The sun was out and the air was hot. Eris felt her skin searing as the hours dragged like the fractured axel of a wounded wagon down the road, screeching past her in interminable agony. Patience had never been her strength at the best of times. Now, although her Essence was restored and with staff in one hand and arcane focus in the other she felt ready to do what needed to be done, her stomach remained uneasy. Whatever illness assailed her was still yet to pass.

She had fought battles sick and injured before. She could do it again.

They waited in the town of Crowsbrook. There mustered a small army of two hundred volunteer soldiers, with more anxious arrivals trickling in as the hours drained away. The town, the village, was a dozen thatched-roof homes and businesses, a stable and a blacksmith and a tavern and an apothecary and an apiarist, all spread about the banks of a river that ran down from the hills and toward the city. Around grew huge green trees and buzzed deafening branchborne beetles, and three miles west was the city, an impossibly large object on the horizon, walls like an interminable mountain, and to the north and east and south were endless fields of cultivated land tended by peasants who regarded magic with the same awe and unfamiliarity that Eris regarded agricultural practices.

And then there was the castle and its keep. On a hill, assailable only by a winding and narrow path up to ramparts, Castle Korakos loomed above Crowsbrook like a raven on a perch. The village was its next meal. The taxes from each peasant: the dishes in the course.

While their soldiery gathered Eris followed Rook throughout the town. Her eyes were peeled for Seekers or the Prince’s men swooping down upon them, but no such signs came. Indeed they had free reign over this village; the Duke’s men had been scared out shortly after the Tournament. Victory seemed assured. The battle was a formality.

Their escort was a crone named Sophia whose greatest joy in life was talking. She would not waste this opportunity when faced with the new duke.

“Do you remember me, Your Grace?” she said. “I thought you’d never be back! When you were a boy you would visit here with your father—oh, that was hardly a decade ago, and not half so long as that when you would ride through the village on your horse at night, and when you and your brother met with Master Aetos at the Horse Tale and flirted with the young ladies there—”

“He consorted with common women?” Eris teased. Rook shrank at the accusation.

“Oh yes, consorted up and down the streets, getting into fights and all sorts of trouble—before they sent him away, of course, and before—”

She led the inn—the Horse’s Tale—and stopped abruptly outside its door. There she turned, and there were tears in her eyes.

“Your Grace. I know it isn’t proper. But you were like family. Like a great-grandson. I knew your father since he was a boy, like you, and his father, too, and your uncle, and…” Here she started to cry. “We’re peaceful. A woman can’t support this fighting. It’s a woman’s job to always stand against war, no matter what, because not every boy will come back—I know. But…”

She kneeled down, crying.

“Damn politics. Pardon my language. I’m happy to see you safe, Rook. Happy to see you back. Happy I lived to see it.”

Rook took her hand and pulled her to her feet and embraced her. Eris watched the display with a raised eyebrow. How many subjects were there to Korakos? Twenty thousand? Likely more. There were many vassal lords and countless territories within the city that paid tribute to the family, to say nothing of their merchant empire. Crowsbrook was one close, conspicuous holding, but a minor one. Did it become a Duke to embrace and associate so intimately with one such woman?

Now Sophia sobbed into Rook’s chest. “Your mother didn’t deserve it. I never believed the story. Never. And in all that time, your uncle never visited us, not once, and good for it, because if he had—”

“I know,” Rook whispered. “Things will change, Sophia. I promise. They’ll never be the same, but—I’ll do my best.”

He received a similar reception throughout the village. One, an attractive young woman, went so far as to say, “I knew you would come back, Rook!” before slinking away, content with a mere glance from the Strategos.

“Who was she?” asked Eris.

“I have no idea,” Rook said without innocence.

“Is that so? And is it the custom in Crowsbrook for the villagers to use the nicknames of their lords, or is this merely a quality you inspire?”

“Are you implying something, Eris.”

“I am implying that, perhaps, she was a Horse’s Tale tavern girl my lover used to flirt with.”

“Oh, who can remember. It was so long ago.” Rook smiled at her. “But if you must know, she’s the brewer’s daughter. I think her name is—Alexandra, or Agnes, or something.”

“I do not believe that you cannot remember.”

“Now you mention it, I think she’s Agatha.”

“Did you sleep with these women as a boy?” She was half-accusative, half curious. She was also slightly defensive; she wanted the answer to be no, although she didn’t know why; when they first slept together the notion he’d had many partners appealed to her. It did not anymore.

“Well,” Rook said, leading her back around to their mustering grounds, “do you really want to know?”

“Yes, in fact, I do.”

“Then the answer is that they were girls when I was a boy. What, didn’t you have fun at that age?”

“No. Not until I met you.”

“I suppose a duke’s access to attention is somewhat skewed,” Rook said. “Then again, so is a woman’s when she looks like you.”

“I did not say I lacked attention, only that I did not indulge in it.” Hetairoi in armor arrived on horseback—vassals of Korakos brave enough to defect from the Duke and pledge their support to Rook in the siege. Most would simply sit out the battle and wait to see who won. Eris folded her arms. “Meanwhile. Your brother is still not here—and ‘tis almost night.”

“He’ll come,” Rook said. He raised a hand to the new arrivals. “Ailouros! Khrusos! My most excellent friends! How do you both?”

He left her side to greet them. Eris watched from a distance.

“Rook!” said the one identified as Ailouros, a strapping gentleman near twenty. “By the dead kings, it is you!”

The three laughed and huddled. Apparently they were old friends. They gossiped excitedly in the manner of reunited boys. Rook indicated toward Eris, but she remained distant, before withdrawing entirely. Such reunifications had been the business of the whole day. Knights and old vassals and distant retainers and ancient servants and freed slaves and lost friends and loyal subjects and disloyal men of Hierax, all of whom wanted to meet the Rook they once knew as a boy years past. And he remembered them all. Every name. Every face. And he spoke to everyone, like Sophia, making time for whoever approached.

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Such was his talent. Now it was clear: with him returned to the city so dramatically, Rook commanded loyalty from a vast number of his father’s old men, and his old friends, so that their army continued to swell. That was the business of a duke. He was good at it. But Eris could only think back to long nights alone with him on the road, with no distractions but each other. To days wasted in their rooms together. To an eternity where he was hers and no one else’s.

Those days were gone. He would never be hers and hers alone again. And while she felt some satisfaction to have come so far, some happiness to see him happy, she also felt a deep regret for the loss of the life she knew.

She did not enjoy this socialization. Another one of his lost friends came to speak with her; she responded by telling him to drown himself and fled into the trees.

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Aletheia sat on a stump before the river. She stared into the water. A twig broke beneath Eris’ sandal. To hear her approach Aletheia snapped to alertness, but she relaxed when she saw who it was.

“Shouldn’t you be with Rook?” the girl said.

Eris had no desire to talk to anyone, least of all Aletheia, but looking downstream she saw others nearby—soldiers coming for water, peasants doing laundry, others bathing, and she realized there was hardly anywhere more solitary. This would have to do.

“I could ask the same of you,” she sighed. “Are you not his squire?”

“They don’t let women be hetairoi,” Aletheia said.

“‘Tis a metaphorical usage.” Eris tried her best not to think about others or their neuroses, but she had unfortunately gleaned some understanding of Aletheia over the years. She continued with great reluctance: “It does not seem like you to be here, alone.”

“Aren’t you afraid?”

“Not especially.”

“Not of the fight. I mean…that he won’t have time for us anymore. That he’ll be too busy to be our friend anymore. To spend time with us.”

“He will always find some way to spend at least a few minutes of his day with me,” Eris said. “But the thought did occur to me.”

Aletheia closed her eyes. “We should’ve gone with Pyraz.”

Eris found it hard to disagree. But she offered, “Rook is happy. This is what he wanted.”

But the girl didn’t respond. As ever she did not know what she wanted, clearly. Eris found it all tiring. She was not there to be the elder sister, to offer advice or calm the spirit. She simply wanted to be alone.

That was when Eris noticed the locket. Aletheia had her artifact from the manaforge open, in her hands, concealed somewhat; when she finally opened her eyes again she stared into its reflections silently. Then…

“…I don’t think we’re going to win,” she whispered.

“Is that what your mirror shows you?” Eris said.

“I would spend the rest of my life here with him if I could. If we won. I would never be an adventurer again. I don’t ever want to leave. But my reflections don’t show…they don’t show that.” She swallowed. “Something bad is going to happen.”

“Your mirror does not know the future,” Eris said. “‘tis an object that reflects your soul, not what exists outside it. You despair over nothing. ‘Something bad’ will not happen. We have won already. If you cannot see that, you are even stupider than I suspected.”

Aletheia hung her head. “Probably,” she said.

They stayed together in silence for a long time. The sun was near setting now. Eris leaned against a tree to calm her upset stomach.

“Eris?” the girl said through the quiet.

“What?” Eris hissed.

“If Rook stays here…or if something happens…” she was near crying, “you won’t leave me, right?”

“If I tried, you would merely follow,” Eris said.

“Eris,” Aletheia said again. “You won’t leave me, right?”

Eris gave the girl a long look. “I have not decided yet. But if Rook stays here—then I may have no choice.”

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She walked about the hill in amateur reconnaissance until night. When she returned to the town there were four hundred men there, and she found Rook and Aletheia by his side. The girl was more composed now. The vassal hetairoi and disloyal Korakos retainers managed their great mass of infantry: checking arms and armor (a few swords, a few shields, a few strips of mail, many spears) and keeping order. Rook watched, managed, and waited.

“Where is Khelidon?” Eris asked upon her arrival.

“He’ll be here,” Rook said.

“You do not know that.”

“Eris. He’ll be here.”

“It is hardly an hour’s march from the city,” she said. “There is no cause for these delays.”

“His retinue make up our last reserves, and our most experienced knights. He needs to make certain he has everyone before coming our way.”

“Or he has decided now is the time to withdraw his support.”

“Why?” Rook said.

“Who benefits most, should you and Hierax kill each other?” Eris said.

He glared at her. He wasn’t smiling then. “Khelidon would never do that. He’s my brother.”

“Did your father say the same of your uncle?”

“Stop it! He’ll be here, Eris. Not everyone is as treacherous as you. Some men can be relied upon at their word.”

“Some fools, maybe. Not many men.”

But Eris’ fears were yet unfounded. Ten minutes later torches appeared down the road, and presently there arrived Khelidon on horseback, flanked by twenty heavily armored, heavily armed knights—all wearing the tabard of the blond crow. These men were worth ten times more than all the rest of their rabble together.

“Sorry for the delay, brother,” he said as he dismounted. He cringed and toppled as he put his weight on his bad leg; Rook caught him by the bicep. They nodded to each other. “I wanted to make certain I found everyone I could.”

“You’re here before the fighting, Khel, that’s on time by my account. Any word on Hierax?”

“He sent out the call for reinforcements, but most of his vassals wait on the sidelines. Or come to fight for you.” They made for the square. “The Prince is afraid of you and sits the fight out. I hear a few loyalists honored Hierax’s call the day after the Tournament—there might be as many as a hundred hetairoi inside the walls. No more than that.”

“We have a fight in store for us after all,” Rook said. He looked to Eris. “I hope you’re ready to bring down the gates.”

They were surrounded by people now. Rook’s advisors—Eris, Khelidon, Aletheia—climbed the crier’s scaffold in the town’s square, and there were countless armed men everywhere.

“I am not certain being a soldier ‘twas my calling in life,” Eris said slowly. “But I am ready.”

Khelidon withdrew a salpinx, a trumpet used by the hetairoi of the city, and blew it. The clamor of the soldiers gathered in the town square calmed—and all eyes fell on Rook.

He hesitated. Villagers, unarmed, women and children, peeked from their houses to listen to the speech that followed.

“You know the story by now,” he called. “The diadem of Korakos was stolen by Hierax the Deceiver. Its wearer was stabbed, his body left in the gutter, and its thief placed it on his head and called himself duke. But a robber who takes a throne is no more duke than the vagrant who steals a sculpture is an artist. Today, around you, you see those who remember what loyalty to the traditions of our people mean. We’ve come from across the city to see the thief punished for his crimes—and the stolen goods returned.

“That diadem isn’t just mine. The usurpation of my father’s duchy was a crime against every one of us. Every tradition. So when we storm those walls tomorrow, when Eris tears down the gates and my brother’s men lead the charge to the Keep, remember that that we’re returning Korakos to all the people. I was chosen by the aether to be my father’s heir because I can rule with the interests of everyone in mind. Selflessly. Hierax killed his brother because he cares for nothing and no one except himself—and he cares nothing for the people he rules over.”

The most alarming thing about such a speech, in Eris’ mind, was that Rook seemed to believe what he was saying.

“My promises will sound empty to you. Many of you know me, but only as a boy—not as a man. But I give you my vow. I will rule for the people, like my father, and not for myself. To that purpose, I pledge upon my honor, and upon my title as Strategos, that all taxes and duties upon Crowsbrook will be lifted so long as I reign in Korakos.”

This received tremendous cheering from the crowd. Eris was against all taxation principle, except for governments she was in charge of, in which case she was fully in favor of whatever extortion earned her the most money. But such an agreement did seem prudent in the moment.

“I also promise to let all villagers keep their own arms, and will take one volunteer into my retinue every month to be made a hetairos. For subjects of the city, any family that has sent a man to fight for me will receive their stipend of five hundred drachmae, and an exception on all licenses that require my approval. Forever. Now…”

He gazed at the ground.

“Now. I would ask you all to get some rest. My knights will set a schedule for watch, in case a raid comes at night. The fighting will be hard but quick. And I thank you all, deeply, for the support you’ve offered to me. I hope I prove worthy of it.”

Eris spotted Sophia in the crowd. She began to clap. Soon the others followed, until there was an ovation. Then it was set. They retreated to the tavern, where the knights were given rooms. And Eris knew, tomorrow morning everything would change in their lives forever—no matter what happened. She did not sleep at all.