Fire Emblem Fan Fiction ❯ Fire Emblem Tellius Saga: Book 1 ❯ CHAPTER 6: MASSACRE ( Chapter 6 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

Soren took his time walking back from the tannery. He’d washed his hands the best he could, but the foul odor stuck to his clothes. He refused to wear his new outfit to work, for fear of ruining it, so he was one again clad in Ike’s overalls.

Setting one foot in front of the other, he considered what would be awaiting him at the house: Mist doing something cute or Ike accomplishing something difficult, Greil’s bearhugs and Elena’s lullabies, a special dinner or perhaps a guest visiting for the evening, content smiles and laughter at nothing. Usually these things didn’t bother Soren, but today the thought of them slowed his steps to a crawl. 

Today he had overheard something he was not supposed to, something he could not ignore or forget. A client had confronted the old tanner about his newest employee, without realizing the boy was tending the vats in the next room or that the door was ajar.

“Why?” had been the question. “Why let a thing like that under your roof? Why invite calamity into your place of business? Why offend Ashera when you need her grace now more than ever?”

Hearing things said behind his back was worse than having them said to his face. At least when Soren was insulted directly, he could imagine the speaker was exaggerating or lying. But the fur trader’s only motivation had been concern for his colleague.

At times like these, Soren recalled what Greil had said. People are ignorant, he told himself. People are narrow-minded. People are superstitious. It had become a kind of mantra: They are ignorant. They are narrow-minded. They are superstitious. They are all fools. But today the mantra failed him, because Soren had heard once again the word Sileas had used in the cellar: Branded.

“You know what he is, right?” the trader had asked gently. “The boy’s a Branded. You can see it plain as day. Why take such a risk just for a few hours’ labor?”

“You said it yourself,” the old tanner had answered. “It’s just a few hours a week, and anyway, Greil and Elena are good people. They wouldn’t steer me wrong.”

Soren could not convince himself that these people were ignorant, when they knew things he did not. They knew what a ‘Branded’ was. They knew why Soren was hated, even though no one, not even Greil or Elena, had ever been honest with him about it.

He was walking home slowly, because he needed time to muster his courage. The only reason he didn’t know what ‘Branded’ meant was that he’d never asked. He could not truly blame Greil and Elena for not telling him, because honestly, he hadn’t wanted to know.

But he had lived with Ike’s family for twenty-one months, he had moved to Crimea with them, and there was little to no indication that Greil was going to uphold his promise of helping Soren make a life of his own. No one was going to act unless he forced them to act, and no one was going to answer his questions unless he asked them.

 

Finally he reached the house and closed the door gently behind him. “Something wrong, Soren?” Ike asked, looking up from where he was playing with his wooden knight and horse figurines. He seemed to sense Soren’s trepidation.

“I’m fine,” he answered and wished it were true.

Elena was sewing at the kitchen table, and Mist was napping by an open window, the summer breeze wafting her hair and bringing in the scent of grain from the storehouses down the road. Ike put his toys down and came to meet Soren. The boy had a greenish paste on his cheeks and nose, a concoction Elena made to treat sunburns.

“Are you sure?” Ike pressed, ever empathic.

“You have something on your face,” Soren replied coolly.

Ike touched his cheek as if he’d forgotten, and he smiled when the cream squished between his fingers. Soren knew what was coming and dodged when Ike tried to wipe the paste on him. He let Ike chase him around the room until Elena told them to stop, and he was surprised to find he felt a little better.

Greil was clearly not around, so Soren resigned himself to waiting. Although Elena may have been able to answer his questions, Greil would certainly answer them more directly, and that is what Soren wanted.

“Why don’t you boys start husking the corn?” Elena asked without looking up from her mending. She cocked her head toward the basket in the sink basin, and the tips of her blue hair bounced against her jaw.

“I just have to change first,” Soren agreed, and Ike pulled a face.

“Good, because you reek!” he teased.

 A retort formed on Soren’s lips, but he let it fade. He didn’t have the energy to tease him back today. Now that the game of chase was over, his thoughts were once again consumed by unanswered questions.

 

   The man appeared just in time to eat. At the dinner table, he and Elena discussed what was going on in town and what was going on in the country in equal measure. The meal was eaten, and the kitchen cleaned. The summer sun finally dipped behind the horizon.

Elena took Mist and Ike out to catch fireflies, and Soren was relieved he would have the chance to be alone with Greil. He presented himself before the man and opened his mouth to speak, but he was cut off by Greil asking, “Ah, Soren, do you have a moment?”

Soren was so surprised he nearly forgot what he was going to say. “Yes, sir,” he managed, realizing Elena had taken her children outside for some ulterior purpose.

Greil lowered himself into his favorite chair, one he’d carved and upholstered himself last spring. In the colder months the chairs formed an arc around the hearth, but at this time of year they were faced the large window overlooking Elena’s garden. Soren placed himself carefully in another of the chairs and waited for Greil to speak first.

“You’re a good kid, Soren,” Greil began.

“Yes, sir,” Soren replied quickly.

“I remember when you first came to us and you could hardly say a few words, but now you can converse easily. That tells me you’re smart.”

“Yes, sir,” Soren said again. (He certainly didn’t feel he was conversing easily right now.)

“And I trust you can use that wind tome?” Greil waved his hand toward the black leather satchel hanging by the door.

“Yes, sir.”

“Show me.”

Soren didn’t think he could be more surprised. “But you told me I shouldn’t use magic…”

“I did. And you’ve done well following that order, but now I want to see what you can do. Bear with me.”

Soren trusted Greil, so he went to his satchel and removed the spell book. The weight was so familiar, even though it had been almost two years since he’d actually used it. He was out of practice, and his heart thumped excitedly at the chance to use his skills again. “What should I do?”

Greil stood and walked to the window. “Could you hit the scarecrow from here?”

“Through the window?” Soren asked, eyeing the bucket-headed post sticking out of Elena’s garden.

In answer, Greil pushed open the foggy glass panes as far as they could go. “Is that a problem?”

Soren shook his head and stood in front of the window. The chairs around him made him feel as if there were five invisible spectators judging his performance, but really it was only Greil, his palm on the wall, his other hand on his hip, watching the scarecrow, waiting for Soren to begin.

Soren took a deep breath, cleared his throat, and took another deep breath. He whispered the words first, to refamiliarize himself with the lilt of the language, and a thrill ran through his whole body. Then he said the words louder, channeling his own will and merging it with the power contained within the ink and paper:

“*Spirits of wind, slash the flesh before me*.”

The spirits were more unwieldly than Soren remembered, and they fought against his control, with small breezes branching off of the main gust. But he still managed to keep most of them flying straight and sharp, and the main gust whacked into the T-shaped frame of the scarecrow, blowing tears through the old shirt it wore and shaking its bucket head until it tipped up and fell to the ground. Then the spell died, and Soren assessed the damage with a wince. There were faint scratch marks in the wood both above and below the window, and the tops of some of Elena’s plants had been lopped off or their leaves shredded.

Soren looked up at Greil, waiting for his punishment, but the large man was just rubbing his chin. “Not bad.”.

 “It was messy,” Soren correct him, not wanting to disagree with the man but also refusing to be coddled.

Greil shrugged and sat back down. “I want to talk to you about an opportunity.”

Soren took one of the other seats.

“How old are you now?”

“Nine,” Soren answered.

Greil seemed to be grappling with some idea. “Well, the opportunity is this: I am considering forming a little mercenary company. I have a couple people lined up if I decide to go through with it. But even with additional members, we would be a small band. I believe in quality not quantity.”

“We?” Soren repeated, trying to keep the incredulousness out of his voice.

“That is what I’m asking,” Greil explained. “I want to know if you’d be interested in joining. Now, you don’t need to commit. I don’t even know if this is going to happen. And you would have to train hard to pass muster. But in a few years, if you’re interested, this could be a way for you to get the skills you need to make a life for yourself.” 

Soren was shocked; he’d had no idea Greil and Elena had been planning anything like this. But he tried to overcome his astonishment and consider the offer logically. On one hand, the job of a mercenary was dangerous. They risked life and limb and only survived if they were decent fighters. If they were not, they died without fanfare. On the other hand, he would be able to actually use his skills as a mage and even develop them through practice. Most importantly, however, Soren knew he didn’t have many other options. If Greil was offering him a position as a mercenary, it must be because he had no luck finding another arrangement for his future.

“Okay,” he finally answered.

“You’d want to join?”

“Yes.”

“You don’t have to agree for my sake,” Greil continued. “You don’t have to tell me what you think I want to hear.”

Soren shook his head. “I don’t do that.”

He twitched a smile. “You’re sure about this?”

“I’d rather be a mercenary than nothing,” Soren answered honestly.

Greil sighed again. “Alright then, why don’t we catch up to the others? I’ll keep you updated from now on about any plans Elena and I make concerning the company.” He stood again, but Soren stopped him:

“Wait.”

Greil looked surprised but then erased the expression. “Of course, you must have questions. Shoot.”

“No, that’s not it.” He took a steadying breath, and Greil sat back down. “There was something I wanted to ask you, before any of this mercenary business.”

Greil knitted his thick eyebrows together. “Fire away.”

Soren ran a fingernail down the corner of the pages in his tome, taking comfort from the soft paper. “I overheard some people talking today…and it wasn’t the first time. I can’t stand not knowing anymore. I need you to tell me: What is a Branded?” He could not stop the panic rising in his voice.

Greil took a long time to respond, and each passing second was agonizing. He moved his gaze around as if in thought. He knotted and unknotted his jaw. He closed the window when a moth flew in, but then he stood still, and the fluttering of the moth’s fat gray wings were the only sound or motion in the still, silent room.

Soren felt almost guilty, as if he’d asked something he shouldn’t have. But he had finally worked up the nerve, and he refused to be ignored. “Sir, my question,” he re-prompted. “People have called me that before. What is it?”

Greil didn’t seem happy to do it, but he started talking: “I once knew a man whose mother was human and whose father… Well, he had a little something else in him.” He latched the window, turned, and sat back down.

Meanwhile Soren replayed this statement in his mind. He didn’t quite understand the implication, but he had an ominous feeling.

Greil placed his elbows on his knees and steepled his fingers. “He was a good man, a good soldier. I trained him, taught him everything I knew. He was an exceptional swordsman and is probably still today… Nobody but I knew he had mixed blood, and I don’t even think he realized I knew the truth. His Brand was on his back, easy to conceal. And he was the first in his line to have one, so maybe he didn’t even know…” Greil cleared his throat. “But I investigated his lineage until I found out about his great-grandmother’s affair with a Kilvan pirate. I never told him what I found out…but maybe I should have.” He gave a small, regretful sigh. “Maybe it’s better for lads like you to know the truth.”

Soren felt as if time had slowed, as if it were taking an eternity for Greil to finish his story. Kilvans were subhumans. Kilvans weren’t human. So what did that make a Kilvan’s great-grandchild?

“Branded,” Greil continued, “is what they call people with mixed blood like him, due to the marks they develop early in childhood. Some people believe their very existence is a crime against the Goddess and that the Brands are a warning to stay away. Even those who may not know the term Branded—or even know their origins—are raised to believe marked children are cursed, or even that they’re evil spirits given human form. It is superstition that they bring misfortune and death wherever they go.” Greil gave a small sad sigh. “But I am sure you know that. You have eyes and ears.”

 “…No.” Soren stood with his fists clenched to stop them from shaking. “I’m not a subhuman.”

Greil did not appear dissuaded. “Of course not, but someone in your family-”

“No,” he repeated.

Greil sighed sympathetically. “You never knew your family, right?”

“I am a Spirit Charmer, not a Branded!”

“That’s the lie I told you to tell. Do you think it will work on me?”

“Can you disprove it?” Soren demanded in response.

Greil frowned. “No. I suppose not.”

“Can you prove what you claim?” Soren added.

“No, I can’t.” He sighed again. “I’m sorry, lad. I know this isn’t news anyone wants to hear. But remember this—” his voice was firm now “—you are who you are, no matter what else. You are a good kid, a friend to my son, and a damn-good wind mage. Think on that instead.”

Soren shook his head in frustration but growled, “Fine.”

“Now, would you like to join the others?”

“I don’t care about fireflies,” he spat, struggling to keep the anger and pain out of his voice. All he wanted to do was scream, to deny everything Greil had said at the top of his lungs.

“I understand,” Greil replied. “Will you be alright?”

“I’m going to bed,” was Soren’s answer. He stalked up the stairs with a quiet, measured gait even though he wanted to run and stomp his feet. His heart was pumping in his ears, and when he opened to door to Ike’s room, he realized he couldn’t stop his hands from trembling.

He settled his head on his pillow even though it was the last thing he wanted to do. He hugged his wind tome to his chest and tried to order his thoughts while staring at the ceiling.

Greil had answered Soren’s question honestly, so he couldn’t be angry about that. He had offered Soren an employment opportunity, so he couldn’t resent the man for stifling him. He had only given Soren encouragement, so he couldn’t feel insulted. And yet he was filled with rage and shame nonetheless.

I know what a Branded is now, he attempted to reason with himself, but that doesn’t mean I am one. He eventually fell asleep consoling himself with a new mantra: This changes nothing.

 

The next day, Soren easily rationalized away Greil’s assumption. The man had discovered Soren in Gallia, so it was only natural he feared he had something to do with the subhumans. But Soren was from Nevassa, where there were no subhumans for thousands of miles. For whatever reason, Greil and Elena must not have believed him when he said he was from Daein. But Soren knew this was true and therefore could be certain he was not a Branded as various other people wrongly assumed. With this thought in mind, Soren was able to return to his daily routine without distraction.

 

A storm was coming, and Soren walked briskly back to the house, hoping to reach shelter before getting caught in it. The clouds were rolling in at a lethargic pace, already casting the village in an eerie dark while the distant fields still shone in stark sunlight. The temperature had already dropped, but the breeze was only a lazy tug, not yet the gale the storm promised to bring. The air smelled expectant, and Soren did not know whether it was the pressure or the silence that threatened to pop his ears.

He nearly jumped out of his skin when a crow took off from a metal drain pipe in the alley beside him. The ping reverberated through the still air, and when it faded into silence, Soren heard the first scream.

The cry was cut off prematurely, causing Soren’s skin to prickle. Fear drove him into the crow’s abandoned alleyway. The few other people in the street either ran toward the sound or stood confused. Further shouts and screams followed. Those who had stood in place now chose a direction—toward or away. But Soren remained in the alley.

Not knowing what to do, he sat with his back against the building, held his head, and listened. Shrieks of fear and cries of agony continued on and off for almost a quarter hour. The sky grew heavier and darker, but it did not break. The screams had been growing more and more infrequent in recent minutes. Finally, Soren found he could move.

He crept out into the street, but he did not yet know whether to move west toward the house, downtown to where the screams had come from, or back the way he’d come and therefore to maximal safety. In the end, his curiosity won him over, pulling him as if he were on a chain.

When he turned onto the main street, the first thing he noticed was the swath of red that streaked across his vision. The roadway was a river of blood. Only then did he notice the bodies, and he moved cautiously forward.

Instinct told him this was wrong; he knew he should see the craned body of survivors leaning over their loved ones. But on closer inspection, he realized there had been mourners, but these too were dead, slumped over the bodies of the others.

Instinct told him some people should have escaped; he should have passed injured men and women sending up an alarm. People should have tried to hide exactly where he’d been hiding. At the very least, he should have seen bloody footprints beyond this street. But where the blood stopped, the people stopped. Once again, on closer inspection, Soren realized there had been runners. But they had been slain in one fell swoop, all face-down on the road. Their backs had been ripped open, their spines cut. Soren kept walking.

Now he thought of the houses and businesses lining the street. Instinct told him there should be witnesses, terrified faces in those windows. But there were none. Looking closer, Soren saw that the doors had been kicked in or knocked down. A trail of blood led in and out of each one.

Soren knew he should turn and run. He knew something was wrong here; he knew he was seeing the impossible. But that was exactly why he couldn’t turn away. Covering his mouth against the smell, he followed the sound of another scream.

Soon he reached a section of the road that appeared to be the epicenter of what had happened—what was still happening. The flagstones were chipped. Windows were shattered, siding sliced, and pillars splintered. Arrows were imbedded in wood and dirt. Swords lay where they’d been dropped, their blades pitted. Spears broken clean in two littered the ground.

Heavily armed men in dark clothes and sparse armor were scattered over the street. Soren didn’t recognize them, but around them also lay men he knew belonged to the village’s militia. They had been wielding their standard-issue weapons and wearing nothing for protection but their regular clothes. Walking farther, Soren found soldiers from the local outpost, but their armor had done nothing to protect them. The metal plating was crumpled like paper. Among them was the gleaming amber armor of the Royal Knight who’d stayed here this past month. Even he had died like a dog.

Of course, there were civilians too: shopkeepers, tradesmen, parents, and children. Soren knew these people, but they looked like strangers now that their broken bodies lay beside the road. The wounds on their backs, necks, and stomachs looked like wet, red flowers with the petals pulled back. Their eyes were open, unseeing. Their faces were frozen in terror.

Soren’s mind raced to come up with an explanation, but he could not. The sounds of slaughter continued nearby, but there was not a single sound of combat. Everyone capable of fighting was already dead. Whatever this massacre was, it was still happening, and now there was nothing to stop it.

Soren was debating whether to run or investigate further, when a sudden urgent thought tore through his mind: What about Ike? He began dashing here and there, checking the bodies for his friend. Where the bodies had fallen in piles, he pushed some off others to reveal them, and when he did see a blue-haired child, he had to roll the body over to confirm it was not Ike. Although Soren had never prayed to Ashera before, he begged her now, over and over, that Ike and his family were safely at home.

His sleeves and knees were soon coated in blood, and he was sweating both from the rigorous work and the panic. The disgust he felt at seeing and touching the bodies was nothing compared to the thought of his friend as one of them. Bile collected in his throat, tears stung his eyes, and he resisted the urge to vomit.

His search brought him closer to the adjacent street where he knew the carnage was ongoing. He could hear footsteps, whimpering, the swinging of a blade, a scream, a thump. But Soren turned the corner anyway. He had to follow the bodies. He had to confirm Ike was safe. Keeping low and quiet, he found himself at the bottom of the steps leading up the hill. Both the steps and the road above were littered in even more corpses.

Soren raised his eyes and saw the shape of a man, but it could hardly be a man, because it moved too quickly and too jaggedly. It swung a sword left and right, cutting down anyone who tried to fight it off and anyone trying to run from it. When it struck, it struck with more force than a man should be capable of exerting. The blade cut deep, crushed bone, and flung bodies to the ground, killing them instantly. A blue aura rippled around the man, and Soren knew no explanation for what he was witnessing.

Soren watched him cut down the baker sheltering his wife and daughter as they made a mad dash out of their bakery. First the baker died. Then his wife. Then his daughter. Soren could only stare.

But then someone else ran toward the swordsman. She was limping, bleeding, but alive and light on her feet as if carried by unearthly purpose. “ENOUGH!” she cried in a wretched voice. She dove for the man’s hand, just as he spun around, blade-first.

The sword pierced the woman straight between her lungs, sprouting out of her back and stopping her charge. But she’d succeeded in tearing something out of his grip. Both stood completely still, as if time had stopped. The haze around the man faded, and Soren’s mind finally processed what he was seeing:

The blood-caked swordsman was Greil.

The limp woman was Elena.

This shock was worse than anything Soren had seen so far. He had been frozen until this point, but now he found he could move. Greil hadn’t seen him yet, so he lowered himself to the ground on slow, shaky limbs. Lying on his stomach, he tried to hide himself behind the body of a dead man, but he did not take his eyes off Greil and Elena.

Finally the moment broke, and Greil’s legs buckled. The motion caused a bronze medallion to fall from Elena’s slackened fingers—the same pendant she had always worn around her neck. It bounced, rolled, wobbled, and fell in a puddle of blood. Greil knelt, looping an arm around Elena’s back. He withdrew the sword with a sickening sound and tossed it aside.

“What have I done? Elena!” Tears rolled down his cheeks, and he pulled Elena’s body into him even while her head lolled back. His shoulders were racked with sobs, and for the first time, Soren noticed the arrows lodged in his arms, legs, and back. But Greil hardly seemed to notice them, and none seemed as deep as they should have been.

It was just another impossible detail in the entire impossible scene. Soren could not rationalize this; he could not believe what he’d seen with his own eyes. A single man could not have killed all of these people, and even if he could, that man could not be Greil. He was Ike’s father. He was good.

From his vantage point on the ground, Soren could not tell if any of the bodies near Greil belonged to Ike, but he couldn’t risk getting any closer. Greil seemed entirely consumed by his grief, so Soren thought he could escape if he moved now. He slowly crawled backward, and when he was out of view of Greil’s street, he hopped to his feet and ran as fast as he could to the house where he prayed Ike would be.

Thunder rolled through the sky, finally shaking free the multitude of fat drops waiting there. They fell heavy and cold, immediately soaking Soren to the bone. But he didn’t stop running until he reached the house. This side of town was completely untouched, but Soren wasn’t assured until he saw warm lights in the windows. Greil and Elena wouldn’t leave Mist home alone, so he could safely assume Ike was inside. He was about to charge in and confirm this with his own eyes, when he remembered his clothes were soaked in blood as well as water.

Stripping off his shirt, he left it in the trough and tucked his shoes underneath. The packhorse’s nostrils flared at the scent, and its eyes widened.

There was a good deal of blood on Soren’s trousers as well, but he did not want to walk into the house in nothing but his underpants, so he took clods of wet dirt and smeared it over the blood. Then he entered the house, shivering and with arms crossed over his skinny chest.

 “Soren! You’re back late,” Ike greeted him. “What happened to your clothes?”

“The storm,” Soren lied vaguely. He walked past Ike straight for the stairs. He couldn’t face him or Mist right now, and needing to get dressed was as good an excuse as any.

“Naked rain!” Mist sang, jumping from one chair to another in a circle. “Naked rain! Naked, naked, naked rain!”

Closing the door to Ike’s room, Soren muffled her song. He immediately stripped off the soaking wet, bloody, mud-encrusted trousers. Wrapping them in a ball, he opened the glass pane and storm shutters just enough to toss the ball into the horse’s trough below. He heard the old horse whinny and rear at the unexpectedly falling pants, but Soren couldn’t stand to leave the bloody garment in the house where Ike could find it.

Back downstairs, he used the washbasin to scrub his whole body, but most important were his hands. They were still shaking, and it was not just from the cold. It took a long time, even with the abrasive soap Elena had concocted. Finding a pair of nail sheers, he clipped his fingernails down as far as he could to remove the blood underneath, but he accidentally drew his own blood in the process. It took him several minutes to realize this, because he could hardly feel it. He was still numb.

When the last hint of red was gone and his broken nails were bandaged, Soren dried himself and dressed in fresh clothes. He had finally stopped shaking, and in this strange new calm, he wondered if any townsfolk were investigating the massacre right now or if they would wait until the storm passed. He wondered if they would find Greil and if they would try to kill him. He wondered if Greil would kill again to protect himself. He wondered if he would try to escape and pretend to be innocent. He wondered if he would try to eliminate any witnesses, and with a detached sort of fear that wasn’t fear at all, he realized he was a witness. Most of all, he wondered if Greil would come back here, and if so, when.

   The house was still empty save for Ike and Mist when Soren emerged. Mist was playing with her dolls by the empty hearth, and Ike was eating an apple while lazily flicking the seeds at her.

“Stop it!” Mist whined, and when Ike did not stop, she added, “I’m gonna tell Momma!”

   At this, Ike did stop, and he turned his face to the front window. “I wonder where they are anyway.”

   “Where did they go?” Soren asked, having decided to feign ignorance of today’s events.

“They said they went out to meet someone.” Ike waved a hand disinterestedly. “They should be back soon.”

Soren felt like something was lodged in his throat. He did not know what to say, but telling Ike the truth was out of the question. The mother he adored was dead, and the father he admired more than anyone had killed her. Soren did not know why or how Greil had done what he did, and that meant he did not know what Greil was capable of doing. Ike could very well be in danger.

“Ike, we have to leave,” he whispered. They were the only words that made any sense. “We have to leave before your father comes back.”

Ike cocked his head and made an incredulous face. “What are you talking about, silly Soren?”

“I can’t tell you why, but it’s not safe here. We should both run. We can use the storm as cover. I will protect you.” The words came in a rush. “We have to go.”

“Is this some sort of game?” Ike asked curiously.

Soren thought for a moment. “Yes, it’s a game. Will you go with me?”

Ike seemed to consider this. He looked at the storm battering the shuttered windows and then at Mist playing quietly on the floor. “I’m in charge of Mist when Momma and Father are away, so she would have to play with us too. But it’s thundering and lightninging out there, and it might be dangerous for her because she’s smaller than us.”

Soren’s heart sank at Ike’s rationale. He knew it had been a long shot. Ike could be tricked, but not to the extent that he would leave his family behind. “It’s alright,” he finally said. “It was a stupid idea.”

“We can play runaways inside the house though,” Ike offered.

Soren shook his head. “I don’t want to play anymore.”

He sat on one of the chairs Mist had arranged for jumping and stared at his knees. If Ike won’t go, should I leave on my own? He considered this at length but eventually decided to stay. There was a chance Greil would never return. He could be killed or arrested, or he could flee town to escape justice. If that happened, Soren wanted to be here for Ike. And if Greil did return, Soren wanted to protect Ike from him. With this thought in mind, he retrieved his tome and waited.

 

An hour ticked by. Despite the grotesque things he’d seen today—the things he still saw now with his waking eyes—Soren couldn’t deny he was getting hungry. He could tell Mist and Ike were feeling the same way, and they both seemed subdued with worry that neither Greil nor Elena had returned. Soren slipped his tome into his satchel and wore it over his shoulder as he went into the pantry to find something he could make for them to eat. Ike saw what he was doing and helped.

 

Another hour passed, and the storm was long over. The darkness of evening replaced the dark of the thunderclouds, and Soren watched the street from the window, hoping to see some sign of how the town was reacting to the massacre. Meanwhile, Ike drew pictures of heroes and monsters and Mist drew princesses and pegasi, each sharing the bits of charcoal and scraps of paper.

Finally Soren saw Greil’s face in the window, and he retreated, heart beating fast. The man strode in, and the first thing Soren noticed was that his face and hands had been washed of blood and he was wearing different clothes. He shrugged off an oilskin jacket slick with rainwater to reveal that his clothes were damp too. He moved as if his arms were weakened, and Soren saw bandages where there had been arrows in his flesh. His shoulders sagged, and he removed his boots as if it were an exhausting ordeal. When this was done, he limped forward, and Soren saw that his eyes were bloodshot and had dark bags underneath.

Ike and Mist had clearly realized something was wrong as soon as they’d seen their father enter the house looking so defeated. They had not run to him with happy chatter and smiles. They’d merely risen and stared at him. Mist took Ike’s arm, and he did not pull away. “Father?” he asked timidly.

Soren took a step back and wished he could blend into the wall and disappear.

“Father?” Ike repeated.

Greil knelt in front of them, and his eyes were on Mist. “Take it,” he said, holding out a small cloth bag.

Mist let go of Ike’s arm to accept the gift. Loosening the drawstrings, she tumbled the contents into her hand. “It’s Momma’s necklace!” she announced in awe.

“Put it on,” Greil said in a strangled whisper.

Mist did so, and Soren could only stare at the bronze medallion. Greil must have wiped it clean, but he imagined he could still see the bloodstains.

“Keep it safe, my dear.” Greil ran a trembling hand down the side of her hair.

“I will,” Mist promised, “but what about Momma?”

Greil just shook his head. Soren had no doubt his grief was real, which was why it didn’t make sense that he would have killed Elena to begin with.

“Can I hold it?” Ike reached for the medallion only to have Greil slap his hand away. The boy’s eyes welled with tears.

“Ike, you are never to touch that medallion! It is Mist’s now. Do you understand?”

“Y-yes, sir,” he managed, even while his tears started to spill.

Greil seemed to regret his harsh action, and he grasped Ike’s arm with one hand while clamping Mist’s shoulder with the other. He moved his jaw but made no words.

“Fader,” Mist asked, “What about Momma? Momma should have Momma’s necklace, not me.”

Greil stared at the floor between them for a long time, seeming to summon his courage. When he did, he looked almost like his old self. “I am so sorry, Ike, Mist.” He wrapped them both in a tight embrace. “There was an accident. Your mother is not going to come home.” He gulped, and his voice broke. “She’s gone.”

“No.” Ike tried to pull away but could not. From across the room, Soren could see his face split in two. Mist nuzzled into Greil’s neck and began to cry. Ike kept trying to shake his head and pull out of the embrace, but when Greil’s hand cupped the back of his head, he froze and started sobbing into his other shoulder.

Soren suddenly felt like he shouldn’t be here. He could try to imagine their grief, but in his heart, he knew he could never truly understand it. The wind tome felt useless in his hands, just a silly book. He felt invisible, watching his friend’s world be torn apart and unable to offer even a word or gesture of comfort. Ike needed his father now, no matter what Greil had done.

With this thought in mind, Soren decided the man who had entered this house was not a murderous lunatic. He quietly retreated to the second floor, where he laid down on his cot and was suddenly overcome by exhaustion. He didn’t know what had happened. He didn’t know what would happen. He didn’t know what he should do now. But he did know he was tired, so he slept. 

 

He woke immediately upon hearing the stairs creak. Someone went into Greil and Elena’s room. Soren threw his legs over the side of the cot, lit a candle, and waited. The door across the hall clicked closed and someone knocked on Ike’s door.

“I’m awake,” Soren replied, just loud enough to be audible.

Greil pushed open the door. Bringing one finger to his lips, he jerked his opposite thumb at the door to his and Elena’s room. Evidently he’d put Ike and Mist to sleep there. Then he stepped back and gestured that Soren should come with him, pointing to the stairs. Soren was nervous, but it was hard to be afraid of a man who looked like a hollow shell of his former self. He followed obediently.

When they were in the kitchen, Greil went to the fire and started some water in the kettle. “I saw your clothes outside,” he began.

“You mean the blood,” was Soren’s response.

“You’re not injured, are you?”

Soren supposed this was a good indication that Greil didn’t remember who he’d slaughtered, which was also a promising sign that he did not know Soren had seen him. “It wasn’t my blood,” he answered.

“But you… You were there, today. Did you see anything? …Did you see who did it?” Greil was no good at playing coy, but Soren supposed he wouldn’t be good at doing anything right now. There was no vigor in his body or voice.

“I was on my way back from the tannery. I hid when I heard the screams,” Soren answered honestly. “When it was over, I found the bodies.” It was only a half-lie. “They were all dead, and whoever did it was gone.”

 Greil was silent for a while. When he spoke it was to say, “Elena was one of the causalities, but I don’t want Ike and Mist to know she died the way she did. I don’t want them to know anything about what happened… Thank you for not saying anything.”

Now it was Soren who carried the silence. When he finally spoke, it was to ask the only question he could without betraying what he knew: “Were there any survivors?”

Greil stared at his hands, which were now heavily bandaged. “Not many,” he answered. “A handful of children whose parents managed to hide them. A couple people whose injuries were not serious enough to kill them…yet. They’re delirious from blood loss and may not survive the night.”

Soren chose his next questions carefully: “Is anyone investigating what happened? Can the survivors indicate the perpetrators of the attack?” He decided to make it seem as if he were assuming the massacre was carried out by a group of individuals, to further distance himself as a possible witness.

The man shook his head. “They’re in shock, incoherent. But it’s clear they don’t know what they saw.”

Soren supposed this was fortunate for Greil, but the man did not look pleased or relieved. He only looked grief-stricken. Just then, the kettle began the airy hiss that would precede a full-blown whistle. Greil poured a mug of Elena’s favorite tea for each of them.

When he sat back down, he said, “I buried Elena.”

Soren did not know how to reply to that, so he did not. He tried to think of ways he could ask his questions without making Greil suspicious. “Do you know what happened?” he finally asked, judging that it was a safe enough question. “Is this likely to happen again?”

Greil shook his head. “This will never happen again,” he promised, and there was a spark of life in his voice for the first time tonight.

It was almost enough to make Soren believe him. But he knew he could never again trust Greil or safely predict what the man was capable of.

“We will have to leave,” Greil said when he spoke again. “I can’t raise my children in the place where this happened.”

Soren nodded slowly.

“You’re free to come with us if you like.” Greil did not wait for a response. He stood, taking his tea in hand, and climbed the stairs back to the room where his children were sleeping.

 

The next day Greil left early, but he would not say where he was going or what he was doing. “Don’t leave the house,” he ordered. “Ike, you’re in charge of Mist. I’ll be sure to send someone to check on you both by noon.”

Ike’s and Mist’s face were still swollen and blotchy, and they had not had much to eat for breakfast. They sat at the table with their watery porridge and watched their father leave with forlorn eyes.

After eating and dressing, Soren decided he needed to leave too. He couldn’t stand to remain in the house, watching his friend struggling with grief and confusion and unable to relieve any of his pain.

“Where are you going?” Ike asked hollowly when Soren was lacing his shoes.

“Out,” he answered, and Ike didn’t ask him to stay.

 

He crept along the streets, looking and listening for any clue about how the town was handling the catastrophe. When he reached the main street, he saw dozens of people scrubbing the flagstones in unison. The dead were lined up neatly, with blankets covering them and people guarding them to keep the birds away.

As Soren watched, groups of three or four came with small carts, loaded a body each, and took them away, presumably to be buried. He spotted Greil in one of these groups, his hands and pants streaked with dirt and his brow damp with sweat. No one was treating him unusually, and Soren assumed nobody had any idea he’d been the cause of all this. 

The townsfolk buzzed quietly out of grief, but they buzzed nonetheless. By listening to their conversations, Soren quickly discovered the most popular explanation was that a band of rogue subhumans had come across the Gallian border and attacked the town in a mindless rage. There were many things wrong with this explanation: the lack of pawprints in the blood, the fact that the wounds had been inflicted with a sword, the fact that no one who’d overheard the attack reported hearing growls or roars, or that none of the border towns between here and Gallia had seen anything resembling an attack like this. But Soren supposed it was easier to blame the creatures they already hated.

For that same reason, Soren was careful to stay out of sight. He knew it was only too likely that the townspeople would somehow blame him for this. He could already hear the shrill voices and see the pointing fingers accusing him cursing the town with his presence. So once he’d seen his fill of the town’s cleansing efforts, he crept back to the house.

A neighbor arrived around noon, as Greil had promised. He must have told her to lie, because she calmly told Ike and Mist that there had been an accident during the storm (of course, she kept the details vague) and said Greil was helping clean up.

 

The next day, a troop of five Royal Knights arrived to investigate the massacre. After interviewing dozens of the civilians and examining the unfamiliar corpses Soren had noticed, they declared that these unknown men and women were likely the perpetrators of the attack. They gave a local artist a few coins to sketch the dead faces, and then they took the drawings and bodies away with them. Greil was in the clear.

However, he must have still thought he was in danger, because he wasted no time selling the family’s extraneous possessions and packing the cart with supplies. Ike and Mist had to have realized they were on the verge of moving again, but neither asked Greil about it. He brought them to visit Elena’s gravesite once, but other than that, neither had left the house since the storm. They still didn’t know the truth, and Soren realized they probably never would. Greil was clearly in control.

 

Three days after the massacre, Soren finally made a decision. The prospect of staying with the broken family for even another day made his skin crawl, and every moment he spent in the silent house was torture. He was none too fond of the idea of being dependent on Greil anymore either, so he decided to leave.

He didn’t tell Ike he was going away; he couldn’t bear to. He packed a rucksack, donned the satchel containing his wind tome, and stole an additional cloak he hoped would come in handy during the autumn and winter months. He filched a few other items, including a knife, a canteen, a length of rope, and flint for starting fires (Elena had taught him what Sileas had not). He had a grand total of eleven copper pieces to his name, but at least he was better off than when he’d left Sileas’s hovel two years ago.

Ike had grown used to Soren coming and going from the house while he and Mist morosely bided their time within the confines of the walls. So he didn’t say goodbye when Soren opened the door this time. He did not look up, or he would have seen that Soren was weighed down by supplies and leaving forever. But Soren did look back, and he determined to remember Ike as the bright-eyed child he’d been before losing his mother.