A week had passed since the funeral.

Harlan stared down at the bottle every day, he hadn’t gotten any work done, and currently Adina was using an enchanted scissors to cut his hair.

“You shouldn’t drink it.”

“I know. I saw how Blackstone was, I shouldn’t do it.”

“Things are going to be bad, for a while, but I know you can move past this.”

Harlan just groaned.

At breakfast it was just the new maid, couldn’t be more than 14.

“Good morning Sir Fomoria. I made eggs, fresh bread, and-”

“Please, sit.”

She was fearful, Harlan barely spoke to her, and today Isha wasn’t around.

Harlan started eating, but noticed that she hadn’t.

“Eat.”

She took small bites, hesitant even though she was the one who cooked it all.

“What is your name?”

“Stella, uh, Sir Fomoria, Sir.”

“Calm down. Isha picked you, I trust you, and she will be gone in another week. That will make you the head maid. I don’t expect too much, and I won’t be upset if you make mistakes, you are younger than she was when she started and I understand that.”

“Thank you, Sir-”

“Please, call me Harlan. And this is my wife, Adina. You aren’t just another worker, if you are going to be in this home, I would like for us to be closer than that.”

She froze up.

“Surely Isha has told you enough to let you not be afraid of me? Or that you should know I am not that kind of man.”

“I don’t know why she picked me. I don’t think I should be here.”

“Would you rather return to the village?”

“I don’t know.”

“What do you want?”

“I don’t want to bother you with what I want.”

“That’s fine. Please, continue eating, it’s important for a young person to be well fed.”

Harlan brought the bottle downstairs to the table to stare, he considered it a sort of test, something to focus his mind on.

Stella wasn’t comfortable with his sitting there, but it calmed her that Adina was always by his side.

Sometimes he would make an angry face and she would squeeze his hand and lean on him.

Just before lunch Dahlia showed up.

“Sir Fomoria.”

“It’s been a while, but I’m still just Harlan to you.”

“Technically you outrank me.”

“This is my home, there is no rank. What do you need?”

“I’d rather not discuss this in front of the girl.”

“This is Stella, she will be my head maid in a short while.”

“Would you like us to send you somebody from the castle?”

“Are there any who aren’t spies?”

“I could send an Unseen.”

“Stella, do you have any problem with this?”

“Whatever you decide is best, Sir- Harlan.”

“Send one over, but they will be under Stella, not the other way around.”

Harlan stood up, bringing the bottle with him.

“We can speak in the bunker.”

Harlan could barely remember the last time he was in this meeting room, his sense of events and memory was disrupted, he wasn’t sure how many days had even passed, sometimes hours just seemed to vanish.

“We are looking for any ideas on how we might destroy the fortresses.”

“I…”

He rubbed the wax which sealed the bottle.

“I’ve not done anything recently. We should see Balor.”

They moved across the bunker into Balor’s lab.

Inside Brig and him were working on Black-1.

“What happened to him?”

“I was testing a new shell, something with more power behind it. That fucking overgrown lizard is going to pay.”

His arm was partly melted, the barrel had warped and fused together.

Harlan’s eyes widened and he went through the drawers to get out papers and writing equipment.

“What are you thinking?”

Harlan didn’t say anything, he just started scribbling out notes and designs, rapidly going through ideas in his head and onto the paper.

Brig picked up one of the discarded ideas and then another and another.

“This could work.”

Another week passed and Harlan was at an open field testing the first constructed prototype, he hadn’t said a word since he started working.

He sat in the seat and used two cranks to determine angle and rotation.

He checked his paper, zeroing in on what angle got what distance exactly and using a device something like a wind chime and a three dimensional compass with a crystal in the middle to check wind and other factors.

A large arm mounted to the cannon moved the shell from its container and into the barrel before clapping it shut.

Harlan pulled the lever and a deafening boom rang out, kicking up a small cloud of snow around the weapon.

Harlan tapped on his device and a ring of light appeared to count the time.

40 seconds passed and the shell hit the target some miles away.

Harlan grabbed the bottle and opened it finally, taking a swig before putting the glass cap back on; it sealed itself once again with enchanted wax.

Many nobles were invited by Rosewell, who had come to see Harlan’s new weapon.

Harlan coughed heartily and staggered slightly.

“That’s a start.”

He stood next to Rosewell.

“Now we have all seen Sir Fomoria’s weapon, this could be the end to the war without further risking our troops trying to find a way past the wards and arrays of the traitors' fortresses.

Sir Fomoria, is there anything else to add?”

“I’ve memorized everyone here, if I see the rebels using my weapon, I’m going to be visiting each of you.”

A countess raised her hand.

“What is it called?”

Harlan shrugged, it wasn’t something he had thought of in his haze.

“Long cannon.”

Nobody had any issue with the name, or at least nobody said anything about it.

Far away from anyone else, Harlan was making another one, twice the size of the one he had just used.

Adina called him.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“You finally answered?”

“Huh?”

“Where have you been?”

“I just started making a new-”

“What day is it?”

“Its…”

He looked around, seeing that the sun was set and in the distance the mountain was full of craters.

“How long have I been gone?”

“It’s been almost two weeks.”

“I don’t…”

“Please, come back home, just for the night.”

Harlan got up from his chair and the bottle fell from his lap, empty.

He fell to the ground and threw up.

“Harlan, are you alright? Are you there?”

“I’m… I’m going to come back soon. I just need to finish something.”

He laid on his back, unsure of where he was.

Harlan made his way to a nearby lake, punched the ice and slipped into the water to clean the stench of oil and soot from his clothes.

Nothing inside dared get close to him, but he could feel the movement in the water, he was not alone.

When he woke up again he was on the edge of the lake.

Sepul was standing over him.

“You can’t lose control. Men like us can’t.”

“How did you find me?”

“I used a blood divination spell, you are-”

“Your great great great grandson. Eliza Dust’s son.”

“Should we talk?”

“I understand why you didn’t tell me, but you were still there for me. How long have you known?”

“You were… three I think. I watched from the woods, I was planning to kill you for what you are, what happened to the last of my family.”

“What stopped you?”

“The Darkness kept you hidden long enough for me to simmer down, and I couldn’t kill a toddler sitting so still that insects started landing on him. You looked so… gentle.”

“Why are you here, right now?”

“Rosewell asked me to find you. So I’ve been watching you while you worked.”

“Where am I?”

“A few dozen miles south of the mountain range that separates the north from the south.

You’ve been bombing nests with that thing.”

“Where would I even get the materials for this?”

“You had a base setup here already, full of materials. It was three days before she called me, and then another day before I accepted.”

“Hmm…”

“Come, you need food, you’ve been living on tonic and Xol’s whiskey this entire time.

Jane can have mashed potato and fried steaks with gravy in a short time. You need a proper bath, I’ll have her shave you when you get out.”

Harlan polished the ice into a mirror, not liking what he saw.

He stepped out of Sepul’s bath and looked in the mirror again as he dried himself off.

Jane knocked on the door.

“Are you decent?”

“I haven’t been decent in years. But I’m clothed.”

Despite his almost instinctual choice to make a joke, his tone was dry.

She stepped inside with a pair of enchanted scissors and a razor.

“Trim down the sides, leave my beard long in the front.”

She did as asked, her hands moving with practiced ease across his face and scalp.

“You look a lot like him.”

“I don’t see it.”

“There was a time when he wore a beard, he kept it in the same style. His facial hair naturally curls on the sides quite fiercely, and he has always hated it. But I happen to like beards, so as a younger girl I begged him to have one, and eventually he said to just trim the sides.”

She brushed him and then held his face in her hands.

“What a handsome young man you are. Come down and eat now.”

Harlan felt like shit, tonics were not supposed to be an entire replacement, and mixed with weeks of drunkenness, they upset his stomach, his weakness.

“Come, eat. Then you should go back home.”

“Are we cursed?”

“I know it feels like that, but this is life. Nobody lives forever, and your uncle was a ranger, he knew what work he did, and where it was going to end.”

“I was so close, so close to getting him out, I told Rosewell, but it was too late.”

“You told her what?”

“Get him out of the army.”

“Would he accept that? And early retirement.”

Harlan clenched his fists, extruding the silverware through his fingers.

“Doesn’t matter, he had a daughter, a wife, he should’ve-”

Sepul placed his hand on Harlan’s.

“Unlike you I understand that people must be told what to do, and they will often work against themselves.

Please eat, good food always lightens one's mood.”

It was delicious, and it made him feel better.

“Have you ever blacked out? Just… lost time.”

Sepul furrowed his brow.

“How long has this been happening?”

“Since Redmond… since I got the news. I don’t remember the last few weeks, and I was drinking at the time, but I don’t remember a lot of time before that.”

Sepul got up and ran scans.

“A doctor is supposed to ask before touching a patient.”

He did not stop for a moment.

“Any good healer is willing to go against decorum for the sake of their patient, and a patient is anyone in need of medical care.”

Harlan felt some warmth from the old man, he had always felt some connection to him, an innate trust, and was simply trying some manner of banter.

Harlan laid in a guest room in Sepul’s home with him standing over him.

“Unfortunately, you are physically in perfect health, your blackouts are mental.”

“I knew that already.”

“Sometimes a man might believe himself mad when he is not.”

Sepul fiddled with the blue rose pin on his chest.

“Is there anything you want to know? Your mother, me?”

“I know my mother very well, and I know Eliza as well, but she goes by Dawn now.”

His breath hitched.

“Wh-what do you mean by that? She’s alive? That’s… that’s not possible.”

“Shortly after we first met, I asked you to see if my mother’s ghost was in me, and I was right, she was.”

“That’s not possible, I would’ve-”

“If it was her soul, you would’ve, but it was her mind that was attached. She’s been with me since I was an infant, some instinctual casting of a spell. But we couldn’t always speak to one another.”

“Please, I would like to speak with her.”

“She is at my home now, in a new body. We could go if you-”

Harlan felt no movement, saw no blur, the teleport just set him on the couch of his living room.

He felt the minds around him.

“She is in her room right now, with Adina.”

Sepul rushed through the house, but when he touched the door handle, he hesitated.

Harlan came from behind and twisted the knob.

The moment he saw her face he recognized her and she him.

“Adina, we should give them some time alone.”

“No, I think it best you remain here. Your moth- Eliz- Dawn, she is not a woman you would like, I need to know some things, why you seem on friendly terms.”

“Very well, Dawn, do you want me to stay?”

“Yes.”

Adina and Harlan sat on the couch in the room while Sepul stood near the bed.

“What… what is it that happened?”

“Which part?”

“How did you die?”

She shared a look with Harlan, and he nodded.

“Coronach. He-”

Sepul’s eyes became small suns and his skin cracked, showing his body turning to pure radiance.

“I tried to sell Harlan to The Darkness, and she had me killed so I couldn’t ruin him by being who I was.

I’m not even entirely Eliza, his magic was born from a desire for a mother’s love, and my mind was changed by him. I’m her, but I’m not. And I don’t blame The Darkness for what she did, if Eliza had been allowed to live, she would’ve tried to use Harlan just like Elise tried to.”

The light faded some, and a few radiant tears fell, scorching the wooden floor.

“I know that I have failed you, again and again, I let grief and guilt keep me from helping you.”

Dawn got up from the bed and hugged him.

“Eliza had people who tried to help her, but she let herself stay in that pit of despair, she pushed away everyone who tried to help her. You could’ve done more, but we both had enough problems that stopped us from helping each other.”

He hesitated, but embraced his great great granddaughter.

Adina began sniffling.

“It’s sweet, family reconnecting after so long.”

She began fully crying as she buried her head into his chest.

“I wish I had a family worth forgiving, I wish they made mistakes, or had reasons, but they were just bastards who hate me for what I am.”

Harlan didn’t have a reply, so he just combed her hair with his fingers.

After Dawn brought Sepul up to speed on many things, he was conflicted about many things, such as if she really was Eliza or just a recreation, and while she hadn’t failed to answer any question he asked, there were some questions he didn’t want to ask, for they could reveal a bit too much, family secrets and the like.

“This has been wonderful, now we need to get to Elise so-”

“NO.”

“What? Surely you-”

“No, I don’t think I can face her yet. What happened with Harlan, that could be justified, it was wrong, but it could be. But I abandoned her, and how she is now is my fault. I can’t do it, not yet, not now.”

Sepul stepped back.

“I understand, I will give you a month.”

“What?”

“From what you said, you’ve been aware of yourself and sane for at least a few years, and you met her through Harlan already, you cannot put it off forever, which I know you would. If Harlan had not brought me here, would you have even wanted to see me?”

“I just needed some time to-”

She looked past Sepul, seeing Adina passed out on the couch and Harlan nowhere to be seen.

“Where is Harlan?”

Sepul cast his divination spell, but had no response.

“How did he…”

As light revealed, darkness concealed.

Harlan had returned to the base he had spent the last couple of weeks in and searched through his notes.

Most of them looked like mad scrawlings that even he was having trouble reading, but they started to paint a picture of where he got all of his materials and what this base was.

It was rebels, not of the noble variety, but the revolutionaries.

He didn’t remember how he found the place, but he did, and he tortured the information on other locations out of them.

There were a series of marks on a blank map, it was hard to decipher and made him wonder how or why he had even written down the locations.

But that didn’t matter, his long cannon was constructed, and there were a few shells left.