The royal siblings and their Honor Guards entered Grits-Pabai Gulch just as the sun started to paint the horizon sky a dim but light blue. The stars were bright and there were few clouds. The gulch was miles long and about one-hundred feet wide. Grass and wild white flowers blanketed the hard dirt ground. White butterflies and brown moths fluttered between the blades of grass. The rock walls of the gulch were foliated with blue-gray and black ribbons. Birds of many species built nests in crevasses in the cliffs. Hares burrowed where the rock met the dirt.

There were no tents and the beasts were exhausted. Many of the of the Honor Guards and Kunigunde and Bregorn laid up against the warm fur of their goshens closer to the cliff on the mountain’s side. The night was cold than usual that time of year. The sweat that was soaked into Bregorn’s clothes were cold. He did not want to take off any of them, however. The uncertainty and fear in his mind demanded that he stay armored.

Bregorn and Eeria had found a comfortable spot against the cliff where the dirt was free of rock and the grass was as thin but soft hay. He laid there on his side with his head against Eeria’s belly just as many of the other men did. He stared at a small lonely tree on a far side of the gulch. Its leaves were varying in color of green to brown. There was also an empty bird nest between the trunk and one of the higher branches. He wondered of the life that it has had. How did the seed that became that tree find itself so alone? Did an animal carry it? Did the wind take it? Did the rains wash it into the gulch from the mountain? He then thought of the animals that had been in the tree. Did the bird that built their nest ever thank the tree? Did the squirrels appreciate the food that the tree grew for them? Perhaps these thoughts were attempts to think of not his mother, or where he himself was at, or what he was doing.

Kunigunde approached Bregorn after inspecting her men. She reminded them to stay quiet and to not leave the gulch until night falls. Kunigunde dismounted her goshen and it laid down against the cliff. It’s tongue hung out of its mouth and rested on the dirt. Kunigunde unslung her rifle from her back and leaned it against the rock of the cliff. She unbuckled her armor and placed it next to her rifle. She kept her belt attached to the armor: her sword and equipment still attached. She took the canteen on wine off of the belt and sat next to Bregorn.

“How fare you?” Kunigunde asked after taking a small sip of wine.

“How should I fare? I am very confused. I feel as if I am in a dream. I mean this truly. I question if I am awake.” Bregorn responded, keeping his eyes away from meeting his sister’s eyes.

Kunigunde felt confused as well. “Why would the Creator let such things happen?” she asked herself in her mind with anger. But she remembered the teachings of the hierarchs when she was young. We cannot love the Creator without our free will. Love is a choice, not an emotion. She did not understand why it had to be so, she only trusted that the Creator knew what she was doing. “I understand,” Kunigunde then said.

There was a moment of silence between them. Kunigunde reached into her left boot and pulled out a leather pouch filled with pipe petals.

“I hope that you do not intent to smoke that. The smoke or the smell might tell Conrad that there are people over here.” Bregorn said with a lift of his head.

She forced herself to quietly laugh. Putting the pipe petals between her thumb and finger, she placed them between her gums and her cheek. There was another moment of silence, Bregorn unamused. Kunigunde looked at Bregorn and grimaced.

“Not too bad,” she said with a wince.

Bregorn put his head back down on Eeria’s belly. He laid there with his eyes close for a few hours until eventually falling asleep. Kunigunde stayed near him carrying conversations with Sergeant Asher and several of the other men.

Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

It was around six in the evening when Bregorn arose from stood up after awaking several times and falling back to sleep. He could barely keep his eyes open when he awoke each time. A few moments after being active, he was quite awake and alert. The same feeling of his squeezed heart held his hand to his chest. Perhaps he had hoped that when he woke up, he would be back at the citadel. He was disappointed when he learned again the death of his mother from his own memory. Standing against the rock, he looked at the approaching twilight.

“You are finally awake, prince Bregorn. You can sleep for a little longer. Sundown is not for a few more hours and you need to be well rested. We may not have much time to rest once we reach the second plateau.” Said Kunigunde. She addressed Bregorn as ‘prince’ on occasion as a man would address a young man as ‘sir’. This made Bregorn feel less miserable for a short time.

He did not respond to her. He only politely smiled back. Kunigunde’s attempt to cheer Bregorn only slightly annoyed him. “How can she be so unbroken by what has happened?” Bregorn thought to himself.

Kunigunde knew that Bregorn was not able to bear the anxiety of near conflict and the death of their mother as well as she was able to. “I have a job for you, brother.” She said.

“What would you have me do?” Bregorn asked after acknowledging her statement with a short moment of eye contact and continuing to stare at the horizon.

“First I want you to make sure that you eat something, even if you do not want to.” She said as she drew her sword and bayonet. “After that, Make sure that your sword is sharp, then sharpen mine.” She then pulled out a sharpening stone out of a pouch on the back of her belt and handed it to him.

Bregorn licked his lips. “Very well” He said. Bregorn did exactly as Kunigunde told him. The executive officer of rations gave Bregorn a biscuit. It was dry but filled him well. For the next few hours, until the brighter stars started to spear through the sky, Bregorn made sure that his and Kunigunde’s blades were as sharp as they could be made with the stone that he had. He was got them sharp enough to cut an and apple with very little pressure or slice. As the sun went down, the men became more active. They gave their goshens food and water, what little they had.

They departed when the sun finally went down and their eyes adjusted to the darkness as much as they could. It was warmer than the night before. The wind was almost not noticeable. There was a silence of the land that confused Bregorn. Leaves did not rustle, birds did not sing, not even the goshen that they rode upon made any little purr. Of course this worried Bregorn. He thought that perhaps was some sort of bad omen. It was not the way of the peoples of Craetakur to think about such things. It was like dabbling in witchcraft to them. Such attempts to look into the future were seen as a lack of trust in the Creator. It was written in the Edict during the ‘Soctmo’ or ‘Origins War.’

Bregorn, as well as many of his company, had never been on the Kahrrexian Trail. Kunigunde was the only one to have ever been on the Kahrrexian. The trail was a series of tall markers with red banners and wind chimes. It had not been used since Kunigunde and Naomi used it to descend when the main road was flooded. The Kahrrexian was much more treacherous than Bregorn and his company thought it would have been. The ground was broken into large rocks.

The night, just as the previous night, was very dark. At each marker, they stopped to try to spot the next one. They would send men with ropes tied around the previous marker look for the next one so they could follow the ropes. They went over gentle hills, along narrow cliffs, and through dense thickets. Then the sky started to lighten. They used the little light it gave to find a low spot to hide where they waited until night again. They traveled in this fashion for about three nights.

It was several hours before sunrise that the company reached the second plateau. Kunigunde knew the plateau well enough to reach where the road meets the second plateau soon after the company stopped their ascent. She was relieved when she looked close enough at the ground that the glow from her eyes could light the ground just enough to look for horse tracks. There were none.

The honor guard distributed ammunition among themselves and put the goshens out of harms way. The sun soon came up and they continued to wait. They dug trenches and hid in them. In the trenches, they checked their equipment, sharpened their swords, cleaned their rifles, and repeated until the sun was high. It became warmer and the air became heavy when the clouds cleared. They only spoke in whispers in their anxiety. Kunigunde and Bregorn laid prone on the edge of the cliff of the plateau, concealed around the rocks. Bregorn felt hot and his sweat soaked into the clothes underneath his armor. He felt as if he wanted to jump out of his skin. His hands shook. He curled his fists as hard as he could and relaxed frequently. However, Kunigunde’s fear was blocked by anger.

As they laid there, they watched the road.