‘Emily?’ Lewis said loudly as he shook her gently, the early morning sunlight flooding through the narrow entrance to the cave. ‘Emily?’ he asked again, shaking her more vigorously this time.

He had been woken up abruptly, slumped in the entrance to the cave beside the dying fire, when he had heard her shout out. When he had gone to investigate, he had found her muttering in her sleep. The same word, friend, seemed to be coming up on a regular basis.

‘What?’ she muttered uncertainly as her blue eyes opened slowly.

‘It’s morning,’ he said, leaning back so that she could sit up.

‘Great Precursors, I’m sorry,’ she said sitting up, suddenly remembering that she had been supposed to take over the lookout for him. ‘I didn’t mean to sleep all night.’

‘It’s fine,’ Lewis said, deciding not to tell her that he had fallen asleep after what could have only been a couple of hours after he had said he would keep lookout. ‘I heated up the leftovers from last night,’ he said, pushing them towards her.

‘Thanks,’ she said as she rubbed the sleep out of her eyes, picking up one of the pieces of meat. ‘I’m sorry about last night, I just want this nightmare to be over.’

‘It’s alright,’ he said, waving away her apology. ‘Was that what you were dreaming about?’

‘What?’

‘You were talking in your sleep.’

‘What was I saying?’ she asked curiously as she finished the last piece of rabbit.

‘I didn’t catch much of it but something about friends kept coming up,’ he replied as he considered her. ‘Are you ready to go?’

‘One minute,’ she said as she untangled herself from the fur coats, she had been using to keep herself warm while she slept. Stuffing them back in the bag she glanced up at him as he stood over her waiting patiently. ‘How long have you known Arron?’

‘A couple of years,’ Lewis replied slowly as he led the way out of the cave. ‘Why?’

‘Just wondering,’ she said brightly. ‘You trust him then?’

Leaving behind the charred remains of the fire that they had lit the night before they set off along the path again, continuing in the same direction that they had been heading in the day before. It had taken him a while but he had eventually recognised the path as the one he used to take whenever they had visited his uncle years ago.

‘Of course, patrol partners have to trust each other,’ Lewis said. ‘If you don’t trust one of your patrol partners then it puts you both in danger if something happens.’

‘One of your partners?’

‘Each patrol route had four guards,’ he explained. ‘Only two of them patrol at a time though. As long as two guards are patrolling the route then it doesn’t matter which two do it. They tend to let you pick who you patrol with each day.’

‘So, you don’t always patrol with Arron?’ she asked.

‘I do most of the time,’ he admitted. ‘It depends what route we are patrolling most of the time.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘The route we were patrolling the night we found you ends near where we live so it makes more sense for us to do it than David and Louise who live on the other side of the market,’ he said as he sidestepped a frozen puddle in the middle of the path.

‘Did you meet them while you were training as well?’ Emily asked.

‘I vaguely knew Louise before because she came to the bakery when I was working there sometimes,’ Lewis said. ‘I didn’t meet David until training though.’

‘I never knew there was so much going into keeping the city safe,’ Emily said, pausing when she spotted a deer amongst the trees.

‘What did you do at the castle?’ he asked, stopping when he turned to look at her and realised that she was half a dozen paces behind him watching the deer. ‘Come on.’

Startled by his voice, the deer disappeared back into the forest, Emily hurrying to catch up with him. ‘Just bits and pieces. Going through reports mostly and looking for anything that needed Sebastian’s attention. It was quite monotonous, nothing like this.’

‘At least it would have been warmer,’ Lewis said as a vicious gust of bitterly cold wind funnelled down the path between the trees.

‘That’s true,’ she said as she pulled Lewis’ mother’s coat around her tightly. ‘I don’t know how you can patrol all night in weather like this.’

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

‘You get used to it,’ Lewis replied, beckoning for her to follow him as he deviated from the path as the trees began to thin. ‘We’re almost there.’

As he parted the snow laden branches of the giant fir tree that sat on the edge of the forest it revealed a snow-covered valley. About half way down the slope sat a small clump of buildings.

‘Is this The Green Valley?’ she asked sceptically as she looked around at all the snow.

‘Frost is the only time when it isn’t green,’ Lewis laughed. ‘It got its name because when it isn’t covered in snow, they grow grapes on the hillsides. Most of the wine across the kingdom comes from here.’

‘We have Green Valley wine at the castle,’ Emily said as they started their decent towards the group of houses. ‘I thought I recognised the name when you said your uncle lived here.’

‘I’m not surprised, it’s supposed to be the best wine there is,’ Lewis said.

‘I don’t know, I’ve never tried it,’ Emily admitted as she took an interest in one of the snow-covered grape vines. ‘What is your uncle going to say when we just turn up?’

‘If my grandmother is already here, he’ll probably be expecting us,’ Lewis said, guiding her away from the vines gently as he urged her onwards.

‘I feel bad that I’m wearing your mother’s coat now,’ she said quietly.

‘She’ll understand, it wasn’t doing anything out in the forest anyway,’ Lewis said as he spotted a man moving between the rows of vines close to the houses. It seemed as if he had spotted them at the same time as he suddenly looked up.

As they got closer Lewis realised that it wasn’t his uncle but one of the other villagers who worked the vines with him.

‘Lewis? Is that you?’ he called, turning away from the vine close to the house that he had been trying to tie up. ‘I haven’t seen you in years.’

‘Hello Mr Harper,’ Lewis said as they passed. ‘I’m sorry, we can’t stop, I need to get to my uncle, it’s urgent.’

‘Wait! You can’t go down there,’ Mr Harper called after them.

Ignoring his shout, Lewis continued towards the houses, knocking on one of the doors.

‘Shouldn’t we listen to him?’ Emily asked as Lewis knocked again, louder this time. Ignoring her as well, Lewis reached out, turning the door handle, the battered wooden door swung open.

The room inside the door was almost completely in darkness. Behind him he was vaguely aware of Mr Harper still calling after them. As he stepped through the door, he spotted a man in his late forties sat beside a dead fire. As he looked up his straggly brown hair parted to reveal his bruised face that was an assortment of different colours.

‘Uncle Samuel?’ Lewis asked as he took a step closer to him. ‘What happened?’

‘Lewis?’ he croaked as he slowly recognised him. ‘You need to go, now!’

‘What?’

‘You need to go!’ he insisted as quietly as he could. Standing up he tried to push Lewis towards the door.

With heavy thuds, the sound of footsteps filled the room, a huge shadow falling around Samuel.

‘What a nice surprise to see you Hargrove,’ Commander Redmond said as he stepped into the room behind Samuel, pushing the man aside with one hand. ‘At least that’s what I would be sayin’ if I hadn’t already known you would come here.’

Backing away quickly Lewis reached out behind him, his hand finding Emily’s, pulling her after him. As Commander Redmond stepped forwards into the light, he caught sight of the large scab that had formed on the side of his face. It seemed as though Emily had really done some damage when she had hit him with the log at the cabin.

‘Go!’ Lewis shouted, dragging her after him as he dived for the door.

With Emily’s hand in his he pulled her through the door and back out into the snowy streets. He had already taken a handful of steps before he realised that a dozen guards were stood around the front of the house. They were surrounded Lewis realised as Commander Redmond forced himself through the door of Samuel’s house and into the snowy street.

He had just enough time to see Mr Harper standing helplessly behind the guards before he was thrown sideways, Emily’s hand wrenched from his. Beside him he saw her thrown to the floor as Commander Redmond tackled her to the floor, his huge frame engulfing her. ‘Get him then!’ Commander Redmond screamed when none of the other guards moved.

Uncertainly two of the guards stepped forwards, walking towards him nervously. He couldn’t go down without a fight, he thought as he whipped the bow off his back. As he drew his weapon the two guards began to run at him, trying to tackle him before he could notch an arrow.

Releasing the arrow quickly he saw it sail between the two of them as one dropped his shoulder, wrapping his arms around Lewis’ midriff as he tackled him to the ground.

Letting go of the bow he used his knee to force the guard off of him as he scrambled to his feet. As his eyes darted around looking for the other guard, they fell on one of the guards who stood watching. It was Arron.

‘You!’ he shouted as he strode forwards. ‘You’re how they knew we were at the cabin! You sold me out for what? A higher rank?’ he demanded. ‘I trusted you!’

He had never felt anger like it before as he closed the gap between himself and Arron, shoving a guard out of the way when he tried to get between them. Deep down inside him he could feel a weak flame burning in his veins. Clenching his fist he swung at Arron, the punch connecting with his jaw with a satisfying crunch.

Pulling back his fist a second time he took aim at Arron again as he stumbled back. For the first time he noticed that Arron’s nose was now crooked compared to how it had been when he left. He wondered who had done that. A little part of him wanted to congratulate them for it.

This time Arron was ready for his swing though and he jumped back to dodge Lewis’ punch. He hadn’t even managed to draw his hand back for a third punch before several of the guards came to their senses and piled on top of him, forcing him to the floor.

With a mixture of elbows and kicks he tried to shake them off but it was no use. In the end they managed to pin his flailing limbs to the ground, one of the guards pushing the side of his face in to the snowy ground with his knee.

Looking round he saw Emily still being held down by Commander Redmond, a look of terror on her face. She must have been able to see the whole thing.

Shouting amongst themselves, the guards pulled his arms behind his back, tying the together just as he had tied Commander Redmond’s at the cabin.

As he felt the burning in his veins fading, he let his body go limp, letting the guards do what they needed. They had failed. They would never know what had been written by Sebastian in his letter to Charles Hargrove. Tristan wasn’t going to find its rightful heir.

Ignoring the commotion around him, he looked at Emily, his brown eyes meeting her blue ones. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said quietly, hoping that none of the guards would hear him.

Weakly she managed to muster a smile as Commander Redmond pulled her roughly to her feet. A moment later Lewis found himself being hauled to his feet.

‘Get them out of here!’ Commander Redmond shouted as he pushed Emily into the hands of two of the other guards. Quickly they bound her wrists behind her back. ‘The sooner these two get executed the better.’