Against All That Is Sacred - By Malcolm Nzioki

Written By: Malcolm Nzioki

Category: Fantasy; Mystery Series

Competition: Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026

Malcolm Nzioki takes readers on a riveting journey in his submission "Against All That Is Sacred," a compelling entry in the Creative Writing category for the Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026. This fantasy-mystery series introduces readers to a world of suspense and intrigue, capturing the essence of survival and moral dilemmas. Within its prologue, readers encounter a protagonist grappling with existential threats in a wintry landscape, setting the stage for a tale of profound mystery and adventure.

About the Work

"Against All That Is Sacred" creates a vivid and immersive world, where themes of survival, secrecy, and moral conflict are intricately woven. The mood is tense and atmospheric, with a narrative style that skillfully balances suspense and introspection. Nzioki's work stands out for its rich imagery and a storyline that challenges the protagonist's values against a backdrop of a harsh, unforgiving winter landscape. Readers are drawn into a narrative where every choice carries significant weight.

Against All That Is Sacred by Malcolm Nzioki

Original Submission by Malcolm Nzioki

AGAINST ALL THAT IS SACRED

by Malcolm Nzioki

-PROLOGUE-

WINTER’S BITE

Day 548

Sleep has been evasive since the onset of winter. Normally that is no bother but since last week I keep hearing the sound of snow crunched underfoot near my home in the predawn hours of morning. As of two days ago I can confirm they are two men, one much younger than his counterpart. I believe my time in hiding is truly over, but they do not appear to be Telestrial Guard. They come every other day, passing by the bedroom window and making their way to the river nearby. Today I lie awake in wait for them. Though it pains me to even think of shedding their blood, I need to stay hidden in this place a season longer.

Since their last reconnaissance I have hoped with everything that the young boy is not found by me this morning. He deserves to live long.

Minutes after the pen was put down and the journal closed, the now-familiar sound of trampled snow began to break the predawn silence. With a heavy sigh Cahil snuffed out the candle wick illuminating his bedroom, and in the same motion reached for the tomahawk axe hanging on the wall facing the desk he wrote on. The footsteps drew closer to the bedroom window as expected, though this time Cahil could hear a change in one of the men’s gait; the steps were irregularly spaced out, leading him to believe the man walked with a limp. What’s more is the footsteps didn’t pass by the window and disappear into the nearby forest leading to the river. They came to a full stop right outside the boarded-up window and before the silence of predawn could fully settle again, a faint knock met the wood on the window.

Cahil stood stiff on the other side of the wood, slowly slipping the axe into the leather holster on his right hip. Given he wore a massive cloak over his winter wear, the small axe was well concealed until needed. The knocking persisted, followed by a curt and raspy voice.

“Please come out and help. I know you can hear me.”

Not what he expected. His eyebrows grew slant and furrowed. From where he stood, whoever spoke from outside the window was most definitely not Telestrial Guard.

“What is your angle?” He thought to himself.

While stuck in his mind perusing through ideas on how the situation could unfold, the footsteps could be heard again, this time headed for the front door. Cahil’s neck turned sharply towards it, beginning to realize that he had no contingency for a direct confrontation that did not involve him initiating.

The knocking on the front door was much louder. If the men outside wanted to convey desperation they did a magnificent job making it palpable.

“PLEASE OPEN THE DOOR!”

Cahil trudged out of the bedroom to the main door, right hand hovering over the perfect spot to brandish the axe from his cloak if a break-in ensued. The sound of his boots pounding the wooden floor made the knocking cease immediately they were in earshot. He put on his hood attached to the cloak and opened the door fully in one swing.

A sweeping rush of cold air filled the living room, while the men outside came to understand they too did not prepare for the encounter they started. Since it was near dawn, the house and its environs were still awash in blue hues and draped in low light. The two men tried to peer into the house, but covering most of the doorframe was a man in a cloak black as sackcloth of hair, whose eyes did not meet theirs on account of his stature and the hood draped over his head. Cahil studied their startled countenances not with pride in how they reacted to him but a strange feeling he hadn’t felt in a long time: confusion. His heart dropped to his stomach upon seeing the younger man there. He could hear the men whisper to each other “I think it’s him”.

One of the men seized the moment and spoke with a stutter, “W- We would like to come in.”

“No,” came the curt response.

“The least you can do is let us in. Our people are dying because of you,” retorted the young man.

A long pause followed. Long enough that the tension could be broken with a pin needle. Only the howling winter wind could be heard, interrupted here and there by the chattering of the two stranger’s teeth. Their clothes seemed too light for winter, let alone one this harsh. The two of them stood puzzled at how the man they came to question just went silent and his breathing all of a sudden picked up pace. They could see the breath leave his mouth and vanish into the air and before they could start a further line of questioning, Cahil gnashed his teeth before moving to speak.

“Who is it you say I am?”

“What?” they answered in unison.

“You walk up to my door at dawn asking to come in yet call me a murderer.” Cahil glanced at the older of the two. “I will ask you the last time. Who is it you say I am?”

“What the young man said. Our townspeople lie dead in the snow because of you. We were sent to survey your home and see who built the dam on the river upstream. We’re now sure it’s you.”

Silence followed. Cahil noted the shakiness in the response he just got & nodded. After a few moments he cleared his throat and spoke wryly,

“Then take me to it.”

“I’m John, the young man here is Iluat. What about you?”

“Elio.”

“We appreciate you helping us with the dam, Elio. Forgive me for being so rude earlier,” replied Iluat.

They all went down the porch stairs and rounded the house to the left after Cahil closed the door, with John and Iluat poignantly anxious as to why ‘Elio’ was walking behind them rather than in front. “Isn’t it his dam? Shouldn’t he lead the way?” John mused to himself. Iluat on the other hand was trying to break down the short encounter he just had with this stranger in the woods. All manner of questions fluttered in his mind, and his stomach turned within him. Both of them searched earnestly for a good excuse to start conversation with the man, and yet there stood a sort of unspoken rule that if they turned back to face him instead of walking straight into the forest, they wouldn’t leave that place alive.

John and Iluat observed the man’s house, noting its intentionally compact size. It looked like it was built in a hurry, but that’s not to say the structure was shoddy at all. John had a keen eye for handiwork, from pottery to architecture. From the few glances he shot at the house, the worry that began to grow in him from the moment ‘Elio’ opened the door exploded into full blown dread. As they passed the back of the house and made their way to the forest edge, both John and Iluat saw the opportunity to bring up the boarded up bedroom window. After all, why would someone completely self-isolate in the kind of world they live in? If anything it’s a death sentence. John turned back with an awkward smile plastered on his face, hoping to break the tension with a light hearted joke.

To his complete dismay, ‘Elio’ was standing a safe distance away, just staring at them. In all their mental gymnastics and focusing on not freezing to death they missed when the man’s footsteps stopped following them. A single question from him cut through the air.

“Where is your limp, John?”

An incoherent stuttering mess left John’s mouth; barely intelligible in speech but fully conveying the dread upon realizing he severely underestimated this stranger.

Cahil’s face was unchanging and blank. With the little time he had to think, Iluat thought to deescalate,

“Seems you’re really observant. We just didn’t know what kind of person would open the door so we thought to appeal to empathy if it came to it. About our townspeople, we’re telling the truth.”

“Are you?”

“After we deal with the dam, you are welcome to come to our town. We’ve been sending word back on what we find during our patrols so they know you live here. You can stock up on supplies if you need.”

A towering wave of regret crashed into Cahil’s heart. “Their town knows about me…” He gazed at their faces, trying to remember them for the last time. John’s was still paralyzed with fear, forcing Iluat to bear some kind of strong gaze to throw Cahil off, but all was in vain.

John could see Cahil’s eyes lock onto him, his darting eyes met with the same blank expression from when he opened the door.

The axe was grabbed from its holster and thrown with such force and accuracy the axe head was lodged on the left-hand side of John’s ribcage before he had a chance to react.

Iluat watched helplessly as the body dropped into the almost knee-high snow, turning red as it soaked the blood jetting out from John’s side. His wide-eye stare at the man who threw the axe was met with an eerie gaze.

“You told your town about me?”

Iluat choked on his own words before he could speak, his eyes darting from the corpse on the ground to the man staring at him with this inquisitive look, as if he was pained to do what he just did. “He did it so quickly. That can’t have been a mistake.” His inner thoughts were involuntarily followed by a raw, guttural cry. Kneeling in the snow, he embraced the body that had now gone fully cold. His crying sounded like choked breathing and long sniffling. He didn’t notice Cahil walk up to the body to plant his foot on John’s chest so he could retrieve the axe from his side.

Cahil looked at the weeping boy, who was now looking up at him, his eyes bloodshot from crying and his nose running onto John’s clothes.

“Please don’t.” he begged.

“I had hoped you stayed home this morning,” he replied before gulping and clearing his throat to say, “But what I do here cannot be told to anyone.”

“Our people already know you live here. My death would bring you nothing.”

“You already lied to me before. How do I know your town even exists?”

“We live downstream from the river. Your dam has doomed us to endure winter without water.”

Iluat’s words gave him some pause. He stepped back a few paces and looked at the axe in his hand, bloodied and dripping onto the snow. His face winced and his hand dropped the axe.

“But I cannot let you leave,” he whispered with remorse.

As he said this he shut his eyes and balled his hands into fists, trying to muster the strength to do what needed to be done.

In that moment, the boy saw his chance.

Iluat ran off into the woods, heart pounding at the mere thought of being chased. “I should’ve taken the axe,” rang in his head over and over as he darted between the trees and made his way downhill, going into a full sprint when he saw his town was within range. He ran out of the forest that descended down to the base of the hill and began to scream,

“Open the gates! Open the gates!”

Back atop the hill, John’s body lay lifeless and cold while Cahil knelt with one knee to pick up the axe he dropped. He carried the corpse and walked into the forest, following the river upstream near where he built his dam. He stopped near two other graves, laying John down in the snow and covering him in two packed layers of it. If it weren’t for permafrost in the soil he would have gotten the burial he deserved, but such luxuries seldom come easily in this world.

He trudged back to his home, eyes fixed on the ground. When he passed the patch of blood-soaked snow he looked up at the sky, now grey and drab as the Rayleigh scattering from early dawn was muted by the thick, dreary clouds of winter morning.

In the house, he washed his hands in a pail of water, rubbing the stains for so long he forgot he bought soap and was well stocked. He refused to light the candle in his bedroom until the compulsion to journal the morning’s events took over as he lay on his bed with a deadpan stare at the ceiling. Trying to distract himself he thought, “Maybe I should fix the roof. Snow has been accumulating and I am yet to deal with it.”

He sat up on his bed and looked to his desk. A little light from early morning peered into the room through the slivers in his boarded up window. He walked over to the desk and lit the candle, taking his seat with barely a clue what he would write at first.

Day 548

Since their last reconnaissance I have hoped with everything that the young boy is not found by me this morning. He deserves to live long.

They came by on patrol today and revealed that their town knows of me. Whether it is true or not, I will have to find out. They young boy is named Iluat, but I cannot speak for the other. My time in hiding is well and truly over. May my preparation for the trials to come prove sufficient.

I only wish I asked what the town is named.

-CHAPTER 1-

VANGUARD

“What’s the matter with you? Talk!”

“Will you stop your crying and tell us what happened!”

“Whose blood is that on your outer tunic?’

“Why didn’t John follow you back?”

For the better part of two hours a relentless barrage of questions were hurled in Iluat’s ears. His breathing had now slowed down to its default after the panic attack that kept him from speaking a word. Paralyzed by the thought of the man on the hill coming back to end his life, he almost put himself in a near catatonic state; his own mind and the memories of the early morning twisted into a labyrinth he couldn’t free himself from. When prompted to speak, the memory of John keeling over into the bloodied snow made his tongue feel like it was tangled in barbed wire.

The only thing colder than the interrogation Iluat endured was the winter gale growing in strength outside as the morning took shape. He couldn’t recount how he got into that chair or how he was in his own house, only that he ran with all his might to the town gate and when he reached, he figured he must have passed out. Finally internalizing that he was in his own home and far enough from the town gate allowed him to believe that the man on the hill wouldn’t easily find him. He was sat upright on his living room surrounded by three other town residents. Two of them were the men who opened the gate for him when they heard his screams, the other was a close friend. By then his tears from earlier had dried up and the mucus hardened on his upper lip. The people in the room had draped a thin woolen blanket over his shoulders to help stop his shivering, but it wasn’t caused by the biting cold of winter. They barked questions at him and chattered amongst themselves, all proving futile as Iluat seemed unaware of his surroundings. The closest way to describe what he heard was a low, monotonous humming that often changed pitch when the only woman in the room spoke to him.

Already aware that the heavy inquisition was leading nowhere, she opted for a different approach. She went and fetched a cloth from a cabinet to her right, dipped it in the water cistern nearby and started wiping Iluat’s face, washing off the dried tears and mucus. As she did so she tried to make eye contact, but the young man’s eyes were glued to the floorboards with a sullen look. Before all this it was only the other men in the room who had asked any questions, whereas she only had one on her mind but every time she wanted to interject when the men spoke, her tongue clung to the roof of her mouth and all the saliva dried up.

She put the cloth down on the table at the center of the room, returned to where Iluat was seated in the corner and squatted a little so her eyes could meet his again. Taking his hands into hers and holding them firmly she finally found the courage to ask,

“What happened to my husband?”

No response.

“I heard that there’s some wolves that side of the hill… if that’s what took my John then you can just tell me.”

Iluat lifted his eyes to meet hers. They welled up with tears as he slowly nodded ‘No’ and lowered his gaze. He didn’t have an iota of strength to tell her, not when the memory of John in the snow kept replaying.

As he shut his eyes to stop the tears from falling, he felt warmth around his cheeks and jaw. He opened his eyes to see her cupping his face, her wide doe eyes looking despondently at him.

“Tell me my John is coming back to me, please.”

“He’s gone, Aleena.” Iluat murmured weakly. He sighed with such heaviness, as if he blamed himself for what happened.

Her hands dropped from his face to clutch her chest before she could give another line of questioning. Her whole face winced because she tried to stop herself from crying.

“Was it the wolves?” she responded.

“The man on the hill. He took an axe, and…”

Before he could finish, Aleena broke down in a surge of tears running down her face. She immediately stood up and walked off to the opposite corner of the room to compose herself, but she failed miserably. All she could do was try to stop her cries from breaking into loud wailing so as to avoid alerting the neighbors. She repeatedly hit her forehead against the wall, tormenting herself by replaying their last night together before he left early for patrol, agonizing over everything.

“I didn’t say ‘I love you’ before we slept.” “Why didn’t I stop him from going?” “What do I tell Caspian?” “This can’t be fair.” “My John… my dear John.” When she arrived at that last thought, the bitter weeping devolved into helpless sobs. She turned around so her back was leaning against the wall and slid down to sit on the floor, her head firmly planted in her palms as her tears drenched her gloves.

The other men in the room, Boros and Ikal, continued to grill Iluat now that he seemed ready to divulge a report on the patrol. Following in Aleena’s approach, they tried to soothe Iluat with half-decent apologies for how they spoke earlier. They excused their behavior by trying to explain that the Chief typically receives the patrol report within an hour of their arrival, but two whole hours had elapsed by then. Apparently it was an urgency to fulfil their duties coupled with a ravenous desire to know what transpired that pushed them to be as harsh as they were. Eventually Iluat assented to give an account of the ‘man on the hill’. Boros and Ikal helped him to his feet, and led him out the house to speak to the Chief.

Meanwhile, Aleena sat hunched over in the corner, eyes shut and covering her ears while her intrusive thoughts kept her in a chokehold of rue.

Before long she sat upright and opened her eyes to see an empty room. Her eyes were bloodshot and her vision was weakened from shutting her eyes with force for a while. Aleena laboriously walked out the front door and onto Vanguard’s singular road and looked around. What began as a genuine attempt at reminiscing became a bitter exercise in scrutiny.

All the homes were line up on one street with perfectly mirrored rows of houses. To her left, the town gate was at the far end of the street with two watchtowers on either side of it. Whenever one would enter the town gates they were immediately met with adjacent horse stables on either side that the townspeople built in spring that year. It cost the town 100 silver Friats to buy four horses… an investment that would’ve expanded their trading capabilities and paid back that hefty sum of money. Additionally they could’ve helped the townspeople patrol a larger radius. She reminisced how eager Iluat was to learn from her how to ride a horse, how she promised to teach him and perhaps patrol together some day. Unfortunately, with that winter being the worst of their generation and the town’s source of water drying up, the horses could not survive. After the stables were some resident’s shops for bartering, with all their entrances boarded up. Hard to barter when half the town is dead or starving, isn’t it?

The rows of houses started some safe distance from the town gates after the stables and old trading shops all the way to Aleena’s view to her right, where the street ended and the Town Hall stood tall and proud. The bottom floor served as the collective dining hall, with a kitchen, butchery and town storage in-built. Meals were shared collectively and the town’s resources and trade amenities were pooled together in the storage, which acted as their treasury and bank for the time being.

The second floor was the residence of their Chief and Preeminent, whose windows had a view of the whole town from Town Hall to the gates. Only his house had a balcony from where an urgent address to the townspeople could be given and if needed, he could call all the people into the dining hall to hold lengthened discussions affecting the collective.

The entire town’s perimeter was fenced about with thin logs of spruce wood tightly packed together with pitch and firmly wedged in the ground, towering at about double the height of any of the regular houses, with the top ends of the logs sharpened to ward off any climbing predators. Their homes were simple: stone walls with well-thatched roofs for insulation and windows at the front of the houses. The back windows in the bedrooms only had a view of the perimeter fence, which was a healthy distance from the houses to allow sunlight to enter. It was only the Chief’s residence that lacked the blocked view, both front and back. Due to him having his indwelling at a higher elevation than the rest, a special cutout was made in the perimeter fence facing his back windows allowing him to see the sprawling fields outside of Vanguard.

Almost every structure in the town reminded Aleena of John. In her heart she truly recognized Vanguard for what it was; his life’s work.

She looked wearily at all they had worked towards; from building the houses together when they all settled in that region of the Gildera Valley, to the painstaking task of assigning everyone their duties. She remembered with bitterness how many they once were, travelling together from Felnia in the Farlands to settle in a new land and right the wrongs of their collective past. She could recollect how proud they all were to have found land so prosperous; how rare it was to stumble on a steady flowing river in that region of the Valley, which was also surrounded to the North by a range of hills that encompassed the town in a sort of U-shaped arc.

The natural defense the hills provided eventually influenced the town’s name, and Aleena championed the idea to build the town gates facing that direction for easy access to wood and the river. The fact that the hills were endowed with dense tree cover lulled the people into a false sense of security. It hardly occurred to anyone that a threat could lurk in those woods. Nonetheless, they trusted that the river atop the hills would be hard to interfere with in view of the plain fact no one in their right mind would live alone up there. This firm assurance was shattered the previous week when they discovered that their gradual water shortage was caused by a lone man who built a dam upstream to hoard the water. The people voted for a diplomatic approach rather than direct assault, and John paid the price with his life.

“All this for nothing.”

Standing as the only one on the city street at that hour in the morning, she reluctantly trudged across the road from Iluat’s front door to her own home. The two men guarding the gate looked down from the watchtowers at the pitiful sight of the town’s newest widow. They could only watch in pity when she leaned her head against her own front door, hesitant to enter.

As Aleena slipped past the doorframe and out of their line of sight, they each turned back to face the hilltop where Iluat and John were on some hours prior, their minds frothing with questions as to what must have happened. They both desperately would have wanted to abandon their posts to hear the whole story, but Vanguard’s safety was paramount. Another pair of men stood below the watchtowers at the gate’s sides, replacing Boros and Ikal in the task of opening it at the watchdogs’ command.

Aleena walked into her house and shut the door so hard the wooden latch to lock it fell into place and locked it with a heavy thud. She walked to the bed and threw herself to her knees at its side, burying her head in the sheets. Remembering how John used to sleep closer to the bedroom door, she grabbed a handful of the sheets and smelled them; a fresh stream of hot tears burst out her eyes as she wailed with the realization that she had begun her day a widow. She collapsed into a fetal position on the floor, still holding on to the bedsheets as she used them to suppress her crying by covering her mouth with them. She wailed and kicked her legs while the sheets began to soak her tears and the mucus from her running nose. The skin on the sides of her eyes wrinkled and contorted as her eyelids clamped shut.

“This can’t be happening. This can’t be happening. This can’t be happening.”

In the upper chambers of the Town Hall, Iluat was forced to delay mourning John as he sat before Vanguard’s Chief and Preeminent, Markus. He was a stern man in some aspects but he listened keenly to Iluat’s report. While his eyes were a piercing blue, his direct gaze at Iluat lent itself to a more comforting visage. It was only towards the very end his demeanor completely shifted.

“So he allowed you to run back here knowing you would tell us this?” Markus asked with disbelief strewn across his face.

“As reported Sir, he dropped the axe and hesitated. I ran while he was distracted.”

“Are you certain he didn’t follow you?”

“No, Sir.”

Markus momentarily averted his gaze to the carpet on the floor. Looking up at Iluat, he cracked a small smile saying,

“Thank you Iluat. That will be all for now. Please give my condolences to Aleena, tell her I will pay her a visit shortly.”

When he heard the sound of Iluat’s footsteps descend down the stairs to the dining hall and eventually fade out of earshot, his stern look returned after pivoting back at the two men.

“Boros, Ikal, take a seat.” He closed the curtains of the living room windows facing the town square and returned to his seat. The windows on the opposite side of the room were facing towards the perimeter fence and left uncovered, letting in some of the morning light.

“This man on the hill,” he continued, “sounds like a threat, wouldn’t you say?”

“He should be dead by nightfall, Sir.” Ikal snapped.

“And who knows whether he’s making his way here as we speak? I say we go now and strike as we should have initially!” Boros exclaimed as he stood up. His hands were balled into fists, but his wrath-filled eyes were met with the same steely gaze Markus had from Iluat’s departure. Markus calmly stared on, waiting for that brainless lump of muscle standing over him to breathe normally and sit down. Eventually he did, and realizing he almost forgot where he was, spoke to correct himself,

“I suggest we strike now, Sir.”

Markus halfway acknowledged the correction with an eye twitch. He rose from his seat and walked over to the windows peering over the Valley, arms behind his back. His focus slowly veered to the right-hand side of his field of view, where the dried up river channel was. Snow had begun to accumulate on the river bed, meaning whatever little water flow remained had frozen over. He sighed deeply and barked at the men, his back still facing them.

“We’ve lost enough of our numbers. Our focus should be destroying the dam upstream.”

Boros and Ikal exchanged a look of such fierce rage they immediately stood up. They did it almost instinctively, unintentionally pushing the chairs back as they did so. Markus clenched his jaw as he heard the scraping of the chair legs against the wooden floorboards.

He turned around, arms still behind his back.

“Is there a problem?”

“He needs to die, Sir!” Ikal emphasized as respectfully he could.

“Listen, when we all left Felnia, I seem to recall we all agreed not to be like those who came before us. Our forefathers spilled blood at the mere sound of a felled log, no consideration for due process or the gift of life. This man, whoever and whatever he is, should not be our most pressing concern right now. We know by Iluat’s account that his physical presence cannot be mistaken, that he cannot walk in here as a resident and attack us from the inside. Our sole and primary objective is to bring water flow back downstream. How many of us have we lost over the course of winter? Our numbers have dwindled to the point our only willing volunteers for patrol were a married man and a teenager.

But no, our best course of action according to you two dullards is to send an envoy to kill one man. Remember you all appointed me leader for driving us out of that wretched kingdom in the Farlands. So have I lost your trust?”

“No Sir,” they replied in unison.

“Meet me here after the town address. Speak no word of this to anyone. You’re dismissed.”

As the men descended the stairs, Markus heard one click their tongue and scoff. He walked toward the window overlooking the town square and opened the curtains, eyes fixed on Aleena’s house just down the road. In haste, he left his abode and walked down to her home as the town began to wake up and buzz with activity.

Gone were the days people used to smile and cheer at his public appearances. Gone were the days they would go out of their way to greet him on the roadside and thank him for gathering them out of Felnia. The world around him was beginning to change, and John’s death was shaping to be the lynchpin to a permanent shift.

For some into light, others into outer darkness.

He knocked on Aleena’s door three times, to no response. The fourth knock was cut short by Iluat, who opened the door and squeezed past Markus to cross the street to his own home. Not a word was exchanged.

Markus walked in slowly and shut the door behind him. Upon noticing the living room curtain was shut the whole time, he opened them to allow some light to enter the home. He heard faint sniffling from the bedroom and cautiously walked across the trashed living room to the door.

“Aleena? It’s Markus. Can I come in?”

All he could hear was the ruffling of clothes and the sniffling. Cracking the bedroom door open, he saw Aleena on the floor, sitting in the corner covered in the bedsheets while holding one of John’s tunics. She was circling her thumbs over the fabric, crumpling it in her hands without paying attention to her visitor. Her face was despondent and her forehead was pink and sore from the repeated head bashing. Her nostrils were flared and also turned a muted shade of pink. Eventually she made eye contact with Markus but something about her gaze seemed sinister.

“You killed him,” her dry voice lamented.

Markus had it in his heart to tell her it was John’s choice; that he volunteered to protect Vanguard and find the river source through patrol duty. But his inner self-control saved him from worsening her grief. “What kind of man does that to a grieving widow?”

“He’ll get his recompense. I’ll see to that.” Markus vowed.

Aleena just keeled over onto the floor whilst chuckling. Markus thinned his lips into a slight frown before slipping out the room and house. Outside the house he was shocked to see just about every resident standing at the town square whispering to each other and shooting a glance at Aleena’s house, more so now that Markus just walked out the front door. No one greeted him in kind that morning. He walked up the street and stood in the center of the square, with the people gathering in front of him in a sort of semi-circle.

Snow was falling as the morning went on but the harsh wind had subsided. Markus had thought to invite everyone into the Town Hall to discuss the matter at hand but he was well aware the people wanted it there and then. He glanced at all their faces for he knew them by name, oftentimes reminiscing over the circumstances that brought the group together while in Felnia.

“Fellow residents of Vanguard,” he enunciated, “I would invite you to the Town Hall to have this meeting but I can see you’re all anticipating news or have caught wind of some of it. It saddens me to inform you of this but our brother, John, passed away while on patrol.”

A swell of gasps and murmuring filled the air for a few moments. Still he continued,

“We all knew John to be a fine craftsman, he helped build all our homes in our early days when we found this Valley. He is the reason we know where the stone we use to build comes from, helping us in our first trades with the neighboring towns and societies as we made our way here. John is the reason why we have stone from as far off as the Great Kingdom of Telestria, the reason why we have a tiny piece of the Marvelous Land etched in our homes. Apart from his work he was a devoted husband as you all know. I ask that we respect Aleena in her mourning, but I urge you all to be there for her as we’ve all been there for you. For John we are always grateful, as he gave his life protecting Vanguard and his patrol companion Iluat. The man who did this will be brought to justice, and our first course of action will be to restore water flow by destroying the dam upstream.”

Some semblance of calm returned to the audience of his speech, but many still had itching ears and were already uneasy.

“How soon will he be brought to justice?” a voice in the crowd seized the mood of the hour.

“As soon as the dam is restored, he will stand trial. Don’t doubt it for a moment, Alax.”

“And even if we get the water back how do we recover the loss from our horses?” yelled another.

Markus held his hands akimbo and grit his teeth before answering. He was hoping this topic wouldn’t come up.

“The trade routes are still dry, Lisa. Even if we could make gold Friats fall from the sky there’s hardly a merchant worth his salt who could get us more stallions. You all remember that we sent a delegate of six men in early summer to inquire about the trade in the region and they are yet to return. When or if they do, we will know how to handle the situation.”

“So you’re saying we are stranded out here? In the worst winter seen in our generation?” Lisa chided.

In the pause of silence Markus took to compose a fitting response, the murmurs in the crowd grew to audible whispers then to chattering. Ikal emerged to the front row of the crowd, walked a few paces forward and turned to face the people,

“People of Vanguard, I share in your pain. You were there for me when I lost my brother at the start of winter, when we buried him in the snow and when I went to visit his grave only to find wolves feasting on him. We stood in this same town square, given the same speech and promised the same things. Who does that remind you of? For me it’s King Agar and how he treated us. How he kept us in a cycle of mourning and loss after making such promises! His legacy lives on in Markus his secret Regent!”

“That will be enough, Ikal!”

Ikal didn’t even turn to face him before continuing to caterwaul, “No! We, the people of Vanguard, have had enough with the failures of poor leadership. We choose our own destiny. We make manifest the desires of the one who loves freedom.” Finally turning to Markus he continued with gall and mockery in his speech, “And you, our ‘Chief and Preeminent’, tell us where John’s body lies! We wish to bury him! Not only do you deny a widow her husband’s funeral, you refuse to acknowledge it in the first place! You fraud of a leader, to hell with men like you!”

The people cheered in one strong and mighty shout.

“So we, the people of Vanguard, are now our own Chief and Preeminent! We will march on at nightfall to end the marauding beast who did this to John. He won’t just hear from one of us, he will hear from ALL OF US!”

The sound of cheering and clapping in that town square could deafen a young child. Markus could not believe what he was seeing, his heart dropped to his stomach as his eyes shifted across the crowd from face to face, looking for at least one person who didn’t side with Ikal but none were to be found. “Mutiny…” was the only word his shell-shocked mind could string together. He backed up, eyes wide and his breathing shallow. Running past the crowd into the Town Hall made the people cheer all the more.

“Ikal, bring us justice!” one man shouted.

“He tells the truth! Finally!” another jeered.

Inwardly, in the deepest recesses of their hearts, Boros and Ikal felt a joy they could not express with mere words. The only fitting expression for their new lease on life was the death of the man on the hill, the man they knew to be named Elio.

The mere thought of taking the man’s weaponry and razing his home to the ground filled Ikal with glee. “O how sweet the taste of freedom. The sun has shined upon us this day.”

-CHAPTER 2-

HUNTER

AND

HUNTED

At sunset, thick clouds hanging over the landscape tried to strangle the red and purple streaks left by the sun as she found rest, creating a stark contrast that washed Vanguard in hues of red and blue. The little silhouettes of people walking up and down the road from their homes to the Town Hall could be seen, but their faces remained unclear from his perspective. With a keen eye he watched all their movements, which over the course of the late afternoon signaled that the townspeople were planning something. He could easily hazard a guess that it was a plot against him, though only time could tell. Hours of patient waiting were no problem, but being exposed to the harrowing cold was beginning to make the task daunting. Neither did it help that he was watching from an uncouth position: perched on a tree branch overlooking the town. Despite all his reservations over what he did to John that morning, it helped that Cahil was a patient man. He was well obstructed on account of the fact that he avoided climbing any trees near the perimeter fence or watchtowers, instead choosing one not far from the forest edge on the East side of the town. Masked by the tree cover and nightfall, his stakeout was proving successful thus far.

Earlier, over the course of the morning, Cahil was able to deduce that Iluat could not possibly have the mental wherewithal to stagger his trail down the hill and most likely ran straight to the city gates. Meticulously planning his approach and preparing his home for its eventual new visitors took up most of his morning. Around noon, feeling satisfied with his preparation, he walked out the door and closed it without locking. Stepping back a good distance from the porch, he sought to drink in the view of his home once more. Without realizing it, a smile formed on his lips and his gaze softened greatly. But all of a sudden his smile dropped as he internalized what he was doing and what he was leaving behind.

He slowly trudged in the thick snow past the house towards gravesite near the dam as he needed to do one last thing: say his goodbyes. Upon reaching the gravesite he stood over the buried corpses and glanced at each one. John’s was the most fresh; both in his murderer’s mind and in the ground. Next to John was a recently emptied grave and next to that was the first one that Cahil dug. He knelt next to the oldest grave, which was covered by snow but not enough to flatten the bulging mound of soil underneath. Cahil softly placed his right hand where the head was and whispered, “The Day is here,” he took a pause before sighing, “You know if I could bring you, I would have you along. I promise to avenge you, no matter the cost. Please stay with me on this journey, and forgive me for taking this long.” After staying in that position a short while longer, he stood on his feet. The dam was about a stone throw away so he collected some water in his leather flask to nourish himself. A single thought asking whether building that dam was worth all the trouble it caused slowly crept in but he rebuked it sharply and shook his head. “No room for distractions now.”

Cahil walked away from the graves, from the dam and from his home. Every time the snow crunched under his boots the sound echoed in his ears like the shutting of a door. All that mattered then was the town John and Iluat had sworn was real.

Atop the tree, as dusk drew nearer, he couldn’t help but ponder why no one had left the town looking for him yet. In a way, the town’s inactivity was in itself worrying. Since climbing the tree to gain a vantage point, nothing of note had happened. He was fed the same boring view of the balcony protruding from the main structure in the South of the town, and a sliver of the town square below it. Eventually the darkness of night engulfed the sky, enveloping the land in a swathe of black ink if not for the light emanating from the town Cahil overlooked. The moon refused to give his light that day; everyone below would have to fend for themselves.

Time was running out for Vanguard’s stalker. Options needed to be weighed: waiting longer for an opening or a classic barge through the town gates. Beginning to recount his observations from earlier in the afternoon, barging in seemed more attractive as a solution. As he descended the hillside looking for the town, he had noticed that the watchtowers adjacent to the city gates were abandoned. And although the perimeter fence was fairly tall and sharpened at its tip, by Cahil’s assessment it was nothing more than poor handiwork.

Spruce logs are particularly vulnerable to rot and insect damage, leading Cahil to believe the structural integrity was already compromised, especially that far into winter. Regardless of the weak defense structure surrounding the town, he recalled the primary reason for halting his one man siege of Vanguard.

It came to mind that as he traversed the forest searching for the optimal position for his stakeout, he stumbled across a gut-wrenching discovery. Deep in the forest behind Cahil’s hiding spot was a small deforested area. A rank, pungent smell spread through the forest and onto the path he was using to sneak up on the perimeter fence on the East side of Vanguard. He considered the choice to investigate the source of the odor his worst decision of that day. Cahil’s eyes were met with the harrowing sight of a mass grave: corpses piled on top of each other and covered only by the tears of the clouds that had to bear witness. As soon as the dots in his mind connected, a sharp, wincing pain struck his chest the moment he remembered John’s words from that morning, “Our townspeople lie dead in the snow because of you.” He hang his head and fought against his body’s instinct to hyperventilate before looking up again at the souls he took.

Still barely covered in enough snow to hide the horror, Cahil was able to observe the mangled appearance of the corpses. Most if not all of them had been gutted and were missing massive sections of flesh on the midriff and thighs. “I don’t understand… there are no wolves in this Valley,” he tried to reason. The cuts in their flesh were precise, calculated as a butcher would.

Spending nary a minute longer in that place, he fled out of the deep forest towards the forest edge. As he ran, he removed his climbing hooks from his pocket and ascended the best tree he could find. Even though he loathed having to wait in that uncomfortable position from afternoon to twilight, he remembered that torturous sight of chopped up bodies as the reason that convinced him to watch the town from afar, lest he risk his life in an encounter with wild savages he knew nothing about.

It was atop that tree Cahil had tried to understand his emotions over what he did, from the building of that dam to the morning he was confronted about it. He was conflicted on whether his murder of John was justified, whether he was in the right place to be weary of Iluat’s offer to stock up on supplies if he followed them. Recounting the day’s events caused the gears in his mind to spin, robbing him of focus. The rapid movement of people walking up and down the town road with lamps in hand drew him out of the labyrinth of his thoughts. He straightened his back and fixed his posture, eyes widening with intrigue. A quorum of people began to form at the town square, all of them holding a flaming torch. Whatever the people were planning to do, it seemed they eagerly waited for the dead of night to set in first.

“Aleena! It’s time!-”

The door swung open while Boros was still knocking. Aleena’s harsh gaze threw him off his words for a moment. It didn’t help that she was silent either.

“Uh… I wanted to inform you we’re all leaving for the hill now. When we find John’s body we’ll send back word.”

“Tell Iluat to pass by immediately,” she ordered before shutting the door in his face.

Her lamp remained snuffed out on its stand. Light peering in through the living-room window covers slightly illuminated the room, but not nearly enough. She sunk into a chair and rested her legs on the footstool and waited. Before long, the sound of wood creaking was followed by the room flooding with light as Iluat opened the door. Aleena’s standoffish posture made him hesitate to sit next to her, so he stood idle in the doorframe. Her side profile remained unchanged with her head locked in place as though she was unbothered by his arrival. Thankfully the boy had some sense to walk in and close the door behind him before the living room could be robbed of all its warm air. Not wanting to come off as awkward by stumbling through the dark, Iluat just spoke from where he stood.

“You sent for me?”

“Iluat, what makes you think you’re coming back here alive?” Aleena huffed.

“They only need me to show them the patrol route,” he paused for quite a while before mumbling, “We’re doing this for you.”

If the room weren’t so dark he would have seen the sheer disgust painted on Aleena’s face.

“Their only concern is the chiefdom, this was never about my husband.”

“Then I misspoke. I’m doing this for you. The sooner this man dies the better it will be for us. We get the dam destroyed, river flow is restored. It doesn’t fix everything but it’s a start. Our reserves run out tomorrow. The time is now.”

“After which, Boros and Ikal return as Vanguard’s champions. Do you have any idea what they will do to Markus when they get a taste for power?” she let out an exasperated sigh and shook her head. “You’ve only gotten to know them after we left Felnia. Markus recruited me and the two of them from the same district and I can bet my life they’re the same men from then.”

“What would you have us do then?” Iluat retorted. “Elio could be plotting our collective bloodshed as we speak,” he fretted as his voice went an octave higher in panic, “What he did this morning… it was like he’s had practice. And whatever darkness you think Ikal and Boros hold, his is levels greater. John has to be avenged tonight, no matter the cost.”

“All day long you people have banged on my door telling me how good this is for me. And yes, I want him dead. I want him to die slowly and painfully for what he did. But no one is doing this for John. Even with all the muscle those two fools are carrying on them they still can’t fight the fact the Vanguard project is a failure.” Her voice grew shrill as she tried to hold back tears. “And I’m… I can’t die here without seeing Caspian.” Aleena said in a low tone before covering her face with her left hand. “Go away,” she sniveled as the tears began to fall afresh.

Iluat approached her to try console her and apologize, but she rebuked him before he could draw any nearer when she heard his footsteps draw nearer.

“I said GO AWAY!”

The young man raised his hands as if saying ‘I surrender’ and walked out. He walked up the road heading to the town square, where everyone in the search party was waiting with flaming torches, chatting amongst themselves with brazen determination. The townspeople remaining to defend Vanguard were stood outside their homes preparing to send off the search party with a round of applause and a guard of honor. The search party was waiting for Iluat, with Boros and Ikal at the forefront to receive him.

“How is she?” Ikal inquired with genuine intrigue.

“We just need to make finding John’s body a priority,” Iluat asserted.

“Very well. When we reach the hilltop I’m assigning you with Alax, Jade, Eli and Rhyatt. You’ll show them where the dam is and how to dismantle it after my group inspects the home.”

“He’ll know we’re coming.”

“We’re ready for him,” Boros grinned his crooked smile.

Before the group proceeded down the road, Ikal turned and lifted his head to face the window of Markus’ home and stretched his arm to point at it. The house was in complete darkness, lending the growing suspicion that Markus was in hiding some credibility. Vanguard’s townspeople were ashamed of their so called Chief and Preeminent, to say the very least.

“When we return, we will decide what to do with that coward.”

Markus silently watched from his window’s edge as the procession walked down the road and out of Vanguard. Iluat’s eyes were fixed on Aleena’s door as they passed it by. Neither the round of applause nor the smiles of the townspeople around them consoled his heart nearly enough for him to feel confident, especially not after the exchange he had with a friend he considered dear. While they all walked out into the darkness of night encompassing the Valley, his heart began to pound and beat violently against his sternum. Unbeknownst to the search party, their stalker was not too far off, watching as the orange glow of their torches illuminated every step. Iluat anxiously looked around the further they walked from the city gates. Far off to his left was the dried up river channel that emerged from the forest that covered everything in front of him and to his right. The roaring thud of the town gates clasping shut behind them in the distance finally made it known (if anyone was in doubt): Failure meant death for all of them, whether by Elio’s hand or a merciless decline due to malnutrition. As soon as the group walked into the forest to ascend the hillside and were far enough away from the gate to make a safe return, Cahil dug his climbing hooks into the tree trunk for his controlled descent from his vantage point whilst keeping his eyes fixed on the orange glow making its way to his home.

Markus lay in the dark facing the ceiling, one leg hanging out of the bed. From hearing the gates shut, he broke out in a cold sweat while his mind ruminated over Ikal’s words. An unexpected knock on his front door caused him to jolt upright and lose his train of thought.

“Who is it?” He yelled from the bedroom.

“Just open the door,” a female voice demanded. Recognizing it as Aleena he jumped off the bed to light his lamp.

Markus opened the door and spread his arms out to embrace her. Aleena walked past him and sat in one of his living room chairs facing the main door. Markus sauntered to the window behind Aleena and moved the curtains to the side to allow some light in. Far off in the distance the orange glow could still be seen, piercing through the darkness of night as they inched closer to the summit. They weren’t too far off by then, yet something in his heart hoped with all fervor that Boros and Ikal would turn out as casualties. He smacked his lips before going back to take his seat opposite Aleena. Between them was arguably the best crafted wooden table in all of Vanguard: a gift from the townspeople back in the early days. Markus looked at it and blinked a few times before facing Aleena directly.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” He anxiously coaxed, though he felt he did a passable job at masking it.

“I need 30 silver Friats and one gold. Right now.”

The request greatly took him aback. Never in his life did he want to be more wrong about where he thought a conversation was going as much as that day.

“You don’t mean??” Markus sputtered.

“Clearly your project failed.” She let him sit with those words for a moment. “Come dawn, either you or that search party will be gone. I know my husband and I contributed a great deal to this town’s construction. If I wanted full restitution for our work you know the amount would bankrupt the treasury.” With her next words she tapped the table with her index finger, “So. Just. Bring. The. Money.”

Markus’s throat bulged as he swallowed some saliva and fluttered his eyelids trying to catch up to what his ears just heard. Aleena’s gaze was fixed squarely on him, her finger still on the table.

“Even if I got you the Friats, where are you going this late? You can’t possible have planned-.”

“I’m going to Highbrook,” she snapped before he could finish his sentence. “At least that’s a city with some idea of good governance.”

“Aleena… that’s a day’s journey, possibly more. That’s not including the possible risk of encountering the Marauders or that doom cult we discussed last week.” His eyes tried to soften and convey a look that said ‘Please don’t’, but his usual stern gaze won in the end.

“I’ve had a day to think it over while you hid in your room. Thank you, though.” She chided with crude disdain in her voice as she sat back upright.

Markus gave in and walked off to his bedroom drawer. Aleena could hear the clinking of metal as he put some Friats in a satchel while he wondered to himself whether he made the right move. As Markus walked back to hand her the money, he stopped dead in his tracks and stared outside through the window with eyes that looked like he had seen a ghost. He dropped the satchel which made a heavy impact on the floor. Aleena turned around to see the commotion and she instinctively stood up and approached the window with her mouth open in horror.

From the top of the hill, a raging inferno emerged from the area where Iluat said Elio’s house was. The wildfire grew in strength and intensity so rapidly it caught the surrounding forest, threatening to spread down the hillside. Markus particularly had to force himself to blink and acknowledge his perception was real. The forest towards the North, at the base of the hill, was far enough away from the city gate that its burning would not pose as much of a threat. The real danger was the East side of Vanguard, where the dry wood in the perimeter fence was dangerously close to the tall trees overlooking the town. To the West was the dried up river channel, meaning they had nothing to fight the flames with if they came close.

Aleena grabbed the satchel off the floor. Thankfully none of the coins had spilled out from their fall as the bag was sealed. Turning to point at the window, she lashed out at Markus,

“Now do you see why I need to leave? You had no hand in making this winter what it is, but today you are responsible for the death of innocents. You have doomed us all.”

Her voice managed to divert his attention from the hill back to the room, as well as his eye contact.

All Markus could muster to say was “Then I wish you well on your journey, Aleena. Pass my love to Caspian when you find him.” His eyes began to well up before bidding her goodbye. “I’m sorry for what I put you through.”

Aleena rushed out the door and down the stairs. At full speed, she ran to her home to retrieve her bag and a small water flask: about enough for a day’s journey if she rationed. Upon exiting her home, the sight of every remaining resident of Vanguard lined up and down the road staring in horror at the blazing forest fire was enough to give her pause. At the mere thought of the name Caspian she bolted right out of the stance she was frozen in. Amidst the cries the remaining women screaming their lungs out and the frantic steps of the men flocking to the city gate, Aleena dashed past all of them, barely able to care who she knocked over or shoved out the way. In the frenzy of her escape her front door remained open.

The men flung open the city gate with the hope of receiving even a lone survivor, but the expanse of snow-laden land before them was empty. A bright, deep-red glow cut through the inky black of the cloudy night sky with thick plumes of smoke billowing into the air. In short time the scorching blaze grew into a wall of fire destroying the hillside. With great fear they all watched as the wildfire raged on to the hill’s base; essentially trapping the patrol group within the forest. Some men walked out into the open field, and upon seeing that the river channel was still dry, cried out in despair as they realized the dam was never going to be destroyed. Elio had won.

“Oh God… he’s killed us!” One of the onlookers wailed.

The gravity of their situation began to settle in their fragile hearts. Some threw their hands on their heads and fixed their eyes on the flames that rose so high they seemed to descend from heaven. Strong gales of wind twisted and pushed the sea of fire all over the tree line.

In their absent minded and frightened ogling, they failed to notice Aleena sneaking behind them as she ran West for the river channel.

Soon enough she reached the river bank and jumped down into the dry river bed. Her landing was less than ideal, given there were only clusters of rock and hard ice to break her fall. Although Aleena’s plan to take a shortcut to Highbrook by traveling West through the river channel was her one and only option, she greatly underestimated the width and depth of the fluvial channel. The width was not so much the problem, rather the fact the river bank she was meant to climb over to reach the other side was about three heads taller than her. Even if she jumped, she could not see anything but dirt and rock.

Aleena looked around desperately for something to aid her, but her frantic breathing and adrenaline fueled state made it so difficult to focus. She had been running virtually ever since leaving Markus’ house, and the time to pay that oxygen debt had come. Feeling the need to grab her stomach, she winced in agony as she developed a stitch.

Suddenly a deep, rumbling sound began to drown out the sound of her breathing and the screams in the distance. It literally sounded like the earth was groaning. Aleena straightened her back from the bent over position she was in from holding her belly to look to the river channel’s source. Looking right back at her from a distance was a surging rush of water as the river eagerly raced down the hillside. The mass of water moved with such speed it was clear a hard impact would end her life.

“No…” Aleena whimpered. Her feet were frozen in place; all her energy consumed by a brain that believed it was in its last moments. Aleena’s life began to proverbially ‘flash before her eyes’ as she stood there, accepting her fate of death by drowning.

“Woman! Take my hand!” A man shouted from across the river channel. She looked up and saw it wasn’t anyone she knew from Vanguard but in that exact moment, in those precious seconds that decide between life and death before our conscious mind is even aware we made the choice, she ran across the width of the river channel and jumped to grab the man’s hand. As he lifted her out she used whatever lower body strength she had available to quicken her exit by climbing up the steep walls of the channel. Almost immediately she got out and landed on the snow, the river swept through that section she just escaped and rushed downstream with newfound energy to announce to the whole world of its rebirth.

Aleena lay on her side shaking and quivering. Through tears and a voice stifled by labored breathing she just uttered “Thank you” over and over.

“We have to go, come.” The man said as he helped her on her feet. When she looked back across the river, she saw that the fire burned so fiercely it consumed all the forest down to the base of the hill, and was beginning to spread to the side of the perimeter fence, even West across the forest that covered the river channel. Everyone who was previously standing outside the gate yelled for her to stop, running toward the river perplexed as to why she was being led away by a man they had never seen. One managed to reach the edge of the river bank first, but the rushing surge of water was too strong to safely swim across.

“Aleena! Come back!”

Every plea was ignored as her back remained turned to them. Aleena and the strange man disappeared into the forest ahead of them. With all means of getting Aleena’s attention expended, they had to shift their focus to retrieving every cistern from every home in Vanguard to collect as much water as possible. If the town was going to survive the night, it would take nothing short of a miracle.

The Vanguard resident standing at the river bank still clueless as to where Aleena went turned to look at the river. He saw two people floating on it, both seemingly motionless. He positioned himself in a squat and stretched his hand out to try pull at least one out. To his surprise and relief, both were still alive, they had just chosen to stop fighting the strong river current and follow it. The two swam to the river bank but were too exhausted to pull themselves out of the water. Following their exit from the river, the other townspeople had begun to arrive with their cisterns in hand ready to initiate a firefighting plan. Iluat and Jade’s teeth chattered in the blistering cold while they lay in the snow, completely drenched and delirious. Within seconds they were surrounded about, pelted with questions from their onlookers, “What happened?” “Did you kill him?” “Where are the rest?” “Who started the fire?”

A few of the townspeople had compassion on them, seeing as they were clearly shaken. Carrying them in their arms, the made way for Vanguard’s infirmary in the Town Hall to inspect any wounds they may have had. Iluat insisted he was fine, and that he first wanted to speak to Markus. He was carried right up to Markus’ doorstep, where he was eased onto his feet so the man who carried him could return to assist with the firefighting effort. Markus opened the door almost immediately since he was keenly watching from the balcony window. Holding Iluat in an embrace drenched most of Markus’ tunic and coat but he hardly cared.

“I hope you can forgive me for ignoring any pleasantries, but I need the full report immediately.”

Clearly suffering from some level of shock, Iluat just stared at Markus, seemingly unable to sit down.

“Iluat, please. We need to know if we need to send a rescue group up there.”

“Don’t. Don’t do it they’re all dead. All of them. He… he wasn’t there,” Iluat blurted.

“What did you find? Who started the fire?” Markus snapped. Impatience got the best of him.

“Boros and Ikal burst through the front door, but no Elio. We saw a corpse lying on the bed?” Iluat faltered as he second guessed what he literally saw. “It had decomposed for quite some time… it wasn’t fresh. Uh… the whole house smelled of tallow, like soap.”

“What about the fire?!!”

“The plan was we… burn the house down after inspecting it. That was Boros and Ikal’s group. I went to break the dam but it took a while. Then fire broke out. Everyone ran out the house on fire, some ran into the forest in frenzy, forest caught fire.” His breathing was so frantic, barely anything he said in between those sentences were intelligible.

Markus began to take some steps back as he started to internalize that the fire was premeditated. “Tallow is flammable. That sick man slathered it all over the house knowing they would set it on fire.”

“A- And John! We found John’s body… near the dam. Fire was growing too strong, only way to make it safely was to jump in the river but the dam took long to remove. We lost the others to the fire. Where is Aleena? Take me to her!”

The silence from Markus was near deafening.

“Where is she?”

Iluat blazed out the still-open door of Markus’ house. His race to Aleena’s doorstep was so staggered he bumped into someone carrying a cistern of water and it broke, yet to him the need to apologize was secondary. Tears filled his eyes when he saw the open door. He screamed and shouted her name all through Vanguard, but everyone else was single minded in fighting the fire, which had spread to the tree cluster East of Vanguard. The perimeter fence had already began to catch fire.

Iluat returned to Aleena’s living room and slumped down near the chair she sat on at their last conversation.

“Aleena… Aleena, No…” he lamented.

Out in the forest, Aleena and the stranger slowed their pace having felt they created enough distance between themselves and Vanguard. For once Aleena had the time to properly look at the man who pulled her from the jaws of death. Illuminated by the distant forest fire, she observed that the man had on a long, black cloak over his winter clothes. His gloves and boots were quite thick, definitely much better and more durable than hers. Back when he saved her from the river channel he had a black hood over his head, but during their run through the forest it came off. His beard was thick and clearly unkempt, with his hair looking similar except it was curly. Something felt… wrong about his gaze, so she stepped back even more to try buy time for an escape.

“Who are you?” Aleena challenged, moving to draw her pocket knife from its holster.

The man stretched out his hand and said, “I am Cahil. I mean you no harm.”

Shaking his hand cautiously, she queried, “And where are you headed to?”

“Highbrook. I need to meet with an old friend.” Cahil internally hated the fact he had to divulge the truth to a stranger. “What about you?” he inquired.

“Also Highbrook. Do you have a tent? I only carried one.”

“I do. But I can keep watch for some of the night, to see if anyone followed us.”

“My name is Aleena. Your social skills need work, Cahil.”

He mustered half a smile and moved to a clear area where they could lay their tents for the night. As Aleena slept, he sat facing the direction they ran from facing the ever-raging inferno in the distance. He couldn’t help but smirk slightly seeing how everything fell into place.

-CHAPTER 3-

STARFALL

OVER

EUODIA

For the first time since John’s passing, although momentarily, Aleena felt she had earned the upper hand over the choking regret that antagonized her. A gaping mass replaced that remorse for a time, slowly eating away at her ability to process where she found herself. It was already past noon in the new day; snowflakes lazily trailing down from the sky before being carried to and fro in strong gusts of icy wind. Visibility was already poor, yet still descending into new lows even for winter. She just stared into the gaping path ahead while her feet dragged her along. Etched on her face was a forlorn expression that she lacked the awareness to know was even there. Even coherent thought was denied to her, and in its stead were constant replays of the last two days: her final moments with John, Vanguard’s end, her near death experience. Aleena felt she had been doing well for most of her journey to Highbrook, until her memories of the wildfire were twisted into harrowing images of Iluat’s charred body lying in the forest.

Out of subconscious intuition, she craned her neck to turn back, hoping against the circumstances that she’d at least catch a glimpse of the burnt forest in the distance. But even that view was much too far off, now covered by the massive trees collecting snow on their branches. Instead, her eyes met with those of the man she encountered the night before, who was walking quite a distance away and was staring right back with a scrutinizing countenance. As Aleena turned her face forward, the understanding that she was a long way from anyone she could confide in finally settled. And in as much as Cahil posed no immediate threat to her, the fact that they shared no conversation since dawn irked her deeply. Asking him how he happened to be so close to the river at that exact time or where he hailed from could lead to an altercation; a high price she wasn’t willing to pay out in the Alves. She astutely judged early on that it would be worse meeting Marauders or the doom cult alone. All the more she hoped they wouldn’t cross paths with either faction, adding in the fact she was attempting to hide her limp from Cahil.

At the culmination of the adrenaline-fueled night she barely survived, Aleena sustained injuries to both legs after her rough landing in the river channel. In the privacy of her tent while Cahil stood watch outside, she saw that both her shins were bruised and the skin on her left ankle was a light shade of purple, but Aleena was confident she could reach Highbrook and receive proper care before Cahil noticed. It was only after packing her tent and embarking on the journey that she started to feel echoes of consequences from her escapade.

In her purview, showing herself a liability to the man looming behind her could be just as costly as confronting him.

Cahil lifted his eyes to the sky in an attempt to determine the time. Though the cloud cover was much less than the day prior, the sun’s position still remained hidden from him. He quickly locked his eyes back on Aleena to monitor the worsening limp.

He had hoped to make an assessment on whether they could reach Highbrook within the day, but not even the most generous of estimates made it likely. Time was of the essence not just because of his own plans, but rather the dilapidated state he noticed Aleena was truly in.

Apart from the near-obvious limp, she was really gaunt and pale; her hair was a dull coppery-orange color from inconsistent care and her fingernails had developed streaks of vertical ridges likely from nutrient deficiency. It was in the morning light when they dismantled their sleeping tents he finally caught a proper look at her, with Aleena none the wiser that she was under a keen eye. All along their trek he pondered the wisdom and value in saving her life, questioning himself repeatedly whether this delay would hinder his plans. It had been well over six years since he last stepped foot in Highbrook and for all he knew the man he had to meet there may have relocated, or worse. If that were to be the case, just about every journal entry would be for nothing, every life lost in his wake rendered insignificant when put against how many would be saved.

Despite her resolute longing to see Caspian again, that sentiment alone simply could not mend torn flesh. Aleena’s body had demanded she sit down and attend to its wounds for so long that her legs completely gave way in protest and caused her to stumble. Instinctively resting her left hand on the nearest tree to keep her from falling brought her to a complete stop. The throbbing pain lit up her lower body in excruciatingly long waves. Her whole face grimaced while her eyes shut so she could focus on mustering the will to continue.

“You have to move, stand up before he knows you’re injured.” “But he already knows… he knows.”

Turning her back to face the tree she rested against, she collapsed to the ground, her eyes already losing strength as they turned over to see Cahil catching up to her. Her hands were at her sides, too frail to be raised up in defense of herself if the situation went awry. Cahil’s pace was still the same: slow and intentional, hardly a hint of urgency in it. Though he stopped when he finally reached her, he remained standing, towering over her.

Lacking the will to look up and see his disappointment, Aleena retained her slumped posture while her field of view was of her legs in front of her and in the corner of her eye on the right were Cahil’s. His voice sounded like the low rumbling of thunder from above.

“To what extent are you injured?”

“I- I can’t walk any further,” she sluggishly vacillated. With every blink of the eye she drew nearer to a deep sleep, steadily losing the fight against exhaustion caused by the involuntary fasting she subjected herself to. Snowfall had blanketed the land so completely over the course of winter that Aleena, while seated on the ground, was covered up to her lower chest. It was in that state she remembered that her last meal was almost three days prior; a meal she refused to finish given how repugnant it was to both nose and tongue. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Cahil move from her right-hand side to her left, walking right over her legs as if she weren’t there.

“You’re leaving?” she panted.

“Stay quiet.”

“You have to carry me to Highbrook, please. Don’t leave me to die.”

The man ignored her, but he didn’t move out of her field of view. And since Cahil’s back was facing her, she assumed he was contemplating leaving her out in the Alves to fend for herself. Whatever ounce of strength she had left all went into her last plea,

“I can pay you. I can give you my only gold Friat. Please!”

Cahil half turned his back to her, looking over his left shoulder to see Aleena pleading with her eyes. Squinting his eyes ever so slightly, as if offended, he retorted back at her,

“I do not need your money. Someone seems to have found us, so stay quiet.”

Aleena’s head reeled back and rested on the tree trunk. Still in the losing position in the fight to remain conscious, her only hope at life was in the kindness of strangers.

Staring out into the open forest, Cahil could see a figure emerging out of the tempestuous snowstorm. The person seemed to be alone, walking with a slow saunter that oozed a high level of presence. They walked with both arms outward making a V-shape, palms facing forward. As the full figure stepped out of the snowy gale and closer to Cahil, it was clear to him she was a woman, dressed in a decadent burgundy robe. The fabric was most certainly expensive at first purchase, but the relentless weathering of time beat it down to a haggard, rag-like state. Nonetheless, the head covering had a veil that remained pristine, just baggy enough to flow with the wind and still cover most of the stranger’s face. Her entire body was covered save for her eyes, with the few glimpses them revealing hazel green jewels when she got close enough. She placed her hands by her side, allowing her robe to flow from shoulder to toe almost perfectly if not for the wear and tear.

Cahil’s right hand hovered over his axe holster, but not too evidently as to make it obvious. The woman’s voice cut through the howling winds of the storm with an elegant and friendly tone of voice, carrying an accent Cahil had trouble recognizing.

“Having difficulty traversing the Alves?”

“No. No we are not.”

She paused for a few moments too long. The slit in the head covering revealing her eyes cut off most of her nose and eyebrows, leaving little to deduce by way of her expressions. Momentarily, her eyes shifted to Aleena, who by then was slumped over in the snow.

“All our food and medicine is at our camp. Hasten your feet and bring her.”

His hand hesitantly rested from its hovering position. As Cahil turned to lift Aleena’s nearly lifeless body out of the snow, he asserted his voice loud enough for the stranger to hear,

“For your own sake I hope you speak the truth.”

“I am,” she avowed, “We set up camp deep in the Alves on our pilgrimage to Zephyr in the South. We were meant to have left already but after the fire we caught glimpses of last night, we knew at least someone would be wandering this place bereft.”

Cahil’s brazen face carried enough distrust to clue her in that he didn’t buy her story.

“Look,” she prompted with a (nearly) imperceptible hint of seduction.

She lifted her left arm out of the robe and pulled back the sleeve from her glove at the wrist down to the elbow joint. All along her arm were leathery patches of burnt skin, healed overtime though unsightly to look at. Just as quickly as she had pulled the sleeve back she concealed her arm before letting it disappear into her robe again.

“I know a tragedy like that can take lives and homes. I take it you’ve lost a lot already, don’t let her be another,” she urged.

Cahil glanced down at Aleena’s face; seeing her visage lacking movement while her eyes remained shut. The rhythmic movement of her chest was still visible, which allowed him a moment of respite, but the weight of Aleena being his responsibility crushed any flickering hope he initially had of avoiding an encounter with anyone. A short sigh preceded his reluctant agreement to follow her back to the camp, albeit based on one condition he kept to himself. As he walked behind the stranger he began to truly feel a deep sense of regret for avoiding conversation earlier with Aleena. In his short-sightedness he failed to consider that she could know more than he of any groups wandering the Alves. Isolation has its cost.

Too weak and emaciated to move, Aleena could only react in her mind to the conversation she heard as she slipped in and out of consciousness. “Don’t go with her! That’s the cult! NO! ” Eventually losing her grasp, Aleena drifted off, lulled into a deep slumber as the voices of Cahil and the strange woman trailed off.

Aleena woke up cotton-mouthed, still feeling sapped of energy. She had woken up on her side and in her movement to sit upright, recognized that she was on a makeshift bed in the middle of a large tent. Its entrance was in front of her, slightly ajar as the flaps of cloth towards the bottom of the tent swayed gently in the wind. From the little she could see of the outside, it was clear that it was nighttime, and there was a campfire illuminating the area with a soft glow. Removing the blanket covering her, Aleena was grateful if not at least perturbed at the sight of her legs well bandaged. She could feel there was a thin layer of warm paste in between her skin and the cloth wrapping it, likely a poultice to reduce the inflammation because the throbbing pain had subsided. Beside her on the right were her bag and water flask. Before even thinking to take a moment to nourish herself, she rummaged through her bag in a panic, but found some alleviation from finding her tent and change of clothes were left in it as they were.

She patted herself on the waist and looked down, finding her leather holster, but missing her knife and the satchel of Friats Markus gave her.

It took minutes of intentional breath work and rehearsing an unsuspicious countenance before she felt ready to step out of the tent and engage with her captors. She thought if Cahil had left her in the camp and went on to Highbrook, she would have a mountain and a half to climb before considering herself safe.

Aleena, groggy and still a tad sluggish, walked out the tent and after looking around, saw no sign of Cahil. The tent she exited was one in a large ring of tents, with a large campfire at its center and a few wooden benches strewn around the compound. Everyone seated had turned to face Aleena at the same time; a deeply unsettling sight since all of them, male and female, only had their eyes visible by way of the eye slit in the head covering. One of them stood and started walking towards Aleena, arms spread out to embrace her.

“You’re awake!” her voice echoed through the camp. Aleena recognized it as the woman from earlier, and as the stranger held her tightly Aleena’s arms remained stiff. Aleena was perplexed that someone out in the woods was wearing vanilla scented perfume.

The stranger pulled away from the hug, but left her hands still holding Aleena’s upper arms just below the shoulders. To her credit, Aleena’s demeanor was fairly convincing, doing its best to conceal her shock at how much taller the woman was than her. The angle they were standing at allowed the glow of the campfire to shine on mostly one side of her face, accentuating her green eyes.

“Thank you for your help. Might I ask your name?” Aleena implored with a slight smile.

“Call me Wrea.”

“Pleasure to meet you, Wrea. Where is the one who brought me?”

“Oh, Poriant Cahil? He’s patrolling the surrounding forest, we don’t like to be bothered over dinner. Food will be served in a moment, probably when he returns.”

Fusing the genuine relief she felt at hearing that into her response, Aleena said rather convincingly, “How kind of you, truly. Why don’t we sit and talk while we wait?”

“Of course. What do I call you, sister?”

“Aleena.”

Wrea put her right arm over Aleena’s shoulders and positioned herself so they were standing side by side and facing the rest of the crowd. She chirped with joy in the sight of the others, using her left hand to point at Aleena and perform her introduction to the larger group with some poise, “All of you, this is Aleena, our new Poriant! She has shown gratitude for our help in nursing her wounds, a sign of a gentle soul as I told you she is. Harlek, make arrangements to tailor her wrappings before we reach Zephyr in two moon’s time,” turning her face back to Aleena she gushed in low tones, “It was by fate that our paths crossed, sister. You belong here, with us.”

As they walked together to a lone bench by the fire, several members of the group stood up and clapped, but the sound of their thick gloves coming together at once just sounded like noise in Aleena’s ear. If Wrea’s face weren’t mostly covered her wide smile would be evident, but all Aleena saw was a cold pair of eyes fixed on her, refusing to let go.

“Well then, Aleena, tell me about yourself!” Wrea beamed.

“You ask as if I’m the more interesting one here,” she chuckled. “But before anything I would like some water.”

Wrea beckoned with her hand and two men rushed to fetch some water for her. She gave a hearty laugh before loudly jesting that she only needed one to do it, much to the chagrin of the man who was last to reach the water cistern. His shoulders drooped and his head was slightly to the ground before quietly returning to his place on the bench. Aleena watched with some level of pride as she saw this, her awe reached a new high when the successful one brought the water to Wrea.

“Honored to help,” the man cooed.

“Thank you, Earl. How long until dinner?” she sighed.

“Not long.”

“And go check for Poriant Cahil, would you? We don’t want to delay tonight’s regale for our guests.”

Off he went into the forest, running like a boy on an errand.

“Like I said, I’m clearly not the more interesting one here,” Aleena mused with a bubbly laugh, a laugh that now simultaneously had to mask the growing fear that Cahil’s ‘patrol’ was cover for his departure on his own or worse yet, a cover up for his murder. It also came to memory once more that her knife and money satchel were gone, involuntarily making her sigh shakily through her nostrils. Wrea immediately craned her neck to face her, sensing some unease in what Aleena just did. “Oh, sorry, I just tried to imagine talking to my brother like that… wouldn’t end too well. You know how some men get,” she kidded with a nervous laugh.

“Hmm, right. Does their behavior surprise you, Aleena? Does it surprise you that they respect me? That I have their undying love and they have mine?” Wrea rasped. With just her eyes Wrea conveyed all the hurt she needed to. The sudden tonal shift gave Aleena such strong whiplash that all the remaining color was washed out her face.

“No, no not at all. I just noticed that you hold a special place with them, something foreign to me.” Aleena nervously stuttered before taking a huge swig of water to fix her cotton mouth.

“Oh. Well then, tell me about this brother of yours,” Wrea giggled as she scooted closer to Aleena. Her eyes returned to their soft, friendly gaze literally in the blink of an eye.

“He’s called Caspian.”

“Caspian… I like that name. Where is he? If he’s anything like you he would fit perfectly amongst us.”

“I- I don’t know,” Aleena muttered. Her face dropped as she went for another sip of water. Sore of a topic as it were, she was yet glad no one asked about John, so this would do for the moment.

“I can help you find him,” Wrea consoled as she rubbed her on the back.

“How?” Aleena sputtered as her eyes burned with intrigue.

“Do you at least have a clue on where he is?”

“I do.”

“Then that will be enough. The answer is in your mind, and I can help you find it.” Wrea’s hand went up Aleena’s back to the base of her neck, playing with her hair with light tugging and threading the hair strands between her fingers. “You know, the mind is so, so powerful. It’s how I knew you would be here. Poriant Cahil on the other hand needs far more work; his soul is… let’s just say troubled. But you, you’re special. After tonight’s regale, you’ll know of what I speak. I know you have searched for meaning all your life… to justify your place in this world. You know there’s a reason why I let you use my name and not my title, a reason why I don’t always address you by Poriant.”

“And what’s your title?”

“I am Alma Wrea,” she asserted with such an admirable level of confidence that Aleena didn’t know she herself could have.

“You mean like Almattr? Euodia’s foreteller??” Aleena blurted out. She tried to casually take another sip of water so her face could be preoccupied before making an unwarranted expression. Instead she was left exclaiming in her mind “Cahil I swear if you don’t come back right this instant! Why did you bring me to these people?? ”

“Yes, indeed. I, in fact, we all believe that as we journey to Telestria we all have a strong chance to serve in the Marvelous Land. We will be the first laypeople in our generation to enter those magnificent gates,” Wrea smugly gushed. She closed her eyes in satisfaction the way one would after sipping the finest of wine. She sighed longingly before returning her eye contact and attention back to Aleena as she said, “But first let me teach you something. Look at the sky.”

Aleena lifted her eyes to the night sky, which was dotted all over with endless star constellations and clusters. “It’s beautiful,” she remarked before looking back at Wrea.

“Where is the moon?” Wrea pondered out loud.

“He’s asleep today, isn’t he?”

“He was already asleep yesterday, the night of what we call the Great Wall of Fire. There ought to be light today, yet there is none. Tell me Aleena, when have you ever seen the New Moon two nights in a row? Did you ever read the annals from East Euodia?”

“No… I wish I did.”

“My grandfather would often read them to me as I fell asleep. And I’ll never forget him say ‘Wrea, take watch over the moon as he watches you, the same way you look out for your own blood. Watch that he does not oversleep, lest evil will be done in the dark with no one to witness.’ Is it by chance that the Great Wall of Fire appeared last night?”

Aleena nearly forgot to stop her performative nodding at the end of Wrea’s sentence. Utterly dumbfounded, she let out a dry chuckle and stuttered something about how intelligent that observation was. She couldn’t even be bothered to remember what she had just uttered, all she knew was that she said something rudely dishonest but it seemed to have worked.

“Uh… Then…” she scratched her forehead before continuing, “Wouldn’t Almattr know that already? Every foretelling of future events in our nation has come from her, and none of them have had anything to do with the moon. And even then, she resides deep in Telestria; no one has seen her leave, it’s even a matter of great debate how she has remained alive since the foundation of Telestria centuries ago. How do you intend to gain an audience with her?”

“That’s where you come in, sister.” Wrea cackled as she slyly tapped Aleena’s nose.

“Alma Wrea! I return with our Poriant Cahil. The area is secure,” Earl loudly announced as he walked into the camp with Cahil trailing behind him. Aleena looked right at him, and Cahil could instantly read the unease that plagued her face. He gave a very slight nod, now realizing time was short.

Wrea stood up and clasped her hands together to bring order. “Tonight we feast! To save on time, I will give today’s regale while you eat. It may be a long one but I am more than glad to retell our great nation’s story for the sake of our Poriants, especially Aleena. And I am simply brimming with joy at the thought of sharing with you all our future steps, as I now believe that from now henceforth, our journey to Telestria will finally bear fruit.”

The people cheered heartily, dancing and jubilating as they made their way to the makeshift kitchen structure behind the ring of tents and as they returned to their benches with bowls of meat stew in hand. Cahil joined the queue dead last, along with Aleena. Wrea stood all alone by the campfire patiently waiting for her subjects to be seated.

“Where were you?” Aleena whispered with venom in her tone.

“I went on patrol, are you hard of hearing?”

“And left me with these people? Do you even know who they are?”

“I admit they appear suspicious, but our time here is limited. As soon as they fall asleep, we leave. For now your concern should be getting some sustenance. You clearly need it.” Cahil ribbed.

“It’s only because I have reason to suspect my last meal was interfered with. For someone like you, it’s odd you don’t suspect the same.” She chided right back.

“I helped cut up the deer they slaughtered for this meal, then I embarked on patrol. They took care of you while you slept, I think you can acknowledge that.”

Aleena turned away and scoffed, “They stole my money and knife from me.”

“Remind me of that as we leave. I have something to show you.”

They served their food in silence, and as they returned to the benches by the campfire, he sat next to Aleena, where Wrea previously sat. Every bench that was far off or facing away from the campfire was adjusted so all were facing Wrea as she spoke. For the first time, Aleena and Cahil saw the faces of everyone else at the camp as they took their head coverings off. They all seemed irrationally avoidant; only conversing and laughing amongst themselves.

Cahil looked around as they wolfed down the stew straight from the bowl. He turned to his left to see Aleena’s bowl completely empty and as soon as she told him the food was sweet to the taste, he ate. Across from them, adjacent to the campfire, a man and two women made way to stand behind Wrea in a sort of diamond formation. The man was furthest from Wrea, at the back, while the two women flanked her sides. Cahil observed that they had eaten faster than the other subjects, probably to hurry up in aiding Wrea’s regale. His full understanding of the hierarchy amongst them was taking shape, but even a blind man could tell the entire camp ran according to Wrea’s edict.

A solemn, foreboding melody proceeded from the man’s vocal chords. As the bass emerged from the background of the diamond formation and filled the camp, the women jumped on one of the waves in his voice in a velvety-smooth alto, creating a resonantly rich remake of an old folklore tune usually sang in Telestria. The song was originally made to mimic what people thought outer space would sound like, convinced that all heavenly bodies have a song to sing and thus emit their light.

In as much as Cahil wanted to dislike the harmony blessing his ears, he found himself smiling and gave himself over to the regale. Both he and Aleena were swaying to the tune of the song, with everyone’s eyes fixed on Wrea with overbearing expectation. There was a sort of special release that settled in the audience’s hearts. Something beyond mere words allowed them to be fully present and soothed by the airy singing from the women.

“In the moon’s absence, may the stars be our witness. I stand before all of you as progenitor of our calling, as your herald before the bejeweled Gates of Telestria that we will now surely cross. Never since the great Caldera War has there been a moment in time so pivotal, so crucial. Never since the end of the Old World has there been such great need for people like us.

Passed down the generations was the story of how this world came to be; we were told of the olden times, the days when the earth was wrought by a pestilence that nearly brought its end. A time when mankind lived in prisons of corrupted earth, when their eyes were fixed on metal devices of sorcery that poisoned the soul. Every nation under the sky had the possibility for unity, yet in their hubris they maligned and struck themselves with hatred for one another, and for this there was a reckoning. Look to the sky, allow it to turn back the days and show you how the Old World ended. It was a night such as this, calm as any. But one by one, the stars fell. They hurtled down towards the earth carrying all the abhorrent pride of the human race with them. It was our collective hate that erupted into the plumes of fire that consumed every structure, every human and every animal. We, in our evil, destroyed ourselves.”

Cahil was one of the last to look to the skies at Wrea’s request. Thinking he would just humor her and get it over with, he playfully focused on one star out of the thousands sown in the sky. Every time he blinked his eyes, the star looked as though it was falling. And sure enough, it began to come down with furious speed, accompanied by dozens of others. They ceased to look like stars, instead taking the shape of what looked like thick metal spears with a tail of white fire emanating from the rear end. And when they struck the ground far off in the distance, an enormous ball of light flashed across the night sky before a thundering BOOM followed. Then another boom, and another, and another. Cahil watched in the purest form of bewilderment imaginable as the night sky lost its stars and the earth received them with explosions so massive they could be seen hundreds of kilometers away. Each time a star fell and struck the ground, a ball of fire and darkened ash rose as like lightning into the sky before settling into the shape of a mushroom, far above the initial point of impact. As his heart rate blistered into perilous highs and his eyes widened, Cahil looked around to see if anyone saw what he just witnessed. Everyone else, wide eyed and mouths gaping, were either looking to the sky or covering their ears and flinching to protect themselves from the blasts. Aleena was left star struck, audibly breathing with the depth of an experienced swimmer.

He looked down to try catch a glimpse of the food he just ate, instead he saw what he could only describe in his mind as ‘Why is the meat in the bowl moving and talking to me? And why is the snow… alive? The fire in front of me… it’s singing!! ’

Cahil shot upright off the bench, looking up to see Wrea smiling with her pearly whites on full display. She had taken off her head covering, revealing a face most men would give their kingdoms in dowry for the chance at her hand.

“Relax. Let your mind open,” she soothed. Her voice penetrated through to a region in his conscious mind he didn’t know was there. Cahil carefully and quietly sat down, and when he felt the bench make contact with his body he felt like he truly understood what it meant to sit down for the first time in his life. He took off his gloves and started feeling the textures around him, from the material of his clothing to the curls in his hair. When he reached for the snow, he could have sworn he audibly heard it say “Feel me.” It wasn’t even cold to the touch, as if his nerve endings lost the ability to feel cold.

He looked back up at Wrea with a sense of childlike wonderment. She only responded with a sultry smirk before continuing,

“From the ashes of the Caldera War, very few remained on the earth. Once more they scattered across the earth, defying the odds as they dared to rebuild. It mattered little what tongue they spoke or what creed they ascribed to; mankind had to come together, and correctly this time. Thus our age was born, this is why we are here. Our forefathers and mothers built Euodia to what it is, and a small gentry came together to establish our glorious crown, Telestria. Through her incredulous effort, Almattr’s voice has helped lead us out of troubled times. The heir of Telestria has ensured our survival throughout the terrors of Scoalt, he has provided us our currency and symbol of national pride in the Friat with the symbol etched on its surface. And although Almattr as well as the heir have chosen to remain hidden within Telestria,”

Wrea’s voice cracked and her eyes became glossy at the thought of what she was about to say.

“We journey with the assurance that we will be accepted into the arms of our Great Capitol. We will prove ourselves to Almattr and the heir as worthy by bringing our own foretelling, by showing that we too can read the signs. We have bordered on the edge of prescience and have endured the harshest winter in our history with the knowledge that this is just a test. A test that we will all surely pass when we reach Zephyr and hear for ourselves the new, rumored foretelling. I can see it now, I can see the Telestrial Guard walking us into their dwelling with great cheering and jubilation. We earned it. Together we will help Euodia navigate this new dispensation.”

Cheers and screams of joy erupted out of the crowd, some even broke down crying.

“Alma Wrea, take us on the path!” they chanted with adoration, save for those singing as well as the two Poriants, who were on their knees feeling the snow and letting it fall between their fingers as they grinned like little children.

Poising herself to sound more regal, Wrea announced in conclusion, “And so, my family dearest, churn out whatever holds you back. Purge yourselves of all memories tying you to your past, for Telestria can only receive our best. It may not happen the first time, but it’s for that reason that you have me. No one has entered the Marvelous Land in this generation. But together, together we make history! So go, uproot the dead roots of the past!”

At her command the people began to scatter, walking around the camp and talking to themselves. Aleena walked far off towards the camp’s entrance, led by a familiar voice.

“My Aleena, where are you?”

“I’m here!”

Though she was physically looking out into a forest of dead trees, her eyes genuinely perceived the silhouette of a man shimmer into a real, visible person. He walked towards her with a big smile on his face, a smile she had grown to miss deeply. She started to well up, but quickly wiped the tears away since the layer of tears in her eyes made John look more blurry, and she was desperate to see him in all the details she last remembered of him.

“Is that really you?” Aleena gasped.

“Of course, my love.”

“How do I do this without you? A part of me left when you breathed your last.”

“What do you mean? I’m right here. I’ve always been right here.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t say I love you that day. I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry.”

John’s face drooped a bit into a small frown, but he tried to look strong for her.

“Why can I feel you trying to let me go?”

“I don’t know what to do. The more I think about you and what happened, the more I break.”

He walked closer to her, and when he touched her shoulder it felt as real as though he was standing right there. She leapt forward to hug him and contrary to her expectations, she didn’t pass right through him. They embraced, and she cried so passionately that when she opened her eyes she saw herself with him back at their home in Vanguard, on the night before he left for his final patrol. John was wearing the clothes she last saw him in as he prepared for bed that night.

“You need to let go of the guilt from that night, not of me. You know I went on that patrol for our town’s betterment,” he pulled away from their embrace to face her, cupping Aleena’s face with his right hand before professing to her, “It was the same heart you fell in love with that chose to make that decision. You blame yourself for what happened, why?”

“How can I forgive myself and I never got to bury you?” she said while sniffling.

“You’re carrying a burden I never asked you to, my love. Agonizing over it will only hinder you from your dream.”

“A dream that I saw with you in it… I wanted to carry your children. What do I have in your absence? What if I die without making something of myself?”

John began to sway her in a sort of slow dance, one hand at her waist the other still by her cheek. They maintained eye contact for as long as they could while Aleena focused on every detail in his face in an effort to memorize it forever. If ever a day came that she forgot what he looked like, it would be like losing him all over again.

“When we meet next, I have no doubt you’ll be where you ought to be.”

Aleena choked out through gritted teeth, “What do you mean next time? You can’t leave, I just got you back.”

“The longer you stay on Wrea’s path, the closer you get to Telestria, the more often we will meet.”

Wrea observed with wicked glee at Aleena prancing about amongst the trees, holding out her arms to embrace a figure that was never there. The sight of all her subjects scattering across the expanse of the camp and rambling to themselves always brought her a fleeting feeling of sheer ecstasy. Wrea glanced from one person to the next, each one having a different reaction to the special ingredient in their food. The usually silent night was bursting with the crescendo of all sorts of wailing and groaning as dozens of people relived their most ardent memories. She stared at Cahil in particular, who was kneeling on the ground with his arms spread out as though he was carrying someone fragile.

“I promise I will make it right, even if I have to give up my life.” Cahil heaved while holding back tears.

In his arms was a woman so cadaverous that her skin barely hid the bones underneath. She was pale and covered in splotches of grey, ashy skin. Her scalp was mostly visible as a result of terminal hair loss, leaving behind flakes of skin that peeled off at the slight push of wind.

Surrounding the two of them was a harsh contrast of an environment: a room as beautiful as one could imagine. Everything down to the wooden legs of every table and footstool showcased golden embroidery, authentic gold at that. The woman Cahil carried was dressed in fine linen; a crimson red dress with gold accents at the hem and neckline. She wore a pendant bearing a large jasper gemstone, her favorite of them all.

“Promise me you will see me again.” She whispered.

“I would tear down the stars from their place in the sky to bring you back.”

“I know you would. But I need to see you do it. Bring down the sky on those who made you this way.”

“Verdier, you have my word.”

For the very first time since he saw her materialize before him, she smiled faintly.

“Don’t let what they think of you stop you. Prove to them you’re my brother, not what they think you are.”

Wrea clapped her hands three times and shouted, “Everyone, return!” Immediately, whatever her subjects looked at during their trance began to fade. First the environment they stood in, then the sounds they heard, lastly the people they were with. One collective, guttural weeping sound filled the air as the subjects came to the realization that they never truly spent time with anyone they saw. Aleena and Cahil watched their loved ones fade away in a cloud of glowing ash, something that looked akin to a large group of fireflies flying away. Both of them sunk to the ground, crushed in their hearts by the newfound loss they experienced. Cahil punched the ground over and over while he wept. He only stopped when he heard a raw scream of agony come from across the camp at the entrance.

Shrieking from the deepest recesses of her belly was none other than Aleena, who was lying down in the snow.

“Jooooooooohhhhhhnnnnnn!!” she wailed again and again, each time louder than the last.

Everyone in the camp watched on in horror. No one before ever had such a visceral reaction to Luminary. While everyone else thought to themselves in their hearts “What did she see?”

Cahil covered his mouth as his eyes bulged out their sockets in shock. “He was your husband?” He felt completely and totally paralyzed from the neck down to the point he failed to register in his mind that a woman in such distress ought to be comforted. Cahil watched helplessly while others ran over to Aleena, but for him it was as though the world came to a complete stop. His ears blocked out the frenzy of activity and his mind went blank. He looked to the trees towering above to avoid the sight of what he caused, balancing a surge of tears in his eyes.

Atop one of the trees he caught a glimpse of some movement. Not once in his whole life thus far had Cahil felt as much genuine fear as that moment, when his eyes locked on to someone perched on a tree branch, overlooking the camp under the cover of night.

-CHAPTER 4-

DREGS

OF THE

HEART

About the Competition

The Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026, hosted by Hashtag Kalakar, is a prestigious event celebrating the art of storytelling. This competition invites writers from around the globe to showcase their talents in poetry, short stories, essays, and creative writing. It serves as a platform for diverse voices and narratives, offering participants the opportunity to share their unique perspectives and creativity with an international audience.

We extend our heartfelt thanks to Malcolm Nzioki for his captivating work, "Against All That Is Sacred," submitted to the Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026. His story invites readers into a world rich with mystery and moral complexity. We appreciate his contribution and look forward to more of his storytelling prowess in the future.

About Hashtag Kalakar

Hashtag Kalakar is a creative platform dedicated to providing artists, writers, singers and other creative talents with opportunities to showcase their work and reach wider audiences through competitions, features and creative initiatives.