The tavern's evening lights glowed through the trees. Tears burned at the corners of her eyes. Home. She sprinted, heart pounding with desperate hope, through the woods as if the light might vanish.
At the clearing by the woodpile, she halted.
She grimaced. Fin wouldn't let this go. Lina clawed at the blood stain on her chest.
Lina veered toward the well and hauled up a bucket. No matter how much she scrubbed, red stained her hands.
'You're imagining it,' Raithe said.
'How do you know?'
'You're not the first person to get blood on your hands.'
She sighed, pulled her kitchen knife, and sawed through the stained fabric. When she'd removed the last of the ruined pieces, she tied her apron higher to hide the damage.
She steadied herself and marched towards the tavern. The forest's hush faded behind her as she crossed into the flickering warmth of the inn. Each step felt stretched thin with dread.
Did Arystelle tell Fin she'd run away?
Before she could overthink it, she pushed through the door. The din of voices hit her at once, severing her from the woods.
The room felt wrong.
Soldiers packed the room from wall to wall. Fin sat on a stool watching the bard ensnare the room in her song.
Fin tilted his head in her direction. Lina shook her head once, and whatever he saw there made him let her pass. She rushed up the stairs, tearing off her dress before the door clicked shut. She stuffed it beneath her bed and yanked on a clean one.
'Lina,' Raithe breathed.
She paused with a clean apron in hand.
'Are you healed?' she asked.
Raithe let out a strained laugh.
'Raithe—'
"Lina," Fin called from the hallway.
She opened the door and met his frown.
"Where have you been?"
Lina opened her mouth, closed it, and shook her head. Tears slipped free.
Fin's expression softened.
He cleared his throat. "There's a bowl of stew for you at the bar."
She met his soft brown eyes with a smile. A stray tear slipped onto her tongue, mixing with the remnants of dried blood that clung to her teeth. Iron and salt. The taste of a lie.
Fin never asked about her past. He never judged her for keeping to herself, never asked why a young woman turned away suitors. She never pressed about the scars on his arms or why he handled a knife like a man more used to cutting flesh than vegetables.
"I'll go serve the guests," she offered.
"They returned from the front this morning."
Lina stilled.
'They shouldn't be back yet.'
"All of them?" she asked.
He nodded. Fin's brow furrowed.
"Did they say what happened?"
Fin shrugged and said, "Been a quiet bunch since they came to the inn. Can't say I miss them breaking my chairs."
She moved toward the bar.
"Lina, go get that stew, and we can talk about… what happened when you're ready," he said, scratching his chin. "And tell me if any soldiers give you trouble."
She nodded and asked, "Fin, have you seen Arystelle lately?"
"No. I don't talk to the king's mages."
The tension in her back and shoulders eased.
Inside the common room, stew roiled in the cook pot. A bowl lay beside the tap. She wrapped her hands around it, the rough ceramic radiating warmth. Her skin felt like ice, fingertips tingling as the heat seeped in.
Every soldier in the inn watched the bard with predatory stillness. A few slumped in their seats.
The bard started a jaunty tune. Lina tapped her foot to the rhythm.
Not a single soldier joined in. Lina glanced at their eyes. Dull.
'...they shouldn't be there.'
The bard's song ended.
Lina teetered on her stool. Stew sloshed over the rim and scalded her hand.
She cursed.
'Why?' she asked, thrusting her hand under water.
"Didn't think the stew was that hot," Fin muttered and brought over a damp cloth to wrap around her hand.
He pulled out a small wooden spoon from his pile of bowls and handed it to her.
"Use this," he gruffed. "Can't have you taking more days off."
"Thank you," she said and dug in.
'Raithe?'
No answer came.
'Raithe… why shouldn't they be here?'
'I don't know…'
"They don't usually come back here," Fin grumbled while cleaning bowls. "Couldn't have seen anything too terrible on the front, though—they aren't drinking themselves into an early grave."
After the uneasy exchange, she finished her stew and took up her place at the tap. Mugs were scattered on the tables, untouched, the room still thick with tension.
The bushy-bearded one with the eyebrow scar stared at the bard and reached for his mug. His hand knocked the cup, and liquid sloshed over the table.
Lina rushed over with a cloth and bent over to wipe up the ale.
"Let me get you another," she offered, turning back to the bar.
A small laugh escaped her when she realized that she'd gotten close to him without fear of being touched. Maybe Fin got through to them, she thought.
"No," the soldier said.
"No?" she repeated.
She studied him, trying to understand. He stared back, eyes empty. Lina shrugged. She brought the mug back to him and placed it on the table.
The man raised the mug. Ale spilled down his face.
Lina froze.
"You don't need to fill it," he said with the mug against his mouth.
The words gurgled around the ale.
'…this is wrong,' Raithe growled.
This wasn't wrong.
This was impossible.
The soldier put the mug down and turned to watch the bard, Sofia. Her amber eyes twinkled as she swirled her music through the room.
'You're overreacting,' Lina told herself and sat beside Fin.
Sofia slipped into a mournful lullaby—a woman lured into the woods by a lover's voice.
One of the soldiers leaped up at the end of the song, and his chair fell back and clattered to the floor. He took a step back. For a moment, he balanced on the chair's back leg. He didn't reach out a hand to steady himself or flail his arms. Then he collapsed across it.
A loud snap cut through the bard's song. Sofia halted and peered curiously at the man.
'…wait—no…'
The man didn't cry out. He didn't try to rise.
White bone shot through his pant leg.
"Thom?" Fin asked and rushed to the man's side.
Fin reached out as if to steady him, then stopped. Thom stared blankly at Fin, unmoving.
Silence settled heavier than smoke.
Each soldier swiveled their head towards Thom in unison. Thom opened his mouth to speak, and a gurgling sound reverberated from his throat.
Lina hurried to his side, cloth in hand to bind the wound.
"We need to get him to the apothecary," she urged.
"Lina," Fin growled a warning.
She reached down to assess the man's wound. Fin lay a hand on her arm.
"Lina!" He said, motioning to the man's eyes. "Look."
Lina peered into Thom's glassy eyes, lifeless.
'…this isn't—'
She dropped the cloth. If Fin hadn't held her arm, she would have collapsed.
A gash gaped through Thom's thigh. A mortal wound that seeped his lifeblood days ago.
Lina stared.
"He's not... alive?" Lina cried.
"None of them are."
'Why would they come here?' Raithe asked.
"That explains why they were so quiet tonight," the bard let out a short, humorless laugh. "I've seen corpses move before…" She frowned. "Never like this."
The soldiers stilled. Their chests didn't move with breaths. Eyes as empty as the endless night sky.
Fin cursed and said, "Any ideas how to kill something that's already dead, Sofia?"
Sofia's mouth curved, but her eyes stayed sharp as she pulled a dagger from her sleeve, "Not a skill in my repertoire, old friend. Won't try to guess what the plan was for them, but can't let them leave either. Harmless now doesn't mean safe tomorrow."
Lina pulled her kitchen knife from its sheath and faced her adversaries. She wouldn't cower while Fin and Sofia fought.
'...I didn't—' Raithe interrupted.
'Raithe? You're feverish,' she whispered, worried.
'It's not that,' he said, 'How—'
The room tilted. She glimpsed a man in the shadows clutching his side.
Fin drew the sword from Thom's sheath, swung back, and cleaved his head clean off.
No blood. Lina gagged at the crunch of bone and closed her eyes. She took steadying breaths and pressed a hand against the memory of a deathblow in her chest.
No one moved.
No one breathed.
Lina swallowed.
When she opened her eyes, every soldier sat still, waiting.
The bushy-bearded soldier cocked his head like a snake eyeing prey.
"Cutting their heads off won't keep them down," Sofia mused.
'...I don't remember,' Raithe muttered.
'Raithe,' Lina said his name like a plea.
"His leg's already broken. What else can we try?" Fin said and glared at her.
"You haven't fought these?" Sofia asked.
'I don't want to die. Not again.'
Her breath hitched, chest tightening as uncertainty overwhelmed her.
Her hands slipped on the wooden handle of her knife. She swapped hands and rubbed the sweat on her apron.
'Lina—move.'
His voice cut through her thoughts—clear. Sharp.
Focused.
The words hadn't even settled when the first body dropped. The sound cracked through the room. Then another and another. Each man collapsed like a marionette with cut strings. Limbs at strange angles. Eyes devoid of life.
It pulled—faint and cold.
Like something had claimed her.
Or she had claimed it.
For an instant, she felt him. Focused. Controlled.
The presence vanished just as quickly.
Like it had never been there.
'…you're safe.'
Corpses littered the common room. Only the bard, Fin, and Lina remained standing.
"That… worked."
"You ever seen them drop like that?" Fin said.
"No. Can't say I've heard of this," Sofia said.
Fin surveyed the corpses for movement.
'They died,' Lina thought, 'and stayed dead.'
She clutched at the place where steel carved a path through her chest. Whole and untouched.
Sofia kicked the nearest soldier, then she brushed away her golden curls and tucked her blade into her sleeve.
"So Finnegan, how far do we need to go to burn bodies without getting caught?"
"There's a thick copse in the woods that hides a small clearing. It's near the border, but no one goes there," Lina whispered, remembering where she'd come back to life.
"Is it safe to go that close to the border?" Sofia asked.
Fin snorted and said, "Not like we'll run into the king's army."
Sofia arched an elegantly shaped eyebrow and drawled, "Your new neighbors used to you disposing of corpses?"
Fin shook his head and lifted Thom's headless body over his shoulder like a sack of flour.
"Lina, show us where the clearing is."
"Going to be a long night, like old times," Sofia purred.
Fin turned and went without another word.
Sofia watched Lina with a feline curiosity that made the spot between her shoulders itch.
She kept her head bowed, bundled Thom's head in the cloth in her hands, and led the way toward the clearing.
Silence stretched.
'...I don't remember,' Raithe said, his voice as weak as Lina felt.