There were a few times in Messy’s life where what she had to do had seemed impossible, yet somehow she’d managed. Leaving Silvervale and everything she knew behind so that she could be with Lara had been one; leaving Lara had been another. She’d never regretted the first; she’d often regretted the second, though it had taken time for that regret to set in.
It didn’t take five minutes before she regretted leaving Ana behind, and when she did she was convinced she’d never regretted anything so much in her life. She knew that it was the right thing to do. She knew that they’d just be making things worse if they stayed and forced Ana to keep them safe, rather than letting her focus on herself. It made no difference. Ana was fighting for her life while they ran toward safety, and Messy hated herself for it.
And yet, not once had she suggested turning back. They couldn’t. It would be worse than pointless; it might doom them all, Ana included. No matter how much Messy—or Jisha, or Deni—wanted to, they simply couldn’t. The entire Splinter was in danger, and Ana was doing her part in defending it. They had to do theirs, and that meant getting back to the outpost, raising the alarm, and rallying the militia.
Messy prayed that Ana could hold on until then.
They ran, and ran, and ran without stopping. They couldn’t afford to take a rest; even with Ana’s new Endurance Enhancement boosting their stamina recovery, there was always the risk of someone—most likely Deni, who was less athletically inclined than the rest of them—collapsing entirely. Then they’d either have to stop or split up, and neither was acceptable. So they ran.
Rayni had estimated that they had at least seventy miles to cover; she was confident that with 20 extra Points of Endurance and Indefatigable preventing them from succumbing to exhaustion as long as they kept moving, they could do it in ten to twelve hours. They’d be useless once they arrived, and they’d probably need Touanne’s help to be able to even think of walking tomorrow, but they could do it. Ray was sure of it, and Messy chose to believe her. She had to, because failure wasn’t an option.
“Can’t believe. I’m running farther. And faster than I. Ever have. Twice. In two weeks!” Deni panted from the middle of the pack. Her voice was ragged, and Messy could only pray the girl didn’t hit her absolute limit before they reached the outpost.
By silent agreement, the rest of them didn’t dare let Deni out of their sight. Deni was a mage through and through. Her Class gave her bonuses to Acuity and Connection, and while she hadn’t gone into detail, she’d told Messy that she’d barely invested in Endurance at all. She had the same 20 Point bonus from Ana as the rest of them, but Messy wouldn’t be surprised if that was somewhere between half and two thirds of the girl’s total. And while Indefatigable let them ignore the fatigue trying to drag them all into the ground, it didn’t stop their bodies from eating themselves alive, or their joints and muscles from breaking down under a level of exertion that they’d never even imagined putting themselves through.
Messy’s feet were numb where they weren’t on fire; her ankles, knees, and hips complained with every step. No one talked about it, but she was sure the others were no better off. And yet they kept running, because there was a possessed sapient back there. A live sapient demon, the stuff of nightmares, the kind of thing that could lay waste to a young Splinter like this, where the average level was so low. And not just that, but someone most of them knew, or at least were acquainted with.
Rill. A devoted follower of the Wayfarer, and one of Ana’s most ardent supporters. He’d fought, and he’d sacrificed, and he’d survived, and now…
Merciful goddess, Messy didn’t want to think about it. It could have been any one of them whose Willpower was on the lower side. It could have been her. She could have been a prisoner in her own body, helpless to do anything but watch as she killed her friends and Ana was forced to kill her. Just like Rill, she was sure, had been forced to watch as Part and everyone else with them died at his own sword.
Running in silence, Messy decided, was not good for her mental wellbeing. It gave her too much time to think when thinking couldn’t do any good. But there was nothing to talk about that wouldn’t sound either horrifying or trite, which left her only one option: Messy sang. Occasionally off-key, frequently out of rhythm, she sang for mile after mile after mile, just to silence her own heartbreaking thoughts.
After a while, when Messy had just finished one song and was at a loss for where to go from there, Jisha took over, singing in what Messy could now recognize as Ingliss. When she ran out, Rayni took over, and then the others, one by one. By the time the sun was setting and they reached the clearing that surrounded the outpost, they’d all been singing for hours.
Feria the Peacekeeper was on the dawnward gate as they approached. “Miss Mestendi!” he called out as they approached. “What’s the rush? Where’s Marshal Cole?”
“Possessed!” Messy replied, her throat parched and raw from running and singing for hours without a drink. Hers was only one voice among a chorus of similar replies from the others with her. “Not her,” she corrected as she saw the abject terror on Feria’s face. Gods, did she understand that. If that spirit had gotten Ana… “Rill the Hordebreaker! It’s Rill! Get the captains!”
Beside her, just as they reached the gate, Deni staggered to stop and keeled over, which everyone else took as the signal to stop as well.
“And Touanne. And Mistress Touanne,” Messy added, staring blankly at her passed out friend, as she herself followed suit. She was out before she hit the ground.
As consciousness slowly intruded on blessed sleep, Messy’s whole body throbbed. Not with pain, but it was like every breath, every heartbeat, inflated every part of her to near bursting before relaxing, then doing it all over again. Beyond the throbbing, she could barely feel anything below the waist, and her throat felt raw from her tongue to the depths of her lungs.
Her first thought as she realized that she was awake was to wish desperately that she might just slip back into sweet oblivion. Then she coughed, a racking, spasming cough that had her tasting blood as she lifted off the bed and curled in on herself.
A firm but gentle arm caught her around the shoulders while another pressed a cloth softly to her mouth. “Here,” Touanne said once the coughing was over and the cloth was removed. “Drink this.”
Fragrant steam wafted into Messy’s nose as the rim of a cup or mug was laid against her mouth. When the warm liquid within touched her lips she obediently sipped at it, and the moment her tongue felt the first trace of wetness it was like something took her over. She grabbed weakly at the hands holding the cup, urging them to tip more of the liquid into her mouth, and groaned in protest when they resisted.
“Slowly now. Slowly,” Touanne said. “There’s more once you finish this. Good. There you go. Gods, Messy, I’m so sorry to wake you, but the captains have questions that really can’t wait.”
“Tou?” Messy asked, finally accepting that she’d just have to stay awake for a while. She opened her eyes to Touanne’s gentle smile, her caring, freckled face framed by chestnut hair that, on closer inspection, turned out to be so many flyaways that it almost looked intentional. “Your bun’s coming loose,” Messy rasped.
“Gods, I know,” Touanne laughed wryly. “I’ve been rather busy with you six. Messy, tell me honestly: can you answer a few questions? Just a few. You need rest, and I won’t let them keep you awake for long, I promise.”
“Questions? I—” The past day came flooding back. The demon, Ana staying behind, running, running, running for hours until her feet were ice and fire and her joints felt like someone had taken a sledgehammer to her. Messy’s stomach contracted and she retched, but she had nothing but a little tea to bring up. Touanne caught it with her cloth.
“Sorry,” Messy groaned. She felt wretched. “Gods, Ana. Rill! I… the others?”
“All resting in the front room. It’s a bit of a hospital at the moment, so I had Tellak bring you in here for privacy before I woke you.”
“Oh. Good.” A tiny bit of the tension that had overtaken Messy melted away. At least everyone was alright. “Uh, you said there was more to drink?”
After another full mug of Touanne’s restorative tea, Messy sighed and said, “You asked if I could answer some questions.”
Touanne nodded solemnly, taking the empty mug. “I did. Can you? It’s perfectly alright if not, but the captains are rather worried after what you all told Mister Feria.”
Messy wanted nothing more than to sleep again, but she knew how important this was. “I need to,” she said, laboriously scooting back to sit against the wall at the head of the bed. She didn’t trust herself not to sleep if she relaxed into the pillow. “I’ll answer what I can.”
“Thank you,” Touanne said, taking Messy’s hand in one of her own and giving it a gentle squeeze. “Again, I really wish that this hadn’t been necessary, but—”
“But it is,” Messy said, squeezing back. “I’m glad you did. Though I’ll be glad to go back to sleep when I can, so…”
“Right. Right, of course.” Touanne stood and, for some reason, walked over to the window, throwing the curtains open. The window had been fitted with a metal grille when Jancia the Lumimancer occupied this room, to prevent her from escaping into the outpost and hurting someone in her void plague-induced confusion. As Messy watched in silent confusion Touanne turned the key set into the lock holding the grille closed. She opened the grille, then the window, letting in the cool evening air.
“Captain, she’s ready,” Touanne said, stepping back before turning for the door, which she opened before saying the same thing to someone in the hallway outside.
In the doorway appeared Captain Falk. He looked haggard, as though he’d aged a decade in the few days since Messy had last seen him. “Good evening, Miss Mestendi,” he said, placing a low stool by the bed. “Thank you. Mistress Touanne tells me you and your Party almost killed yourselves returning here.”
“We had to,” Messy said. “The demon—”
“Young Mister Rill. Yes, we heard,” said the solemn voice of Captain Pirta from the window. When Messy turned to look, the tall elf was leaning in, her elbows resting on the window frame. “I’d hoped never to see another possessed sapient,” she said, her voice faraway and her eyes haunted. “I’d hoped many things for this Splinter. The Lady of Fortune has made us all the butt of some joke, it seems.”
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“Captain Pirta!” Messy quickly nodded, then realized she hadn’t greeted the other guild officer in the room. “And Captain Falk, of course. I’m sorry, I…”
“That’s quite alright,” Falk said as Messy trailed off. “Now, why don’t you tell us the most important things about this whole mess, so we can see if it’s quite as bad as we fear, or worse, or gods be kind, all a misunderstanding.”
The gods were not kind. With frequent questions from the captains that she answered as best she could, Messy told them about the Delve. She told them about Part, and how they’d been sure that he must have been murdered. How they started back for the outpost in the morning, and how Rill—or rather, the demon wearing his body—had run them down. How Ana had stayed behind, and told them to go.
“She’s alive,” Messy said with fierce pride. “The bastard almost got Deni and Ana came swooping in like… well, an angel. That was the last time I saw her. Now it must have been fifteen hours at the very least, and she’s still alive! Not incapacitated, either. Gods only know what that means, but we didn’t get a notification, so she didn’t kill it.”
The fact that neither captain scoffed at the suggestion that such a thing was even possible only made Messy’s pride burn all the hotter. Her angel was a force of nature. If anyone could possibly survive a possessed sapient at her Level—Level 20 now, she’d noticed—it was Ana.
“Thank you,” Falk said not much later. He looked almost as tired as Messy felt. “I’m sure we’ve learned all we need to. Please, Miss Mestendi, get all the rest you need. But if you should happen to find yourself strong enough to stand and fight tomorrow, I hope that you will meet us in the square.”
“What’s happening there?” Messy asked. She could already feel herself drifting off.
“We’re mustering the outpost. For the second time, in far too short a span. We can fight, or we can abandon the Splinter and let it collapse. Pirta and I spoke before we came here, and we’ll be damned if we give this place up after all we’ve been through. And we’ll be equally damned if we leave Miss Cole to that abomination after all she’s done for us.”
And Messy, she thought as she drifted off, would be damned if she let them leave without her.
“I’ll be there,” she mumbled. She was asleep before Falk was out the door.
When Messy woke the next morning she felt much better. She was ravenous, and desperately thirsty, and she needed to pee something awful, but she felt like she just might be able to get out of bed and deal with all those things.
When she looked in the storefront of the building, everyone else was already awake. Jisha was gone. “She went to the temple,” Rayni said between spoonfuls of the porridge or pottage that everyone was eating. “She said that she needed to ‘talk with the goddess,’ which— honestly, I love the girl, but I couldn’t tell if she meant that she needed to pray or if she meant that literally, the way Ana does.”
“The latter,” Messy said frankly. That—having a closer relationship with Messy’s own patron goddess than Messy herself did—was one of the cornerstones of the jealousy she felt toward the girl. The others were the shared cultural background and the two languages Ana and Jisha had in common that no one outside of the Stolen spoke. It was stupid, and irrational, and absolutely unfair. Messy loved Jisha; loved her for her courage, her kind heart, her optimism and cheerfulness, and for all the bright moments she gave to Ana. She was beyond grateful that her angel had someone she could connect with from her old world. But sometimes, when she heard them laughing and speaking Ingliss or Fransess together and Ana looked at Jisha with the kind of warmth she never gave anyone else but Messy, Messy hated the girl just a little. And she hated herself for it.
It was stupid, and irrational, and absolutely unfair, but jealousy generally was. She was working on it.
In the kitchen, Touanne was hard at work making sure that there was more pottage than they could possibly eat; since, as she put it, she knew that they were all going to be going along with the rescue expedition, no matter what she said. “It’s your feet I’m most worried about,” Touanne said, then asked to see them. “Your soles were raw and bleeding when we got your boots off—which wasn’t easy with all the swelling. You don’t want to know what we washed out of them. But it looks like potion, poultice, magic, and my aura all together have done their work well!”
“And I’m free of those infuriating calluses on my heels,” Messy quipped as she accepted a large near-overflowing bowl from Touanne. “It’s all baby-bottom smooth now.”
Touanne snorted, smiling. “And that, I suppose. Now eat up. You’ll need it.”
The square was full, but not quite as full as Messy had ever seen it. From where she stood on the plinth before the Waystone, it was painfully visible how many they’d lost in the past three months—she didn’t know the exact number, but she’d heard that it might be over a hundred people dead. Maybe as many as ten dozen, counting the traitors and those who lost their lives when the Ascender and his mercenaries attacked.
They could add eight more to that number, she thought somberly. Part, Rill, and whoever else had been in that Party. Rayni’s friends. And all of them combat Classers or mages, the kind of people they desperately needed right now.
Even the presence of all the Stolen couldn’t make up for the lost numbers. Most of them stood in a throng in the corner between the Exchange and the training yard, with only a few standing with new friends and acquaintances among the rest of the crowd. And then there were the mercenaries. The same mercenaries who’d killed so many, first when they broke the prisoners out of the stockade and led them into the forest, and then when they broke back into the outpost to try and leave the Splinter. The five of them stood off to the side, near the scar where Administration had once been, surrounded by volunteer guards and hateful faces.
They looked relaxed and almost entirely unbothered. Whether that was theatrics or confidence in their own abilities, Messy couldn’t say. She locked eyes with Aaspiyah the Iron Warrior, the woman who had nearly killed her and Rayni, and got a scowl and a raised eyebrow in return before looking away.
God, that woman scared Messy. Talleh, the leader, seemed amoral but reasonable. Aaspiyah just came across as unhinged. And she hated that the mage resembled Ana as much as she did. In the dark, when they’d been fighting, Messy hadn’t noticed. Now, the few times she’d seen her, it had been all she could think of.
Karti the Grand Summoner was notably not with them. He was presumably in the cells for the duration of the meeting. Messy didn’t know, and she didn’t care.
There were four of them on the plinth. There was no podium this time. In the center stood the two captains, Pirta and Falk. To their right was Messy. To their left, for some reason Messy had yet to learn, was Jisha, fidgety and finding it hard to look at the crowd.
“People of the Splinter!” Pirta’s voice rang strong and clear across the square. “And guests. It is with deep sadness that we call you here today, on such short notice. I know the rumors going around. One is true. Two are false.” She paused for effect, letting the murmurs of the crowd swell and ebb. “There is a sapient possessed in the forest,” she declared gravely, and the sound of the crowd rose again. “It is not Miss Cole. Nor is Miss Cole dead. We have people here who are in a Party with her and can verify that she is still alive, and not incapacitated.”
The roiling mass of noise that filled the square now was a mix of unintelligible questions, relief, and, to Messy’s fury and disgust, disappointment. How dare they? She knew that some were unhappy with the deal Ana had struck with Talleh and his mercenaries to stop the fighting, but how fucking dare they wish harm on her for that?
She scanned the crowd, trying to see who looked unhappy with the news that Ana was free and alive and doing her best to match names and commit their faces to memory. She doubted most of them would ever act on their idiocy, but they damn well couldn’t be trusted, she knew that for sure.
Pirta waited for some time for the noise to settle; when her patience ran out, she simply raised her voice until it carried above the entire crowd.
“We can confirm, by the observations of six trustworthy guild members in good standing, that the possessed sapient is Rill, a young themion man and a Horde Breaker. That is a melee combat Class focused on mass combat, for those of you who are unfamiliar. He distinguished himself during the campaign against Karti and his cult, and was Level 18 as of his last recorded Summary. The demon should be considered to have an equivalent Level of 50 to 60, though it will fight above its Level considering demons do not feel fear, pain, or fatigue.”
The volume of the noise impossibly rose again, and so did that of Pirta’s voice. It was to the point of being painful now, and Messy wondered how much more she could take. At what point would it count as being in combat? She’d love for Fight Through to kick in so she could ignore the pressure in her ears.
“Mister Rill went out a few days ago along with Part the Bulwark and six others. The returned members of Miss Cole’s Party have confirmed that Part is dead; they destroyed his revenant in a Delve. The rest must be presumed lost as well.”
A piercing wail rose from somewhere in the crowd, cutting through even the noise. A small clump of people formed a tight knot around a woman who fell to her knees, screaming. Messy recognized her face despite it being contorted in horror and grief, but who she was or whom she was grieving, she had no idea.
“The appearance of a sapient revenant means that we have been forced to make a difficult choice. We must either abandon the Splinter, which at this point would mean its complete collapse, or we must unite to destroy the threat. We have chosen the latter. We have fought too damn long and too damn hard to give up now!”
As Pirta spoke, Messy felt her own courage and determination swell. Among the crowd as well, the fear and confusion slowly turned to angry agreement. After all they had done, all they had sacrificed, and all they had lost to preserve this place, there were very few who had any wish to leave.
“We have a plan. It’s simple, but it’s the best we’ve got. Miss Pillay here—” Pirta indicated Jisha with a sweep of her hand, “—has spoken with the Wayfarer. Yes, she can speak directly with the goddess, just as Miss Cole can. No, she is not a second Chosen. The goddess has confirmed that Miss Cole is currently keeping the demon distracted, leading it around the forest. When we are ready, the Wayfarer will ask her Chosen to come to us. And then we will destroy the demon, or die trying.”
“We will prepare to leave as quickly as we can. Anyone with combat experience, anyone who was in the militia, is asked to join no matter their Class. So is anyone with a weapons Skill or who knows at least one Shaping with a combat application, regardless of their experience.
“Those who truly cannot help will remain here, along with Mistress Thair and her circle of mages. Some of you will be asked to join Parties with those who are leaving. Your role will be to determine if the expedition to destroy the demon has failed.”
The noise didn’t stop then, but the volume fell abruptly. There was no one there, save perhaps some of the Stolen, who didn’t understand what Captain Pirta meant. Those selected few would be checking their Party rosters constantly. And the sign that the expedition had failed would be that almost everyone, in all of the Parties, was dead.
“If that happens,” Pirta continued solemnly, lowering her volume to match that of the crowd, “Mistress Thair and her mages will undo the lock on the Waystone. She will force it open, and you will leave, letting the Splinter dissolve behind you. You will not hesitate. That is not only permission. That is an order from your captains. Captain Falk, do you agree?”
“I agree completely,” Falk replied, his voice weary but strong and confident.
“What about the merc bastards?” someone called, loud enough to be heard clearly over the din. “They staying too?”
“No,” Pirta replied, and Messy looked up at her with surprise. “We have enlisted the services of Mister Talleh and his mages. They will be coming with us to slay the demon.”
Messy unconsciously turned to look at the mercenaries. She again found Aaspiyah, and when their eyes met the mage, still scowling, just shrugged as if to say, “a contract’s a contract.”
There were angry mutterings at that, and more questions afterward. There were details to hash out, and preparations to make. You didn’t simply mobilize the outpost with a wave of the hand. But by early afternoon they were ready, and they marched out: just over eighty Bluesky guild members organized into nine Parties, and the half-Party of mercenaries.
“Are you scared?” Messy asked Jisha as they marched side by side through the forest. They were following the same path they’d taken a week before, when the sun had been hot and bright and they’d all been excited.
“Very much,” the girl answered without hesitation.
“Me too,” Messy confessed. “Do you want to turn back?”
“Never.”
“Me neither.”
Afraid and determined, they marched on. They had an angel to rescue, and a demon to slay.
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