They were mostly the elderly and women, along with a few men wrapped in filthy bandages, their wounds still unhealed.
Unlike soldiers, they didn't offer military salutes. Instead, they bowed clumsily but with immense sincerity, or placed their hands over their chests, their lips moving without a sound.
Their clothes were tattered and their faces sallow, but as they looked at Murphy, their eyes were filled with an almost pious gratitude.
A mother holding a small, thin child felt her eyes quickly well up. She seemed to want to say something but was too choked with emotion to speak. She simply turned her clueless child gently to face Murphy and pressed down lightly on the child's head.
Murphy reined in his horse.
Aurora watched everything in silence, seeing the genuine light in the eyes of the common folk.
She said nothing, only pressing her cheek a little closer against his back.
Her voice was a soft whisper, audible only to the two of them. "Brother, look… They remember you."
