It was hard being home.

The trip home had gone surprisingly smoothly. There were a couple of close calls with the ship’s crew, but Bessen had been able to talk her way out of any trouble. Her large size meant that people didn’t want to challenge her too directly, and were willing to let suspicious-but-not-too-suspicious situations pass. The largest problem had been combating her boredom and antsiness while being cooped up in the dark hold for days.

When she finally made it back to Rampart City she discovered that she was just as restricted there as she had been on the ship. She couldn’t live at her apartment. She couldn’t reunite with her friends. She couldn’t even walk around the city too much, or she would risk someone wondering why such a powerful woman wasn’t currently fighting in the war.

She rented a cramped apartment in a poor neighborhood. Unfortunately, she had little in the way of savings, and she wouldn’t be able to keep this apartment long without income. Her first plan was to seek out some of the city’s various semi-legal fighting tournaments, but without her usual contacts she had no way of finding them if they were even still running during the war. Instead she was forced to take a job washing dishes at a cheap inn.

This was where she came across Antimony.

Antimony Limerick was a guest at the inn. She usually wore cheap-looking clothes, often damaged or stained, but there was something about her that looked off. Her hair was shiny and neat, as if she went to an expensive stylist and used product. She always wore makeup, as well, making her look like a wealthy person dressed as a poor person. Bessen also occasionally saw her wearing an alchemist’s labrobes. Labrobes were usually an ugly brown color, not the kind of thing anyone would wear as fashion. However, they were also expensive, being made of an alchemically treated fabric that was meant to protect against the various acids and volatile chemicals that alchemists normally worked with. Bessen began to imagine that she was an unlicensed alchemist working in secret to produce illegal potions for wealthy clients.

Antimony must have taken notice of her, too, because one day as she was leaving through the inn’s alleyway exit she found Antimony leaning against the wall, waiting for her.

“You’re name’s Bessen, right?” Antimony asked. When Bessen nodded, she continued. “What do you think of the war, Bessen?”

“I mean, no one likes war, do they?” Bessen replied.

“Some people do.”

Bessen shrugged. “Kings do, I guess. It lets them conquer more lands.”

Antimony cocked her head. “So war’s bad for everyone except kings? Sounds like you don’t think much of kings.”

Bessen wasn’t sure what to say, so she shrugged again. “I try not to think of kings at all.”

“Why?” asked Antimony. “Because it makes you mad? It bothers you that they have all the power and you have none? That they get to send you and your friends to die in a war and sit safe in the castle? You take all the risk and they get all the reward.”

Bessen began to walk past Antimony. “The demons attacked us. We had to go to war.”

Antimony began walking alongside her, trotting to keep up with the larger woman’s pace. “Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe the king could have worked things out with the demons diplomatically. Maybe he didn’t even want to try.”

Bessen exited the alley, entering the street, Antimony at her side. “But the prophecy—”

“Maybe we don’t have to live our lives according to prophecies,” Antimony interrupted. “What do you think would happen if we just refused to go along with it? It can’t stop us, it’s just words on paper.”

Bessen halted, staring at Antimony. Was that really possible? Could someone look at fate and just say “No, thank you”?

“Imagine there was a woman who worked as an adventurer,” said Antimony, staring up at Bessen. “And imagine she, like everyone in the Adventurers’ Guild, was forced to fight in the war. This wasn’t why she became an adventurer. She wanted to help people, she wasn’t a bloodthirsty killer. So she deserted and ran away. A woman like that would be struggling; she’d have to live in hiding. A woman like that would probably want the war to end as soon as possible, so that she could get on with her life.”

Antimony held out a slip of paper. “If you know anyone like that, tell her to come to this address tomorrow evening. There are people there she would like to meet.”

Bessen accepted the paper, resisting rolling her eyes at Antimony’s attempts to sound clever and mysterious.

She wasn’t sure why, but Bessen went to the address the next evening.

It seemed like a foolish choice. Whatever Antimony was planning was more likely to get her killed or arrested than stop the war. But she decided it was at least worth feeling out. If Antimony were as incompetent a Bessen suspected, she could refuse to take part and have nothing more to do with the woman. But if there was a slim chance to end the war, maybe it was worth looking into.

 The address belonged to an abandoned-looking building that was little more than a shack. Bessen’s knock was answered by Antimony and a scent of rot strong enough that it almost made Bessen turn away then and there. However, she persisted and after exchanging greetings, stepped inside.

Inside was a single room that was just as derelict as the outside, with walls falling apart and dust covering everything. It was lit by a single light potion which sat on a half-rotten table that dominated the room. Around the table sat Antimony’s co-conspirators.

“Wow, you were not kidding about the woman you found,” said a man with long, curly hair. He was dressed in a heavy grey cloak that protruded oddly in a couple of places on his back. “She’s huge.”

“Yeah, she’s impressive,” said a tall woman with long hair. She wore a bright green dress and sat somewhat awkwardly, with one leg curled beneath the other. “But I wish you would have listened to my concerns a little more. Bringing in too many people is dangerous, and with Darren we have all the muscle we could want.”

As she spoke, the man in the cloak murmured to a green-skinned woman in another language. Apparently she needed him to translate. Was she an alraune?

“You need to listen to my expertise on this,” said another man in a tone that suggested that this was a discussion he had had before and had long ago grown tired of. “It’s a good idea to have a few fighters who can think for themselves. If someone’s smart enough to come after me, it’ll be good to have her to protect me.”

Bessen stared at this man. There was something familiar about his blond hair and patchy attempt at a beard.

“Didn’t you try to kill me once?” she asked.

He stared back at her. “Wait, you’re the brute who was with those adventurers who attacked my tower. Antimony, we can’t trust her. She’s a tool of the government. She’s probably a spy.”

Antimony rolled her eyes theatrically. “She’s not a spy. She’s a deserter, a fugitive.”

“And what’s to stop her from turning us in to get back into the crown’s good graces?” asked the tall woman.

“Oh great, we’re going to have to kill her, aren’t we?” said the man in a cloak.

“Hold on,” Darren replied. “If we’re going to kill her anyway, we might as well get some use out of her. Let me turn her into a lich.”

Bessen glanced around the room and cursed herself for not bringing her battleaxe. If she entered a battle trance, she could easily leap across the table and incapacitate or kill Darren before he completed a spell. However, that would leave her back open to the man in the cloak. She wasn’t sure what he had hidden under there, so she would have to turn quickly to punch him. She would have to hope that the green woman was, in fact, an alraune and not some type of fairy and quickly dispatch her immediately afterward. However, that would give the tall woman more than enough time to cast a spell, if she happened to know magic. Bessen would have to be ready to avoid that, but she would be in a position to throw a chair at her. Antimony would be little threat unless she had a potion with her.

“We’re not turning her into a lich,” Antimony snapped.

Maybe Bessen could still turn this group to her favor instead of killing them.

“Listen, I don’t know if there’s a way to prove to you that I don’t want to turn you in,” Bessen began, “but at least let me explain myself. I work for the Adventurers’ Guild. I took a job to put a stop to a guy who was raising zombies. I don’t know why he was raising them and I didn’t care. No one raises zombies unless they’re planning to kill people and I wanted to protect the nearby towns. That’s why I became an adventurer. I’m strong, and I want to use that strength to protect people.”

“You mean protect the rich,” Darren replied with a sneer.

Despite the fact that her life was on the line, Bessen felt indignation rising within her. How dare Darren assume that she was only concerned with protecting the wealthy?

“When monsters attack villages and when mages decide they’re powerful enough that they should rule, they aren’t attacking the rich,” she said sharply. “They’re killing a bunch of random poor villagers.”

Darren glared at her. “You’re still protecting the status quo. You’re protecting a system where an uncaring king allows people to starve while he and the nobles and the industrialists hoard enormous amounts of money.”

“I…” Bessen began, but she couldn’t think of a response. The room was silent for a few moments save for the man in the cloak catching up on his translation for the green woman.

“Okay, maybe you have a point,” Bessen admitted, finally. “I’m not a philosophical person, and maybe that’s the kind of thing I should have thought about more. But I really do just want to help people. I don’t want to fight in a war.”

“I don’t believe you,” said Darren.

“I do,” said the tall woman.

The others stared at her, and she shrugged. “What? She sounds genuine to me. Plus, I really don’t want to kill any more than we have to.”

“At least tell me about what you’re planning,” Bessen said. “I want to help if I can.”

She really did. She wasn’t sure why. She had arrived expecting that she would turn down their offer to join and now she was asking to join without even knowing what they were doing. Maybe it was just that it now felt like a choice between helping this group and killing them.

“Well, we’re still in the planning phases a little bit,” Antimony admitted.

“But the gist of it,” the tall woman continued, “is that we want to attack the castle, imprison the king and that warlord, Lady von Ekko, and take control.”

“Won’t that throw the entire country into chaos?” Bessen asked.

“Our thought is that if we can maintain order in the capital, the rest of the country will follow suit,” said Darren. “The alliance might collapse, but the other countries won’t be willing to continue the war without Rampart.”

Bessen frowned. “But that will just make it easier for the demons to invade.”

“It might,” the tall woman agreed. “But we’re going to try one thing to end the war that the alliance hasn’t. Diplomacy.”

“You’re… going to try talking to the Demon King?” Bessen asked.

“He doesn’t want the Edhru Prophecy fulfilled any more than we do,” the man in the cloak explained. “Our goals are the same, there’s no reason we should fight.”

“But what if that’s not enough? What if he wants to take over anyway?”

“Then we’ll go back to fighting,” said Antimony. “At least we’ll have tried peace.”

Bessen considered this. Part of her wanted to dismiss these people out of hand. Their plan was a long shot at best. However, she had spoken the truth when she told them she had become an adventurer to protect people, and ending the war would protect countless people. As much as she cared about people, Bessen wasn’t someone who liked hard work. She preferred to take it easy, spend most of her time training, and only take the occasional job. After all, as important as protecting people was, there had always been plenty of other adventurers to pick up the slack. But here there were only a few people. If she turned down this opportunity, then no one else would pick it up and these conspirators would go forth with one less person.

“Fine, I’ll join you,” Bessen said. Somehow, the tension in the room seemed to decrease slightly. She still wasn’t entirely certain that they had decided not to kill her, but at least they seemed slightly less ready to. “But I still have one more question. How do you plan to keep order in Rampart City when you take over the castle?”

“Darren is going to take care of that,” Antimony said proudly.

“Darren,” Bessen repeated incredulously. “What kind of name is Darren for a necromancer?”

Darren shrugged. “It’s pretty bad, yeah, but the problem is that if I change to something like Sammael, Master of Death, I sound really pretentious.”

“That’s actually a good point,” Bessen admitted.

“Anyway, do you know why I became a necromancer?”

“Because like all necromancers you wanted to overthrow the king using an army of the undead?” Bessen asked.

“Because I wanted to overthrow an oppressive leader using an army that requires no resources and isn’t made up of sapient beings.”

Bessen blinked. “I see your point.”

She still wasn’t sure about the ethics of starting a violent rebellion, but it was clear that Darren had put some thought into his approach.

The seated members of the group stood and started lifting the table aside. There was some awkward shuffling when the tall woman realized she would have to move her chair, but eventually they had it pushed against a wall. Underneath was a trap door. Darren began to tug at it, but was struggling to pull it open all the way until Bessen assisted him. As soon as it was opened, the stench of death became even stronger, wafting throughout the room. Underneath was a long staircase leading downward.

Gesturing to Bessen to follow, he began to walk down the stairs. “See, there’s one thing there’s never any shortage of in a war,” he explained. “The dead. People are sentimental about their dead, too. For whatever reason, they want the discarded husk of their family members back to bury, so bodies are constantly being shipped back across the ocean. If you pay the right people, it’s easy to have them brought to you, instead. And then…”

He stopped, holding up his right hand. Bessen stopped two steps behind him. He whispered and incantation and a sphere of light appeared before his outstretched fingers, lighting the way the rest of the way down, where zombies could be seen, milling about at the bottom of the stairs.

The light shot forward, traveling across the cellar, revealing it to be much larger than Bessen had imagined. It was bigger than a ballroom, bigger than a warehouse, and full of hundreds, maybe even thousands of zombies. When the sphere hit the wall at the other end and vanished Bessen let out a breath she hadn’t realized she had been holding.

“...you end up with an army of your own,” Darren finished.