against this magic and this grief and this madness and mortal danger all at once. 

I climbed over one of the resting creature's massive necks to enter my bedroom, still unable to perceive it. My temples pounded as its song ripped away thoughts of my sister and gave my mind a dozen excuses for my hands and nightgown being covered in slime and blood.

I did not sleep well. Its faces practiced my sister’s expressions to each other and to my unseeing eyes as I tossed and turned in the night.

The sun had been up for some time when I'd finally gotten out of bed. I was exhausted by nightmares of strangers being pulled to their deaths. On top of that, I had a horrible wooden splinter lodged up under my left index fingernail. It took more than a few minutes to retrieve it and clear the debris from the nailbed, and as I worked I could not shake the feeling of being watched. Silly thought for a solo farmer on a property as isolated as mine.

The dining room was a mess. Chairs were out of place and a horrendous-smelling film covered most of the floor. Gopher-piss, probably. Another hole in the floorboards too. Definitely gophers, what else would it be? 

I started getting the space back in order: counters, general tidying, and the floor took most of the morning, slowed by throbbing headaches every so often. 

One such headache drove me to take a seat and as I tried to re-center myself, my fingers passed across an irregularity on the table. Through blurry eyes, I could make out the words but not their meaning, scratched haphazardly into the table. My head hurt, my finger throbbed, my heart ached. But still I stared, focusing through the discomfort and doubling down as it turned to pain. My breaths grew shorter and my knuckles were white, gripping at sides of my chair. Fighting to comprehend the words sent the feeling of a white-hot metal spike through my temples; I read and re-read, grasping and losing and regaining the meaning every second. Blood dripped from my nose onto the table from the effort of focusing, but I refused to let the thought slip away. I fought and tore at the wall in my mind, clawing at the memories just beyond it and digging my fingernails into my palms to remain focused. My breath came in ragged gasps as I ground my teeth and held. 

Then something inside my brain tore, the tension released, and I could hear The Song clearly, so loudly it forced me to wince. It blared from monstrous faces across the property, some high above the rooftops on fleshy necks and some still within their holes. The closest of them hovered just outside the dining room window at eye level, watching me. It had been there the whole time, singing its horrible song as its neck snaked out of the hole in the middle of the room and out the door. 

I calmed my breathing and fought not to meet its eyes. 

To pretend I still could not notice it. 

To not see the bits of my sister’s flesh still hanging from its teeth. 

To hide my interest in the fireplace full of smoldering coals nearby.

To pretend I could not remember. 

My mind was the clearest it had been in years. I looked down at the words I’d struggled with for the past few minutes. They were a note, in my own handwriting, scratched into the oak table. 

"The Song stops when they eat. You cannot forget again."

Every seed is a soul. And every soul at some point spreads roots. Many find their way into earthen vessels and thread packed clay into muscle and bone and sinew. Roots give way to heart and lung and nerve and consciousness, and it is beautiful. 

Some seeds find deeper root. Among the deep and old things, they burst into waking and their great vines color the wild, wondrous corners known only to fools and adventurers. 

Deeper still, every dozen worlds or so, a seed finds an uninterrupted path to the Hearth: a roiling spring of liquid fire. Usually these natural fonts of magic exist in a cycle of pressurization and explosive release onto the surface. But if a seed taking root is able to tap the stream and harness the terrifying forces at work– well, you get Monsters like Babakai-Yon

As Telemetrr cleared the underbrush and made it up the last boulder between them and the view Ipa motioned to, their eyes took a moment to recognize what they beheld. The textured, ashen wall that dominated their vision from so very far off in the distance was in fact no wall. Its endlessness climbed to the cloud line and through the gaps in it they could make out branches and leaves, looming above both their heads and stretching until the fog and horizon conspired against sight. 

Awe-struck was not the word. Telemetrr was visibly shaken as their guide and mentor strode up and squatted to match their eye-line, raising a finger toward a section of the miles-wide trunk. The melodic cadence of Ipa’s words drew the stricken youth back into their body,

“If you squint, you can see them: the Eaters. They bear the World Tree no ill will, they burrow and eat because it is their nature, not unlike young Eranas skipping their reading before an expedition.”

The child’s mouth quirked at the gentle rebuke as their mind struggled to make sense of the sight before them, and just as the question began to take shape, Ipa continued, 

“They bear us no ill will either, as you shall soon see. But elephants need not harbor malice for ants to prove a fatal threat, so too is it for us and the great worms of Yon.

Your grandsire third is said to have been the first of our people to enter their tunnels and return, and was invoked often to stay my wrath at your antics. Perhaps now, with the necessity of your training and my methods laid bare, arguments on your studies will find their end.”

Wondrous as it was, this revelation did not answer the question that nearly drove the pair to violence days ago. And the invocation of their grandfather, Selendrr still drove a hot spike through the young Erana’s heart, considering all the questions about his death still left unanswered. They touched a breast pocket and felt for the ring stored there as their thoughts wound down. 

The pair covered the next few miles together in relative silence, Telemetrr’s complaints about the steppes, their backpack, the ritual, and even the dried rations they carried all giving way to awestruck wonder at the storied beasts of bedtime legend manifested in flesh -however stone-like and impossible- before them.

Mid-way through an explanation of how gravity worked differently near the world tree, Ipa’s cadence sharpened ever so slightly and her voice rose a half octave. Innocuous changes to strangers put Telemetrr on alert and they glanced at their mentor for confirmation– she’d already drawn her slingshot and a readied flashnut cast a dull blue light on her mahogany skin. She was scanning the treetops to their right as she continued her lecture on Greatworm physiology and why they seemed weightless as they tunneled in and out of the world-tree.

The winged screechers alighted from their nests and perches, twenty-strong, soaring toward the fumbling youth with wails and cries that the stories did not adequately warn of. Before Telemetrr could load their projectile, Ipa loosed hers. The flashnut struck the leading bird with a crack audible from their position 30 meters away, and it exploded into a brilliant flash accompanied by a sustained shower of sparks and bioluminescent pyrotechnics. 

The birds’ disorienting attack cry strangled off and their dive immediately ended as their wings pumped. They rose and regained formation high above, thinking better off what still looked like an easy meal. 

Oh elder, we do not weep; death’s just a beginning

Oh elder, love never fades; you are more than your bones

Oh elder, if you would; Rest beneath the waters

Oh elder, if you would; Rise again and serve

Gnawing on a bit of jerky as she watched and listened, Ipa used only her eyes and the slightest facial expressions to correct any missteps as Telemetrr went through their forms and vocal exercises. The child was talented; they inherited their parents’ strength and aptitude. But not their discipline or wisdom, if this trip had been any indicator at all. Hesitation between forms and poor flexibility betrayed chronic neglect of daily practice. In Ipa’s day, that alone was inexcusable and would disqualify an Erana hoping to advance meaningfully toward promotion. Worse than that, they performed moves without power, entered stances without depth, and even attempted to skip entire movements when Ipa’s eyes wandered and they believed themselves unobserved.

“Enough! Eat and we will be on our way.”

Just a hint of irritation made it to her voice.

The tension drained from Telemetrr’s body and they slowed, their breathing returning to normal. They shoveled a handful of berries into their mouth and cast a glance over their shoulder at Ipa. She was standing with her back turned, writing in that ever-present notebook of hers. Again. It would have long been taken and plundered for secrets if it did not hang at her waist at all times. If they could learn where grandfather Selentrr was interred or what Ipa’s cultists had done with his stolen things, bartering for faraway travel would be a real possibility. They'd never look back until it was time to return home to burn it all down.

“The youth are lost

They believe the sacred burdensome 

Our roots are as rotten as Orialas’s

Are those who cannot persevere 

And those who shun belief

Worthy of seeing?” 

The final words were scribbled with such frustration that the point of her charcoal pencil chipped; it had been years since she’d last been irate enough to commit the feelings to verse. Ipa stood and stretched to her full height and quickly shook off the stiffness from sitting.

They broke camp wordlessly and put foot to trail within thirty minutes.

In times past, faith and discipline alone were enough to drive young Eranas into fierce competition for ascension; Eldership was a universal desire for all that held any aptitude or ambition. Any hints of insubordination or laziness that managed to hang onto aspirants were driven away with the routine of pilgrimage, and any doubt or exhaustion creeping into their hearts during the rigors of the journey shattered upon witnessing the Great Tree, Babakai-Yon and the great worms it houses.

Ipa remembered her own pilgrimage almost thirty years ago, long before she was tasked with leading Eranas of her own. She remembered the names of the two that did not survive their journey, the solemn vows made by her peers to recover and see their bodies home, and the awe of witnessing the majestic creatures for the first time. She'd dreamt of them as a child, piecing together mental pictures from the stories of her elders and imagining what it would be like to be up close. Her wildest dreams could not prepare her for the sight, and she had to be reminded to breathe when she first spotted them. The stories did not do them justice: how could they? What could prepare someone to see gods older than time, so large they were visible from a horizon away? 

But times change. Culture unexplained can seem like madness to children caught up in wanderlust. A pang of sorrow struck Ipa as she considered how upsetting this entire process must be for the bereaved that do not know the truth of Eldersreach and the Choosing. In this contemplation, an idea struck Ipa: this was already an irregular pilgrimage and Telemetrr was her only Erana. Allowing them to see beyond the veil a few days early could only do -so much- damage, and one of them was as likely as not to die if the child acted on their poorly hidden impulses of escape. She decided to take the risk and called to the child behind her, not even breaking stride. 

“Telemetrr, do you know why we do not bury our dead like the faraway peoples in your books?”

“Because death is not the end, and to bury before the Choosing is to deny the soul a choice”, Telemetrr responded, in a cadence so dry it could be considered sacreligious. 

Ipa sucked her teeth in dismissal, not surprised by the indignant response. The child stiffened at the rare show of emotion, never having heard the sound from their always-dignified escort. 

“Yes, but do you know what the words you've memorized mean, young one? Speak freely”

Telemetrr paused and thought, face betraying their suspicion. Ipa had never engaged them in casual conversation in all the weeks they'd traveled. This felt like a trap, with some fresh hell of discipline waiting behind the potential heresy she invited. But they decided to take the bait. If there was a chance that this waste of time could end early, it was worth it. They engaged:

“I believe that it's foolish to mandate burial rituals. I think it foolish to keep secrets about where half of our loved ones rest after they've died.”, they started, voice growing strained and wild as they continued.

“And I think it's BEYOND stupid to leave whether or not I'd be able to visit my grandfather-”

“Grand-sire”, Ipa gently interjected.

“-up to some stupid water divination. I don't know what it is exactly that you all do after you've sent everyone else away, but I know the cultures I read about would call us barbaric and probably accuse us of cannibalism if they saw what most of us see.”

“What do you think the Choosing is?”

Telemetrr was shocked into silence by the gentle response to their almost-screaming. They stopped walking and stared at Ipa as she continued forward. Her eyes were calm and scanning the horizon as they always did, but the wrinkles at the corners betrayed a bit of mirth that her voice did not. They kept pushing.

“I think it's cogey old magic that's held together by tradition and will not survive beyond my generation. And I suppose this is the part where you threaten to report me to the Elders, so I’ll be taking my leave.”

With those last few words, the young Erana drew a blade from its hip sheath and fell into a low, defensive stance and contemplated the madness of the current situation. The hammered metal glinted in the sunlight despite the thin layer of rust creeping along the edge. Their right hand, hidden from Ipa’s sight, slowly grasped a small rock and tensed for throwing. As they looked beyond their still-relaxed mentor at the path back down the mountain, a loose fight plan took shape. There was no hope of defeating the older woman outright, but that wasn’t the only win condition here: feint step left, throw the stone high, then aim the blade at a leg to injure her enough to escape- 

Their mind was awash with combat strategies when, for the second time in two minutes, Ipa turned the world upside down with a word. 

“I miss him too, you know. I only agreed to walk with you so I could see him again. The old man taught me that stance you're holding. He's the reason I chose to be a woman.”

The words gave Telemetrr pause. They released a shaky breath but still didn't move, didn't blink. They were waiting for a lunge that was surely coming. Why else would a cultist betray such information, change their tone so quickly? 

Wait– see him again? What did she mean by that? 

“Here, maybe you'll behave if you know what we're doing”, Ipa called out.

She tossed a ring from her satchel to the terrified child. Blade and throwing stone both clattered to the ground as Telemetrr recognized it in mid-flight and leapt to catch it, mouth agape.

The child landed on shaky legs, tears already forming as they clutched the missing heirloom close to the chest. This ring was supposed to be buried with the old man

“Why do you have this?!” 

The words came out in a low growl, rage beginning to boil.

Memories of his funeral five years ago flooded into the Erana. The stillness of their grandfather as he lay, the wails of the mourners that surrounded the family, and the distinct lack of tears from Ipa and those she traveled and spoke with. 

“Ask him yourself, we're almost there. Times change but the sacred persists for a reason.”

Telemetrr blinked away tears and met the eyes of the lightly armored woman once more; the wrinkles above her cheeks shone like copper in the setting sun and betrayed a smile that did not reach her lips; there was earnest compassion there. She was crying too. Anger and confusion gave way to curiosity, and Telemetrr released a long-held breath.

Ipa recognized the shift behind her pupil’s eyes, wiped tears, and gave them a soft smile with an almost imperceptible nod.

They continued forward in silence. 

The still, midnight soundscape is pierced by the screech of whetstone on honed steel. Sparks dance across the warm soil, turning the yellow firelight white for a heartbeat. The hunched figure is statuesque but appears a roiling specter of soiled iron, covered in stubborn shadows that cling to form as they wrestle with the dancing yellows and reds of the pit-fire dying nearby.

Statuesque save for the loud, well-practiced ritual whose sound is unmistakable to similarly experienced professionals. The sound of a loud conscience's guilty hands seeking absolution in monotony, attempting to strike blood from steel and soul alike. The sound of the wicked seeking rest that will never come. The sound of a fool's errand.

"I was doing what I had to do to survive"

Another stroke. Another screech, another deluge of sparks. Another memory pushed away, into the dark recesses of business as usual, taking the crouched traveler one step closer to blissful forgetfulness, however temporary it may be. They'd lost count somewhere after two hundred perfect executions, fingers flexing and wrist coiling ever so slightly at the fuller to compensate for cosmetic imperfections that came with the blade; a smooth movement each time.

They adjust their position ever so slightly, releasing a breath that sounds suspiciously like a sigh. A practiced flick turns the blade to begin work on the back edge.

Another stroke. Sparks dance as the stone begins to sing and the smooth screech ends midway as the ceramic edge catches an unfamiliar notch in the blade. A token of failure from morning past. The wages of a sloppy backswing with hasty edge alignment; blade meeting bone and chipping as it skittered away from its mark. Unnecessary suffering. A mercy kill. Another voice crying out for quarter, repeating endlessly, to join the nightly din.

"If I hadn't, someone else would have."

They managed to avoid eye contact as their victim failed to avoid the heart-seeking plunge. This new specter will be faceless, at least. The realization is enough to draw a mirthless chuckle from cracked lips.

Another stroke; this one adjusted to perfection on the fly, as any professional's work would be. The first of a hundred more perfectly aligned passes, with echoing rasp and shower of sparks to match. Their eyes follow an ember as it dances its way to a small satchel of leather, sagging with the weight of the worth of a dozen human souls. Their grandmother was a scholar and the thought of what her horrified face would look like if she knew is strangled and discarded, but not before the damage was done.

Another stroke. Or, the beginning of one. A deep breath. A long, hard blink. Another sharp inhalation, held for two-score heartbeats and released over four.

"I'm just trying to survive.", they whisper to themselves in the darkness. 

A single bead of moisture carves a salty path in the dirt of their ashen face, past sunken crow's feet and around teeth gritted in apparent agony. Others begin to well and flow.

"Them or me, This is the only way."

The flames flicker out.
A sound like choking sobs is swallowed by the wind.
The air smells of blood and iron and lies.