The door to Fallon's room hung half-open, a vase shattered across the white tiles in the doorway. While the shouts and crashes of looting echoed through the rest of the villa, this section lay deathly silent.

"Fallon!" Aida shouted, following Broadaxe in as the woman stormed in with axe ready. Ghillie, as always, followed in Aida's shadow while Goldilocks stood guard in the hallway.

Fallon lay belly-down on the floor, his waist wrapped in a short sarong and torso in a dirty bandage. His head rested in a dry pool of vomit. Aida rushed to him, rolled him over, and bent to listen to his lips as she felt for a pulse at his neck.

Alive.

His eyes fluttered open.

"They burst in, saw me lying in my own filth, screamed something about a Wretch Plague, and ran off," he croaked. "Apparently illness failed to kill me and saved my life instead. What did I miss?"

"Nothing important. How do you feel?" Aida helped him to sitting position, smiling.

"Not dead." Fallon groaned as Aida and Broadaxe helped him to his feet. "Not the bed! I have had enough of lying in it. I would rather lay on the floor."

"They kept you hydrated and clean?" Aida looked him over. He'd lost weight in the last couple days, but some of his color returned. "You look well. Well as can be expected anyway."

"I performed every Inoculation Chant I have ever heard. In my head even when I became too weak to say them aloud." Fallon swayed slightly. "Knowing you were out there alone with that pack of wolves was worse than the sickness."

Aida gave him a mock-surprised look. "Why Fallon, my cynical Seneschal! It almost sounds like you care what happens to me. Weren't you begging me to order you away earlier?"

"Spent too much time trying to civilize you to throw it all away now." Fallon grunted. He wobbled as he took a few careful steps towards the bathroom. "You seem to be also not dead."

"Barely." Aida hovered a step behind, ready to catch him should he fall.

"I heard only a few snatches from the servants tending me and cannot be sure what was dream. Tell me everything, whatever happened since I was laid low."

"Better take a seat first." Aida leaned against wall outside the bathroom while he did his business. "I'll stick to the short version. Or however short I can make it."

"Anything," he said from inside. "I went half-mad here not knowing."

"Let's see. You know about the orgy and firsthand about the failed assassin. How's the wound?"

Rustling fabric. A moment's pause. "I am a scabbed, ugly mass of scar and blister. I have been partially slavanted, completely stabbed, and struck halfway dead by the White Kiss returned. In spite of all that, I remain at your service."

"You're a tough man to kill." Aida smiled at Broadaxe. "I order you to keep it that way."

"I will do what I can, Dynast. Speak on. What after?"

"In no particular order, I dispersed a mob by offering them all forty acres and a mule-"

His voice was alarmed. "What is an acre? Offered it to everyone?"

"Shh, let me finish. The common folk apparently worship me 'cause some prophetess said I'm a goddess or something but I still almost had to fight my faithful over a handful of Wretches. Mobs are fickle beasts, I'm learning. When you send them to scare some Dynasts and one gets torn to pieces, for example."

His eyes boggled as he stumbled out and sagged against the door frame. "They killed a Dynast? Who?"

"No one super-important or slightly pleasant even." She waved her hand. "Oh, I may or may not have broken a deal with the Directory over a Syphon by turning down a loan of tank knights due to the unknown quantity of strings attached. Jury's still out on that one."

"Strings? Tank Knights?" It delighted her to see him overwhelmed and struggling for once.

"Yes, Aliasara seems to think I shouldn't have even let them put in one Syphon, but I figure-"

"You made a deal with the Directory?"

"And maybe broke it too. C'mon, keep up." She punched him lightly in the arm. "I also maybe pissed off a few major Dynastic Chapters by blasting them across a courtyard and burying them in a heap of million-dollar gravel."

Fallon looked ready to throw up. Given what he just recovered from, Aida took a precautionary step back. "You okay?"

"Which Chapters?"

Aida rubbed her cheek and looked up in thought. "Um... all of them, I think. Maybe with Reck dead the Fraction won't get the memo though."

"Reck? The Dynast of Chalk?"

"Not anymore. And call it 'Vistas.' He gets... er, got really prickly about that."

Closing his eyes, Fallon took a minute of slow, deep breaths. He managed to keep his voice calm. "I hope that is all. I do not know if I can handle any more."

She threw her hands up. "See how it feels on the other side? I think that's everything though. Current situation: the mob is off looting all the villas nearby which works for me since it's keeping them from killing Wretches-"

"Wretches?"

"They think Wretches started the pandemic, er, the Plague for... reasons. Speaking of, the flu you survived is probably starting to kill off its first wave of victims here and Ocyl actively spread it as far as possible. Oh, and apparently Eth decided she was bored of being snarky and superior around Ocyl and so instead is being snarky and superior around us. She filled in for you for a bit."

Fallon sighed and buried his face in his hands.

"Cheer up." Aida bumped him with her elbow. "We all survived it."

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

"I am so thrilled for us," he grunted. "Now we need to-"

"Aida!" Aliasara cried, stumbling through the door. Tears streamed down her face.

"What? What is it?" Aida caught her friend as the woman collapsed into her.

"He's dead. They killed him!"

Aida's heart skipped a beat. "Who's dead? Which 'him'?"

"Come, see for yourself. It's horrible." Aliasara clasped Aida's hand and pulled her from the room, flanked by Ferals. They left Fallon behind on a search for his sandals.

The suspense didn't last long; a rush through the debris-strewn, shout-echoed halls and they stood in the central courtyard half-wrecked by Aida's audience. A body dangled from the sprawling tree in the corner. The vines were apparently sturdy enough to make a noose.

Aida felt ashamed at her relief. Still, even nursing home life never fully purged the surprise, sadness, and fear that shook her when someone she knew died. "Riccaro."

"We should cut him down." Aida walked over to place a hand on Riccaro's foot. "Whatever his faults, he didn't deserve this."

Aliasara shook her head as she wiped away tears, looking aghast at Aida's hand. "You shouldn't do that! Everyone knows bodies are unclean and dangerous if handled incorrectly."

Aida shrugged and looked up. "Just meat now."

"No, their spirits lodge within the unclean flesh. Only the Wretches handle them as they cannot get any more dirtied."

The look Aida sent her way made Aliasara swallow. "It's true, Aida, everyone knows this."

"Everyone's going to get over it pretty quick. There'll be bodies heaped in the streets soon and they're busy killing everyone willing to haul them off." She glanced at the Wretches padding curiously into the courtyard. "I thought you were above such things."

"You don't understand, Aida. Touching the bodies risks-"

"Yes, uncleanliness, got it," Aida said shortly, turning to Broadaxe. "You going to help?"

Even the usually boisterous Feral took a step back as did Goldilocks when Aida's gaze fell on her. When Ghillie stepped up beside her, Aida smiled at her and touched her shoulder. "I appreciated it, but you can't even reach his feet."

"We'll deal with him, Mother," a sonorous voice said. The leader of the Wretches squatted a short distance away. Aida mentally labeled him the Professor for his surprisingly-refined speech.

"You don't have to do that anymore."

"Please." He shuffled closer, craning his neck to look up at her. "It is what we know. It would be our honor to take the body of your friend."

"I don't know if I'd go as far as 'friend'," Aida muttered to herself, then looked back up at Riccaro. "What will you do with him? I don't remember seeing any graveyards."

"Normally we would take him to the nearest gonist or, if not fresh or whole enough, to the Crowmen." The Wretched looked away as a looter rushed past a doorway lugging a fine vase. "Leave it to us."

"I trust you completely." Aida squatting down beside the Wretch as his people moved towards the tree. "I don't want to call you Wretches, but don't know what else to call you."

He smiled, eyes glowing with warmth. "Wretches."

"They use it like a curse word." Aida shook her head. "Labels like that beat you down into a box somewhere outside humanity and then keep you there at arm's length."

"We've seen the depthless cruelty with which you Walkers treat each other, the suffering and pain inflicted unthinking." The Professor paused, sadness clear on his features despite their deformity. "We don't mind being held apart and left to our own. It is our pride to serve even those who would beat us, to help those who spit on us. We may be forced to crawl, but they can't take our dignity. No Walker family could ever imagine our people's closeness."

Aida stared at him in wonder. He smiled back. "There's a saying us Wretches hold dear. 'Loss grows gratitude for what remains. Suffering releases blooms of compassion. Service plants seeds of salvation.' Now if you will, Mother, let us serve."

With a squatting bow, he padded off to oversee Riccaro's disposal.

Leaving the Wretches to their work, Aida walked over to Aliasara for a hug. "Why did you care about Riccaro so much? He looked down on you and the other servants."

Aliasara smiled sadly as their hug released. "Because of him, I had work and my family food. Without him I'd be painting my lips and nipples."

Aida stared blankly for a moment before remembering the alleyway near the Cupola back when she'd first arrived at Heaven's Tread. "Prostitution?"

"My husband couldn't find work. If men putting their bit in me put a bit of food in my family's bellies-"

Movement drew their attention; Fallon walking in one door, Eth and Rusty another. Only when Ryk failed to materialize did Aida realize how much she hoped to see him.

"Time to leave," Eth said in curt way, stopping so close Aida could smell alcohol on her breath.

"Bit early for drinking, isn't it? Hour and age both. Leave for where?" Aida gestured towards the city arcing overhead. "It's all riots and Wretches and plagues, oh my."

"The One-Eighth. Ryk is bringing her."

"Bringing who?" Aida looked around. "We can't go to the One-Eighth. Ocyl never got my Valeer."

The Imminent stared at Aida, then rolled her eyes, pointing to a random door until Ryk walked through it leading a woman by the arm.

Matted, snarled brown hair. Filthy clothes. A glassy-eyed, unseeing look. A shambling stagger; the already-gorgeous Ryk looked a Greek God in comparison to the woman.

"Who is that?" Aida immediately answered herself. "My Valeer."

"Shat herself," Ryk said, matter-of-factly. "For the best probably. Kept them from raping her."

Her Ferals argued silently before Goldilocks grudgingly took charge of the Valeer.

Aida looked back to Eth. "Is this the best time to go? It seems pretty bad out there."

"It is bad. And every hour will grow worse."

"I told everyone to join us in a week."

"Most of them will be dead in a week."

"How do we know she knows the way to the One-Eighth?" Aida gestured at the catatonic Valeer. A breeze proved Ryk's statement about her continence.

Aida caught Ryk's eye and had to wrench herself back to Eth.

"Almost forgot what it feels like," Aida muttered, heart fluttering.

"We knew this would happen so we got a Valeer who knows the way.” Eth tapped her foot impatiently. “It took Ocyl forever to find us one even with advance notice, but here she is such as she is. Gather your things and let's be on our way. If we wait too long we don't get there before the Thorn closes for good. We do make it, though, since you shut your mouth right now, do as I say, then do as Ryk says, then as he does. We leave right before a new group floods the place looking for a certain Dynast instead of food, coin, rape, and rapine."

Aida blinked a few times, then turned and walked towards her quarters, unable to find anything to say. On the way, she granted Aliasara leave to inform Riccaro's family of his death and gather her own family.

Once in her room, Aida repacked her toiletry kit, wrapped a few dresses in a bundled blanket, and then took an extra-long time to brush her teeth just to spite Eth.

"Minty-fresh breath." She tucked her toothbrush into the kit and turned, bouncing off a solid mass of Ryk. Aida dropped her toiletry bag in startlement, but Ryk caught it and handed it back to her. He smiled impishly.

"I've longed for the scent of you since I departed boyhood."

"That early? How'd you get in here?" Aida said, flustered at his proximity.

"Your Ferals know that if I wanted you dead, you would be. And they know you like me."

She leaned past him to see the room empty. The first time she could remember since her near-assassination in the Spire that she could take a step without bumping into a Feral.

"Do you want me dead?"

"I want you alive as can be." He leaned his spear against the wall.

"How do you know I want you back?" She put a finger to his lips. "Stupid question, forget I said anything."

"More easily done than you imagine." His strong, calloused hand rose to brush her cheek as he looked deep into her eyes. He smelled of oil, metal, sweat. "Do I make you nervous? You're sweating."

"Pretty damp elsewhere too." The richness of his laugh surprised and delighted her.

"I've waited to hear you say that for nearly two decades," he said, still grinning. "You're already even better than I knew."

"This is hot and really damn strange at the same time." Her breath came in short gasps as he pressed into her. Her fingers curled into his long tunic as he began to kiss her neck. "Do we have time?"

"That's all we ever have." Ryk undid her sword belt, began to unlace her dress as she worked to unfasten the gleaming metal strapped to his arm. "Not enough time to undo the bracer, though. Try down here."

He guided her hands to the thick, brass-studded leather slats of his skirts.

They fell onto the bed, but he leaned back for a moment with a grin. His eyes twinkled. "This is technically my first time, but don't worry, I know how you like it."

As he kissed his way down from breasts to navel, she arched back. Moments later he lifted her dress. She soon discovered that he did indeed know exactly how she liked it.