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My days of normalcy were fleeting at best. They always had been.
Days of habit, of custom, of ritual—they became rarer and rarer as time went on. As more of the world around me changed. When I’d been reborn, my peaceful life had been interrupted by the beast. The vile thing had ripped away everything I’d known and loved. Everything I’d considered normal.
A flicker of white flame punctuated my thoughts as I trudged into the hallway. A groan slipped between my lips. My tired bones creaked as I forced myself into action after doing nothing but packing all morning. Nothing but preparing for the arduous and painful journey that was sure to come.
I sighed.
After the beast had ripped my own body away from me, torn up all shreds of happiness, and cursed me with a new life for its own amusement, I’d only survived out of spite. I’d only pushed through with the determined resolve that I’d built up over an entire lifetime.
But I’d survived, I told myself as my fingers tightened on the grip of my sword. A thin smile grew across my lips as I walked on, turning the corner into the training room. Each new step I took felt solid. They felt poised and confident as the memories streamed back before my eyes.
Kye turned to me as soon as I walked in. She raised an eyebrow and spared half a wave my way before going back to picking between arrows on the shelf in front of her. The way her short but flowy chestnut hair settled over the blue cloth on her shoulders only brought my smile to life.
I’d survived back then, sure. But I hadn’t done it alone. Not completely, anyway. In the grand scheme of the world, I’d been lucky. No matter how strange it felt to think, I’d been fortunate that mercenaries had ambushed me on my way to town. Lucky that I’d ended up in Kye’s cell. And even luckier that I’d become a ranger after that.
Because after arriving in Sarin and becoming a ranger, I’d fallen back into normalcy. Into habit. It had been a welcome one of training, learning, and hunting, but it had been a habit all the same. One that brought my body to a level of physical competency. It had been interrupted from time to time, usually because of a call for assistance that I had to heed, but I’d spent most of my time in town. Most of my time in routine.
To its credit, Sarin had started feeling like home quicker than I’d expected. And the longer I stayed, the more the effect compounded. The more I grew accustomed to it all—the more my memories of the past blurred and fell away only for new ones to rise in their place.
“Are you ready?” Kye asked, ripping me from my thoughts. I nodded.
Eventually, the routine had to break.
“I’m as ready as I’ll ever be,” I said, fingers drumming on the hilt of my sword. At the thought of what was to come, I straightened up. I stiffened my posture and squared my shoulders, suddenly feeling the bag on my back even more. The weight of my clothes, and a bedroll, and the rations that I’d become all too familiar with since my journey to Farhar.
White flame flared behind my eyes, calling for my attention as if to make sure I didn’t forget.
And the map, I reminded myself.
“I guess that’ll have to be good enough,” Kye said. A smirk already danced at her lips as she finished with the bundle of arrows and placed them in her quiver. “But don’t blame me if you find out you forgot anything.”
I smiled, tilting my head. “What about if you’ve forgotten something?”
Kye stopped. Her brow furrowed and she looked up at me in disbelief, as though my question were ridiculous on the face of it. “I didn’t.”
Another smirk followed her movements as she pushed away from the weapons rack and toward the door. I stifled a chuckle and followed after her, running down the list of items I’d had to bring in my head. A blast of brisk morning air flooded into the lodge as Kye swung open the door. I caught it only a moment later and walked out into the sun.
“Where’s Lionel, by the way?” I asked, suddenly aware of the charismatic ranger’s absence. He had offered to go after Kye and I had taken the plunge, after all. And to Marc’s benefit, he’d brought multiple members of his throng along with him.
Kye stopped in front of me, twisting. “They’re at town hall already.” She rolled her eyes. “I had the pleasure of being in the kitchen when they bustled through the training room like a herd of wild animals.” I allowed myself a soft chuckle at that. Kye’s lips tugged up at the corner. “I swear, if I didn’t know better, I would think they’re all joined at the hip or something.”
My soft chuckle grew into something more than that in short time. Because really, I had to agree with what she’d said. Lionel had been a veteran ranger when I’d arrived, and from what I knew, he’d even been one when Kye had started. It was clear that he was skilled, and he finished almost all of his assignments in record time.
But if I wasn’t on a hunt with him or standing guard while he was on duty, I nearly couldn’t stand him. His constantly boisterous and always amicable attitude grated on me. Almost like he was continually playing a part of some kind, acting as a sort of ring-leader to the small group of rangers that seemed to flock around him.
“I’d assume most of the knights are there already, too,” Kye continued. “Marc said the briefing was to be shortly after the crack of dawn.”
Almost unconsciously, I curled my lip. My fingers tightened into a fist and I flicked my eyes up, scanning the sky. “And yet it’s almost mid-morning now.”
A sigh fled from my lips, one lined with all the disappointment I held. Marc was my lord, I reminded myself bitterly. He’d given us a simple order, and he’d even been gracious enough to give it to us two days in advance. Yet still we were running late.
“I wouldn’t worry about it too much,” Kye said, seemingly reading my mind. Her smirk flashed in the corner of my eye. I blinked, looking up at her and quickening my pace to catch up. The way she shrugged only irritated me. It picked and scraped against the discipline I was having trouble keeping up as it was.
“I’m not worried. I just—”
Movement in the corner of my eye killed the words on my tongue. I furrowed my brow and turned, pursing my lips as two rangers emerged through the tree line. For a moment as they walked across the clearing, I didn’t recognize who they were. But as Jason’s voice lilted to my ears, I got the idea rather quickly.
The swordsman ran a hand through his hair, turning to the ranger next to him. Squinting, I recognized the smirking woman as Tan.
“You know,” Jason started as the smirk that had been missing from his face grew, “we could always do it over again if you’re so intent on figuring out which one of us is a better hunter.” Beside him, Tan raised an eyebrow. He only grinned in return. “In more equitable conditions, of course.”
Tan laughed at that, obviously exaggerating the gesture to condescend. And judging by the way Jason’s lips wilted, it worked. “Does ‘more equitable conditions’ mean in an open clearing where you couldn’t possibly get your sword caught on a branch?”
Jason’s face reddened, his ears burning. His hand twisted, tightening into a fist as he opened his mouth. Kye, however, cut him off before he’d even started.
“What’s going on here?” the chestnut-haired huntress asked. Tan turned, her eyebrows raising when she saw Kye and me standing near the base of the climb into town. Kye rolled her wrist. “Not that I’m not all for giving Jason a reality check, but…”
“Oh fuck off,” Jason said, flashing Kye a derisive smile. I chuckled, earning the swordsman’s apparent ire toward me as well.
“What does it look like?” Tan asked, her fingers thumbing between the two arrows left in her quiver. “We went hunting.”
“Right,” Kye said, nodding slowly. “But why is Jason bitching?”
Tan grinned, breaking into a laugh not long after. “About halfway through we decided to make it competitive because it was boring.” One of my eyebrows shot up at that. I turned to Jason, already knowing what was to come. “And I won, but he doesn’t seem to want to accept it.”
I chuckled, earning myself a sharp glare from the sandy-haired man. He rolled his eyes. “You only won because you got lucky. We had to chase those boars into the thickest brush I’ve ever seen, and you got to sit back while I had to dive right in.”
“You didn’t have to, you know,” Tan said.
Jason glared at her before turning to me. “She only killed more game than I did because she has a bow. If we had been in a space any clearer than that, I would’ve outpaced her easily.”
“I’m sure you would’ve,” I said, my voice dripping with unguarded sarcasm. For a second, Jason smiled at me. Then, his face contorted and he grumbled something distasteful out under his breath.
My fingers adjusted on my sword. Truthfully, I did know what he meant. Working with a blade in thick trees was a recipe for either getting the metal stuck of getting yourself stuck. Which, in either case, led to your target getting away. Images and memories of complaints I’d spewed out myself about our gnarled forest rose up to match Jason’s, but I ignored them. Watching the swordsman get flustered was too amusing to pass up.
“And I’m not nearly as tired as he is,” Tan added.
Jason grumbled again. “Yeah, because sitting back in the trees and waiting for a boar to become stupid enough to poke its head out requires so much energy.”
Tan seemingly ignored the quip, turning to Kye instead. “I didn’t have to waste a single arrow, either. All I need to do is cast for barely a second, add the required force, and the arrow strikes through the thing’s skull in one go.”
“You’re not the only one who can make your strikes more powerful, Tan,” Jason said. His dry, flustered, and unimpressed voice was a far cry from the smug one he normally carried himself with.
Tan turned, her dark brown hair lashing through the air. “Yeah, well, it sucks that you have terrible aim.”
Jason blinked, whipping his head around. He squinted at the brunette ranger who was apparently very full of herself at the moment. She only flashed him a toothy smirk that looked almost identical to the one he always gave. His expression morphed into a scowl.
“Whatever,” he said, shrugging. His eyes drifted until they fell upon me. “Where are you two going right now? Lorah handed out new assignments just yesterday.”
I nodded, the movement short and curt as I hid the smile on my face. “She did, but neither of us got anything new.” I straightened up. “Actually, she didn’t give us anything new for the entire week.”
Jason’s eyes narrowed on me for a second. “What? Why did—” His face changed, the memory of the crowded meeting in town hall probably registering all at once. “Oh. You’re about to head off on your suicide mission, aren’t you?”
The smug grin that I’d let out on my face changed. My eyebrows dropped and I had to fight myself not to glare at him. “We’re going to fulfill an obligation. To real people, Jason.”
The swordsman’s gaze softened a hair. If I looked carefully enough, I could see the fear hidden behind his eyes. But he shrugged it off a moment later. “Whatever Marc has you thinking.”
I curled my lip in disgust, but fortunately, Kye spoke before I could.
“You still scared, Jason?”
The swordsman sighed, shaking his head slightly as if her question was too ridiculous to even bother considering. “Not particularly. Scared of the mythological beast that may or may not exist, maybe. But I’m not the one running headfirst into the flames.”
Comments rose to my lips. I sealed them shut and held my tongue, taking a deep breath before I said something I’d regret. Meeting Jason’s eyes again, I could still see the worry behind his nonchalant mask. I could see it in the way his fingers twitched restlessly, searching for something to do. For some way to help.
I could understand the fear, I thought. I could understand the worry and his want to cling to the comfortable. His want to cling to the routine he’d probably been comfortably living in for far longer than I had.
The beast’s visage flashed behind my eyes, burning away only in a crackle of white flame.
I cringed, taking a step back and ignoring the way Tan raised an eyebrow at me. Shaking my head, I realized that even though I could get Jason’s reluctance, I couldn’t relate. Not with Anath’s words still spiraling in my head. Spinning and spinning with a thin, ominous black cloud that foretold things I didn’t ever want to happen. And not with the possibilities she’d placed in my mind, either.
My sense of normal was corrupted, now. It was plagued with potentials for the future and a burning hatred that kept itching at my bones.
No. He may have been able to stay with his pattern day in and day out. But I couldn’t.
“—won’t be bored to death with the same assignments over and over.” Kye’s voice tore me from my stupor. And I looked back up just in time to see Jason’s perplexed reaction.
“You’d rather go walk your way to the mountains with a group of knights than do ranger work?” He took a step back and smiled, his eyes flicking back to the golden symbol on the lodge’s front door.
Kye’s smirk withered away. She sighed. “I’d rather go do something more. I’d rather be on the front lines against a threat than sit back and burn when the message reaches me a little too slowly.” Her breath quickened, and she shot me a glance before shaking her head. “I love hunting, and I love being better at it than you are”—Jason’s eyes bulged, but Kye barreled ahead—“but at this point, I know that forest like the back of my hand. I’ve fought everything there is to fight in there.”
After her statement, Kye leaned back on her heel. She took a deep breath and rubbed her neck, tilting away from the sun. In front of her, Tan opened her mouth. She bit off words before they’d even formed, though, and looked at the ground.
“Really?” was all Jason came back with. “It never bothered you before, you know. Protecting the town that saved your life. Doing work for the woman who was nice enough to give you a home when you used to hunt in the woods alone instead of sleeping.”
My eyes widened. I slumped my shoulders and glanced curiously at Kye. It hit me all at once how little I knew about her past.
But, well, she knew almost nothing about mine as well.
“That was before we had knights around, Jason,” Kye said. Her voice came out to match the morning breeze. Cold and unwavering. “That was back when people still left Sarin because they couldn’t afford to live here anymore. Back when it was more desirable for some to risk getting torn to shreds in the wilderness than sleep on cold cobblestone every night.” Kye shook her head, a dry smile forming at her lips. “People stumble into town to look for work these days, you know.”
I swallowed, my mouth suddenly dry. As Kye’s words trailed off, nobody spoke. The silence stewed in the air around us like a fetid odor none of us wanted to admit we smelled. But still, something nagged at my mind.
“That was before Sarin had the threat of dragons looming over its head,” I said, my words coming out soft enough to be swallowed by the wind.
Kye took a deep breath, regaining her composure in short time. “There are just bigger fish to fry these days.”
I nodded, the idea of Rath floating in my head. All of the stories I’d heard of her and of dragons in general. They added together into the mangled, destructive image wrapped in red-tinged flames. I knew she was a threat—she was the mother of destruction herself, after all. But she was distant. Something I could’ve passed off as impossible if I tried hard enough.
Though, then again, I’d once felt that same way about Death.
“Right,” Tan added, her voice much smaller than it had been when they’d walked up. After a moment, she looked over at Jason, who only stared at the ground. With each passing second, his face contorted into more of a scowl before he just shook his head and looked back at the lodge.
I stood there frozen for a minute. I let the cool winter breeze—if it even was winter anymore—brush over my skin and ruffle my hair. It felt nice. To listen to the silence and have the sun beat down on me. Yet, as it continued, the white flame became restless. And the obligation that I’d been so up in arms about came back. Flicking my eyes up, I knew that no matter what Kye had said, time wasn’t getting any slower.
And we were already late.
I stiffened my posture. “We should get going, though.”
Suddenly, all eyes turned to me. I didn’t falter in the slightest, using the core of discipline I still had left to prop me up. Eventually though, everyone recognized it. Tan nodded before sparing a wave. And Jason nodded as well before more-or-less storming off toward the lodge.
When I turned to Kye, she was scowling at me.
That was when I faltered. “What?”
She sighed, the scowl dissipating in short time as she started up the slope toward town hall. Toward where our briefing was. The last barrier before we were on our way. “I’m still not sure how I got talked into all this.”
I quickened my pace, metal boots scraping against stone as I caught up. A smile tugged at the corners of my lips. “You sounded pretty sure just a minute ago.”
Kye shrugged, casting a half-hearted glare in my direction. “Sure, I guess. I mean, all of that is true, but that doesn’t change the fact that we’re still willingly walking into the belly of the beast. I just have to wonder how the hell it got here.”
I nodded, bowing my head a little as we pushed through the gradually increasing morning traffic. She was right, after all. Looking back, I wasn’t sure how much of it I understood myself. It had all passed so quickly from when I’d first stumbled upon Anath in the woods.
“You said that if I went, you would come as well,” I said. The crystal-clear memory of that night played back for me. How tired she’d been. How the information had poured out of me.
Beside me, she bobbed her head. “I vaguely remember. And I remember saying that, if not anything else. But I almost wonder how you talked yourself into this.”
I furrowed my brow, glancing sideways at her. Her question repeated in my head, only punctuated more by the shallow smirk on her face. And after thinking about it for a moment, I laughed. The white flame flickered its amusement.
If the same thoughts had raced through my head all those months ago—before I’d even fought the beast—I would’ve thought myself ridiculous. I knew I would have. In my past life, I would’ve disregarded it as myth and fantasy. Something I had no use trying to wrap my head around when there were more pressing matters.
But now, these matters were more pressing than any other.
“I got chased into the woods,” I started, ready to let the explanation flow out of me all over again. “I got stranded and somehow found the true source. She—”
Kye held up a hand. “I know. I… I know. I remember all of it, even if the exact words you used are a little faded.” She swallowed, her eyes falling to the ground. “That girl from the cell next to ours, from when we first met… she was the source. And she was a dragon, as well.” Each syllable left her lips stiff and calculated as though she was feeding them back through the cogs of her mind in search of understanding. “I’ve… I’ve heard the stories about Rath—the current ones. The ones about knights going to fight her cult and coming back looking more like a scar on the world itself than a person. I know she’s a threat.”
I nodded, remembering the stories she was describing. Fyn had told me one, even. On guard duty one night, he’d come by on his own patrol and rattled off about it. At first, he’d been as full of energy as always. But by the end of it, he’d sounded hollow.
“What I don’t get is the girl,” Kye continued. I looked up, meeting narrowed eyes. “You said she was a dragon.” I nodded. “But… nobody just meets a dragon. Nobody sees dragons unless they have a deathwish that needs to be fulfilled. They're elusive yet everpresent, like… the wind.”
I smiled at that, watching Kye’s face scrunch again as she tried to understand something I didn’t get either. When I’d talked to Anath, I’d been just as confused—and even more terrified. I’d thought my mind would split in half with fear before she’d stopped it.
I shrugged. “I don’t understand it either. The terrors chased me to her and she spoke with me.” A scowl breached my face. “I’m lucky she didn’t kill me right there and decided to warn me about Rath instead.”
Kye shook her head. “I don’t understand why the girl even cares. Let alone enough to tell you.” My former cellmate side-eyed me, suspicion residing just behind her mask.
Memories played back, lined with emotionless words. Grey wings punctured my vision, poking walls in my psyche like it was thin fabric. I remembered her words about the beast, remembered the hatred that I shared with her. I didn’t mention it the beast, though. It was still too close for me to let out.
“Maybe it’s a testament to Rath’s power,” I offered instead. “Maybe it’s proof of just how much destruction she could bring, beyond simply the deaths of humans.” I fought back a cringe as I remembered Anath’s exact warning.
She could bring the mortal world to its knees in a pledge of red flame.
I shuddered.
And it seemed that Kye felt a similar way. “Well that’s horrible to think about.”
I nodded. “You’re telling me.”
She shook her head, weaving past a couple chatting in the street as we made our way toward town hall. Looking up, the large, sweeping wooden building almost comforted me. Although, that comfort fled as soon as I realized I’d be leaving it behind.
“I just don’t like not knowing,” Kye said as she started up the large wooden steps. “I’m a huntress, dammit. We’re supposed to knowour prey.” She rolled her shoulders. “The fact that it’s all unknown is the worst part.” She swung open the creaky wooden door. I caught it a moment after.
“Well,” I said with a smile as we stepped into the briefing. “Let’s hope this trip clears some things up then.”
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