“This wasn’t supposed to happen.” Greufard accepts the knight’s extended hand. Standing up, he removes his headguard to fling it onto the ground and raises an ink-black pebble to the sunlight, as if he might see through the stone with a shine from behind it.

“What was, then, Ser Greufard? And may you not conclude this too early; the Shade still breathes. Unless that is the least that should have happened? I did ask not to pry, yet my curiosity is boiling me over. And reasonably so, don’t you agree?” Iacy wears a stern frown that fades with a sigh to be replaced with a pressed smile, then she faces away. “What did you say to the Lady Ulsnadir for her to run off? Definitely answer that.”

Greufard slides his palm down his face. “I thought…I caught a glimpse of the child when we first entered the forest, so she shouldn’t need to die.” Then he stutters at receiving the next question. “What? No, of course I didn’t expect us to…” He trails off into a silence that the goddess allows. “Without the soldiers, we might not have made it. Or we could have. It’s just…he shouldn’t still be like this. In this form. There was already sufficient darkness.” He flinches as if struck by a jolt of electricity, but the words have left his mouth, so slowly he lowers his hands to his sides and tilts his head to the canopy above.

“According to what you already told me: there was a deal. You assumed your friend might complete the exchange. Something like that? I thought so. Hm, no, just an unlucky guess. Isn’t it?” The goddess interlaces her fingers, which she brings up to cover her mouth. “Can you tell me what you might not have yet revealed? Can you? Anything that might tell us what to do now. Anything that might put to question the obvious solution of directly beheading your friend. Can you? Because this cannot continue.” She sends a piercing glare to Greufard, golden lances in her golden pupils, though – however so – the glare still harbours calm golden ripples as gentle as the suns that reach for them through the broken carvings of the leaves overhead and the fleeting golden mists that are her eyelashes. “Not anymore.”

The Shade twitches abruptly, but is otherwise immobile. The hood loosely bags the vague features of a face: grey skin, the rounded tip of a nose and sickly-blue lips, the cloth fluttering with each heavy breath that sizzles through clenched teeth. Kneeling with a spear through the chest and an axe buried in where an arm should be, the Shade awaits judgment.

“I-…” Greufard struggles from breaking. “You would have helped him, no? If only he had returned properly. I don’t understand. Because I waited! All this time! Erdent, do you hear me? Why? Just come back!” The composure he has so far exhibited shatters in an instant. He swings his hand back. “So, so close! You took everything! But it wasn’t you! It wasn’t! You…Stop this!” He throws, and the pebble hits and jerks the hooded head a little to the side. The Shade twitches again. “Her! So many…So many lives!” He yells at his now-empty palm. “So-…But-

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“I’m sorry. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t lose what little I have left.” He falls back down onto his knees. “What now? Help me, my Lady. This is all me. I killed them. The girl at the well. That lady’s husband. Years of bloodshed…That village; that couple; those travellers; and children! And I did nothing to stop him. Don’t ask. Please don’t ask. You don’t understand.” Greufard scrunches up his hair tightly with both hands, his fingers gripping hard enough for his forehead to stretch, his half-squinted eyes on the ground. “What else can I expect you to do now?”

Iacy gathers her words carefully. “You’re not saving him by keeping him alive. Preserving…Hm. Procrastinating. But would you have accepted reality, the reality that it was your body that has reaped the lives of so many, of even your loved ones? Accidents. Mishap. Magic. Could you genuinely acknowledge all that and live on? To come back? But you already know that. I’m sorry.”

“I’m more at fault as a murderer. But why must I consider their lives, because what else should I have done? I have the right to be selfish too. It’s so unfair, your Lady Luck. Can’t I be relieved of this reality too? Why must I acknowledge this?” Greufard bends his head down and shuts his eyes, but he receives no answer. “Only forward? Are you going to phrase it like that as well?” He laughs grimly. “Because what else can you say?”

She takes a thoughtful silence before deciding on her response, aware of the situation’s flickering delicacy. “Your sanity is intact, and therefore you have no right to death. Convince yourself that you will live your dear friend’s share of life on top of yours. And the other victims’. Live for them; do good by their names. Lie to yourself that you can and it will become the truth, as big a lie as it may seem now.” Her voice echoes throughout the clearing, angelic and resonating, with the air hanging on the thread of a commanding spell. “Do you understand? With nowhere to return to, you must start anew. You asked for my help, these words are but all that I could sincerely offer. For now, cherish this anguish that is coursing through you; blame the divine, or blame not, but savour the now in its whole; stop looking away.”

The forest quiets down as the now processes her words, then: “I am evil.” The sudden voice returns, with a tone so deep and a cackling raspiness so unnerving. The Shade is facing down to the ground, neck bent and hood drooping. “Power. I am evil.” It is an almost-inaudible whisper toned with a droplet of an unyielding plea, but perhaps even the sky can hear, for a faint rolling rumble arrives from distant dark clouds.

Greufard shakes his head for more than a whole minute, slowly from side to side. “I’m sorry, Erdent, but you’re not. But I’m so, so sorry.” He rises to his feet and wrenches his axe free with a sharp pull, then he turns to the knight. “I’m sorry. I still can’t.”

The knight nods. He approaches the Shade and raises his sword to a measure above the neck. It is a clean slice.