“Why am I so small?” Boreal asked, looking at the statue.

“Why exactly is there a statue of me in the middle of the camp?” Zalia asked.

“For an answer to that, you’re going to have to ask Lady Indis I’m afraid,” Alara said.

“I think it best you take me to her right away then,” Zalia said, looking at the statue with a mixture of confusion, annoyance and disbelief..

A statue of her was the last thing she wanted, she wasn’t some damn war hero to be celebrated for their heroic deeds. Well, if her actions were spun in a certain way and key facts, like her being alive, were ignored or unknown, her actions might be shown off as such but the reality of it was much different.

Boreal was up at the statue gently tapping the small version of herself with a paw.

“Why so small?” Boreal asked again.

“That is how small you used to be,” Zalia explained.

Alara looked at her weirdly.

“Oh, she speaks to me with her mind,” Zalia added.

“Rrright,” Alara said.

“I wasn’t smaller, world was bigger,” Boreal told her.

“I- yes, sure. Can we go now?” Zalia asked.

The statue was making her a little uneasy. The unease was made a little worse by the wide-eyed Aylie staring at the statue, like she believed Zalia was a hero too.

Boreal hopped down, some passers-by looking between Boreal and the statue, then Zalia and the statue. This was not good.

They continued onwards, deeper into the camp. Before long, they arrived at what was a miniature fortress mixed with a bunker within the camp. Thick stone walls of a large circular building greeted them, three small doors set into the walls through which a flood of activity moved. Alara moved forwards and began trying to push through the crowd into the building and quickly found her way free once Boreal tried making her way in. She received a few alarmed looks as she allowed her fear-inducing aura to slip through, people moving quickly out of her way. Boreal wasn’t a wait in line kind of girl.

Zalia followed closely behind, garnering not a few odd looks herself.

They entered into a bustling room filled with various administrative types, at desks and not, using magic to note down information or messages. Pieces of parchment were then handed to a few people who sent it flying through the room to various locations. Alara pushed through, the bustle stopping, for just a moment, as Boreal strolled through the middle of it all following after her.

They left that entrance room through a door at the back, entering another similar yet less busy room where people were reading through pieces of parchment that landed on their desks and noting down parts of them before they were filed away at their sides. Some of the pieces were wiped entirely, the clean sheets put aside for reuse.

“Seems a little inefficient to have all that at the door,” Zalia noted.

“Stops people from getting through to speak to the leaders personally unless it’s actually important,” Alara said.

Zalia shrugged, the explanation not making a huge amount of sense to her. She wasn’t a leader or an administrator though so it wasn’t really her forte. She did take note of the guards posted all about the place, more so than she would have thought necessary for the building despite its importance. Had something happened to warrant those measures?

Finally, they left that room via a door to the right, entering another room with three tables set in a U shape. At the middle table sat General Faian, General Ballast and another she did not know. On the left was a group of three who could have been the administrators in the room they had just left for all Zalia could tell the difference.

At the final table were two people she didn't recognise and Lady Indis, on her feet, hands flat on the table, in the middle of a heated argument.

“I don’t care if we don’t have the resources, there must be a way to house these people!” Indis was almost yelling.

“I might be a magician but I am not a miracle worker Lady Indis, expanding the wall would mean taking down the defences and we simply do not have the manpower to do that right now. Especially so if the enemy takes note of our actions and chooses to attack at that time. We have simply run out of space!” the first of the three closest to Zalia on the administrator table replied.

“We-” Indis started.

“Lady Indis, everyone. I believe we should take a short recess to cool down and deal with other more important matters at this time,” General Faian interrupted, having seen Zalia walk through the door.

“What matters are more important than the-” Indis cut off again, having turned to Faian before following her gaze to the door.

Zalia had to admit to herself that she enjoyed the torrent of emotions that crossed over Indis’ face as she saw her. Surprise, worry, confusion, shock, worry again before finally settling on joy.

“Zalia?” She whispered.

“Hello Lady Indis,” Zalia said, giving her best dramatic bow.

Boreal jumped forwards, basically throwing her body weightily at Indis’ in a greeting. Indis stumbled, catching herself and looking at Boreal with an equal measure of shock as Zalia had received.

“Yes, I happen to be not dead. May we talk in private?” Zalia asked.

The administrators were talking between themselves while the three generals were walking around the table. The two others that were at Indis’ table were staring at Zalia as well.

“You’re certain this isn’t one of them?” Faian asked Alara.

“Most assuredly, Fin was the one to check,” Alara replied.

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“Good, you may return to your duties then. We will be fine from here,” Faian said.

“As you command,” Alara said stiffly, a clank of plate armour sounding as she turned and left.

“How are you alive?” Indis asked, watching Boreal inspect the room, Aylie still on board.

“I have a few questions of my own, somewhere private first,” Zalia insisted.

“Zalia!” Ballast exclaimed, coming up to give her a shake of the hand, his giant hand covering her own.

“General, good to see you still around,” Zalia said.

“And you! I told them you weren’t dead, you’ve got the look of a survivor about you,” Ballast exclaimed.

“Through this way please,” Faian said, gesturing to a door.

Ballast led the way, Faian saying something quietly to the other general before he walked off. Zalia followed Ballast, Boreal and Aylie close behind and Indis after that, her stare boring a hole in the back of Zalia’s head. She had never really known much to shock Indis into silence before but if anything were to do so, coming back from the supposed dead would be it.

Ballast led the way through a corridor, past a few doors into the one at the end, arriving in a sparsely decorated office. A desk sat front and centre, the walls bearing the banner of the rebellion as well as some decorative weapons, and some not so decorative ones, hung upon hooks or sitting on shelves.

There were only two chairs in addition to the one on the other side of the desk so Zalia forfeited taking one and lifted Aylie off Boreal to sit her down instead. Ballast leant against the wall to the left after taking a bowl of some type of nut from the desk. Indis stopped behind Zalia and she turned around to finally greet her friend.

“It’s good to see you,” Zalia said, meaning it despite all they had been through.

“We thought you died,” Indis said, her voice cracking.

“You should have known me better than that,” Zalia said, moving forward and giving the younger woman a hug.

“Where have you been?” Indis asked, still in an embrace.

“All in good time,” Zalia assured her.

Faian came in and sat in the chair on the other side of the desk with a deep sigh.

“Right, let’s be about it quickly then. Still much to discuss,” she said.

Indis sat down in the second chair, almost dropping down in contrast to her usual controlled movements.

“First and most importantly, this is Aylie. She has lost her family and needs to be taken care of. I’m no parent nor am I really cut out to be but I would still like to see her safe. Can that be arranged?” Zalia asked.

“Certainly, shouldn’t be too difficult,” Faian assured.

“Good, I’d like to be kept up to date on that,” Zalia added.

“Very well. Zalia, where exactly have you been and why are you not dead?” Faian asked.

“Ah, yes. Well, that is a very long story. I don’t know if the others knew this but the only idea I could come up with at the time as we were fighting atop that tower was to use a certain herb that has a reversing effects on rituals in a hope that doing so would disrupt something badly enough to break the whole thing across the continent. It looks like that succeeded, to a degree. It had the unfortunate side effect of dragging Boreal, Juniper and I into Cormaine however,” Zalia explained.

“Cormaine!?” Indis said aghast, “that’s where you have been this whole time?”

Zalia nodded, pacing around a bit.

Boreal was staying close to Aylie, as a comfort.

“And Juniper?” Faian asked.

“Dead, then dead again,” Zalia said.

“... dead again?” Faian said questioningly, looking towards Ballast with a raised eyebrow, who just shrugged.

“Have you come across the undead here yet?” Zalia asked.

“We have not, I assume there were many in Cormaine then, being the realm of the dead,” Faian said.

“Well, Cormaine isn’t the realm of the dead but yes, there were many. An entire city of undead Bathar, actually. Juniper became one when she died there, turned by the aura that pervades the entire place,” Zalia explained.

“The aura yes, we can feel it when we leave the defensive barrier and again in the parts of the world that seem to have died by the rituals. It is quite annoying,” Faian said.

“Annoying is one word for it. The one you feel here is weak, like an echo of the real thing. There it has the power to kill you if you do not have a type of healing. It can raise those it kills to become the walking dead. It comes from those that live in Cormaine see, thousands upon thousands of shades, and the…,” Zalia trailed off, shuddering at the memory of the god-like entities that emitted the debilitating aura.

“And the what?” Indis asked, concern in her voice and expression.

“I’d rather not speak of them, just yet. The aura killed Juniper and I released her soul from its undead prison shortly thereafter. I had to spend a lot of time there simply surviving but I’ve learnt much about fighting our enemies. I’ve also learnt a lot about where they actually come from and what their purpose here is. Before we get into that though, I need to know. Indis, Faian, Ballast, whoever can answer the question. What the hell is with the statue of me?” Zalia asked.

“Ah,” Faian said, giving a low chuckle.

“Well, you-” Indis started.

“You’re a bloody hero,” Ballast said.

Zalia looked at Indis who was a little bit flushed and very embarrassed.

“Well, after you… died, I didn’t want to let the memory of what you had given for a kingdom that isn’t even your own die as well. When I arrived here and after the initial days of fighting, I told anyone who would listen what you had done. One thing turned to another and the soldiers began seeing you as a war hero, praising your name and fighting harder for it. After all, if a stranger can die saving your kingdom, why shouldn’t you be able to do the same? The statue, well, it turned from a matter of keeping the memory of your actions alive to a matter of morale. They seem to look up to you,” Indis explained, avoiding eye contact and looking down.

“And where is Ember and Zen? I couldn’t help but notice that Zen has not been mentioned by any of the people I’ve talked to so far.” Zalia said, a little coldness in her tone.

“After the ritual went off, we thought it was all done. The one you disrupted didn’t explode or summon creatures like the others did you see. Zen asked that he be left out of anything to do the rest of the war and left for his home, his farm. Oh, Ember was able to heal him from the wound he received thankfully, though a scar does remain. No, he wanted to leave it all behind and be left out of it so I promised he would be. Once we realised things were very wrong, we backtracked to go find him but found his home destroyed. There were no signs of him or his family and we haven’t seen him since,” Indis started.

“As for Ember, well. She and I had a disagreement about the way I went about praising your name and actions. She said that you would not have wanted it, which is true I realise now. I guess I felt guilty about my part in your death and that blinded me to what you really would have wanted. I’m sorry for that too,” Indis finished, getting quieter over the course of the explanation.

Zalia felt relief at hearing Zen was alive, then dismay at hearing he was missing. Indis seemed as much of a constantly in motion train wreck as she had been when Zalia had left, which didn’t surprise her.

“And where is Ember now?” Zalia asked.

“Don't know. She returns every now and then with a group of refugees or important information before leaving again. She doesn't really work well as part of a chain of command and prefers being out there, helping however she can. You know her,” Indis said.

“Yeah, I suppose I do. I’m not surprised by that at all,” Zalia said, giving a smile and letting out a deep sigh, “it’s good to be back in this world again. It’s a beautiful place.”

“What happened to you in Cormaine?” Indis asked.

“One day I’ll tell you the whole story. For now, Faian, we need to go over a few things that might help with the war,” Zalia said.

“I was hoping you’d have something for us,” Faian said with some hope.

“I might just,” Zalia said.