”D-do-d-don’t lo-lo-look.”

Pen hadn’t noticed Ibiko rushing up, yet there he suddenly was, wrapping his arms around her. The smell of his shirt enveloped her likewise, a smell of safety, of nights huddled against each other in the caves’ cold, of him. His shoulder rose to block her view. Unsure what part of her made the decision, Pen threw him off with all her force and kept staring. She knew she shouldn’t look. But just then, and only for a breath, she didn’t want his warmth, his protection, but the cold reality of consequence.

Just then, she wanted to suffer for her choices.

”Fi—” started the siwe.

The red mist first took form in the periphery of her vision. It enveloped the line of executioners, growing whipping arms that splashed down onto the rock around her. Something warm dashed across her stomach just as the line of bodies became a line of loosely-strung-together parts. Hisses, thumps, splashes, clattering of guns. Then, silence. As the mist settled on the bodies it had sprung from, Pen’s eyes began to turn these sights into meaning, and she grew terribly afraid. She looked down to find a streak of not red, but blood painted across her sarif. Her mouth opened by instinct. Nothing but air came out.

Another thump. »… day liars die.«

Pen closed her eyes and grabbed Ibiko’s hand, fighting to keep control of her senses as the world around her turned into a mad place. A place where the roles of executioner and executed were reversed. Where the voices of the dead spoke aloud. A place that she feared she would have preferred over reality if it hadn’t been make-believe.

»Private Kirhonen, stand down!«

The hoarse voice didn’t sound familiar until it trailed off at the end, morphing into a whimper whose origin was undoubtedly Rannek. When she opened her eyes again, Pen found him in the midst of a pained limp across the cavern, his crutch nowhere to be seen. He almost slipped in a pool of blood, and kept his hand extended, screaming »Stop!« a second and a third time. She forced her eyes off the bodies and spotted Wellan, Dhav, and Kysryn unharmed, looking up at the liar. His bones were dangling in the air, clattering softly in the grip of the scariest man she had ever seen.

That was, until she saw past the blood that covered every spot of his body. There was a ragged uniform beneath it that could have once been beige. His stature was of a less-than-strange straightness and towering height. That blade approaching the liar’s neck would have made a not-at-all-strange hiss. It was impossible. It was make-believe.

It was Glane.

Pen tried to scream. Barely a sound came out. Still, that ’stop’ the red giant did respond to. The liar dropped to the ground like sack of taters, and before her empty scream had ended, the shadow of an enormous chest took her in. He knelt down before her, planted his mighty blade on the ground, and bowed the Tahori bow.

»Forgive me, miss Penroe,« Glane said softly. »I shall never leave your side again.«

Her legs gave out, and she sunk down. But not even her tears would obey her. She sat with dry eyes and uncertain breaths until he finally looked up. What pain she saw in that stupid big mustachioed face. Pain well known to her, caused by his failure to fulfill his duty, but also a jerking of his cheek unrelated to lofty ideals. He was hurting.

Glane slumped off to the side, and barelycaught the fall with his arm. Pen noticed only by Ibiko’s hand letting go that he had been holding hers all this time. He rushed to Glane’s side and did his best to support him as he lay down on the ground. No, she thought. Not again, not now.

»Priv—Glane! Are you alright?« Rannek came limping back, almost slipping once more, and rushed to Glane’s side. »I command you not to die!«

A chuckle shook the giant chest, followed by a groan. »I shan’t, prefect. The Gift takes a toll, is all.« He sighed for an eternity, it seemed like. »Allow me to catch my breath.«

Without the use of her legs or her words, Pen could only sit by his side and hold his hand. She found herself sighing just like him, expelling the tension that had kept her strength intact. She saw wounds on him, a shocking sight, yet they weren’t too deep, and after all, he was a Cursed. He would survive. He was weak, but he would survive. In that, they were the same; never in her life had Pen felt so drained. It must have been the price for certainty.

Over. It was over. The struggle, the fear, darkness, hunger, thirst, they had made it through. The same seemed to dawn on Kysryn and Dhav who, as Ibiko freed them, hugged and laughed and cried ecstatically, twirling in circles around the center of the cavern. Wellan rose to his feet running his finger along the remains of his nose, wincing. He sent his men a look she could only guess expressed annoyance before turning around. There, he found the liar lying still, tied up.

For a breath, Pen wondered if he was stretching, until his lifted foot shot down to dig into the liar’s side. Two more kicks Wellan got in before Ibiko intervened, shoving him off the wincing pile of bones and alerting the others. ”D-don’t!” he shouted.

Wellan bounced back with surprising energy and moved his smashed face close to Ibiko’s. »Get out of my way.«

»Calm down, Wellan,« Rannek said. »He’ll get his due back in Koeiji.«

»He was about to get his due until Kirhonen arrived, I say we keep it that way.« Wellan took another step forward just short of kissing the young Tahori. »Move back, boy.«

Ibiko did not move. ”No.”

”’m ready to repent before the law!” The liar let out a sardonic laugh, panting. ”I suggest you strip dem bones off’a me, I’ll be easier to carry. Just make sure to get me a better judge this time!”

»Move,« Wellan hissed. Pen got a look at his eyes flashing over at her and Rannek. They were a stranger’s. Nothing was over in his mind, clearly. Even his men started to back off instead of intervening, wholly unsure of their place in this. This wasn’t the Wellan she knew.

»Commander Sersynin, you will stand down, or I will stand up.« Glane had not even opened his eyes. He laid there, his hand filling both of hers, booming nonetheless as he spoke. »Do not misrepresent the Empire.«

»… Did you just threaten me, private?« Wellan snarled.

»Yes.«

Pen waited, but there came no response. Wellan clenched his fists, scratched his ear, and stayed silent. When he turned away from Ibiko in a sudden burst and started toward the opening, Rannek stood up on unsteady legs to limp after him. Kysryn and Dhav followed, too, but not before rushing behind the boulder and retrieving their rifles from where the rebels had stashed them. A couple of steps before the bright outside, they caught up with the head of the Guard. Wellan snarled at them some more, albeit with less hostility.

Pen let her head hang and studied Glane’s body. From up close, the reds he was wrapped in weren’t of one, but many shades, overlapping across his massive body. The deepest patches revealed incisions in his skin—an impossibility, she had thought—while in the lighter areas, spots of beige and pale still punctured his scarlet cloak. His wounds were many, yet none seemed that deep. Most of the blood wasn’t his. And the mist hardly accounted for the rest.

»I thought you were…« she said, and stopped. »What happened?«

»The jungle caught my fall, young miss. Sadly, what I’d fallen into was my past. I’m ashamed to admit that I gave in whole-heartedly. I did things I swore to never do again—I enjoyed it. I let my mind get clouded by the fight, the hunt, the endless…« A long sigh came from his lips. »Please, I do not wish to burden you with it.«

She shook her head.»You’re here, that’s all that matters.« Yet glancing up, she felt not as certain as she sounded. The mingled parts that had once been siwe Luor Nhi’s troop lined up not far from her, surrounded by pools of blood whose arms found every crack in the rock, flowing, branching out. A piece of overcooked moss drifted amidst the pools, red seeping into the dried blue to create a violet island. »… It’s over,« she said.

»Indeed.« He sighed, and this time, it did not sound like pain. »I can’t describe what a relief it is to see you alive, young miss.«

»You, too.« A list of things she had regretted not telling him ran through her mind’s eye, yet she felt like saying nothing instead. She found her satchel nearby and took out a sip from her bottle. She held the bottle to his lips, too, keeping some to wash his face. The bright mustache, the broad jaw, his ruler-straight nose soon returned to a familiar pale tone. He lay there breathing slowly, not asking her to stop, but not acknowledging her either. His eyes remained closed, but his breath stayed steady. He’d dozed off. When Pen gave her legs a try, she found that they were not that shaky anymore. She stood up and forced herself to take a long look at the pools, the parts, the maroon mayhem. It did not touch her like she thought it would. It looked unreal.

Something told her to move, so she moved, away from the blood this time. She strolled around the boulder with heavy steps, finding bags and scarves and remnants of dinner scattered on the ground where the rebels had left them. A gas heater was still cooking even though the water inside its pot had evaporated and the borvin had become a sludge of swollen mushrooms. She turned off the gas, and found a backpack on the ground next to it filled with dirty clothes, sloppily stored ammunition, and half a dozen papers and magazines. Pen could not tell why, but the Liberation reading news and drinking borvin like the old folks of Koeiji struck her ten times harder than the sight of their mangled bodies. She tried to wipe their blood off her sarif with a stained shirt, but it only blurred the edges. After stashing some of the magazines in her satchel, she turned and left the backpack, the heater, and the sludge behind.

The skeleton sat in the same spot she had found it in. Jaw broken, mouth open, it stared at her and the rebels’ belongings like it couldn’t quite comprehend what had transpired. That she could relate to. Questions about the mission that had brought the siwe and his men here were bouncing wildly around her head when she heard a commotion, the muffling of objections from a sardonic voice. After it had calmed down, Ibiko suddenly stepped around the boulder.

”What are you d-doing back here?” he asked.

”Not sure,” Pen said. ”You gagged him again?”

Ibiko looked ashamed. ”Didn’t want to, it’s j-just… That m-man is—”

”Yeah.”

They stood together before the skeleton for a while, neither saying anything. Soft Gralinn sounded from somewhere behind the boulder; Wellan seemed to have calmed down for the moment. A small speck of white on the ground caught her eye, its tip dipped in red. The splinter. Pen ran her hand along her neck, finding the spot where it had pierced her skin, and pulled back her fingers to find them dipped redly, too. Just then, Ibiko’s head jerked to the side with his teeth clenched.

”You okay?” Pen asked.

”I tho-thought I heard something by the…” He sighed. ”Never mind. My nerves are sh-sh-shot.”

”It’s over,” she said.

”… Once we l-leave this place, it will be.” He crouched, and inspected the skull from up close. ”D-do you think they were telling the truth?”

”There are no Tahori Cursed.” Pen shook her heard slowly. ”Not anymore. And besides, it doesn’t make sense even if there were. Why would they come here just take back a skeleton? That’s way too much risk.”

”I d-don’t know.” He put his hand on her shoulder, and smiled. ”And fr-frankly, I really don’t care.”

She smiled weakly as they took their last looks at the skeleton. Rannek’s voice called her name then, so they left the site of their interrogation, finding him reunited with his crutch, coming at them quickly. The direction of his limp changed slightly when she walked out from behind the rock, Pen noticed—he was trying to put himself between her and the dead.

”Vohl almighty, you two!” he exclaimed. ”Please, don’t go running off in a time like this, you scared me.”

”Are we leaving?” Pen asked.

”Within the frag. You ready? Me, I’m looking forward to the jungle so much, it’s almost disconcerting.”

Pen nodded, and so did Ibiko. Dhav’s voice suddenly cut through the air. »Sirs, we have a survivor!«

Rannek shot around to where the private was standing over a body among parts. Pen tried to peek around Rannek, but the shape seemed as still as the carnage surrounding it. For a moment, it looked like Dhav had gone mad, tying up the hands of a corpse. Only when he turned it around did Pen see that he was speaking the truth.

The girl’s body was long, and wiry, and void of cuts. Pen recognized the face instantly. Her still features seemed drawn towards a spot not too far off the tip of her nose, a spiky, unseemly long thing closely neighbored by beady eyes. A rodent’s face. Something dropped from her hand as she rolled onto her back making a crinkling sound. Pen dashed around Rannek to pick up the newspaper. Blood had seeped into the edges, and dirt had been smeared across the photograph, creating a scene of bowed devotion to a smudge. She was stashing the paper with the others in her satchel when Glane walked up behind her holding his side.

»We do not kill the unarmed,« he said.

»So we carry them, is that it?« Wellan scoffed, but kept his distance to both the girl and the liar. »It’s either that or wake her up, and then we’ll have to worry about her making noise. The Liberation has eagle’s ears in the jungle. I say leave her. Dead or alive, your choice.«

»I disagree«, Rannek said. »We have to think about after. She might be the only one able to give us answers. This ’rebel’ is only a child, we can get her to shed light on what this all was about. What the siwe truly was after.«

»He told us. A withered old skeleton, that’s what brought them here. Who cares if its Cursed—it’s dead. We have bigger problems.«

»You’re not wrong,« Rannek said. »Be that as it may, she comes with us.”

Wellan threw up his hands and turned toward the opening. »Do as you please. Dhav, you’re with me.« Before anyone could object, he had walked into the light, and disappeared. Pen still had to shield her eyes looking at the broad opening blown into the cavern’s wall. The outside. She could barely wait, and neither could Dhav, from the looks of it. He stormed after Wellan to merge with the brightness crying words of praise to the Allfather.

Glane crouched down to heave the unconscious rebel over his right shoulder with silent motions. Despite his wounds, he still moved smoothly like a cat, and his posture was straight as usual. Only his steps betrayed how exhausted he was; they thudded, and shook the ground faintly when he stepped past her to the center of the cave. There, he picked up the liar, too, whose muffled voice objected throughout his rise onto Glane’s left shoulder. Blood-covered and framed by two butts, one dressed in olive, one in bone, the giant Gralinn nevertheless managed to retain a dignified expression as he walked back toward her and the others.

»You’re sure it’s not too much?« Rannek asked.

Glane’s mustache bent in a smile. »Not too much to add a prefect. You are injured?«

»Injured, but fit. I haven’t moved this much in years—who knows, I might even be able to lift you!«

This moved the giant to laugh, shaking his head and the butts to either side of it. As Rannek began a tale of his hardships during their journey through the darkness, Pen noticed a jerk of Ibiko’s head, a clenching. She lightly punched his elbow, but he didn’t react, staring once again at the opening across the cavern that led down the giant’s stairs.

»What’s up?« she asked.

»Nothing, I ju-just—« He shook his head, and turned around. »I wanna g-get out of here.«

»Me, too.«

Her hand took his, they caught up with Rannek and Glane, and Kysryn joined with a bag of provisions taken from the deserted dinner. Rubble forced them to tread lightly around the opening, and the light stung their eyes as it enveloped them. Pen threw one last glance back into the cave. It was gray and blue and maroon and olive and quiet and sad and dark. And then, it was gone.

The world she stepped into was a strange one. It looked and smelled and felt the same as that she had left behind only days ago, yet a hundred times more intense. The sun scorched her skin despite hanging low over the western mountains, glowing in a deep orange. Scents of dried leaves and weeds registered with her distinctly, clashing with the ubiquity of earth, not the faint minerals, the bloody taste of rock, but earth, hard, dry, cracked-up, welcoming her to the surface. She let her eyes be blinded until a deep wave rolled through her ears forcing her to look down. Through tight lids and fingers, she saw movement between the grass and moss and shrubbery tossed about by the explosion, insects and small animals rushing in and out of focus. Something stabbed her skin, and she shot around. The attacker had already fled leaving only a dark blot on the back of her upper arm. Right, there was that. A few bugs couldn’t lessen her joy, though. Following Dhav and Kysryn’s example, she reached out her arms and twirled, letting her ripped shoes sweep through the dust in overlapping circles. A rock made her stagger, but Ibiko caught her. They laughed.

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A clearing opened up only a few ells from the mouth of the cave, hardly more than a patch of sparse weeds and thickets cut down by the rebels’ machetes. It was there that Wellan stopped to inspect their surroundings. At the edges of the clearing, the vegetation ran up into a wall of trees, teaks mostly, many of their trunks wrapped in vines and—exclusively green—mosses. The movement in the treetops was more sound than sight, save a few darting bodies and wings inside the dense web of branches. Birds made calls eerily similar to those made by the siwe. Voices of a more human quality ’ah’ed and ’uh’ed, erues most likely. And beneath all that buzzed a billion tiny tymbals joining in the cicada’s song.

Pen stopped. She had just passed something in the grass, something that did not fit. She turned back to the entrance of the clearing, where from underneath a shrub, a bare foot stuck out, upright, unmoving. Trancelike, her eyes stayed on the five still toes until a voice made her snap out of it.

»They had watches posted,« Glane said. »There is another over by those trees.«

»Good job,« Wellan said, and spat in the direction Glane had pointed. »How many did you count in these woods?«

»Not many, and those that I counted are no more. Their forces concentrate elsewhere.«

»What about the mines?«

»When I came to, there were no—« He paused, and Pen thought she saw his eyes glance over at Ibiko for just a breath. »I did not see.«

»Fine. We’re east of there, so we should go west.«

»West?« Rannek asked. »If what remains of the TLA is going back over the High Road, they’ll be heading west, too. Shouldn’t we—«

»Indeed, and they are coming from the east. Best not run head-on into them. If we make it to the banks of the Foen, we’ll be save. The Empire is going to have ships on patrol there.«

»We don’t know that for sure.«

Their discussion went on, and Pen grew disinterested. Past the foot, she peered through the trees to spot specks of blue between their limbs and leaves. The jungle was not even, not at all; it sloped. They must have been higher up than when they had entered the caves. She looked back at the mountainside rising steeply above her and the dark mouth of the cavern beneath it, rubble strewn around its lips like shattered teeth. Even knowing what lay inside, the boulder, the stairs, the pools, she couldn’t make out anything but black. She didn’t have to. Never ever would she have to step into a cave of any kind again; houses, that’s what she would content herself with from now on. Well-known houses, the municipality, her own, places where she could control how dark it was. How cold it was. Places with plenty of non-blue food. Places whose openings weren’t big enough to let through more than her voice.

How she yearned to talk to Yuri, Pen realized. For the first time in her life, she had a story of her own to tell—a thing that happened to her, not someone else—and he was the only friend of hers that hadn’t been there. She smiled to herself. It would be fun to tell him about Ibiko, his higher age, his climbing skill, perhaps leave out his stutter, and see what reaction it got. He’d surely bicker with her over the TLA, as he had yet to find a rebel cause he did not sympathize with in his irate, but inconsequential fits. He would listen, poke fun, and feel for her when she got to the parts about Mallaslyn, and Staen, and all the others that had been lost.

Only it somehow did not seem enough. She wanted to tell him, but not just him. Her books were great storytellers, better ones than her by leagues, yet they utterly sucked at listening. She wondered what other people would say. What sense they’d make of it. What would, say, a man like Aphun think about the boneyard? Would he snap his fingers and yell out ’The Iphaenian Abyss’? How would the nice ladies that sometimes brought flowers to her doorstep judge the siwe? She wondered what harm there could truly be in talking to them once in a while. They would bow on occasion—so what? That wasn’t unchangeable.

Hi, I’m Penroe. Could you not bow? She’d sound like an ass. But perhaps sounding like an ass at first was inevitable if you wanted to learn. Hi, I’m Penroe. My eyes are up here. No, that was even worse. Hi, I’m Penroe. Gimme five! Could work. Childish, but it could work.

As the men behind her approached an agreement—east seemed most sensible, after all—Pen’s hand entered her satchel to fetch her fan. From crumpled magazines to the ledger to pencils and handkerchiefs it slithered until she found the folded sticks and strings. The heat was in retreat, yet the ground’s warmth still made her sweat a little after having gotten used to the cool of the caves. She opened the fan to its full wing-like span and welcomed the breeze on her face with closed eyes.

She would meet new people. She could introduce people. Glane would undoubtedly make an ass out of himself, but that was nothing knew. She would keep him in check. Perhaps Rannek would one day learn of a casual friendship between neighbors, one that came to be by chance over the garden fence, not through a hole under father’s desk. And once that was out of the way, forget telling Yuri about Ibiko—she would invite the young miner and his girlfriend to stay over, see the city, and meet the neighbors first-hand! There was fun to be had. She would feel less lonely. In that moment, it occurred to her as nothing but stupid that she had never tried this solution to her solitude: talk to people.

A short high-pitched cry sounded somewhere above. When Pen opened her eyes again, she saw a ring of tail feathers every color but green shoot between the trees and disappear. Its call came once again from inside the jungle sounding distant, and somehow lonely. Was that a southern diva? They rarely made it up this far, yet the feathers she knew she’d seen before, albeit as drawings; the only bird known to completely redress during mating season, the diva liked to switch its green cloak of near-invisibility for a feathery fireworks of colors that attracted mates just as much as it did every predator of the jungle, including poachers. She turned to see if Rannek had seen it, and was relieved to find that he had not. A bird that peculiar would have only distracted him.

She fanned her face, and turned, laying eyes on Ibiko standing not far from her. He looked back to where the mouth gaped, darkly, with his jaw clenched and his hands trembling softly. It’s over, she wanted to say, and opened her lips. But then Ibiko opened his eyes. They became white dishes carrying only the smallest green grapes, lids utterly disappearing as he stared. He lifted his hand to point back to where they had escaped from. It wasn’t trembling anymore, it was shaking, buckling, resisting his will. None of the others seemed to notice. So Pen looked.

The mouth appeared nothing but dark to her at first glance. Unchanged. Toothless. Then, the movement started. Something parted from the shadows flinching back multiple times, a long brown shape that brushed the ground and reached up hesitantly toward the sun. An arm. Fingers opened and closed with mesmerizing slowness before it went back to the darkness. Pen noticed her mouth had fallen open, but there was nothing she could do but reach behind her, unable to avert her eyes. Her hand grabbed clumsily into air; Rannek was nowhere to be found, his voice still engaged in discussion. Stop talking and look, she wanted to say. Yet her tongue had all of a sudden turned into stone.

The arm returned, and with it came a head, a body, a creature, moving in hesitant jumps and jerks while cowering closely to the ground. The sunward arm did not shield its eyes properly, so it cupped them with its fingers while fumbling around the ground with the other hand. Its three-limbed walk was akin to an ape’s, its hair matted in clumps like that of a wild buffalo, its dark skin faded and parted by faint lines like the scales of a a snake—and still, she saw its humanity. This was a man. Rags of colorless linen hung around his shoulder covering little but the shoulder itself. His feet were bare and split into five digits like his hands. And the eyes he hid from her were more than likely green.

His shadow had just separated from the mouth when he stopped, and pointed his finger-sealed face toward the clearing.

”R-Ra-R-R-Rannek?” Ibiko sputtered.

The talk behind them died out then. Breaths were drawn not to be released. Two thuds and a muffled groan sounded dryly. The man meanwhile kept his distance, hunkered down until his hand left the ground, and he stood up facing them.

His head snapped back as the bang cracked in her ears. Pen watched the man fall to his back and lie still, head shrouded in the mouth’s shadow, puffs of dust rising from the ground around him. She spun around in shock, looking past Rannek, Dhav, and Kysryn, to where Wellan stood with his rifle still raised. A trail of smoke clung to his muzzle. His eyes were even whiter than Ibiko’s.

”What—What did you do?” Rannek asked.

»What Kirhonen started,« Wellan said as he lowered the gun. »His blade’s gone blunt, seems like.«

His breath was heavy, and he turned his eyes from the dead man all too quickly, yet Wellan still acted like he hadn’t just made a mistake. Like the man had at all deserved death. Anger welled up inside Pen, causing her to step towards him until an immovable object appeared in her path. »I killed every single one but the girl,« Glane said. »That man was not one of them.«

Wellan’s head shot around toward the red giant. »Then what were you about to do just now, shake his hand?«

»Question him, then incapacitate him.« Pen realized Glane had indeed dropped the two butts and kept his blade at hand, half-drawn. His other hand meanwhile continued to hold her back from Wellan.

»Kirhonen’s right,« Rannek said. »What if he’s the first of more to come over the stairs? What if the shot got their attention?«

»Simple answer,« Wellan said, and spat. »We keep moving.«

For some reason, the liar’s muffled voice agreed with him enthusiastically. He squirmed on the ground, eyes fixed on the mouth. His relentless meddling only spurred her rage. Pen pushed away Glane’s hand. »That wasn’t a rebel, look at him! He wears neither maroon nor green. You didn’t have to shoot him!«

»Well, I did! Can we focus on what’s important? Your protector just killed over a dozen people, I don’t see what difference it makes.«

»He… he had reason. You didn’t.«

”P-Pen,” Ibiko said, ”Ran-R-Rannek?”

Wellan started talking through his teeth. »You look at my fucking face and tell me I don’t have reason.«

»Hold it,« Rannek said. »We have to stay calm. What’s done is—«

”Pen?”

»What is it?« she shouted at Ibiko.

”LOOK!”

Pen turned and saw the dead man, lying no more. He held his head as he stood back up just outside the clearing, scratching at his forehead. Something small and shiny was lodged in the skin just above his brows. He pried it off and covered his eyes with his hand again. Looked up.

His lunge came out of nowhere, as came Glan shoving her into the bushes. She never saw the object leave the man’s hand. There was only a sizzle in the air as Glane vanished from her side. Within an instant, he had rushed back in front of Wellan, and met the sizzle with the hiss of his blade. The sound of clashing metals shot over the clearing.

An instant later, Pen witnessed a red hydelia blossom from the back of Wellan’s head with a cracking sound. Shades of maroon and pink and white sprouted into the air trailing ells behind him while his braid swung sideways clinging to the remains of his head by nothing but a thin strand of hair. The flower seemed to hang in the air for a breath before losing shape and crashing down onto the earth painting it with Gralinn blood, followed by the lifeless thump of Wellan’s body.

Voices rose up around her. Rannek fell down, crawling on his knees to the corpse, his hand squeezing that of Wellan without sense as he screamed. Pen felt her own lips part to let all air flow out of her lungs in a subdued wail. Somehow, they spoke as if to object. ”It’s over.”

Glane dropped something to the ground; a blade-less hilt. His eyes met hers, and despite the blood, his pain, she saw that he shared her shock. It vanished from his face when he turned toward the mouth and drew a knife from his belt. »You will repent.« Pen reached out to him, but in vain. He’d dissolved in air. She only then noticed Kysryn and Dhav raising their weapons on the other side of the clearing. No, she thought. They had gone mad. This was no force to provoke further, this was—

”C-CURSED!” Ibiko yelled, jumping up with his arms spread wide. He positioned himself between the guards and the mouth, his entire body shaking. ”That man is Cursed! D-d-don’t shoot!”

”Ibiko, go!” Dhav yelled back. ”Go now!”

Ibiko shook his head, staying in their way. Rannek crawled to the two guards and pulled their weapons down. »He’s right! Privates, please, we have to run! Kirhonen will—«

A sound so searing it made her cover her ears cut Rannek short, and turned the heads of every man still present. Pen stumbled out of the bushes on wonky legs and almost tripped over Wellan’s leg trying to see what had happened. There at the mouth, no more than fifteen ells away from her, laid the man, the killer, the creature. It lifted itself off the ground with one thrust of its arm, grunting. Face still veiled by fingers, it jerked around with quick birdlike motions looking for something. Barely one look was spent on them.

And then the sound came again, like the sawing of those gargantuan machines used to cut down the trunks of Oldwoods, a sound high and piercing and inhuman. A swirl of sparks rose from the creature’s back as it dove face first into the ground whirling up more dust. Still, it kept moving, and stood up. The fingers never left its eyes unguarded. The sawing came again, and again, causing sparks to fly, beating the creature down. Each time the sound came, Pen could see the shifting of the dust, arms of it reaching after a rapid shape shooting in and out. He was still that fast. Each time, she wished for the creature to stay down, and accept its defeat, and die. Tahori Cursed did not exist, and in that moment, she felt with every fiber of her being that they shouldn’t.

The cloud grew so dense she could barely see through, and the sawing sounds stopped. A hand grabbed hers from behind, its spasms betraying the owner. ”P-please, let’s g-g-go,” Ibiko said. But she resisted. It wasn’t over. She had to see the end of it, make sure. A cool sensation hit her skin, and suddenly, Glane was standing next to her again. He was panting, his eyesstill fixed on the cloud of dust.

All of a sudden, he shoved her back into Ibiko’s arms. »Run,« Glane said. Ibiko did not waste a breath, dragging her across the clearing with shaking, yet iron hands. Her feet scraped by the tied-up captives, both now awake and squirming. Their eyes followed Pen in a wordless plea until Rannek crawled over to untie them. Kysryn pushed him aside and drove his knife into the ropes, freeing the captives almost instantly. The four of them followed after Pen as she was still kicking and protesting, trying to wrestle free of Ibiko’s embrace. They couldn’t leave Glane behind. Not again. It was over. Leaves and branches closed in around her just when she saw the dust cloud at the mouth burst apart.

A shape flew at Glane, missing him by just a hair. His movements still escaped the eye, but they were shorter, less instantaneous. An ear-splitting crash sounded not far from her, a bursting of trees filling the air with a thousand splinters. She saw the shape slow down and collapse against a massive trunk to her right. It was a boulder. It was bigger than Glane. Pen stopped struggling and turned around, unable to look away from the giant chunk of rock. Run, he’d said. Run she would. Sawing noises, cracking trees, dull tremors of the ground followed her into the jungle and down the steep decline. Her skin was torn bites and scratches and hits as she fought to just stay on her feet, wrists aching each time she grabbed a tree for support. Something flew past the blue-speckled canopy, not high above her head. Another shape. Another rock. It split a tree in two, whose falling top just missed Dhav and the mouse-like rebel, but they bounced back to their feet before Kysryn could scoop up either. Rannek struggled with his crutch, and received support from the liar of all people. A sizzle to her back made Pen look back just long enough to deliver her foot into the looping snare of a root.

Her body became a boulder at the mercy of the slope, tumbling past Ibiko and Dhav and Kysryn and the rebel with reckless speed. Up became down became up as her ribs, her hands, her flailing arms and legs bounced off the trees unable to stop her fall. Voices called after her as the tremors got ever closer. She regained her bearings for just a moment to see the tree ahead burst into a million pieces. Shadows consumed her. It’s over.

Mighty hands closed around her shoulders. Pen had stopped outside the splinters’ reach, feet dangling far above the ground. Glane set her down and turned toward the others higher up, and bellowed. »FASTER!«

He rushed off again. This time however, Pen could follow him up the incline with her eyes; his vanishing had turned into the darting of a blurred red line between the trees. Ibiko arrived beside her shortly, urging Pen to move.”Ri-right b-be-behind us!” Rannek arrived twisting his face in pain and rubbing his shoulder, followed by the two guards and the freed captives. She started moving with them keeping an eye out for roots, but still looked back back every other step. Calls and cries and the flapping of wings sounded far above in the trees. She stumbled again, but caught her fall. Then, she saw another shape whizz past over their heads before it crashed into the trees ahead. It was impossible. It was a nightmare.

It was Glane. His body ripped two young teaks with him and toppled dully to the ground. The man she had always thought invincible was jerking in pain, struggling to stand up even. He was searching for something. His knife. Pen spotted it lying on the ground off to the side, and ran, and picked it up. It was so heavy she almost fell over on her way to him. Kysryn and Ibiko meanwhile helped Glane to his feet, who nodded with a solemn smile when she handed him his weapon. Suddenly, private Dhav spun around with his rifle pointing up the slope. »I see him!«

The liar yelled out, ”Don’t, you idiot!”

The shot crackled, smoke rose, and a silence ensued. Dhav kept his aim. »I think I go—«

A flash shot by from the left yanking him out of sight. Pen looked between the trees and thickets, and found nothing. He was gone. Glane’s mighty hand grabbed her shoulder once more and put her behind him together with the the others. His right arm was hurt, red dripping down his fingers, hanging off his side barely moving as he raised the knife with his left.

»Show yourself!« his voice boomed out.

Sunlight broke through a hole in the trees off to the west, blinding her. She looked around restlessly, failing to find anything but softly billowing leaves, and sturdy trees, and the zig-zag of bugs. A thud sounded. Only a few steps from Glane and a few more from her and the others, she saw the leaves part and the creature emerge from the bushes.

It walked toward them slowly, scarier even from up close. Its hair had sprawled without a checking hand, reaching here and clumping there, covering head, jaw, chest, armpits, down to the areas she had no mind to scrutinize. It was black, as was the skin brown, yet something about it seemed… wan. Lacking color. ”What is it you want?” Rannek asked, pleading. The creature kept walking. They huddled closer together behind her protector, Rannek, Ibiko, the rebel and the liar, Kysryn, and her, staring at this man-like beast. Pen wondered if it truly had eyes behind those fingers. Its mouth seemed untainted by emotion, peaceful almost. ”We don’t wish you harm!” Rannek said.

The creature did not stop, and so it was Glane lunging this time, driving his knife toward his foe’s face. The attack was so robbed of speed, even Pen saw it coming. With ease, the creature stepped to the side and fended off the blow with its arm. Sparks flew through the undergrowth. There came no wound from the collision. Only the knife had splintered. Just as Glane tried to pull it back, the creature ripped apart its jaws.

Glane’s knife shattered between its teeth, and a ferocious blow to his side sent her protector flying into the trees. Suddenly, Pen and the others were face-to-face with the creature. It huffed. It grunted. It locked eyes with the last guard. Kysryn raised his rifle, lowered it, then closed his eyes. The rifle hit the ground as he started whimpering, expecting his death. Ibiko sunk down beside him, rocking. She heard a cracking of leaves, and did not have to turn to know that the liar was no longer there behind her.

It was over.

The creature walked off leaving Pen to realize how long it had been since she’d taken a breath. Rannek gasped with her, as did Kysryn and the rebel; only Ibiko stayed rocking. It had spared them. But why? Was it over? What was this man-like creature after?

She followed the creature’s muscled back with her eyes, and found it closing in on Glane, leaning against the tilted tree that had caught him, battered and broken. Her mind was racing. Wellan had attacked it and died. Dhav had attacked it and died. Glane had attacked it.

She stormed after it before the others could stop her. ”No!” she said, trying to get the creature’s attention. ”Leave him alone!” She fought through the thickets, the rises and falls on the uneven slope, and soon reached the unhurried creature. It grunted once more. ”Please!” she cried, running past it.

»Young miss, run!” Glane said, reeling, spitting blood onto the weeds and leaves.

”Pen, NO!” Rannek screamed behind her.

Pen planted her feet between her protector and the creature and turned, lifting her arms. ”GO AWAY!” The creature did not stop.

She watched in dismay as her hands started bashing against its chest, its stomach, its cheeks, driven by something outside her conscious mind. The creature’s skin was rough and hard, impervious to her attack, and yet her body wouldn’t stop. She looked up knowing that it was over. Mercilessly, eyelessly, the creature’s fingers looked upon her futile attack, stopped, and parted ever so slightly. She’d gotten its attention, but Glane would still die. And she would die with him. Pen sunk to her knees, her strength waning for good. Her fists hit the ground, loosened, and became weak tiny hands clutching earth as she waited for the final blow to strike her down.

An arm closed in around her lifting her off the ground. A blow hit her body propelling it in ways she could not understand. Winds lashed against her face. It barely hurt. This was it. She intertwined her fingers, and apologized. To father. To mother. To Rannek and Glane and Wellan and all the others that had been good to her.

When she opened her eyes again, Pen was soaring through an ocean of leaves.