Billy stood amongst a few dozen Sons guarding a handful of supply carts. A vast line of refugees stretched off into the distance, waiting to receive a quarter loaf of bread from the cart and a handful of grain. They were positioned on the outskirts of the Outwalls by the burned husks of countless buildings. A thousand small fires dotted the rocky landscape beyond the city, partially illuminating the new shanty town of canvas that housed the thousands with nowhere else to go. Many would freeze in the coming days. Billy’s breath was already frosting, and the sun had only just set moments before.

Whatever sources of wood once lay near Bleakridge were long since exhausted. The closest forest he knew of was the Bleakwood standing about a mile downriver of the Bleakcreek. It painted a rather bleak picture as refugees dug through the charred wood and trash piles in the hopes of finding something to keep them warm.

His work here was mostly over, having set up the lines and positioned the Sons assigned to him to keep an eye out for any Venrarn or Thorne Soldiers getting a little too curious.

They hadn’t seen any southerners as of yet, but the Thorne soldiers had built up a strong presence on the outskirts of town, distributing food and supplies much as the Sons were. They seemed to be making as much a conscious effort to avoid the Sons as the Sons were to avoid them. The arrangement suited Billy just fine. Enough Rillish blood had been shed today.

Billy sighed, walking to one of the carts and leaning against it as he watched the faces of the crowd. Many had some form of burns about their person. Most looked as exhausted as they were afraid. All were covered in soot and looked to him and his men with hopeful, desperate eyes.

Billy’s eyes drifted to the ruins. Blackened timbers stood as shadows in the night, their outlines betrayed by smoldering embers. The desolation was almost beautiful in a twisted way- the stillness pristine.

A dark figure interrupted the scene, scampering between the carcasses of fallen buildings. As the figure drew into the torchlight, Billy saw Kid nearing. Blood spattered his tunic and mixed with the ash spread across his face.

“You okay, boy?” Billy called.

At the sound of his voice, Kid’s eyes snapped onto him, and he scampered over. “I’m fine,” he said, “Well- as fine as one can be right now.”

Billy nodded in understanding. “What brings you out here?”

The boy held up a finger, signaling for Billy to wait a moment. He reached into a bulging pocket of his jacket and gingerly pulled out a shining gold brooch covered in sharp thorns. Billy recognized it immediately as the brooch worn by the Earl’s elite soldiers, the Briar Guard.

He reached out and grabbed Kid by the collar, pulling him out of sight of the crowd waiting in line. He didn’t want anybody’s eyes lingering on the gold and wondering how much food that could buy them inside the city walls. “Where’d you get that?” he hissed.

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Kid’s eyes were wide, and Billy realized he was still holding the boy by the shirt. He let the fabric fall from his hands. “Sorry,” he muttered.

Kid cleared his throat, seeming a little embarrassed that Billy had scared him. “From Melna.”

Billy’s eyes drifted to the Briar. That was not something she’d ever give up. It belonged to her late husband. Billy had brought it to the Earl himself, and the man hand delivered it to her along with the news a lifetime ago. He looked to the ruins, trying to pinpoint where in the carnage her home would be. “She’s-” he trailed off.

“Dead,” Kid whispered.

An ache ran through Billy’s heart. At the loss and for the time he’d spent avoiding her. The sole remaining link to his past. The wife of his dead best friend. He’d loved her in a way, though he had a piss poor way of showing it. He reached out and pulled the Briar from Kid’s hand, sighing as he did.

He started at the twisting, golden vines for a long moment, remembering cutting his finger as he pulled it from Alvin’s corpse. Billy looked once more to the ruined houses and found himself walking forward toward the devastation. Kid and one of his men called out after him and he waved their questions away, ignoring them as he walked down the rubble strewn streets.

Feet scampered after him and he looked to his left to see Kid walking beside him. “You can go home, boy.”

Kid ignored his comment, following at his side and as silent as the dead. He already knew where they were going. Far be it from Billy to tell him to return to his duty when he was abandoning his own post. In the Earl’s army, it’d likely see him lashed within an inch of his life the next day. In the Sons, he doubted anyone would care.

The streets grew deathly silent as they drew further from the refugees. Singed bones could be seen among the rubble, grinning skulls watching them from sockets as black as the night. All that was left of those too foolish or too slow to run. The scene up close reminded him of when he’d first walked the streets of Varna. The small bones of the children were what haunted him the most- his children.

He felt a wetness at the corner of his eyes and brushed it away. He felt Kid’s eyes on him, filled with the curiosity of youth. Billy could barely remember what that felt like, every secret he’d uncovered about life darker than the last.

Kid broke the silence, “What was she to you?” he asked.

Billy didn’t even know how to begin to answer that question. He took a deep breath. “Someone I’ve failed too many times,” he said as they stepped over a blackened support beam. “Sorrows of the past have a way of clinging to old friends, and it becomes easy to find reasons to drift apart.”

Kid didn’t say anything in response, and Billy could hardly blame him. He was too young to really understand, but he would someday. The ruins blurred into one another, and Billy retraced the streets by memory. He’d been this way many times before.

Soon they came in sight of where Melna’s home had once been. Billy walked through where the door had once been, now just a blackened frame reaching to where walls once stood. There were corpses strewn along the floor. Far more than Billy expected. He looked to Kid.

“Greencloaks,” the boy said.

Billy nodded, walking over the blackened remains and doing his best to ignore the stench of burnt flesh. It was obvious which corpse belonged to Melna. It was by far the smallest in the room, curled on the floor. Billy’s hands shook as he drew closer.

Kid walked past him, eyes scanning the scene and settling on the ash and debris covered altar. The stone itself seemed completely untouched by the flame. Billy let him wander off as he fell to his knees beside Melna. The fire had eaten away much of her flesh, leaving little more than blackened bone and charred meat

He reached out a hand and caressed her face. Ash flaked away at his touch, drifting in the light breeze. “I see you, Melna,” he whispered.

The snap of wood to his left drew his attention and his hand fell to his axe. A dark figure was approaching from the shadowed ruins. As the man drew nearer, Billy recognized him- Edgar.