Beyond our encounter with the Deacon, our path turned south. The road to Bell Haven was not straight from west to east, it flowed north and spiralled around small fields of boulders and dense trees before dipping south into Durn, all the while mostly sticking to rivers and creeks that flowed against our direction of travel and into the ocean that now lay behind us, and the occasional foray between brackish ponds formed centuries ago by a flood and kept moderately saline despite the rain thanks to salt deposits at their basins.

The old road went up along the hillsides, now long since buried by brambles, overgrown roots, and young poplar trees. That was the way of old roads, left unmaintained to rot like ghost towns. There were many of them coming out of Senvia, old logging roads and paths down to the base of the cliffs. But the fields outside of Senvia were covered with thick layers of moss and grass, deep enough to sink into. Those roads were not quickly overgrown. They were replaced with burrowed holes by small furred things, anthills, and tufts of stiff blue grass working its way in between the gravel. Even the logging roads grew in not with trees, but with tall threads of that same blue grass, pigweed, and fireweed.

When I was twelve, Lyana had taken me down one of them. It led through a thin rowan forest filled with rhubarb and ferns. The floor of the pathway had overgrown itself with wild, violet thyme. The edges were adorned with the same bilberries that I had on occasion found on the cliffsides.

I never told Lyana that, or she'd have strung me up. I had officially been in her service for six years, but it wasn't until a few months before that that I had actually come to know her, and see her on a daily basis. Once that happened, she very quickly learned how many of my lessons I had taken to skipping in favour of exploring. I excelled at fighting, naturally, but training was tedious and boring. Even though he was Kindred himself, the palace instructor was an inadequate sparring partner.

So I collected berries. Rather, I ate them straight off the branches, and made sure to wash my mouth before I came back, so that I wouldn't be caught.

It was when I wasn't hungry enough to eat the palace food that she caught my purple-stained tongue, and found out where I had been. It turned out, I wasn't very good at cleaning the stains from it.

She was less concerned about the berries, I think. If anything, she smiled at the thought.

But, she said, "Never, ever go near the cliffs. Do you understand me?"

And I nodded. Of course, I understood. No more cliffs.

Of course, I immediately resolved to go back at the first opportunity, as soon as her back was turned, and eat more berries. Until the next morning, when she took me to that fire road, showed me those same berries, and gave me a bucket to fill.

We brought back heaps and loads, and I stuffed even more into my pockets, not realising they'd be squished as I walked.

We made a randalin and pies with them, and the next morning, she took me to train. Not with my instructor. She sparred with me herself. Twenty four years older than me.

"I don't want to hurt you," I told her. Her age and experience wasn't enough of a handicap to make it an even fight. I was good enough to spar with my instructor, himself a Kindred. Lyana was completely human. She couldn't even use magic, however much she'd studied the theory.

"You won't," she said, and readied her staff. I held a copper short sword, my weapon of choice against my instructor. Dulled, but metal, as was custom. It was well sized, and I could cross the distance between us with ease. A staff would have reach, but only if she could stop me from crossing the distance.

And I knew she couldn't. I was twelve, and no human would have been able to stop me. I knew the very truth of this, of my strength. So I grabbed a wooden sword instead, and promised to strike her gently. She smiled.

I struck, and I found myself flat on my ass. No matter how many times I came at her, the outcome never changed. I was a flurry, a storm, and increasingly unforgiving. And to her, I was just a twelve year old.

It was years before I saw her fight to kill, and it remained the only the one time. She hated fighting. It was laughably rare for an Empress of Senvia to be such a pacifist, but she was. Her first approach was always to talk her way out of problems, and she held me back from brandishing Stoneguard at attackers.

When she was finally pushed to fight, it was against a hired band of Kindred. Who hired them, we never knew, but they had the resources to hire all of the Guild of Delmest. It was a fifty-some year old guild based out of Eaden Helm. The entire complement was there, even the guild leader.

We fought for our lives, the royal guard. I was among them, carving my way through as many of the enemy as I could. These were professional members of a mercenary guild, each one experienced from years of battle. I had only sparred to train. It was all I could do to keep up with them.

But Lyana was different. She was a scythe in a field of briars. Each strike was perfect, and I had to focus my senses just to see them for their speed. I could see more clearly than ever, that each time she had beaten me in sparring, she had been trying to pay me the compliment of at least making it look like it was a challenge for her.

She was small. Even if her foes had been human, they were still each twice her size, and mostly men. They had thick armour and blades wider across than her head. In a contest of pure strength, she would have lost to any of them, even without the fact of what they were.

But she stood against them all, a single human in a field of Kindred. Their strength didn't matter. She used her own more efficiently, and moved without effort between their blades like a blade of grass in the wind.

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The guild went extinct that day, their doors later shuttered and their support staff interrogated. Delmest died.

When the battle was done, she greeted us without a single speck of blood on her body. She hadn't even been wearing armour. Mine was dented, and I had suffered a massive gash down my leg while the others of the royal guard had worked to protect me as the youngest among them.

There were six of us, one for each guard ring. Only two were unsurprised. The rest of us were left in awe. I recall asking something along the lines of why she even needed us. The others were not very happy with my question.

All of that, and even Lyana was still wary of the Deacon we encountered later on that same day. He blessed us and wished us well, and congratulated us for the progress made on the Path were were all supposed to share.

It was the same Path the Deacon had told me to keep to, on that day with Eskir and Jenny. The Path of the Warrior. The three cardinal stars of Pathoticism, of east, west, and north. The Path of the Warrior was the zenith star, and the one true Path for all Kindred.

It would not be night for some time, and we sat there in silence, away from its watchful eye as we passed out from the province of Ibolan that stretched around Dengal and Bell Haven, and followed the road south into Durn. The canopy sheltered us from the sun, and within the hour, we were greeted by a new form of silence.

The silence was the way of Durn. There were scuffling sounds of rodents and birds, and the occasional deer unafraid of malicious hunters within the boundaries of the ancient forest, but the sound of wind died away. The traces of civilisation vanished. Here, the path was not cobblestone, but dirt, tended only by traffic that never seemed to show itself to outsiders.

More than that, the forest changed. Near Senvia, it was rowan trees to the northeast, and more concentrated expanses of pine, fir, and birch to the southeast. Those evergreens remained through to the inn and the intersection with Durn.

But from that point on, the evergreens began to fade. There were still many, but they now formed the minority of the forest, replaced with oak, spruce, and trees I didn't recognise. There were trees in these woods that nobody really knew the names of anymore, nearly one-of-a-kind old growths, some more than a thousand years old. The animals here were different, almost touched.

"Is there no other way around?" asked Eskir.

"We're already inside the forest," I reminded him. "We won't be here for long."

"I've never been," he said, the nervousness in his laughter palpable. "This is my first time. Have you heard the stories? The forest grows on the backs of ancient dragons that have slept for an eon. Old magics and dangerous folk."

"Really?" I mumbled, only half paying attention. My gaze was drawn the the increasingly thick treelines, cautious for another ambush.

"They say the people of Durn hold power in their eyes and leave stardust in their wake."

I hadn't taken Eskir for superstitions. Then again, we were chasing a conspiracy organisation that had likely been responsible for the capital vanishing into the sea only moments after an emperor had been assassinated.

And this forest felt as though it carried that sort of weight.

"They're stories," I reassured him. "Creation myths and gossip. I've been through Durn. The people here are strange, but no stranger than you, in your own way."

"What, so they're afraid of me more than I am of them, is that it?"

"Afraid? Oh no, not afraid. You're a stranger in their territory. They won't fear you. But they will be curious."

Jenny had remained silent, her arms crossed over her chest, but her ears perked up at the sound of a squeak from the woods.

"Did you hear that?" she asked.

I nodded, and she dismounted the wagon.

"Jenny!" yelled Eskir. "Don't wander off!" But she was already gone. "Or do," he grumbled, rolling his eyes. "As long as we get to keep moving."

I reached over to pull back the guidance charm and halt the horses, then lifted myself over the walls of the wagon to follow her.

"Xera!" he protested.

Jenny was kneeling somewhat into the edges of the forest, next to a snare. It had caught a small, besnouted animal by the rear leg. The snare was not enough to even slice through its hide, yet it struggled against the wire in desperation, not realising that the more it fought, the tighter the snare became. It was something like a rabbit, but not like any rabbit I had ever seen, almost halfway to being a fox.

"What are you?" she whispered to it soothingly.

"I've never seen one of these before," I said.

"It's adorable," she said angrily. "Here, hold it while I release the wire. It's kicking too hard for me to get a grip."

The kicks were pulsive and instinctive. I gripped its leg still with one hand, and gently held its head against the ground with the other, careful not to use too much strength against the mammal.

Jenny loosened the wire carefully, then smoothed out the fur it had marred. "I'm sorry," she said. "I hope that feels better. Go on now, you can go. It's okay, go!"

The animal didn't leave immediately. It tested out its leg a few times, wary of its restraints, before suddenly darting off into the forest.

"This wire, it's not..."

"It's not from Durn," I agreed, taking it from her. "It's steel. I wonder who placed this."

"To place snares here though..." she trailed off.

I nodded. "Even though this is technically the main road, I didn't think anyone would be that brazen."

"Well, they are at war." Eskir stood behind us, looking down at the snare in my hands. "Durn and Merity Point. Bigger than any other provincial war, from what I've heard. Senvia vanishes, the empire crumbles, even Durn gets invaded. I'm not surprised people have taken advantage of that."

I looked up at him. "Why haven't I heard about that? Some skirmishes along the border, sure. That's old news, been happening since Merity Point was founded. But war? Actual, proper war?"

He gave a sombre nod. "Apparently, Merity Point was pushing in, and Durn finally retaliated to reclaim their land."

"They united?"

"Yeah," added Jenny, "Perchy Myr finally voted in, so it's official. The whole province is off to war. Merity Point's fucked."

"They're rich," pointed out Eskir. "Merity's gold alone means they'll be able to hire all the Kindred they ever need."

"Durn has all those old magics you were so scared of," she teased widening her eyes in mock horror. "Even that spooky dragon. Or do you take that back? Even Senvia didn't fuck with Durn."

He sneered and stuck his tongue out at her.

"Okay, children," I interrupted, standing back up. "We still have a long ways to travel."