A Night In Dusk’s Maw
It was the morning after I had said my vows in the shield hall of the Twilight Gate when I first doubted my decision to join the Asundrian Order. A strange notion, I know. Who ever heard of a doubting Sentinel? After all, there are only two types of people in Asunder: the honorable few with unwavering dedication to the cause, and those who gambled away the prerogative to question their choices; no in-between. In truth, there are probably far more stories like mine – bland, told a thousand times before, overshadowed by more compelling tales of honor, sacrifice, and redemption. I have little of these things to offer, but my recount may have merit for those who follow in my footsteps nonetheless.
It was neither my steadfast conviction that led me here, nor was I desperate to escape my past. This isn’t to say I was not desperate. At seventeen years of age, I had no family left, no talents to speak of, and the village of Pebble was all I had seen of the world. When winter came, work for unskilled urchins like me dwindled. The fields around Pebble didn’t need harvest helpers, the mines became inaccessible by autumn’s end. I had no place to stay and no way to keep myself fed. Another winter on my own might well have led me to an early grave. With no means to relocate to the warmer lands I had often dreamed about, joining the Order seemed like the obvious answer to my troubles. The Sentinels would house, feed, and clothe me. I wouldn’t be kicked to the streets after the season, and instead have a place to call home for good. A strange and dangerous home, yes, but of all the things I was not, I was least a coward. I had nothing to lose and a lot to gain in the perpetual twilight of Asunder. Even if I’d meet an early end there, dying among brothers would be better than dying alone.
The prospect of renouncing my name and cutting all ties with my past didn’t bother me. Neither was worth a whole lot to begin with. Knowing I’d have to endure harsh training didn’t deter me either. It simply struck me as a fair price. And so I paid it. I endured. I said my vows and I meant every word.
The next day, the Sovereign Sentry himself summoned the newly sworn in recruits to the courtyard to announce our assignments. I awaited my orders with mixed feelings. While I had completed the training without incident, my performance had been mediocre at best. During the first week, the master-at-arms had attested me a lack of skill with both blades and bows. Unsurprising, as I had never held either before entering the training yard. The Grand Sentry, who had quizzed us recruits about other skills, hadn’t been impressed with me either. Barely passable literacy, a short list of menial jobs, no experience in a sought after trade. Only one skill stood out. During a brief stint as a scullion I had learned how to properly butcher poultry. I was therefore expecting to be sent to the kitchens.
My predictions for my fellow recruits held true as the Sovereign Sentry began reading out the assignments. Two to the menders, one to the smithy, one to the fishers. I didn’t expect any surprises when there were only three men left – the two rugged, older lads and myself. The poacher would probably be assigned to the trappers, I thought. The Esterferi brigand – easily the most skilled at arms out of everyone – had surely made the cut for the scouts. Lucky bastard. Since nobody had been sent to the kitchens yet, I assumed this would be my lot when the Sovereign Sentry turned his old eyes to us.
There are certainly worse places to be during winter, I reminded myself. If nothing else, it’s better than joining the menders who work outdoors in any weather. It did little to soothe the imminent disappointment. Like every other recruit, I had hoped to join the scouts, the Order’s most prestigious branch. In theory, the men without past were equals, regardless of assignment. In practice, I had certainly taken note of differences. The ‘true sentries’, as some referred to the scouts, were held in higher regard; considered braver, more dedicated, deserving of more respect than others. It was them who ventured into the strange wilderness of Asunder; their reports the Serpentine scholars eagerly read, their legends the sentinels kept alive by the hearth. Nobody told tales about the daily toil of cooks or menders.
I could barely contain my excitement when the Sovereign Sentry announced that all three of the remaining recruits had been assigned to the scouts. After witnessing the Esterferi’s finesse with the sword, I hadn’t considered that my aptitude with blunt weapons – I wasn’t useless with maces, cudgels, or clubs – might be valued. The surprise momentarily left me stumped, but I was brought back to the ground with a jolt. We would not stay at the Twilight Gate, the Sovereign Sentry explained, as Siedem Fort was in dire need of men.
My heart sank when he said it. Why did it have to be the loneliest, most isolated place in the forsaken gloom of Asunder? Why couldn’t it be any of the other strongholds?
Siedem Fort was the Order’s easternmost stronghold, located at the mouth of Dusk’s Maw, surrounded only by the harsh nothingness of the Grey Mountains. It was known to be an incredibly remote and perilous place even though – or perhaps because – there was no unnatural oddity in the region.
Several other strongholds had been built in proximity to eerie locations that the Order’s premier sponsor – the Serpentine Academy – wished to study. In my short time at the Twilight Gate, I had heard about the unsettling phenomena sentinels had to cope with elsewhere. Hollow Grove where the vegetation grew in the shape of man-made structures that had never been there. Distinct gurgling and rushing from an unseen river near Kersoc Keep. Lake Nibo that seemingly extended infinitely beneath its shroud of mist.
An assignment to these haunted places would certainly have filled me with unease, but I’d gladly have taken any of them over Siedem Fort. Not only was it dreadfully isolated from the Order’s other strongholds, the veteran sentinels also referred to it as ‘where brave men go to die’. For good reason. The absence of high strangeness near Siedem Fort resulted in a stronger presence of a more tangible threat: the savage Asundrian tribes. Madmen touched by the twilight; twisted creatures that were often barely recognizable as men anymore, eager to spread their lunacy across the mountains to Cruos, Haum, and their smaller neighbors. While the savagery was not entirely absent from other regions, no stronghold saw more of it than Siedem Fort. Considering my negligible aptitude at arms, of course I’d have preferred misshapen vegetation or inexplicable rushing in the distance.
The notion was shared by my two fellow recruits. However, unlike me, they turned to drastic measures to elude the bloodthirsty tribesmen shortly after. Before our small party departed, the poacher had slipped and broken his leg, and was therefore unable to travel. The Esteferi couldn’t be found anywhere the next day. Nobody had seen him in the barracks, and there were conflicting reports whether he had been on guard duty that night.
The Grand Sentry’s eyes betrayed stoic disappointment when he told me I’d set out for Siedem Fort alone. Few words were exchanged before I departed with a small party, resigned to my fate. Four menders bound for Hollow Grove, a trapper for a newly erected supply depot near the Dusk Spire, one seasoned scout to guide us on the long way.
*
Siedem Fort was everything I had imagined it to be, and the journey had left me much time to imagine. The monotonous grey landscape, interspersed only by wintery forests, didn’t inspire merry thoughts, nor did the taciturn scout who led me through this tristesse. When he spoke at all, he insinuated that I had picked a bad year to join the Order, or mused about absent friends I didn’t know. After presenting me to the Grand Sentry of Siedem Fort, he immediately restocked his rations and was gone the next morning.
The stronghold itself was sad and sullen. However, my welcome was warmer than expected. The sentinels of Siedem Fort were starved for diversions to break their bleak routine. New stories – no matter how mundane – were worth more than gold here, and I had plenty to tell from my childhood in Pebble.
At the Twilight Gate the veterans had felt a constant need to assert themselves. They had belittled the new recruits and kept us at arm’s length, regardless how well we performed our tasks. Siedem Fort was different when it came to that. Grand Sentry Telwen Arun – a tall, burly man twice my age – made that evident on the evening after my arrival. Unlike the Grand Sentry at the Twilight Gate, Telwen didn’t eat in his chambers. He shared a table with his men in the mess hall, and he invited me to join him right away. At the time, it struck me as a welcoming and companionable gesture. Later, I suspected he exercised his prerogative as grand sentry to be the first to listen to those precious new tales. Either way, I soon came to think that this assignment might not be as dreadful as expected.
Although Siedem Fort served a strictly defensive purpose and therefore didn’t receive the same generosity the Serpentine Academy bestowed upon the observation posts, I had little reason to complain. In fact, the solitude and low population brought forth comforts that hadn’t crossed my mind when I first arrived.
The isolation made the men of Siedem Fort more appreciative of their brothers in arms. Quarrels were rare, friendships formed quickly. We all knew it was us against a hostile world of shadows and cold. Then there was the food. Albeit rationed, it was more palatable than anything I had been served in the past weeks. The proximity to the Icevein river translated to a constant influx of fresh fish and crabs whereas the western castles often had to make do with preserves, stored for months in moldy barrels. Last but not least, the undermanned state of Siedem Fort afforded me the luxury of choosing my lodgings. Only two out of the barracks’ five stories were in use, and there were empty beds in most of the chambers.
I moved in with Barys who I had first met at the Grand Sentry’s table. A likable lad, not quite old enough to be my father. In his youth, he had been ‘one handsome devil’ as he put it, and just happened to resemble the esteemed Olfon Irem – a man I had never heard of, but I took Barys’ word for it. The uncanny resemblance opened many purses and doors to the bedchambers of comely maidens, and afforded Barys a comfortable life. Until the day the real Olfon was confronted about his alleged escapades by a furious husband, and the whole act fell apart. Barys’ past as a charming swindler still served him well. With his never-ending wealth of stories, he was the closest thing to a minstrel we had.
Our shared chamber was also home to two more men. Alamor, a former member of the Serpentine Academy who had become well-versed in herbalism during his many years at Siedem Fort, occupied the bed underneath the room’s only window. He still went by the title of ‘adept’ and served as Siedem Fort’s sole archivist. Felbert the Fair could have taken up two beds by himself. He was exceptionally tall and just as fat, but his imposing appearance hid a kind nature. I was surprised to find out that he, too, was a scout. Due to the odd contrast between stature and temper, I would have taken him for a mender, and when he told me about his true passion – cooking – I assumed he worked in the kitchens.
“I used to,” he explained when I inquired. “But the Grand Sentry needed scouts more than he needed cooks. I’m good with a cleaver. It’s not too different from an axe. So I volunteered when the other branches were asked to bolster the ranks of the scouts.”
His docile disposition, as I learned later, was the very reason he had ended up here. Like myself, neither a criminal past nor stalwart dedication to the defense of our respective homelands had led him to Asunder. Felbert had simply been unlucky enough to encounter pranksters who took advantage of his desire to please. A wealthy noble in the Haumian city of Grafen had taken him into service as a cook, but as so many tales that lead to Asunder, there had been no happy ending. Some young servants had convinced Felbert to start off with a big impression, which had resulted in him serving the lady’s favorite peahen – roasted and stuffed – to his employers. Outraged by the new hire’s perceived malice, they had him publicly shamed and chased him across the mountains. With his reputation in shambles and nowhere to go, Felbert had taken his oath at Siedem Fort.
All things considered, I couldn’t complain. On the contrary. I was grateful the Grand Sentry had sent me here. Yes, the weather was harsh and the work was exhausting, but when I sat in the mess hall with my brothers at night, I couldn’t think of a place I’d rather be. Over the coming months, I thought less and less about my youth in Pebble. When people called me by my sworn name, it no longer took me a moment to realize they meant me. The street urchin had become a sentinel of the Asundrian Order, and Siedem Fort had become his true home.
The curiosity my arrival had stirred up soon petered out. My face became familiar, once riveting tales were no longer new, and drab monotony slowly returned to the lonesome seventh stronghold. The daily routine was as demanding as it was dull. At night we played the same dice games and racked our brains to put a new spin on the same trite stories. Grand Sentry Arun still held out hope that the Twilight Gate would send more men, and we all hoped with him – if only for the sake of diversion.
It was not the Sovereign Sentry who answered our prayers, nor were it the gods – serpentine or otherwise. It was Grael, a fur trader from southern Haum. Every few months, he sailed his little barge to our remote home. Along with salt, flour, and wine – which Grael traded for our wolf furs – his visits also brought gossip that took our minds off the dull routine, if only for a short while. This time, however, he brought more than that. A warning Grand Sentry Arun had dreaded for months.
He had seen torches along the banks of the Icevein, Grael told him, and the icy winds had carried whispering voices from Dusk’s Maw. Being no fool, he had steered his barge away from such sightings instead of investigating, but we needed no further description to know what it meant.
Tribesmen. Raiding parties had gathered in Dusk’s Maw for as long as the Asundrian Order existed to slip past the vigilant eyes of the sentinels. Centuries ago, when Asunder had still seemed like a wild land that could be tamed, the raids had been thought to be a response to Haum’s first foray. Back then, the sentinels hadn’t even been sentinels yet, but a scouting force tasked with exploration. Nowadays, it was an accepted fact that the savage tribes didn’t pursue a coherent goal. They did not raid for supplies. They did not attack for vengeance or to fend off what they perceived as invaders. Any attempts at negotiation – and there had been many over the years – had been met with violence; often outrageously disturbing in nature. There was simply no rhyme or reason to their savagery.
It had only been a matter of time before our lookouts would spot them this winter. Storms had severely limited our sight in recent weeks. Most nights, it had been futile to dispatch scouts to the mouth of the Maw as thick fog and heavy snowfall obscured the pass. That Grael had seen signs of savages while we were temporarily blinded was a fortuitous boon – and perhaps our salvation. We’d have time to scout, gauge their numbers, and devise a plan before the raiders knew they had caught our attention.
A party of scouts would follow the Icevein into Dusk’s Maw to assess the situation, Grand Sentry Arun announced after Grael had concluded his report. Despite the dangers, I volunteered for the task right away. To prove myself to my brothers, I said. As the newest and youngest among them, I had to show them what I was made of. The Grand Sentry took me up on my offer. He called my courage and initiative ‘admirable’, but I believe he knew that I was simply excited for my first venture to the shadowy wild lands in the south.
*
“What are you doing here so early in the morning?” I looked up from my backpack when Felbert entered the armory. At this early hour I hadn’t expected to see anyone here, least of all him. The anticipation had woken me before sunrise, and I had quietly snuck out of the barracks to prepare our equipment. “Get back to bed! You’ll be glad for every hour you slept during the night shift.”
“I’m not on night shift.” Felbert stomped the snow off his boots and strode toward the weapon rack on the far wall. “I’m going with you.”
Stumped, I watched him inspect the row of axes and hatchets, and waited to be told that this was a joke. Why would he have asked to join this expedition? The Grand Sentry certainly had no shortage of men this time. Plenty of men had volunteered as most sentinels burned to finally get out of the walls. Felbert, on the other hand, was most comfortable inside the stronghold. At best, he accompanied the woodcutters and the fishermen to nearby groves or the Icevein. And yet he here was, carefully picking a weapon for our foray into Dusk’s Maw. “Why?” I plainly asked after a while. “Did the tedium finally get to you?”
Felbert took an axe from the rack, then turned around to me with a shrug. “Not yet, no. But it would if I stayed here.” He came over to help me with the furs and tents I was about to store in my backpack. “You don’t know true tedium if you’ve never been stuck with Alamor as your only companion.” He rolled his eyes. “Whenever Barys is gone, Alamor thinks he’s the lord of our room and constantly reminds me to be quiet. ‘Shh, I’m reading. Shh, I’m studying this piece of lichen. Shh, I’m observing the changes in this stupid leaf when I sprinkle hot water on it.’ All day long, day in and day out.”
“Ah.” I didn’t get the impression that he told the truth. “You merely chose the lesser of two evils.”
“The savages don’t scare me. Besides, it’s only a scouting mission.” Felbert straightened his back as if he was making an important announcement. “Even if we spot any tribesmen, they won’t dare to come close to our party. Not when Godric Godslayer is with us.”
“Godric will lead the party?” I blurted out. “Isn’t Lynnifer Kohr in charge?”
I had hoped Godric would be the one to lead us, but Grand Sentry Arun had assigned Lynnifer Kohr to the task. Seasoned and rugged as he was, Lynnifer was also a sour braggart who rarely missed a chance to complain about his miserable life. He should have inherited instead of his feeble nephew, he told everyone who would listen. The ‘incident’ – by which he meant being caught smuggling gold and gemstones that didn’t belong to him – hardly proved he was unfit to rule; he only had the prosperity of his island in mind. It was tiresome to listen to his carping again and again, and this prospect had been the one blemish on my excitement.
Godric, on the other hand, was held in high regard by every sentinel at Siedem Fort. It wouldn’t have been an overstatement to call him a ‘living legend’. His reputation wasn’t owed to the three decades he had spent in Asunder alone. He was everything a sentinel aspired to be. Battle-hardened, honorable, jovial, and he had long made peace with these lonely lands – perhaps even before he had taken his oath, some suspected.
All I knew for certain was that he had been even younger than me when he said his vows. Godric rarely spoke about his past. “A noble of some sort”, my brothers in arms said, but if I inquired where he was from, they only shrugged. In theory, it was forbidden to ask about previous lives and names, but the rule often went ignored out here. It stood out that Godric’s past, despite his long years of service, was shrouded in mystery. According to Barys, not even the Grand Sentry knew more than us. Godric had already served at Siedem Fort for a decade when Telwen Arun had come here after the death of his predecessor.
“He did,” Felbert jolted me out of my awe-struck stupor. “I suppose Godric thought you deserve an enjoyable first expedition. Lynnifer wouldn’t make the best impression with his perpetual whining. He’s still coming along, but at least he’ll shut up about ‘his’ island in Godric’s presence.” He shot me the proudest smile I had ever seen and leaned closer as if to reveal a great secret. “Godric himself asked me to join the party. ‘If we finally get a diversion, we can as well pair it with good food’, he said. How could I refuse him?”
This was the moment when the armory’s door swung open and hit the brick wall behind it with a thud. “Where is everyone?” The unabashed voice belonged to Wily Willy, the only other fairly recent arrival besides myself. The lad was not much older than me, but that didn’t deter him from acting like he possessed the wisdom of eons. “Didn’t Arun say we’d leave by first light?” He didn’t wait for an answer and went straight for the weapons rack to inspect the displayed broadswords and polearms.
“In the morning,” I corrected. Willy wasn’t the fastest arrow in the quiver and this was hardly the first time he had misunderstood instructions. “Although I hope we’ll depart sooner rather than later. After being stuck here for months, I’m more than ready to go.”
“Tell me about it.” Willy took a halberd and carefully weighted it in his hands, much to Felbert’s visible irritation. “Came here three months before you, been sitting on my arse the entire time. I didn’t join the Order to twiddle my thumbs.”
Willy hadn’t simply ‘joined’ the Order the way I had. He had ‘escaped’ to the Dusk Spire after a tremendous display of brazen folly. Fancying himself a knight, he had frequented festivals and tourneys all across the northern lands, but he hadn’t been especially knightly in his pursuits. If Barys’ version of events was to be believed, Willy’s final crime had been so stupid that he’d have been made a court jester in Cruos if he hadn’t escaped the royal guards. Not only had he stolen the prized sword of a prince in broad daylight, no, Willy had tried to sell it back to its owner right away.
“What do you want with a halberd?” Felbert, docile as he was, couldn’t help but remark upon Willy’s choice. “It’s only a scouting mission. We’re not taking horses along. Do you really want to carry that cumbersome thing all the way?” He pointedly looked to the bows on the rack. “The Maw is swarming with squirrels and hares, you know?”
Willy wrinkled his nose. “The Vapourian can handle the hunting,” he declared with an air of importance. “But when it comes to defending the camp from wild beasts, I’m the better man.” I didn’t know the Vapourian he referred to very well, but I was quite certain Willy wouldn’t have said this in his presence.
“Take a spare bow for me then.” I nodded to Felbert, then shouldered my backpack and went to the door. “I need to hone my archery skills anyway. Are we ready to go?”
*
On the first day, our march through the snow was as tiresome as it was uneventful, but nobody – except Lynnifer Kohr – seemed to mind. The pale winter sky was visible between the dark, puffy clouds for the first time in weeks. Ugor Tiv Vato, the taciturn Vapourian, had good luck on the hunt and afforded us a plentiful meal of roasted hare. This was an especially welcome change of pace as even the freshest fish tastes trite after a while.
We made good headway toward the Maw, and when night fell, Godric regaled us with his tales by the fire. I admit, I was awe-struck when he spoke of past expeditions and skirmishes with savage tribes on the banks of the Icevein. Later that night, when I sat watch with Willy and his stupid halberd, I imagined myself fighting alongside Godric until we were relieved.
On the second day, the weather worsened and with it Lynnifer’s mood. He had been displeased with losing his position as party leader since our departure, but – as Felbert had predicted – he at least kept quiet about it. Instead, he complained about the biting wind and made snide remarks about Willy’s cumbersome weapon. We ignored it as best as we could, Willy more brazenly than the others. Inspired by one of Barys’ tales, he kept surveying the group about their thoughts on various mundane topics, always pointedly leaving Lynnifer out.
By the time we reached Dusk’s Maw the waves had calmed, thanks to Godric and Barys. They had steered the conversation back to our mission and told us about previous forays into the gloomy pass. After a while, Lynnifer chimed in with his own observations. Although he had clearly woken up on the wrong side of his fur, these were still valuable insights I could learn from.
We made camp in the early hours of the evening. The staggering rock face of the Maw provided some measure of shelter, and Ugor returned with a good yield from the nearby grove. While the others set up our tents, Barys and I scouted the surroundings for signs of tribesmen.
“We’ll probably have to advance into the Maw for another three or four days before we catch a glimpse of any savages,” Godric said when we reported our findings – or lack thereof. “Grael told us he counted five torches. Scouts, most likely. I expect the bulk of the raiders to be hiding in the caverns farther upstream.”
“If they have any wits at all, they’ll stay in there.” Lynnifer wrapped the fur around his shoulders, then sat down by the fire. “There’s a storm coming from the east.” He gave a brief nod to Ugor when he dropped some dead hares next to Felbert’s cooking equipment, then turned back to Godric. “Might be even worse than the storms we had in recent weeks.”
“There are always storms coming, brother,” Godric said with a wry smile. “It has never stopped the savages in the past, and it won’t stop them now. However, a bad storm will slow them down. For the next few days, the worst we’ll have to worry about are wolves and wayward bears.”
As if Willy had only waited to be given a cue, he proudly pointed to his halberd. “Good thing I came prepared!” he proclaimed. “I’ll take the first watch. And I’ll lend the halberd to whoever takes over next. Not much you can do against bears with bows or daggers, but this…”
“You’re dumber than a yard full of fresh snow,” Lynnifer cut him off. “You’ve never even seen a bear. What would you know about fighting such beasts?” He lazily gestured to Felbert’s axe, still sticking in a tree trunk a few steps away. “You want to make yourself useful? Go, cut some wood for the night.”
“You’re of a mood lately.” Barys abandoned his efforts to steady an awning and joined us by the fire. “Who pissed in your ale? We’ve got enough timber to erect a small fortress.”
“Grael did.” Ugor’s grumbled answer trickled into his shaggy, brown beard. “Said something about a storm hitting Nine Anchors. Did some damage to the ports, or so he heard.” He glared at Lynnifer from underneath bushy brows. “He’s been in a sulk ever since Grael mentioned it.”
“Wouldn’t you be upset?” Lynnifer almost shouted. Evidently Ugor had hit the nail on its head. “That incompetent imbecile ruins everything! Had I inherited instead of my brother’s dimwitted son, none of this would have happened! I wouldn’t have to worry about my mother and sisters! But no, that stubborn goat of my father decided a feeble boy is fit to rule and I’m not!”
“Doesn’t every second man in the Straits of the Thousand Kings wear a crown?” Willy shot him a daring grin, and even Ugor – stoic and taciturn as he usually was – chuckled in anticipation of the inevitable remark. “Makes me think it doesn’t take all that much to be fit to rule,” Willy promptly delivered. “And yet you were dismissed in favor of an imbecile child? Makes one wonder…”
“I did what I did for the good of my island,” Lynnifer grunted, struggling to retain his composure. “Everyone bends the rules a bit to that end. Had I succeeded, it would have made a real difference for my people.” He took a deep breath and straightened his posture. “But I’m not deluded enough to think you’d understand. You’re here because you stole a fucking sword. You brought a fucking halberd to-”
“Leave the lad be and remember your vows,” Godric firmly interjected, then paused and regarded Lynnifer for a moment. “We all make mistakes. Even you. You fell into a ditch during your first patrol and Barys and I had to dig you out. It took us the better part of the morning. We never held that clumsy lapse over your head. So shut your trap now and let Willy learn from his mistakes just like you did.”
Tempers calmed down after Godric’s stern reminder, and the conversation moved into a more pleasant direction. Felbert received much praise for his hare stew and even more when he revealed a bag of spices to mull some of our wine.
The night grew colder and darker, but we didn’t mind. We had eaten well, a delicious treat warmed us from the inside, and the stories we shared lifted our spirits. As so often, Barys told the most hilarious tales from his youth. How he eaten a whole roasted duck on a dare during a wedding feast in Denwood. How Duke Getrod had introduced the supposed Olfon Irem to no less than three eligible noble cousins during a tourney. How an insolent minstrel had almost revealed Barys’ disguise, and strangely found himself accused of stealing Lady Rilger’s heirloom necklace just one day later.
Ugor shared an anecdote of his own; something about a shipwreck, a tremendously large grouper, and the strange currents of the Vapours. The spiced wine had gotten to our heads at that point, and I was not the only one who found the tale hard to follow. We laughed anyway, and even Lynnifer laughed with us, the quarrel with Willy seemingly long forgotten. Godric alone didn’t indulge as much as the rest of us. He nursed his wine and declined refills with thanks – an observation I made, but merely duly noted.
“I’m curious…” Willy slurred the words when he leaned forward with an air of importance. “You…” He pointed at Ugor, then immediately pulled his hand back as he had almost held it into the fire. “You found yourself stranded here after a shipwreck, meaning you’re a terrible sailor. You…” The finger wandered to Lynnifer, passed him by, then landed on Barys. “…fooled everyone into thinking you were a noble knight like myself.” He gestured back and forth between Felbert and me. “You roasted some lady’s prized poultry, and you, you’re a fool who came here of your own free will. But you…” His brow furrowed when his glassy stare came to rest on Godric. “I don’t know why you’re here. I know everyone’s crime except yours. What…”
“Crime? I didn’t commit a crime,” Ugor grunted. “The storms steered the ship. There was nothing the navigator could have done.”
Willy ignored the interjection. “What did you do that made you hide here in Asunder?”
“Killed a vestine.”
I almost spit out the wine when I heard Godric’s answer. A man like him couldn’t possibly have done something so heinous! Fierce fights against savages were one thing, but I couldn’t imagine he’d ever lay hands upon a woman – certainly not a divine daughter of Vestos! This had to be a joke. Godric was just pulling Willy’s leg, made an outrageous claim to see the lad stumped. However, nobody was laughing or even smirking when I glanced around. Willy looked just as dumbfounded as I felt, and I saw solemn respect in the eyes of the others. Maybe they had known all along and claimed ignorance to let Godric share his tale with new arrivals on his own terms. Or maybe they were in on the joke.
“You must be jesting!” I finally burst out. “Why in the world would you do such a thing?”
“I didn’t choose the name ‘Godslayer’ for nothing.” The wry smile on Godric’s lips betrayed a lingering sadness, but no regret. “I was young and impulsive, that’s why I did it.” He gestured to Felbert with his mug who scooped mulled wine into it without saying a word. “She was supposed to look after the children when my mother fell ill,” Godric continued. “One day, a few months after her arrival, I caught her doing unspeakable things in my brother’s chambers…” He trailed off and emptied his mug in one go. “I should have told my father and let him handle the situation, but that’s an older and wiser me speaking. Back then, I was fourteen and blind with rage. I grabbed a heavy vase from the mantle and made her stop, simple as that.”
I didn’t know what to say. For months, I had assumed Godric had joined the Order on his own volition because he struck me as the kind of man I had heard so much about in my youth. A born sentinel; honorable and unwavering in his dedication to the defense of civilized lands. His confession initially shocked me, but I could certainly understand his reasons after hearing his tale. As terrible as his crime was, he had done it to protect his brother and I just couldn’t condemn him for that.
Willy was either less shaken or less respectful, or perhaps it was both. “What did your father say when he found out?” he inquired, ignoring Godric’s pensive demeanor. “Did he believe you? And what became of your brother? Did you tell your father what happened?”
“It’s been so long ago.” Godric let out a resigned sigh. “Kin turned into strangers over the years, and I joined the Order. That’s all I can tell you.” He held his mug out to Felbert for another refill. “There are savages on both sides of the border. I suppose that’s the moral of my story, if you were hoping for one.”
Judging by Willy’s inquisitive expression he was not satisfied with this answer. However, before he could pose another question, Godric got up, walked a few steps, and peered into the darkness beyond our camp. “Did you hear that?” He handed his mug back to Felbert, then reached for his axe. “Might be a wolf or even a bear out there. I better take a look, lest the beast bite your drunken arses.”
I held Willy back when he tried to get up. He was swaying to and fro as he was, and since I hadn’t heard a thing I assumed Godric was merely making up an excuse to get out of this conversation. “Let him handle it,” I told Willy, and Barys gave me a silent nod of gratitude. “He’s right. We’re too drunk to take our chances with wild beasts.”
“Stay watchful,” Godric said as he stepped over the fallen trunk he had sat on. “And keep your voices down until I come back.”
*
“I didn’t mean to upset him!” Willy tried to get up again, but the wine made him stumble before he got on his feet. “I didn’t mean to be rude! I swear it by my honor as a knight!”
“It’ll be fine,” Barys said for the third or fourth time since Godric had gone toward the grove. “Godric doesn’t carry grudges, at least not over vanities such as this. He’s had minor disputes with dozens of nosy whippersnapper like you over the years. I was one of them. You can take my word for it when I say it will be fine. Just leave him alone for a bit and all will be forgotten.”
My eyes followed Godric’s trail through the snow, then traced it back to his empty seat by the fire. The mulled wine in his cup had long gone cold, and the supply in Felbert’s kettle was depleted. “He’s been gone for quite a while though,” I said. “Doesn’t that worry you?”
“Perhaps we should go looking for him,” Felbert suggested.
“We certainly shouldn’t.” Lynnifer got up from his seat nonetheless. “Somebody should. If Godric ran into trouble, you greenhorns can’t help him. You can barely see five steps ahead. Seasoned sentries have learned to rely on other senses.” Not even Willy protested. “Barys.” Lynnifer gestured to him over the fire. “You watch these lads, make sure they stay put. Ugor, you’re with me.”
“He probably found tracks of wolves or bears,” Barys said after Lynnifer and Ugor had left. “Nothing a man like him couldn’t handle.” It was meant to sound reassuring, but I heard a hint of doubt in his voice.
“Wouldn’t you have seen it?” Felbert said out loud what I thought. “You scouted that area while we set up the tents.”
“We were looking for signs of enemy presence,” Barys replied, but it still didn’t sound too convincing. “Beasts come and go out here. Some only come out at night. Humans leave traces. Abandoned tools or weapons, remains of camps or fires…” He hesitated. “Ritual sites, or a lack thereof, to determine which kind of savage is out there. Grael couldn’t describe the figures he saw. That’s why Godric sent me out to scout.” Again, he paused and took a deep breath. “I’m well-versed in the bizarre rites of the savages. I can tell which tribe left which marking in the bark or slaughtered an animal in a certain way. We were looking carved symbols or animal entrails arranged on the trees, not for bear tracks.”
“We didn’t find anything though.” I exchanged a quizzical glance with Felbert. Whether Barys told the truth or merely tried to distract us, I couldn’t say, but it had piqued my interest for the moment. “Does that mean there are no tribesmen marching toward Haum?”
“No. It means the Ghenna are coming.” Barys poked our fire with a stick. “A sizable tribe that lives along the eastern tributaries of the Icevein. The only one that doesn’t leave behind any signs. On the bright side, they don’t possess sophisticated weapons. They fight with sharp rocks and whatever they find on the way.” The stick caught fire and Barys tossed it into the flames, then looked around for a replacement. “But where’s a bright side, there’s also a shadow. The Ghenna perform their rites after the battle. It’s not pretty, I can tell you that.”
Willy quizzically regarded him for a while. “What do they do?” he asked when Barys didn’t volunteer more information.
“‘Ghenna’ means something like ‘leech’ in their tongue,” Barys said with a shrug. “After battles, they descend upon the injured and dying to drink the warm blood from their still beating hearts.”
Willy and I cringed, Felbert grimaced and turned his head away. “That’s disgusting,” Willy got out, but he didn’t get further.
“Godric!” Felbert frantically pointed in the southern direction. Our heads spun around. “Where have you been? Where are Lynnifer and Ugor?”
Something struck me as strange about this. Godric’s trail led to the grove east of our camp, and this was where Lynnifer had gone looking for him. South of us lay nothing but darkness, interspersed with outcroppings of snow-covered rocks along the banks of the murky river. Why had he gone there? Why hadn’t we seen him? Why had Felbert only noticed him when he had almost reached our camp? Were our eyes truly this unaccustomed to the night to have missed a man of his size?
Godric didn’t react to Felbert’s exclamation, but he came closer and sat down on his previous spot. His expression was entirely blank when he stared into the fire, axe still in hand.
“Are you alright?” Barys got up and went around Godric, probably to look for signs of injury or traces of a fight. Willy reached for his halberd and stood up as well, peered into the dark distance in search of possible dangers. “Where have you been?” Barys tried again. “What have you found that led you out of the forest?”
Still no reaction from Godric. There was no blood on the blade of his axe, I noticed, and his dagger still stuck in the tree trunk where he had left it after our meal. Nothing stood out about his attire either. His cloak wasn’t torn, his vambraces and gloves were intact.
Felbert exchanged a bewildered glance with me, then he leaned forward and picked up the mug of mulled wine. “Here. It’s cold now, but the flavor hasn’t faded.” He held it under Godric’s nose. It felt like an eternity until Godric reacted, but he did lift his arm and took the mug after a while. Then he just sat there again, silent, frozen in motion, making no move to drink the wine.
“He doesn’t appear to be injured,” Barys concluded his inspection. There was no resistance when he took the axe from Godric’s hand and put it aside. “Maybe Felbert is right.” Barys sat back down, evidently uncertain what to make of the situation. “Take a sip. Then tell us what happened.”
To our relief, Godric reacted this time. He slowly brought the mug to his lips, drank a sip, then lowered his hand again just as slowly. At no point did he take his eyes off the fire, but to me it seemed as if he wasn’t really looking at it. He looked through it, through me, through the Maw’s staggering rock face behind me, into some unknowable darkness far beyond Siedem Fort. For a moment I thought his eyes didn’t reflect the flickering fire, and I couldn’t entirely dismiss it as a trick of the light.
“Maybe they have an explanation.” All eyes followed Willy’s pointing halberd to the south. Lynnifer and Ugor had emerged from the fog, and they hastened their steps when they saw that Godric was with us. To my great relief, they were talking to one another, although they were too far to understand what was said.
“Didn’t find anything that could have made noises in the grove.” Lynnifer sheathed his blade and rubbed his hands above the fire. Ugor sat back down on his tree trunk and looked around for his mug. “I take it you didn’t either?”
“Something’s wrong with him,” Felbert answered instead of Godric. “He’s not talking. Hasn’t said a word since he came back.”
“He wasn’t in the forest either,” Barys added, more composed. “Maybe that’s where he initially went, but he approached the camp from the south.”
Lynnifer turned around and peered into the darkness with a doubtful expression. “Are you sure?” He studied Godric for a moment, then looked back to Barys. “There’s nothing south of us for miles, not even trees, and the fog isn’t as thick as it is near the forest. He’d have stood out like a sore thumb against the snow.” He went closer to Godric and leaned down to him, but paused when he noticed the apathy in his eyes. “Godric? Where did you go?” Once again, there was no reaction. Bewildered, Lynnifer stepped over the trunk and knelt down next to Godric, then waved his hand between his empty eyes and the fire. “Talk to me, brother. What’s out there? Are we in danger?”
“If he won’t tell us, we should take a look ourselves.” Barys beckoned Ugor – who had just found his mug – to get up again. “We’ll follow his tracks and see what’s there.” He nodded to Lynnifer. “Maybe you’ll have more luck waking him from his stupor.”
In their absence, Godric didn’t say a word, and there was no change to his strange demeanor either. We tried everything we could think of, but he neither reacted to Willy’s apologies nor answered Lynnifer’s questions. The most disconcerting part, however, was the mug. Godric kept drinking from it even when there was no wine left in it. Our kettle was empty, therefore Felbert tried to pour him some ale. Just when he held the waterskin above the mug, Godric lifted it to his lips as if he hadn’t noticed what Felbert was doing. Being the bear of a man he was, Felbert was hard to ignore, yet Godric seemed to simply not see him. Like a puppet, it struck me, and the thought made me shudder. He moves when an unseen puppeteer pulls his strings, not when it would be appropriate for any given situation.
“Have you found anything?” I almost stumbled on my words when Ugor and Barys returned from the windswept field of white. They were easy to see against the snow indeed, I realized in the back of my mind, even though they were farther away than Godric when we had spotted him. Still, they were close enough to have heard my urgent question and undecidedly shook their heads in response. Once they reached us, they seemed even more confused than before.
“Nothing at all,” Barys said with a shrug. “The tracks, they just end in the middle of nowhere. We’ve passed through this area many times in the past, and it looks just the way it always does. Nothing but snow and a few rock outcroppings, the tallest barely reaching my knees. Not even a wolf pup could hide behind it.”
“It’s possible the wind covered the tracks,” Ugor added. “But if so, it must have been an impossibly precise gust. Here, the tracks are easy to see.” His foot scraped a line into the snow next to our fire, then abruptly stopped. “There, only one step farther, the snow is untouched.”
Lynnifer thought about the report for a moment and appraisingly regarded Godric from the side, watched him drink from his empty mug. “It just doesn’t make any sense,” he finally muttered. “Sit down, sit down…” He absently gestured to Barys and Ugor, then straightened his back to compose himself. “We’ve done all we can for now,” Lynnifer said, addressing us all. “The storm renders our torches useless, and I’m not going to send anyone out into the darkness tonight. We’ll conduct a more thorough search tomorrow. And we’ll all go together. Nobody is going to leave the camp until I say so, understood?”
Felbert and I were assigned for the first watch. While the others were sleeping, we sat by the fire and kept our eyes and ears open. Under normal circumstances we’d have chatted, but nothing was normal about this night in the Maw. Some strange, unknown danger lurked out there, and across from us sat Godric like a frozen corpse.
We only saw him move once, very briefly, when he adjusted his hood. Lynnifer had taken the empty mug from his hand, and ever since Godric had stopped pretending to drink. I couldn’t say whether this was better or worse. Moving his arm every now and then had at least proven that he wasn’t dead. Now he sat there like a statue, and only the small clouds when he exhaled let us know he was still alive. And yet it was impossible to ignore his presence. Although he was as silent as a grave and paid us no attention, he made me uneasy. It felt as if someone – or something – was watching us through his eyes, listened to our conversations through his ears, lay in wait for us out there in the darkness.
Shortly before Willy and Barys took over for the second watch, Godric’s chin dropped to his chest, and we heard a muffled, sonorous snoring. At first, the sound startled us, but once we realized where it came from, the unease and sensation of being observed faded. Maybe, I told myself, Godric only needed a good night’s rest, and everything would be well in the morning.
Sleep didn’t come easily that night. The tent lessened the cold, but not the chill to my bones. Again and again, Godric drank from his empty mug before my inner eye. Again and again, previous conversations played out in my mind. Are you sure? He’d have stood out like a sore thumb against the snow. Nothing at all. The tracks simply end in the middle of nowhere. Talk to me, brother. What did you find? At some point, exhaustion claimed me, but I can’t have slept for more than an hour or two. Even in my dream, Godric kept staring into an unknowable distance, and something stared back through his empty eyes.
*
A weak, pale sun peeked through grey clouds when I crawled out of the tent, shrouded the Maw in a murky twilight. This was as bright as it ever got out here. Except for the somewhat improved sight, little had changed though. Somebody had put a wolf furs around Godric’s shoulders, but his eyes were open again and he had resumed his previous posture. Awake, alive, present, and at the same time so far away. Felbert was stirring some a stew in his pot, Ugor and Lynnifer quietly sat by the fire, Barys and Willy tried to restore a tent that had collapsed in the night.
When we gathered around the fire, my desperate hope that Godric would wake from his stupor after some rest was briefly reignited. He took the bowl Felbert handed to him, and he slowly shoveled the stew into his mouth. Spurred by this, we tried to talk to him again, asked him questions, but we had hoped in vain. Had Willy not taken the empty bowl from his hand, I’m certain Godric would have kept eating from it, just like he had kept drinking the wine.
After we had eaten our fill, we went to the spot where the tracks had suddenly ended. Barys’ description couldn’t have been more accurate. It was the middle of nowhere; a vast white plane scattered with rocks, and in the distance the icy river gurgled. No hiding spots for tribesmen or beasts, no caverns or ditches or trees. We painstakingly freed the outcroppings from the snow, only to find unremarkable rocks. Barys asked Godric to retrace his steps or show us which direction he had come from on his way back to the camp. Yet Godric just stood there and stared into the distance as if he wasn’t even aware of our presence.
“It appears the answers we seek lie ahead,” Lynnifer said after Barys’ attempt to coax a reaction out of Godric had failed once again. “He can’t possibly have crossed the river, nor could he have climbed the steep cliffs. The only logical explanation is that he ventured deeper into the Maw than we assumed.”
“I doubt that.” Barys shot him a skeptical glance. “He was gone for quite a long time, but he also walked back to the camp from wherever he was. If it wasn’t for the tracks, I wouldn’t even believe he went as far as he did.”
“Maybe he was running,” Willy muttered, but even a greenhorn like me knew that this was absurd. Godric had shown no signs of exertion, and surely seasoned trackers like Barys and Ugor would have been able to tell.
“Then what do you suggest?” Lynnifer stepped in front of Barys as if to challenge him. “Keep walking in circles until Godric deigns to speak to us? Turn around, head back to Siedem Fort?”
“The latter,” Barys sharply replied. “Whatever befell him, it was not done to him by the Ghenna. Nor do men simply start acting like…” He trailed off and shot a distraught look to Godric. “…that for no reason. We need to report back to the Grand Sentry, tell him there is another danger out here.”
“You forget that we still have a task to complete.” Lynnifer crossed his arms. “The Ghenna may not be responsible for his behavior, but they are a threat – the one we were sent to assess. I say we go ahead and carry out our orders.” He gave a vague nod in Godric’s direction. “Maybe he’ll come to his senses as suddenly as he lost them. Or we find the cause on the way, as I suspect we will.”
“What if…” Felbert uncertainly looked around. “What if we find it and all become like him?” His voice trembled, and I understood why all too well. The same terrifying thought had occupied my mind ever since we had resumed our investigation. “Who will tell Grand Sentry Arun about it if none of us speaks? How would we even get back to Siedem Fort?”
“Precisely!” Barys crossed his arms, still glaring at Lynnifer. “What if none of us makes it back? Arun will send search parties and unwittingly put others at risk.” He gave an appreciative nod to Felbert, then turned back to Lynnifer. “No, we need to report what happened to Arun – and Alamor. If there is a mundane explanation for Godric’s behavior, Alamor will know what to do. He still has ties to the Serpentine Academy, if all else fails.”
Thankfully, Lynnifer saw reason for once and didn’t argue further with Barys. We returned to our camp and gathered our supplies, then began the march back to Siedem Fort.
The weather was milder than the day before, and we kept up a brisk pace, yet the way seemed much longer to me. We barely spoke, as if we were afraid of breaking the strange silence. A few times, Barys tried to strike up a conversation, to little avail. As much as I craved a diversion, I simply couldn’t take my thoughts off Godric. When he walked next to me, I saw him stop unprompted, stare into the distance, and only move again when Ugor or Lynnifer gave him a nudge. When he walked ahead of me, my eyes couldn’t stop searching the invisible strings that kept his lethargic limbs in motion. The most dreadful sensation, however, overcame me when he walked behind me and I felt his empty stare against my back. Although I was armed – and thanks to Ugor, Godric was not – I felt like prey prancing about right in front of its hunter.
*
Alamor tried every trick described in his tomes. Compresses of lichen. Concoctions brewed from mushrooms, herbs, and the bark of certain trees. He made Godric inhale the smoke of incense, fed him all sorts of medicinal broths. He ordered hot baths, rubbed oils and ointments onto his temples, applied leeches to drain the haze from his thoughts. All to no avail. When Alamor reached his wit’s end, Godric’s disconcerting state hadn’t changed.
Grand Sentry Arun listened to our reports again and again. He asked all of us questions, rephrased them, challenged us to think things through again from yet another different perspective. What, exactly, had Godric said before leaving? Were we certain that we hadn’t heard any noises? Was it possible that he had touched something poisonous in the grove; something Alamor might not be familiar with? When we traced his steps into the Maw, was there no spark of recognition in his eyes? Did he not glance or turn his head in another direction when asked where he had been? We answered, again and again, but there were no new insights to be found in our recollection.
The Ghenna came three weeks later. They were as fearsome as Barys had said, but we stood our ground and sent them back to their gloomy wildlands. My first battle, my first triumph, but it felt hollow to me. Even when my hammer split the skull of a Ghenna, my thoughts were with Godric. At times, amidst the battle, I looked around for empty eyes in those painted faces. The savages had passed through the same area. Maybe they had encountered the same unseen terror, and maybe, just maybe, they knew more than we did. Yet wherever I looked, the eyes of my foes were wild and lively and sparkling with thirst for blood.
Other tribes challenged us in the same winter, and many more came in the following years. We stood against the Nightborn; fierce half-giants clad in fish skin attire, their faces obscured by strange, eyeless masks. We drove back the Grige; collectors of teeth, ears, and fingers, and the Wailing Men who hurled incomprehensible curses and the shrunken heads of their captives at us. Twice, we even engaged the Ibin, the most remote of the eastern clans; grotesquely scarred warriors who branded their bodies with markings to ward off the wrath of insidious gods. We, the sentinels of Siedem Fort, guarded the lands of dawn against each onslaught from their strange dusky world. We fought and died with honor; some with more, others with less, but in the end we all did our duty.
Nobody spoke much about what had happened that night in Dusk’s Maw. If new recruits came to Siedem Fort, it often took months before somebody told them our story. It was rarely one of the scouts who had lived through it. In this uneasy silence, the party slowly drifted apart. My brothers became strangers over the years; just another few sullen faces in the yard.
Ugor never spoke much in the first place. He kept to himself as usual and carried out his orders without question. Men who had known him longer than me said he became crankier, that his mind had been warped. During shifts he wouldn’t speak for hours and act like he was alone on his guard post, then mutter clandestine warnings to an empty spot by the fire. Four years after our return from the Maw, a bear mauled him near the Icevein. Nobody was too familiar with the customs of his people, or knew how to perform the Vapourian last rites. We therefore gave his body – or what was left of it – to the icy waters of the sea. I hope he found peace among his long drowned brethren.
Our big-mouth, Wily Willy, became more withdrawn. At first, he came to me often, and we spent many nights by the hearth, trying to make sense of what had happened to Godric. Willy never said it out loud, but I knew he felt guilty. It had been his prying that had made Godric leave the camp, and no matter how often I implied that it wasn’t his fault, Willy wouldn’t let himself live it down. After a year of frequent visits and shared watch shifts, he stopped seeking me out. Instead, he mingled with a group of newly arrived recruits. Perhaps new faces would bring enough distractions to unburden his heart, I thought, so I let him be and forge his new friendships. His duty ended sixteen years ago, during a skirmish two days south of Siedem Fort, when he sacrificed himself to allow his party to escape a band of Grige raiders. He may never have been a real knight as he always claimed, but he sure died like one, and that should be commended.
Lynnifer said it was best to let bygones be bygones. He seemed the least troubled by the events or Godric’s unsettling behavior. Although Lynnifer didn’t volunteer for expeditions to the Maw, he went without protest or hesitation when he was sent there. Even when we were assigned to the same party, the subject of Godric never came up. Instead, Lynnifer kept ranting about his brother’s bad choices and the woeful state of affairs at Nine Anchors as if nothing had happened. It must have been nine or ten years ago when he requested to be reassigned to Firwald Keep. I don’t know what prompted it, only that Grand Sentry Arun gave his permission. Lynnifer left Siedem Fort in the coming spring, and I have not heard from him ever since.
Barys escaped into merrier tales from his past, ever more distant to the shell of a man he had become. When he told his stories, the brothers still cheered and guffawed, but when I looked closely, I couldn’t help but notice that the passion, the fire, the laughter in Barys’ eyes was no longer there. Still, when I sat with him in the mess hall, surrounded by brothers, I was sometimes able to forget the lingering sorrows. His passing was the hardest on me. A sentinel’s life is demanding and filled with peril, I know that, but Barys’ death came unexpected nonetheless. It wasn’t one of the savages he had studied that got him in the end. During an expedition to Viltin Lake, an avalanche buried him and his party. Felbert, due to his sheer size – and padding – was the only one found alive when rescue arrived.
Felbert, the poor gentle giant. He lost an arm to frostbite after days under the snow. As gruesome as the injury was, maybe it was a blessing in disguise. Despite all the hurdles and hardships life had thrown in his way, he finally found a place to pursue his true passion. Grand Sentry Arun reassigned him, and Felbert now works in the kitchen. Some days he even seems happy between his pots, pans, and kettles. Other days, he can’t hide the sadness in his eyes. He claims to have lost his memory when the avalanche hit him, but I believe he remembers all too well. When Godric wouldn’t leave his chamber for weeks at a time, it was Felbert who brought him soups and stews and sat by his bedside.
Felbert’s reassignment was Telwen Arun’s last decision as Grand Sentry of Siedem Fort. After thirty-two years of good service to the Order, he passed away in his sleep at the ripe age of seventy-three. Shortly after, a sealed scroll from the Twilight Gate named me his successor, and I accepted the appointment with a heavy heart. Maybe I should have stayed in Pebble and taken my chances with the beast of winter, I thought. Maybe I’d have been spared from such sorrow if I had never found and lost kinship, a sense of belonging, in the dusk of Asunder. But there was no point in mourning choices I hadn’t made years ago. Yes, I could have declined the office, but I didn’t. I had chosen the Order, and I stood by it.
What became of Godric Godslayer, you might wonder. What happened to him that night in the Maw? I wish I could tell you. Alamor kept trying to find a cure for as long as he lived. He wrote a letter to the Serpentine Academy, asking his former peers for consultation, but no response ever came. I suppose in their eyes, strangely shaped vines and unseen rivers held more compelling insights than an old man who wouldn’t speak. At one point, Grael accompanied a proper Haumian healer to us, but although the man struck me as competent, he couldn’t help. Short summers and long winters went by; sentinels ventured into the Maw and returned without answers.
Godric stared into the distance year in and year out, a silent witness to the passing of seasons. Some days he ate, even followed simple instructions. Swept the yard or the mess hall. Stoically stood atop the battlements, not moving an inch all through his watch shift. At times he was found roaming the hallways as if looking for something, and there was often no explanation for how he got to where he was found. Old habits, I told myself. Siedem Fort had been his home for so long, of course he knows every nook and cranny. Every winter, there were reports of him standing in the courtyard at night; motionless, staring up into the flurry of snow for hours. I only witnessed it myself twice, and in those nights it felt as if the winter sky had a thousand eyes.
As he grew older, Godric rarely left his small chamber in the western tower anymore. I had him moved there. For his comfort, and as not to disturb the sentinels housed in the barracks. I did not assign a servant to him. Instead, I myself visited him whenever my duties permitted. Spoke to him about the goings-on at Siedem Fort, although I had long accepted that he didn’t hear me. Brought him food and ale from the kitchen, but I never stuck around long enough to see him drink from an empty mug.
Last night Godric passed away, and with him died any hope of finding answers. It was the strangest sensation that woke me at night and made me walk to his chambers. Only when I looked down into the wide, empty eyes of his corpse, I understood that I had become keenly aware of the absence of a sensation. For the first time since our party had returned from the Maw so long ago, I didn’t feel watched, didn’t sense a strange presence far behind Godric’s eyes. Whatever had possessed him had finally left his body, but I knew it would forever cast its shadow over me.
The pyre has been prepared in the courtyard. By nightfall, we will give his ashes to the wind and let it carry them back to whichever lands he hailed from. One day soon, Godric Godslayer will be forgotten by his brothers. I’ll be the only one left who remembers that fateful night; that something beyond our comprehension is out there. Life will go on at Siedem Fort. Savage raiders will come and go as they always have, and I will pray to every god I know whenever I must send my valiant sentinels into Dusk’s Maw.