“As beautiful as in my memory,” I muttered, trailing behind her.

  “Don’t come this way and rest well,” Mherlk said, stepping between us. “You’ll find an inn over there.” He pointed toward a street behind me and slipped away.

  I watched her cross the square toward the city guards. Her thick yellow cloak flowed behind her, long mauve hair catching the moonlight. A quiet declaration of her royal lineage.

  “She looks like a queen.”

  “You can’t help yourself, can you?” Saki said.

  “She is... mesmerizing.” I didn’t look away.

  “Now that everything’s settled, can we find this inn? I am starving.” She jabbed me in the ribs. I gasped.

  “Enjoy yourselves,” the innkeeper said, setting a steaming plate before us.

  “We will,” Saki replied, diving into the food like she hadn’t eaten in days.

  My mind kept returning to Id’Iane. I had long known the truth behind our brothers’ slaughter—the conspiracy she had thwarted to protect what was once her lands. I had always wondered why she spared us. Tonight, I understood I had never let myself find out. For fifty-two years, not once had it occurred to me that she acted to save our lives. She had spent a decade chasing us before we made ourselves disappear and had not heard about her until today. The food in front of me went cold.

  “Gal! Gal!” Saki called, snapping her fingers right before my eyes.

  “Will we resume our journey tomorrow?” she asked, concerned.

  “Of course. We must reach the youngster as quickly as possible.”

  She remained silent, brows furrowed.

  “What is on your mind?”

  “We should stay,” she said.

  “I hate it here,” I replied, annoyed. “Eternal is a long journey away. Phaedra even more.”

  “I know. That’s why.”

  “If you are heading to Eternal, you are going the wrong way,” the innkeeper interjected.

  I turned to face him.

  “Are you certain?” I inquired.

  “I am. I make the journey several times a year. Did you come from the northern mountains?”

  “We did.”

  “The road is deceptive on purpose over there. Before the forest, you should have headed east,” he explained.

  “That’s why the path up there made no sense,” I said.

  “You are quite knowledgeable, young man.”

  “The road wasn’t like that the last time I came.”

  I went back to the meal.

  “That was quite a day, right?” I asked.

  “Frightful. Those creatures we fought… They were like nothing we ever crossed.”

  “I did cross them. When those parts were not as peaceful as now.”

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “What are they called?”

  I chewed. Thinking about what it implied for the world.

  “You know their name; you just hope that they are not.”

  She grimaced, disappointed by the way the conversation was going.

  “Has any of this helped you decide?”

  “I am still considering it,” I replied.

  “Is she a part of this consideration?” she teased me. “If we go, you leave her to fight them all by herself. This young human is a much better leader than warrior…”

  “I’ll be right back,” I said, and was already moving.

  I walked back along the path we had taken to get to the inn. Enough time had passed since the fighting ended, that the temperature had already dropped. The crackling of torches filled the air. Built around a hill, the street overhung the square below. Beyond the walls, the plain stretched wide and dark, both moons washed the plain silver, the river catching their light in long ribbons.

  “At peace, a city like this could last a thousand years,” I muttered.

  The esplanade I walked was wide and paved. Around me, stalls shuttered for the night, benches empty. I leaned on the stone guardrail, overlooking the whole plaza. Around the fountain, most soldiers slept where the blood had dried, swept clean around them. Among them, Id’Iane rested against a low wall, the one who had stepped between us beside her. Soldiers lined the walls, watching the plain. A good decision. Malds thrived in the dark. They would use it. I took a deep breath. The cool air helped. Even if we didn’t stay, we would meet these creatures again—nothing I feared, nothing pleasant either. Cunning, unpredictable and they left something behind in your mind each time. If these were old ones, I would be the only standing before long. Beyond the ramparts, everything was too still. I looked for Id’Iane. She was gone.

  “I was sure someone eyed me intently,” she said, the tip of her blade poking at my throat.

  “You may hurt yourself,” I said.

  “That depends on what you plan to do.”

  "Is it fear or anger?” I turned to face her, arms open.

  She silently sheathed her blade and took a step back.

  “Were you sent here to make this city fall or hurt someone?”

  “Neither.” I sat on the bench behind me. “We just didn’t have much time to talk earlier.”

  She watched me, suspicious.

  “We fought two Malds on our way here.”

  She went still. Then sat on the far end of the bench, facing me. Even after all this time she hadn’t changed, trying to conceal the fear that gripped her, the part of her that wanted to flee. But she was too proud to say anything. Or so I believed.

  “Will you stay?” Her voice trembled.

  I looked at her. She meant it.

  “Why must I always be the one saying those words?” She looked away.

  “Id’Iane—”

  “I would rather not be called that name.”

  “Then?”

  “Zenalyan. For now.”

  “I don’t expect apologies. Just say that you will not leave.”

  “I will not.”

  She stared at me, unconvinced.

  “I will not.” I laughed quietly. “Saki already wants to stay. So we stay.”

  She gave me a faint smile.

  “I lost an apprentice.”

  “To Malds?”

  She nodded, eyes tearing.

  “As long as no one encountered any it was easier to think that he died to mere bhors. Even though it would tarnish his death.”

  “Easier for those living, harder for the dead,” I replied, bitter.

  “What brings you here?” She immediately asked.

  “We were headed to Eternal to catch a boat to Phaedra.”

  “Wrong way,” she chuckled, moving closer.

  “The innkeeper told us...”

  “But Phaedra? Isn't the life of a Lair dangerous enough?” she joked, genuinely worried.

  “They are rumours of a young one fighting Daurhm’s armies bare-handed.”

  “That was barely a joke. You will truly dive into hell.”

  She was right. Daurhm's reach was felt in every corner of the known world.

  “Knowing this, we cannot leave him there.”

  She looked at me as if I could disappear in an instant.

  “I won’t leave.” I assured her.

  Once again, neither of us spoke for a while. I had forgotten how much I used to tell her.

  “Do you remember those?” Crimson peaks materialized above my palm.

  “Your brothers often played with them,” she put a hand over her mouth.

  I smiled. Those brothers deserved what happened to them. The hardest part was understanding how long it took me to see it.

  “I didn’t mean to—” she stammered.

  “You did what you had to. I made mistakes I will have to live with.”

  She stole a flying peak. “And I contributed to the extinction of your kind.” Her voice dropped. “One as old as the world.”

  “I should have seen it.”

  “You should have,” she came closer with a smile.

  Our legs touched. I watched her play with the peak. Eyes like a cat’s, ears set high above her hair, catching the torchlight. Everything I had spent fifty years not looking at.

  “Now that you're not drenched in blood, I see how beautiful you are.” I brushed aside the strand of hair falling in front of her eyes.

  Speechless, she stopped playing with the rock. “I have not changed all those years and won’t for a thousand.”

  “And your hair?”

  “I stopped hiding the fact that I am one of the many mistakes a monarch who couldn’t afford to lose the love of his people made.”

  “Does it mean –?”

  “It does. Everything we felt had been put there.”

  I looked at her hand on my leg. “It was—at first.”

  She held my gaze and gave her best knowing smile.