Two years after Edrye joins the war effort, you return to Athar. You note the garbage piling up along the side of the road. The graffiti on exterior walls. The overarching silence.

A single car rolls down the road, swerving around potholes, and pulls up to the shuttle terminal outside the airport. Bennett gets out and waves at you. “Miss Tosteson!” He loads your suitcase in the trunk as you climb into the passenger seat.

The two of you don’t talk much outside of basic pleasantries during the drive. Bennett asks you how Pangua is, to which you reply “Hot.” You ask him how the hostel is faring, to which he replies “Busy.” This is, as you quickly find out, an understatement. The hostel has a rotating door of occupants with many more camping outside, waiting for a room. It has effectively become a shelter for displaced Atharians.

When Bennett gets out of the car, he unfolds a walking cane.

“Are you ok?” A stupid question, you know, but you can’t think of what else to say.

“Ah, yes," he taps his leg with the cane. "A cleverly hidden shrapnel bomb in the streets of Larderngathern."

"I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry. It was my job to find them. I didn’t do my job. Someone died." He shrugs.

Once again, Bennett gives you his room to stay in. "Technically there is no vacancy," he says. "But you always have a room here. At least as long as I do." He leaves you to unpack.

The room, for the record, has not changed one iota. Its surprising familiarity brings you some well-needed reassurance.

As you unburden your suitcase you look at the painting of Jorg Fnun above the bed. The painting stares back at you.

*

At the Athar city hall, a building now covered in anonymous spray paint proclamations, you find no one at the front desk. “Hello,” you call into the large and empty room. “Anyone?” Your only answer is your own voice echoing back. Remembering the way, you walk to the lord mayor’s office.

Inside, a Wilskenn woman is sitting behind the desk. She is writing aggressively on the only paper on the entire desktop.

“Excuse me,” you say as you let yourself in. “But there was no one in the front hall.”

“We’re always short-staffed nowadays,” she says, curtly and without looking up. She continues to furiously scribble out something in Skenyan before dropping her pen onto the table and letting it roll off and fall to the floor. The woman rises out of her chair with a huff and brushes a few wrinkles out of her clothes before coming around the desk to greet you. “You must be the diplomat,” she says, outstretching a large and sleek hand.

“Nowadays I’m more of a courier, but yes. Debrah Tosteson,” you say, and shake her hand. She has an incredibly tense grip. Your hand hurts.

“Lord mayor Nurmäf.” She finally lets you free of her handshake to retrieve a bottle of something dark from the cellarette. She pours two glasses, hers significantly fuller than yours, then sits on the table and crosses her arms. “What can I help you with, Deborah?”

Off-put but her demeanor, you stumble for words. “Well, you see–”

Nurmäf gestures to your still-full glass. “Social lubricant,” she says.

“Right.” You take a sip of the dark liquor, and a breath. You find your footing. “As you know, the war has carried on longer than anyone first imagined.” You pause to gauge her reaction.

Her face is inscrutable. She shifts her gaze, unsure why you stopped, and nods for you to continue.

“Given that original predictions for the time and cost of our involvement proved incorrect, we now face the problem of continuing to fund our efforts overseas.”

“Oh,” Nurmäf says. She gets to her feet and swirls her drink around in her cup. “And from what mouths shall I take that money out of? I already can’t afford a receptionist.”

If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

“The grand treasurer has drafted a proposal for a modest donation, courtesy of the royal family.” You produce the envelope that contains the proposal.

“You want the king’s money?” Wide-eyed, Nurmäf snatches the letter out of your hand and rips it open. “Have you met him?” She pours over the contents of the proposal and rubs her forehead.

“No, but I have met the prince.”

This catches her attention. “The prince?”

“Yes, he signed the draft into law last time I was here,” you say.

Nurmäf stares at you. She looks afraid. Slowly, her gaze wanders into the distance and she presses her fist to her mouth. “I see,” she says. “Please leave. I mean, please come back tomorrow. I will have your money then.”

You hesitate, confused, but then make your way to the door. As soon as you grab the handle you’re stopped.

“What is happening out there? In the war?” Nurmäf is holding hands together above her chest.

“You don’t know?”

“It’s not easy to find someone willing to tell you around here.”

Unprepared for the question, you answer, “What happens in every war, I guess. A lot of permanency. Maybe more than necessary.”

*

In the evening, you and Bennett sit down to tea in the hostel’s tiny kitchen that you still hate. “This is much nicer than the last time we spent time together,” Bennett says. “I’m not too keen to carry you home again. You’re heavier than you look.”

You’re not sure how to take that. “Sorry about that, it’s not my usual style.” You take a sip of your tea. It burns your tongue. “I felt overwhelmed by the circumstances of my visit, but that wasn’t the right way to handle it.”

“Hm, yes.” Bennett appears to be lost in thought. “Gathyote is often an emotional event. The weight of life and the responsibility of taking it. This is what reminds us why our own lives are so important; why we must live well.” His eyes seem to glaze over.

You decide to change the subject. There is a question burning in the back of your mind, after all. “Bennett, between the two of us, what is the deal with the royal family?”

This appears to snap him back to the present. He cocks his head. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, why do you never see them? Why does nobody ever talk about them? What’s wrong with them?”

He scratches the back of his neck, yawns, and takes a drink of his tea. “As people? Nothing, really. I guess you could say they’re a little self-important.”

“That’s an understatement,” you say into your cup.

“Some people think they never die, or at least live a lot longer than the rest of us.” He shrugs. “It’s more about what they represent. Politically.”

Now he’s piqued your interest. “Go on,” you say.

“Well, you see, the monarchy in Edrye isn’t the same as everywhere else. It appeared after a representational form of government had already been created. Some time after Cunio â Lvose popularized the idea of high birth, a coalition of wealthy merchants came to the conclusion that if they wanted to retain their status, they had to make themselves indispensable to the people. So, one way or another, they worked together eventually to eventually control a large swath of Edrye’s resources, and an even bigger portion of its currency. Given this, they put the budding aristocracy into a chokehold and demanded absolute power.”

“And they formed the royal family?”

Bennett clasps his hands together and leans on the island. “Not so simply,” he says. “Cunio â Lvose made a deal with them. For the continued flow of their resources, they would let the aristocracy continue to rule uninterrupted. However, on any occasion their wealth is threatened, they alone would handle the situation as they see fit.”

Your tea is going cold now. “How did he do that? To take so much less than they wanted?”

“He knew that money was not a means to power, but that power was a means to money.” Bennett takes a sip of his tea, then frowns at it. “This is why sightings of the royal family are rare and quite unnerving. Their wealth is our wealth. It's not much different than finding out that insects have been eating the foundations of your house, and that at any moment you might fall through the floor.” He rises out of his seat and pours the rest of the tea down the sink.

“Well, thank you for the history lesson. I appreciate that I could be more informed about Edrye.”

“It’s no bother, Miss Tosteson–”

“Deborah, please.”

“Deborah, of course.” Your name sounds nice in his accent. “I understand what it’s like to be out of your depths in a foreign place, even when your job is being there.” He smiles.

The two of you exist in a comfortable silence for a few minutes as Bennett sets the kettle back on the stovetop to boil. You break the silence when you ask, “How old are you?”

“In years? Thirty-one.”

“Younger than me then,” you say, being thirty-eight yourself.

“Wilskenn believe that age equates to intelligence. Do you feel smarter than me?” The look on his face gives away that the awkward phrasing is intentional. Not an affront but a joke.

You laugh. “Absolutely not. You have a way of making me feel very stupid, in fact.” Forgetting that it’s cold, you take another sip of your tea. You can’t help but continue talking. “You make me feel like I’ve gotten myself way in over my head coming here. Like–like there’s so much about this world just out of sight that I’ve always assumed didn’t exist only because it stayed quiet. Look at me, this is my job. I should already know. But when you give it a voice, somehow I feel like it’s okay to keep learning.”

He looks at you for what feels like a very long while, but is in fact no more than ten seconds. Finally he turns away and takes the kettle off the hot element. As he dips a new tea bag into the hot water, he says, “Two years ago you asked me to sleep with you. Does that offer still stand?”

As it turns out, it does. So goes the rest of the night.