u/yayayokeh

Trake

Trake stepped on the wood crate and lifted himself over the ledge of the brick wall.

Barks were echoing in the narrow alley as two boys teased the dog, keeping its meal of a dead frog just out of its reach. “Shut that fucking dog up.” A drunk shuffled out of an abandoned room and yelled through missing teeth, rags for cloths draped over his boney frame. One boot. The other foot was a mix of blackened skin accented with purple and red blotches that crawled up his leg. He yelled in the wrong direction, corrected, but the boys were already running away, laughing. The drunk turned and met Trake’s eyes as he turned to go back into his hole. He missed his target and walked into the wall, swore at it like it assaulted him, readjusted and disappeared into the dark.

Trake carried on, stepping through puddles on the cobblestone, around a makeshift table and chairs, towards the brothel. A woman was sitting on a stone step, “Got any food? Help me out eh.” Trake kept walking. She cursed at him with a quietly with a shaking voice. He avoided meeting her eyes. It was easier that way. He didn’t have food anyway, and when he had it, he wouldn’t give it to her anyway. Avoid the eyes and she remained a ghost.

Ahead, two men were arguing over a cart, one of them with a hand resting on the wheel and the other with a hand on the other man's collar. Neither sounded like they expected to win A third man was watching from a doorway with his arms folded, waiting to see how it resolved, smoke drifting upward from his pipe.

Trake reached the brothel wall and looked up trying to decide if the climb was worth the effort. It probably wasn’t, but the rooftop offered a good vantage point. The stone was slick with runoff and grease. He hadn’t eaten since yesterday and was beginning to feel the familiar shake in his limbs. It had to be addressed. The life of a street boy was mostly trying not to die, which you had to eat to do.

Fuck it he thought. He watched the man in the doorway turn back into his room and he began to climb.

Something smeared against his palm as he began, cold and wet. He didn’t stop to look. Some things were better left unexamined, especially the stains of a brothel wall. He worked his way up, fingers curling into slick divots in the stone, boots following. He moved slowly, testing each hold before committing his weight.

An open window exhaled a blend of old sweat, fish, and heavy floral oils—the reek of a gutter trying to pass itself off as a palace. It sank into his lungs like smoke from an oil lamp, catching in his throat and lingering. He heard a man yelling at a girl. She yelled back, high pitched and loud. His cock wasn’t working apparently. A slap rang out soon after, followed by a chorus of insults, fuck yous, you’re a fat bastard, and finally, it’s not my fault your mouth smells of the latrine you bitch.

Never make a fat man feel bad about himself Trake thought. Like bloated corpses in summer, touch them wrong and something ugly always spills out.

Trake’s foot slipped.

Not a fall. Just a sudden tug of gravity at his spine. He froze, his limbs flexing into a knot of shaking muscle. His fingers bent, clawing into the stone until the tips went white as he hung there. He was lucky he didn’t fall. But then you don’t survive this long on the street without a little luck.

In this gutter, a slip could mean a scrape. A scrape could fester. A festering wound was a slow, rotting walk to the communal pyre. In the filth-choked arteries of the city there was nothing to justify the struggle, no honor to be won, even so, he did it. There was no time for the theater. No time for dinner with friends at the market, no time for lessons at school. The only lessons that mattered were learned from the mistakes that didn’t kill you. Trake kept climbing. Kept moving. Kept surviving. Not because he was brave but because there was nothing else to do, and besides, a slip would be quick. Starving is slow.

His hand reached the top and he slid over the edge onto the roof and rested on all four limbs. The two boys from earlier were running below, the smack of their feet on the stone disappearing into the alley. “Find yer own damn food you witch,” one of them yelled. The other laughed.

Trake set his feet in two voids left empty from broken clay tiles and looked over the market as he caught his breathe.

I fucking hate the market.

It sat in the city square leaking bodies into the space like a drain until the air was thick enough to chew. The noises blended into a singular offensive thrum.

Trake watched the commotion below. Pilgrims with blistered feet pressed against prostitutes. Men selling relics argued with men selling forgiveness. Preachers shouting over miracle-seekers, all of them selling lies.

One of the prostitutes, dressed in ragged lace drifted toward a merchant. He might have pushed her away if he’d been sure she wouldn’t soil his silks. The man shrank back as if she carried the plague, which she probably did. It was free Afterall. Amongst the few things available to rich or poor.

His vantage offered a view of the entire market. More importantly, he could see the guards. He tracked their repetitive loops through the crowd. On a good day, you got the lazy bastards. On a bad day, the evil ones. Today, three patrols circled the crowd, each one frowning as they walked.

Am embellished laugh rang out from a balcony. A group of wealthy pricks ate on a balcony like it was a performance. A bite here. A taste there. Spiced meat sizzling. Citrus split open. Wine spilling over cups that never seemed to empty. He couldn’t tell if it made him more hungry or if it made him want to retch what little bile he had left. In the end it made his stomach growl.

There was a bread stand tucked into a corner, far enough from the guards’ paths to be ignored. It would have to do. A man in simple wools was smiling as he calmly spoke to the vendor, out of place in the chaos. He would be a distraction at least.

For a moment he just sat there regretting the climb. He had to go down. Should have though about that before. He could let the hunger win, fall asleep on the roof and not be found until the smell got bad enough. He pushed to the ledge anyway.

His limbs shook as he climbed down, his ragged breath battling the fatigue. He gathered himself once more and peered out from the alley, sitting on his heels as damp cobblestones soaked through the thin leather of his boots. The cold worked its way in, as it always did.

He needed new boots.

Not easy to come by. You had to be first to the body and they had to fit. He could steal a pair from another boy but that meant a knife in the back, which was always a possibility anyway. He could enlist. They gave you boots in the army. They also put you somewhere people were trying to kill you, which was the same problem he had now except bigger blades.

Trake looked down at his feet. He would probably just keep these a little longer.

It could get sorted after he ate.

Shuffling on the cobble behind him brought two hollow-eyed boys out of the gloom to join him, survivors by accident, mostly.

They clung to the shadow of the alley.

“Alright, Trake,” the short one said, his voice breaking. A large scar ran down the side of his head. Proof he’d been lucky more than once.

The tall one gave a sharp nod and sniffed, whipping snot across his face with his hand. He looked like most kids Trake knew, skinny, with bulging dead eyes that looked too big for his bony face. His pants were too short and his shirt too big, both likely taken from a corpse or thrown away in some gutter. A satchel of sorts was draped over his shoulder. Its was embellished with lace around the edges and had a little bow on the clasp that looked like it may have been bright red at some point. It didn’t match the filth. He kept a hand around the strap as he stood.

“What’re you doing here?” the tall one asked.

Trake looked from they boys faces to their feet. Their boots were too small. That annoyed him for some reason. He turned back toward the market and watched a holy man howl a prayer over another man, who would surely be miraculously healed at any moment.

“Came for the atmosphere,” he muttered, letting the sarcasm hang in the air.

They just stared, the jab sailing clean over their heads. The tall one wiped more snot across his face and adjusted his satchel.

Trake sighed. “What do you think I’m here for? Fuck off before you bring the attention of the guards.”

The tall boy shifted his weight, bulging eyes focused on nothing. The short one looked confused.

“You seen Rell?” the short one asked. There was an inflection of hope attached to the question.

Trake didn’t answer right away. There was a rhythm to these things. A grim ceremony. He knew where Rell was. He knew what had happened to him. Rell wasn’t living in the royal palace sharing gossip with the nobility.

In this city, when a boy vanished, one of two things happened.

They were dead, like Rell, or taken.

Taken meant sold to a rich bastard who’d eaten, drank, and fucked his way through life until only the things he wasn’t meant to touch excited him.

There was no point lying.

“Guards,” Trake said. The word landed with the finality of a coffin lid.

“Gone then… eh,” the small one whispered, still staring at nothing. Reciting the words as if they weren’t his own. He lowered his head and itched at the back of his neck.

“Ya,” Trake kept his eyes towards the market, “He’s fucking gone.”

One of the boys shifted, his foot shuffling on the cold stone. Trake just ignored them until they folded back into the shadows. Better to say the truth and move on in his experience. They were just words anyway. Rell was gone and now they knew. He almost felt bad.

Trake stood and worked a cramp out of his cold foot, looking back to where the boys were. No point giving the poor bastards hope. It would just weigh them down and they had enough to worry about. He looked at his boots again. He had once hoped for a good pair. A week later his friend died and he took his.

The little dog ran to the edge of the alley and stopped, panting from the day’s activities, briefly starred out into the market and ran back into the darkness, soft clicks of his paws disappearing with him. Little prick had enough energy. Trake wondered if he was too picky. Easy enough to find a frog after all.

He could smell the bread though and it smelled better than a frog. Never smelled a frog though. He could be wrong. He looked back to the bread stand.

Trake waited until the time was right and then drifted into the flow of the crowd, just another shadow in a city of ghosts. The bread stand passed on his left. He didn't break his stride. His hand dipped, a practiced, invisible motion as he pushed it into his sleeve. A sudden, warm weight pressed into his arm, the heat of the crust lingered on his fingers.

“Hey—”

A hand grabbed his shoulder.

Trake twisted, shrugged, and rolled out of it in one smooth motion, already moving before the shout finished forming, ducking fast, shouldered through a pair of arguing men, and ran.

Legs burned as he ran through a fog of his own breath. The market dragged at him, a shifting mass of bodies, livestock, and carts closing in. An elbow slammed into his ribs. A shoulder checked him sideways. Someone’s fingers caught his sleeve and tore cloth before he ripped free, but the bread was still there.

A woman holding a child stepped aside, her head following him as he passed by.

A narrow gap opened ahead between leaning tenements. Trake pivoted, veering into the dark where the air was even colder, and ran.

A sharp turn rushed to meet him. His boots skidding, finding balance by some miracle of instinct, turning another corner only to find the alley ended with a bone-jarring thud.

He looked around at a brick wall, the only sound his heavy breaths. Trash. Piss-soaked corners. Grease that was smeared into the stones. Could have been blood. Hard to tell. Two pigeons landed on the stones edge above him, exchanging coos and they shuffled from side to side.

A dead end. Trake was stuck in a steaming pile of shit with no way out. Smelled like shit, too. His mother always said you could find poetry in any situation if you looked. She died from the drink, though. Hard to find the poetry in that.

Trake turned, back to the wall, and simply waited. A strange sort of calm settled over him, the hollow peace of a man who knows when he’s fucked. A drip of water landed on his neck, sending a chill down his spine. He wiped it away, looking up to see where it came from, followed another drips path and adjusted to avoid it.

Two guards arrived. The heavy, rhythmic crunch of their boots on the stone like the ticking of a clock. They weren’t in a rush. Trake couldn’t go anywhere anyway.

“Well, well, well,” one of them said. “How the hell did you find yourself here?”

“Lost, are you, boy?” the skinny one said, red-faced and grinning a yellow set of half missing teeth. This one liked the drink. His boots were the right size though.

“A street boy,” the first one said. “Lost. In the streets no less.” He spread his arms wide, turning from side to side, almost looking offended. “Ironic, idn’t it?”

An ugly bastard with a flat nose, broken from too many punches to the head. He folded his arms and grinned. More teeth but the same yellow.

“Ain’t how you use that word,” the skinny one said flatly

The flat nose one took a step sideways put his hand on his hip, glaring at the skinny one with a furled brow, “it is.”

“It aint.” The skinny one said louder this time.

Flat nose threw his hand up, “what the right way then?”

“Like when you need somthin and then it appears ain’ it?

Flat nose grunted and looked off into the distance, contemplating the explanation. He began nodding his head slowly. “Ain’t that what happened?” he said softly to himself.

The skinny one watched him, slowly shaking his head, “Nah. This is different. This is where he lives but he don’t know where he is goin.”

Trake took a bit of his bread as the two contemplated a word. The pigeons fluttered away above, moving to a higher perch. The bread was still warm. Fresh.

“Shut the fuck up and grab him you idiots!” the yell reverberated the walls. A fat man with a well-trimmed beard and a clean uniform strolled into the alley. The other two flinched and stood straighter.

“Don’t hurt him though,” he said. “Ya get more coin without bruises.” He looked Trake over. Slow. Like he was deciding where to cut.

“Right,” the ugly one said.

Something bounced off the fat one’s back. A ricochet of grime landed on the side of his face. He didn’t react at first, his eyes staying on Trake. Eventually he wiped it off slowly and looked at his finger with a scowl.

Behind the guards stood the two street boys from earlier, hurling trash, trying to distract the guards. It didn’t work. They tried though. It made him wish he’d said something pretty about Rell. Could have lied and told them he’d been taken in by a nice family.

The other two guards did their best not to laugh. The fat one feinted he was going to chase them and they scurried off.

A thin smile crept at Trake’s lips.

The fat guard’s smile vanished as he looked at Trake. The bloated corpse tore off his helmet and hurled it, missing Trake’s face at the last second. The helmet slammed into the wall beside him with a vicious crack, iron shrieking against stone. It bounced once, clattered, and came to rest. The sound ran down the alley and died.

The guards frowned at one another, each waiting for someone else to explain it.

After a beat, the skinny one shifted his weight. “Thought we was avoiding bruises,”

“Piss off and grab him.” The big one said as he rubbed more grime from his cheek.

Tap.

Tap.

Behind the guards stood a man in simple clothes, a staff resting lightly in his hands.

The three guards turned in unison.

“If you’ve got coin, you can have him. Otherwise, fuck off,” the fat one said.

The man smiled, not wide, not fake. Just pleasant. He rested his hands atop the staff and tapped his foot softly.

Tap.

Tap.

“No,” the man said. “I don’t think I will. The boy will be coming with me.”

Trake blinked, a dull pulse of dread thumping in his ears.

The fat guard nodded at the skinny one. “Go on, then,” he said. He turned back to Trake, confident.

The man met the guard halfway. He struck once. The sound was like a wet towel falling off a wash table. The guard collapsed, hands clawing at his throat, body folding in on itself.

He leaned back on his staff. The smile returned.

The other two guards rushed in.

His staff lashed out and hammered the ugly guard on the side of the head, wood on bone, dropping him instantly. A kick followed, landing square on the fat guard’s throat. He staggered backwards, swayed back and forth, into the wall, bounced off, continued staggering like a fish out of water.

Trake had seen dead bodies. He’d watched people die. He watched people die in fights. Usually, they ended in a scream

This was more like a whisper.

“Come along,” he said.

The fat guard was still fighting the inevitable, staggering, hoping.

Hope was a heavy bastard.

An argument rang out from an abandoned room above them. Ragged voices fueled by the drink, screaming accusations of a missing jug of spirits. Fucks and disappointment preceded the acceptance that one of them did indeed remember drinking the last of their supply. An apology and words of affection followed. The love of the drink always came first in Trake’s experience.

The pigeons fluttered above, having enough of the commotion. Trake watched the man follow them behind a building, looking down after to meet Trake’s eyes.

He man signalled for Trake to follow. They walked out of the alley, the man smiling, indifferent. Almost bored.

Trake didn’t run. He followed. He looked at the alley behind him, and it reminded him there was nowhere to run anyway. Besides, he was hungry and, in the streets, when you found something to protect you, you used it until it was useless.

He looked ahead to the man. He had just killed three men with as little effort Trake put into waking up. He wouldn’t get away anyway.

Trake ripped of a soggy piece of bread and threw it over his shoulder. Clicks on the stone brough his attention to the little dog running away.

Trake heard the heavy thud of a body hitting the ground. The fat bastard had finally given in.

 

Chapter 7

TRAKE

“I don’t trust that bastard?” Trake said as they walked toward the barracks. Rain had started, their boots losing a fight with mud as it pulled with each step. Neither had slept much. Both were beaten and bloody, covered in mud, fighting the slight incline of the path like it was a mountain trail.

Thomas furled his brows in annoyance. At least Trake thought it did. His face was so swollen it was hard to tell. “Why?”

“Don’t know how to answer that, really. Thought it would be clear, given the fact he had us murder men as part of a lesson.” Trake winced as his foot landed on a rock, the uneven ground shot pain up his sore leg, “he’s a madman. The fuck do you mean why?”

“He’s not mad” Tomas said. Clearly, he had already spent the effort convincing himself otherwise, “He operates with purpose. There is a difference.”

“Purpose?” Trake cleared his nostril. “Prostitutes have purpose. It doesn’t mean I’d risk cock rot”

Tomas didn’t respond.

Trake rubbed the already purple bruise on his forehead, pain pulsing with every step “Everything the man says, or doesn’t say, seems to mean something else. He speaks in riddles. He sent us to kill men as a fucking test.” Trake spat blood onto the path. “I would say, that’s not normal.” He said the words not really knowing what normal was. His life certainly was not. Had not ever been. Shitting in an alley with a blade in your hand wasn’t normal to most either, but he had done it.

Tomas finally spoke, his voice sounded thick with a swollen nose, “Eventually we must go out into the real world. He needs to know we are ready” Thomas said the words as he painfully navigated around a small puddle. Trake noticed he had to cock his head in an odd direction to look down at it with swollen eyes.

“Ah yes, one must be ready for a life of lies and killing. Prepared. Must first be willing,” Trake said quietly. “I didn’t really have a plan for my life. I was too busy not dying in the gutters, but this ain’t it.”

The men moved aside to allow a cart to pass. The cook smiled at them, the smoke of his pipe lingering in the air. A leg hung from the back of the cart, hoof bouncing. Trake’s cheeks filled with bile. He spat.

“All in a day’s work for you though eh?”

Thomas shot back. “I’m not in the mood. You just caved my face. I’ve got a headache, and your whining is making it worse.” He winced as if his voice had landed another blow.

This was the first time Trake had seem him angry. The perfect arse would probably apologize soon after.

Trake shook his head once. “Do you not question anything? The training. Punishment in the form of murder. What the fuck the academy does.”

“No,” Thomas said, without hesitation. Proud, even. “The Academy has a history. Purpose. We do not need to know the architecture behind its reasons. Stop complicating everything with questions.”

For Tomas, life seemed simple. Accept who you are. Do what’s told when you’re told and do it well.

“Where I come from, blind men don’t live long.” Trake stopped and faced Tomas. “in fact, men don’t live making their own choices. Things even worse than dying in a gutter happen to men who let others make their choices.”

Tomas nodded slowly, “Well then. Seems they’re fucked either way.”

“The ones who have others making their choices are double fucked, if you know what I mean. It’s always by the men making the choices for them.”

Tomas laughed, “are you always this dramatic? We are here. May as well make the easy choices then eh?”

Tomas wasn’t wrong. The little golden bastard rarely was.

“It probably isn’t worth trying to predict. Come on. I am tired.”

Trake huffed a breath. “I can’t wait to see what they have planned for us,” he muttered. “Steal a noble’s child. Kill the vicar. Maybe we will just murder kittens if the weather is nice. Everyone forgets about the rodents. Gotta make it fair after all.”

They walked the rest of the way in painful silence, finally entering the barracks in silence once again.

Trake washed the blood off his hands for the second time in a day. The cold water on his bruise felt like a blade slowly opening his skull, a welcome distraction from the endless gnawing thoughts. His day had been a long haze of too many things. Too many mushrooms. Too many murders. Too many questions with no answers. Too much Tomas.

He had the afternoon to himself. Time set aside for meditation and indoctrination for the newer students. The older ones were left to their own devices. Normally he would go to the archives, but he needed to clear his head.

He decided to take one of the horses out for a ride. He wouldn’t get any rest anyway, the barracks would be busy until nightfall.

He was so tired that he didn’t remember his walk to the stables, but he found himself there anyway. They were well kept and orderly, the care taken in every beam and stall obvious. The passion of the giant Northman was evident in the details of clean straw, brushed flanks, tools laid out with thoughtful precision. One would expect hanging bodies if you judged the man from his looks, but then the academy man looked like he tended a garden.

Trake stepped inside and hollered a warning to announce himself. In his experience, sneaking up on a man was always ill advised. Sneaking up on a giant with a body half dominated with scar tissue was an even worse idea. As his eyes adjusted, he noticed the red bird flap its wings and dart towards the back of the building, wings pushing small clouds of dust from the beams.

He heard movement at the back of the stalls and moved toward it on instinct. The giant was rolling up a meditation mat, clearly just finished.

The sight didn’t make sense to Trake, like watching a storm cloud release a gentle mist as it passed.

He had a personal area carved out of the shadows of the back stall. A tiny, meticulously kept island of order in a sea of shit and hay. A wooden desk held a row of teapots arranged by size. Bunches of herbs hung from the rafters, accenting the air with a tang of dried mint and lavender, a desperate battle against the pervasive stench of the stables. A bird cage sat in the corner, its gate was not just unlatched, but pinned wide, an invitation rather than a trap.

Trake felt like walked in on one of the old ladies mid-change, an invasion of a private, fragile moment that Trake had no business seeing. He turned his back instinctively and pretended he wasn’t there, pretending to avert his focus on a stack of hay.

“Give me a minute,” the giant grumbled, his voice like rocks shifting under a boot.

It was the first time Trake had ever heard him speak. Usually he communicated in wordless actions, simply getting ready whatever was asked of him with a nod. The voice surprised him. It was a soft grumble with no edge, and the words slipped out with a slight lisp, like they had to navigate through something to get out.

Horse hooves thudded against the stone somewhere behind him, followed by a grunt. Trake stood not knowing how to stand, readjusting his feet and then his hands, waiting for a reply form the giant that didn’t come.

A prominent scar ran from ear to ear, pulling the skin into something like a permanent smile carved into his cheeks like someone did a poor job sewing his jaw back on. Almost like the scars were laughing at the victim.

Ugly bastard up close, Trake thought. He probably didn’t give the scars to himself which made Trake feel bad for having the thought. But facts were facts. This man looked like he had been dragged all the way from the north pulled behind a cart by his feet.

As the giant stood, Trake’s head barely came up to his chest, shoulders broad, muscle like rope bulging along his arms. He cast a shadow on Trake as he blocked out light of the lamps. His meaty hands placed the mat with surprising grace.

Trake spoke out of habit.

“Can I borrow a horse?” he asked like he was asking for a quill.

Borrow. Take. Ride. He frowned inwardly. He wasn’t sure how to ask for a horse.

The giant simply nodded lead Trake into the stables. The smell of the shit always took Trake by surprise, like a punch you didn’t see coming, sharp, sour, and impossible to ignore once it landed. The air was thick with dust and the cloying scent of damp hay, a combination that felt heavy in the lungs, like breathing through a wet shit-soaked rag.

Trake jumped as a laugh rang out from a stall as he passed. The odd girl was playing with piglets, doing her best to stop them running off.

Trake looked up at the scarred mans face, as they walked, his feet barely making a sound. The man’s eyes remained forward. Trake hated the silence. He wasn’t good at it.

“I-Is that your bird?” Trake asked, fumbling at his shirt as he fumbled with his words.

The giant glanced at him. “It lives freely. I don’t own it.”

The giant said it the way a man might talk about a crime, like owning a bird was a short walk to the gallows, a weight he was not willing to carry. Trake frowned. At least the little fucker was free. More than what he could say. It was unlikely the bird would be sent to kill anytime soon.

“Ah,” Trake said. It was all he could think of.

The man saddled the bigger of the two riding horses, one Trake had ridden her before. She was a bitch of a beast, spending more of her effort nipping and bucking him off than actually moving forward. Every ride with her felt like a negotiation that started halfway to violence.

He liked the other horse. It was gentler and wasn’t bothered by Trake. It was everything else around it that set it on edge.

“Can’t I ride the other?” his voice came out higher than he liked.

“A horse feels what the rider feels,” the man said flatly as he looked downward to Trake, “And she’s already skittish enough.”

The giant looked the bigger beast in the eyes. It snorted and nudged its head against him as he patted its neck, slow and careful, calming immediately.

Trake wondered of all these rural bastards could talk to animals. Maybe Varelic taught him.

“Best calm yourself before you get on, boy,” the man said as he walked away. “Her patience is thin.” Trake could relate. His had run out hours ago. He wanted to ride this horse and not stop until riding until the damn academy was merely a memory.

The horse snorted, rolling a wary eye at him. It could smell the fear and rage clinging to him like smell of shit and piss that consumed the building. He hesitated before he mounted her, finally easing himself on and gently persuading her out of the barn.

Trake watched the stable boy again engaged in a battle with himself. This time with a gate.

He kicked the horse gently, aiming for the hilltop overlooking the academy.

The path narrowed as it climbed, the horse picking its way through exposed root and loose stone, being surprisingly cooperative. The academy fell away below him, swallowed by the treeline. Up here the air felt cleaner, carrying the smell of wet earth and pine resin. Woodsmoke from somewhere distant. The trees thinned near the crest and the wind found him, cutting through his shirt and settling against the sweat on his back.

His thighs ached from gripping the saddle. His head still throbbed in a slow, dependable rhythm. Each time the horse's hooves found uneven ground the pain spiked.

Birds moved between branches. A hawk turned slow circles above the open ground ahead. The grass bent and straightened in the wind, the calm of it a welcomed distraction.

He spotted someone already sitting where he was going.

Jarl sat watching the grounds below, a jug of something heavy-looking beside him, a pipe smoldering between his fingers. He nodded as Trake approached.

Gods be damned. Trake had wanted time to himself. Maybe to sleep. Maybe to meditate. Maybe to do absolutely nothing.

“Trake,” Jarl grumbled as they drew close.

“Jarl,” Trake replied, returning the nod.

“I thought your nut would look worse,” Jarl said, eyeing the bruise blooming across Trake’s head.

Trake’s hand went to the bruise without thinking. “It worked.”

He dismounted the bitch and tied her to a tree. As he straightened, the world tipped sideways, his head felt like it was floating. The horse’s head flicked toward Trake and he jumped back as if avoiding a blade. For a moment he swayed like a drunk, unsure if just lying down to sleep would concern the Northman. He steadied himself, grabbed his waterskin, and took a long pull.

“Anything can be a weapon if you drive it into a man’s skull hard enough,” Jarl said, puffing on his pipe. “Once saw a man killed with a purse. Took a while. Had to be hit a lot. But it worked in the end.”

Not an image Trake needed. He was still trying to forget the man Jarl broke the night before. And the burning man. And the man with a neck like a farm chicken.

“Why didn’t you break it up?” Trake asked.

“When you fuck another man’s wife in the north, you deal with the consequences.” He pulled from his pipe. “It was not my business to break it up, and interfering would be a good way to get yourself killed”

“No,” Trake said as he bent down and rested his hands on his knees, catching his breath from dismounting the horse, “Me and Thomas. Earlier.”

“Just because you’re taught to fight pretty doesn’t mean you have to,” Jarl said. “A man fights to win. Better to win dirty than to die clean.”

Trake’s body was failing him. He sat, considering the man’s logic. He was right. It was the same lesson the streets taught him. It reminded him of all the times he watched drunks fight, their feeble attempts at killing each other we never clean, often ended the same way Trake and Tomas did, but effective in the end.

Jarl looked at him with an expression that gave nothing away. Trake couldn’t tell if he was welcome there or merely being tolerated.

“You think too much,” Jarl murmured. “You’re a street rat. Use that instinct in a fight and kill a bastard any way you can. It works.”

Jarl took a long draw from the jug.

“How did you know I came from the streets?” Trake asked.

“Stop fighting like it’s a performance,” Jarl said, ignoring the question and pressing on. “Stop thinking when you fight. Focus on killing. Not dying follows.”

Silence settled in after that. Jarl smoked his pipe, eyes looking off to the distance.

The horse moved behind him, reins pulling tight as it pulled for its meal.

Trake pulled at blades of grass himself. Picking them apart and throwing them. He had known the northmen not to mince words. Tell things how they were. His future weighed on him. Answers would be nice. Anything to calm his thoughts.

“Where do the men go after their training?” Trake finally asked.

“Where they’re told,” Jarl said. “I’ll answer your next question too, save us both the time.” He looked at Trake. “To do what they’re told.”

He took another draw.

“And yes, it usually involves killing. You’ll find there’s never a shortage of men needing to be killed.”

“Why?” Trake asked.

“Because people are bastards,” Jarl said. “And bastards get killed. Some bastards do the killing. The clever bastards are the ones pulling the strings.” Another puff. “The last ones live the longest.” Jarl spat, “You train in fighting everyday. What the fuck do you think it is you are being trained to do?”

“That’s not what I meant,” Trake said. “Why does the Academy get involved when there is a kings and armies to do that.”

“Restore order. Balance the scales. Whatever other horseshit they tell you.” Jarl shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. They’re effective and the king is a twat.”

Below, small specs moved through the academy grounds while others sat in neat circles meditating. The wind was cold now, the dew of the late afternoon seeping into his pants.

“I do come from the streets. I don’t know much about anything, but what I can’t understand is why everything must involve killing.”

“Because it’s effective. Men don’t like being killed.” Jarl said.

He had a point Trake thought. “There must be more to this place than that.”

“There is. When I was still in the North, they cut a trade route. Punishment comes in all forms, boy. They’re cunning pricks.” Jarl adjusted his feet. “If it wasn’t them the king is making a point to someone. Point is, the world doesn’t exactly know what it is the academy does.” Jarl tapped ash from his pipe, “its kin of the point.”

“Why cut off trade?” Trake asked. “The academy doesn’t seem interested in commerce. Don’t think we would be living in wood huts if there was any coin here.”

Jarl looked at him again. “Gods be damned, you’re an inquisitive little shit.” He leaned back on one arm. “They cut off the flow of steel. Blades need steel. War needs blades. Make steel scarce, you make war harder. Can only cut a so may throats with a wooded sword before it dulls.”

He repacked his pipe.

“If there’s one thing the North loves,” he said, smoke spilling from his mouth as flint clicked, “it’s war.”

Trake sat with that. Vareli and Tomas had distilled killing to a simple task. Clearly there was more to the academy than just that. Valeric had been clear, eventually they would be the ears and blade of the place. It would seem the things they heard would move the blade to someone’s throat until what they wanted was given. What Trake couldn’t understand is if not for coin, then what. He though some more and realised he didn’t care.

“Where did you come from?” he asked, changing the subject.

Jarl shifted, sitting up and resting his forearms on his knees. “Sometimes a man needs to leave where he’s at.” He glanced sideways at Trake. “Why is none of your fucking business.”

Something told Trake the conversation was done. A man staring daggers at you was usually a clear enough sign. The sun was slipping lower anyway, shadows stretching long across the hill.

“Right,” Trake said, a little more nervous than he liked. “I’m going to head back.”

Jarl looked toward the Academy, packing his pipe. “We’ll see you, Trake.”

They reached the barracks as the day was just beginning.

Men were just waking. The experienced were mostly dressed, racing to be first to the latrine. Others moved slowly, the newest students still sleeping. One man sat on his bedroll staring into nothing, started to stand, then sat back down, wincing as he rubbed an injured shoulder. Another struggled with a boot, snapped a lace, swore under his breath, and dropped it with a groan.

Tomas eased the door closed, scanning the room like a threat was imminent.

Trake stepped forward and caught his boot on a raised floorboard. His hand shot out by instinct and drove into a boy’s stomach.

“Oi, watch it y—”

The voice stopped when he saw Trake.

“Sorry,” Trake groaned. The word had to fight its way out of his dry throat.

The boy wasn’t looking at his face anymore. He was looking at Trake’s hand. At the blood.

“I…” Trake looked to Tomas. “We were…”

“Had a little too much fun last night,” Tomas said. “Rewarded with night duties in the kitchens. Fucking pigs don’t seem to stop bleeding.”

Trake looked back. The boy stepped away with a smear of blood on his shirt.

Tomas nodded toward the wash basins. Good lie. Probably ready before they even reached the door.

Trake and Tomas moved with purpose, walking along the edges of the room, trying to stay hidden in the waking barracks. The morning’s work had stolen Trake’s attention and wouldn’t give it back. Songs told of killing for crown and country. Books made it clean. They never mentioned crouching in the wet grass with a stone in your hand. Never mentioned the smell of a burnt man.

The guilt sat in his gut like a stone. The heavy, jagged kind you could use collapse a man into a fire.

One of the younger boys farted behind them, a small group snickering before covering their faces.

They removed their boots and went to the wash basins, avoiding any eye contact. Quick to wash the blood from their hands. Trake scrubbed until his knuckles were raw, watching the pink swirl of another mans blood dissipate into the water. He took a deep breath in through his nose to calm himself. The smell of the burnt mane was still there, sweet stench of roasting pork a permanent residence.

He looked at Tomas and noticed something still clinging to his face, darkened along the cheek and jaw. He gestured. Tomas caught it immediately, wiped it away without comment as he continued to wash. No words. Just breath, water, and the scrape of skin on cloth. He looked like a man who had successfully completed a tedious chore. He just hummed a low, tuneless note, his eyes as clear as a winter morning.

Behind them, the men in the barracks grew louder, joking and poking fun as they hurried to eat before the days first lesson. Trake heard the young boy he tripped into express disgust for the kitchen muck on his shirt. Annoyance that he had nothing clean to change into, and finally a fuck it, I’ll be dirty after sparing anyway. Red still clung in the creases of Trake’s fingers. He would have preferred it to be kitchen muck.

Barrick appeared behind them, mud and shit covering him rather than blood. Trake turned to look at him as he took position beside him to wash.

“We saw you at the sables.” Tomas said. “Seemed miserable.” He looked behind the group, a quick glance to see they were alone.

“Wasn’t so bad for me,” he said. “Didn’t sleep much. But I like working with the animals.” The big man splashed water on his face, shook his hands over the basin and wiped them on his shit-stained shirt. “Dirty fuckers, though.” Barrick inspected his hands. There was still mud there, but good enough. He pulled at a clump of something in his hair and threw it to the ground.

“Dirty fuckers then?” Tomas smirked and looked to Trake, “right at home were ya?”

“I was.” Barrick cleared his throat, “Hoch didn’t take so well to it.”

“We saw you all looking for him. I would guess his day is about to get worse if he ran away from his duties.” Tomas flattened his hair with both hands, slicking it back.

“He wandered off. Still don’t know where the odd bastard is.”

“Where?” Tomas asked.

Berrick shook his head once, sharp. “wouldn’t’ be wondering myself if I knew, would I?”

Silence crept in around the words. Drips of water and the heavy breathing of Barrick filling the space while the three boys each looked at nothing in particular.

"He’ll turn up," Berrick said. It didn’t sound like belief. It sounded like something he needed to hear himself say. Perhaps a question.

“Thought you two would’ve been with us,” he said. “What’d they do to you?”

He asked it as he picked mud from his nail.

"They sent us to the kitchen house. Help with preparing the animals. A different kind of dirty that.”

Tomas said it with a face as smooth as a polished coin. No twitch of the eye, no catch in the throat. The way he said it bothered Trake. Trake suddenly wished Tomas was anywhere else. Wanted to tell Barrick what had happened. The big bastard would offer no comfort. Probably just slap him on the shoulder and ask about breakfast.

He watched Berrick’s face, waiting for the story to split. It didn’t. Berrick only nodded and looked past them. “Hoch’ll be back. Probably just searching for some flower or something. Told me he was keen to collect some northern kind.”

Thick as pig shit, crude. Dirty. But he cared. The men, cleaned now, walked to the open room to change. Trake noticed Barrick look at the empty bedroll where Hoch should have been, his eyes vacant, like a dog waiting for a master who wasn't coming back.

“Working with the animals is better, I reckon,” Berrick said. “You missed out.”

“Yes, well, slaughtering animals isn’t something I want to do again. Perhaps next time I will ask to shovel shit.” Trake said it as he inspected the dark stains on his shirt, partly a confession. Partly true save for the animal part.

All three walked to their stations and changed. Trake was tired. Hungry. Indifferent to the activities his day had planned for him. Tomas hummed as folded his bloody clothes. Trake wasn’t sure if that made him jealous or trust the bastard less. Regardless, the sound was annoying.

They dressed in silence.

“Let’s eat.” Tomas finished and made for the door, Barrick following. Trake stood reluctantly, turning around to pick up some dried beef before following. He had to shield his eyes from the sun as he walked out the door. Barrick was already on his way to the dining hall. Tomas waited impatiently.

“I’ll meet you at the circle. I am not hungry.”

Tomas shrugged his shoulders and moved to catch Barrick.

“Fucking bastard fucking sow.”

Trake turned to see the stable boy fighting the ox again, the poor bastard too small to gain any leverage over the animal. The beast had lowered its head to a patch of grass and decided, with the full authority of dumb muscle, that the day could wait.

Trake almost helped.

He stood there long enough to feel the cool air drying the sweat on his back. Long enough to watch the boy curse, pull, slip, and curse again.

Then he moved on.

A group of students sat under a tree along the path, eating their morning meal and arguing over the right way to parry a short sword. The small boy Trake had knocked into earlier stood among them, countering with more confidence than his size allowed. He had been a street boy. Trake knew the look. Knew when boys like that learned to speak, when they learned to stop, and how carefully they watched every hand near them.

The boy nodded as Trake passed.

Trake nodded back and kept walking.

Gravel crunched under his boots as he approached the armory.

He stopped before he entered, contemplating if disappearing like Hoch was a better decision. He thought better of it. Masters would be watching the circles today, as they always did. They would measure grip and posture, timing and intent. They would see the space Hoch should have filled and decide what it taught. At the Academy, loss was never mourned. It was studied. Perhaps plotting more murders. It was hard to say. He decided to go in after all.

The armory smelt of cold steel and damp stone, a flat metallic tang that sat on the tongue like a copper coin. As always, it was threaded through with the sour edge of drink. If Konrad was anywhere nearby, the smell always followed. And Konrad was always here, red-eyed, leaning, and drunk, smelling of stale regret and cheap spirits.

He was sitting at a table with his boots up and his head tipped back, dozing toward a sweet sort of oblivion. Waiting for the hangover to arrive so he could drown it properly with more drink.

His life seemed simple, though. Jealousy flickered in Trake's gut. A simple life, built on the steady rhythm of the flask.

Trake walked up to the table. Cleared his throat and waited. Cleared it louder. Waited.

Finally kicked the table leg.

Konrad woke with a fright, arms and legs flailing back.

“Fuck your mother’s mouth!” he bellowed, already on his feet, body snapping into a defensive stance that could almost pass as competent. “Never startle a man with a blade, boy. He could gut you like a pig.” Konrad blinked his eyes and looked around the room.

He stood there swaying, a pathetic ruin in a stained tunic.

“What do you want, Trake? I was resting. A man deserves rest when he’s on the dole” he spat and rubbed it into the wood floor with his boot.

“I need my sword,” Trake said. “With the practice sheath.”

“Right,” Konrad said as he gathered himself. He squinted at Trake. “You look like you’re not in the best of spirits. Long night? I’ve got something that can help you.”

He lifted the flask, gave it a small wiggle, took a swig, then grunted and clapped his hands once.

“I have,” Trake said. “Come on then. I’ll be late.”

“Hold on to your pants,” Konrad said, holding up a hand meant to provoke calm. It only pissed Trake off more.

He disappeared briefly and came back with the blade. He handed it to Trake and sat back down with a grunt of satisfaction, reaching for his flask like it was a medal of honor. He looked at Trake with an expression of shared victory, as if they were both elite soldiers in the same glorious army. Trake felt a hot surge of loathing at the yellow in the man’s eyes and the stained tunic.

Trake picked up the blade. “The sheath?”

“Right, right, right. Sorry. Had a long night myself” he said, as if he’d spent it patrolling the grounds on some noble quest.

Konrad slithered back once again like an inebriated snake, grabbed the sheath and handed it to Trake.

“Come on then. Why so glum? Better to get these things out. You let them fester and you rot from the inside” He burped, adding his own rot to the conversation. It festered in the air like a summer corpse. “I’ve been told I am a great listener. Besides, self-loathing makes a man look like a prick.”

Probably would feel better getting some of it out. Trake thought it best to leave out the killing part, but then the drunk bastard probably wouldn’t remember what he said anyway. Still, save it for another day perhaps.

Konrad’s eyes were already shutting, the pause long enough to lose his attention.

“Ate your mushrooms. Visited a place I never wanted to go. Didn’t sleep and now I am here. With you.” Trake cracked his neck, “let’s get on with it then.”

A drop of droop escaped the side of Konrads mouth before he caught it with his tongue. “Well, well, well,” Konrad said softly, suddenly interested. He opened his eyes, looked up to the ceiling like he was reminiscing “Glorious, aren’t they?” He slapped the table; eyes shooting back to Trake. “Gotta be careful though. Too much and indeed, a man can find himself somewhere he doesn’t want to be.”

“Might have been good to know before we ate them. Why the fuck didn’t you give Hoch at least a little guidance.”

“Have to learn somehow young Trake. Sometimes it’s best to learn the hard way.” Another swig, “it’s the academy’s way is it not. Learning lessons and all that.” His hand made a circle as he swallowed, “shit.”

“I see you have taken the message seriously.”

Konrad let out a long sigh, the smell of spirits filling the air around them. “Did once.” He shook his head, “not the ways of the academy but….”

A fly landed on Konrad’s forehead. He didn’t seem bothered.

“Some men are better off not exploring the places you travelled,” he said, clearer now, like the drink had sharpened him.

Trake said nothing.

For once, Konrad seemed worth listening to.

“Their minds aren’t built for it. Sometimes you’re better off following the task and the road in front of you. Hard to say when you don’t know where that road leads though, isn’t it.”

Konrad looked at nothing, staring past Trake and the swaying returned. One hand absently fumbled with the cork on the flask, soon moving to scratch his crotch.

Trake looked at his sword.

“You followed your road here. Followed the task set out for you then?” Trake put his practice sword under his arm, “Odd place for a road to end.”

The flask went up, he took another swig. It wasn’t enough, so he took another. “less of a path I’d say. More of a tumble down the side of a mountain.”

Konrad smiled, pale cracked lips giving way to yellow teeth, “and bad decisions. Mean women and the drink. Enjoyable at times though.”

Trake nodded slowly. Konrad was clearly noble. Perhaps an intelligent one if he wasn’t always off his tits on the drink.

“I best get to the circle.”

Konrad exaggerated a gestured with is hands towards the door and leaned back, feet up and head back.

Outside, men were gathered around the sparring circle, some of them moving through forms, others resting. Tomas stood straight backed and watched the group. Eager.

Jarl trudged to the center of the gorup, a leather satchel held open, pushing his arm out to each boy to draw tokens. The day wasn’t finished with Trake and Tomas. Still had plans. Still had irony to give. Tomas drew Raf’s token.

Jarl grunted and then smiled. “You two can go first.” Jarl walked back to his perch, a wooden platform north of the circle. “Give the room you twats!” he yelled. “No Will. Combat only.”

The men formed a circle around Tomas and Trake. Murmurs of excitement passing though the group as the two best fighters squared to spar.

“On with it then.” Jarl commanded.

Tomas moved first.

Every movement surgical. Practiced moves meant to dismantle. The sheethed blade traced clean lines through the air, perfect angles and timing, tapping Trake on the ribs, the shoulder, the thigh. Controlled. Correct. Relentless.

Trake blocked what he could. Parried when he had space. The skill was there, but there was no urgency in it. He thought through every movement. Measured. Calculated too long.

Tomas landed strikes repeatedly.

Trake’s chest burned. His lungs dragged in air that tasted like mud and trampled dirt. Each sting from Tomas’s blade was another reminder of the years stacked against him. Years of drilled superiority. Years of being behind.

The streets.

His future as a blade.

Tomas stepped in for a thrust. Posture perfect. Confidence absolute.

Trake didn’t parry. He didn’t even try to block clean. He lunged into the strike, letting the blunted tip bury itself into his shoulder with a low sickening thud.

Tomas’s eyes widened. For a fraction of a heartbeat, his rhythm broke. He’d expected retreat. Defense. Obedience to the academy’s trained style of fighting.

Trake dropped his sword, rules be damned, and drove his forehead straight into Tomas’s face.

The crack was sharp and wet, like snapping a carrot underfoot. Pain blossomed across Trake’s own forehead; a white-hot bloom of light that made the world tilt. He felt the warm, metallic splash of Tomas’s blood across his own lips. He had a dull roar in his ears that drowned out the gasps of the watching students.

Tomas stumbled back, blood already spilling down the front of his tunic. He tried to reset, to recover and dictate the shape of the fight.

There was no shape anymore.

Trake hit him like a storm with no direction and no patience. A lifetime of alleys and guards and survival replacing technique. He tackled Tomas, the two of them slamming into the dirt in a heavy, breath-knocked thud.

Tomas’s technical skill meant nothing beneath the weight of a man who wasn’t fighting for points, or form, or approval. They rolled in the muck, a frantic tangle of limbs. It became a struggle between two drowning men. Trake tasted blood and grit, his fingers clawing for a grip on Tomas’s collar while the world turned into a blurred mess of grey sky and brown earth.

Anger drove him now.

Trake rolled off him at last, spent. Arms shaking. Breath ragged. Ears ringing.

The circle stayed silent around them.

Jarl didn’t offer a hand to help either man out of the muck. He stood at the edge of the circle, arms folded, watching the blood drip from Tomas’s nose with the same flat indifference he might show the rain. He didn’t care that Trake had fought dirty; he didn't care that the rules had been trampled into the mud. He merely spat a thick glob of yellow phlegm into the dirt and checked the sun’s position, pulling his pipe from a pocket and packing it.

“Get yourself cleaned up.”

Trake stood slowly, arched his back and winced. Tomas was still laying on the ground, briefly lifted his head and set it back in the mud. Trake held out a hand and helped him up.

They walked toward the armoury, Trake limping, Tomas holding a hand to his head.

“Give me your sword. I’ll hand it back to the drunk.” Tomas just nodded a thank you and leaned forward, hand on his knees.

Trake returned his weapon to the armory, his footsteps loud on the wood floor and he limped.

Konrad didn’t even look up as Trake returned. He was huddled over his flask, the smell of stale spirits and sour sweat hanging around him like a swam of fly’s. But as Trake turned to leave, the man caught his eye.

“Our minds may not all be built to explore. In the same way one could say they aren’t all built to be controlled. Not all of us are dogs.”

Trake didn’t know what to make of that. He nodded once and walked away.

He found Tomas outside the armory, sitting against the wall, fastidiously wiping the blood from his lip with a perfectly folder handkerchief. Even with a nose that was already turning a violent shade of purple, he offered Trake that infuriating, lopsided smile.

“Sorry,” Trake said.

Tomas looked up.

“You had to beat me at some point,” he said. “You dirty bastard.”

He held a hand out. Trake took it and hauled him to his feet.

They walked in silence.

Valeric waited for them by the gates, his posture as stiff and correct as a fresh-carved headstone. He watched them approach, limping, bruised, and smelling of sweat, and his only reaction was to pluck a microscopic piece of lint from Trake’s shoulder.

“Efficiency,” he said softly, the word carrying further than a shout. “It doesn't have to be pretty, Trake. It just has to be final.”

He smiled again and stood to the side for the men to pass.

Their guide didn't speak. He walked with the same flat, unhurried rhythm he'd kept since they'd been hauled out of the infirmary. Boots clapped stone, the echo dying in the damp walls. One corridor bled into the next, the mushroom disorientation still claiming Trake's senses. The air was a heavy, wet blanket. The walls, slick with moisture, seemed to sweat. Trake walked with eyes half-closed, head a hollow drum, ears ringing with every thud of the guide's boots. A pig being led to slaughter.

Tomas followed, wearing an easy confidence. Eager to perform for Valeric, as always.

They passed the stables and the reek hit before the stalls came into focus. The shit-soaked air coated the back of his throat and lingered.

Berrick and Hoch stood in the yard with an Academy official. The man's accent suggested high-birth even if his posture didn't. Hands clasped, voice low and calm, he looked like a man discussing the weather while watching two dogs drown.

Trake recognized him after a moment. The curator of battle strategy and campaign history. The sort of man who talked about troop movements the way other people talked about fine wine. Judging by his comfort among the filth, he'd learned his lessons somewhere real. Somewhere loud and bloody.

Nearby lay the instruments of penance: buckets, heavy shovels, brushes stiff with old muck. Honest tools. The kind that didn't care who you'd been before you wrapped your fingers around them.

The official hefted a shovel, his tone sharpening as he demonstrated the proper technique, handing it back to Barrick with a look of clinical expectation.

Berrick and Hoch already looked broken. No defiance. No jokes. Already marinated in filth. They didn't look up as Trake passed. They just stared ahead, their world shrunk to the width of a shovel blade.

Hoch's lips twitched in silent prayer as he looked in the wrong direction. The official’s annoyance flared as he repeatedly attempted to tether his attention. He latched onto Hoch's eyes and led him to a pile of straw, demonstrating the labor again.

Trake had always liked the man. The enthusiasm with which he expected Hoch and Barrick to perform their punishment was a colder matter. Barrick didn't seem to mind, digging into his duties without complaint, moving efficiently between wipes of sweat from his brow and his signature projectile of phlegm. Hoch didn't notice where he was or what was happening. All men true to who they were at that moment.

Nearby, the giant Northerner labored in silence, shifting straw and muck with the solemn care he might've given to digging a grave. No hurry. No complaint. Just work.

His bird fluttered up as they passed, wings cracking like a whip before settling on the jagged pitch of the stable roof. It cocked its head and watched them with flat, black eyes. The damned thing was judging them.

A cold knot tightened in his gut. Whatever Berrick and Hoch were paying for, he and Tomas were being marched toward a different ledger entirely. To what, he wasn't sure. He had no energy for enthusiasm.

They stopped beside a cart near the sparring grounds, the area lit by a single guttering torch, its light joining the bruised grey of the rising sun.

Valeric turned to address them as if this were a polite meeting arranged days in advance rather than the edge of something vile.

"Trake. Tomas. Thank you for joining me." He bowed his head in mock acknowledgment.

"You have known life before the Academy," he said. "And you have known life within it."

Plain words. No warmth.

"Before we assign purpose, we must know what you can be trusted to do. The two of you have shown promise. Dedication. And until this evening, control."

Something rustled leaves in the darkness behind Valeric. He stopped and stared hard in the direction of the noise, his gaze returning as the shadows settled.

Trake's head was pounding, eyes stinging. The ringing came in waves, ebbing and returning louder with each labored breath.

"Most men never know who they serve, not really." Valeric’s voice was smooth as fresh-scraped bone. "Most men never notice the people standing close. Guards. Hired hands. Drivers. Servants. Men with hidden blades and ears open. That," he unclasped his hands, "is the mask you will wear. Our presence masked by the mundane."

He leaned against the cart, fingers tracing a jagged splinter in the wood with a bored, rhythmic precision.

"We don't seize crowns," he murmured, pinning Trake with those flat eyes. "We serve no crown. No altar. No house. That is why every crown, altar, and house has reason to fear us, if they ever learn we exist."

The other instructor's voice carried from the yard, a muffled bark as he attempted once again to wrangle Hoch's attention.

Valeric glanced in the direction of the shout as he spoke again.

"We are not invited to tables where kingdoms are discussed. Men like you stand behind those tables. At doors. In yards. Beside carriages. Close enough to hear what should not be heard, and ordinary enough that no one thinks to stop speaking."

Trake looked at the cart, then at the man. A factory for assassins and liars. He was just another part being filed down to fit the engine.

Valeric brushed a hand across his chest, smoothing a wrinkle that had assaulted his tunic.

Something shifted in Trake then. The orientation, given without sleep. His eyes felt like they'd been rubbed with sand, his head a hollow vat of confusion and the lingering rot of the mushrooms. Not an ideal time to learn his future, but at least he was finding out. The questions had always been present, ignored and masked by the comfort of his new life.

"You two are adaptable. That's what matters. When you leave, you'll move back into cities and communities. You'll pass for someone else. Integrated into the company of merchants or nobles. They may pay you. They may house you. They may think you theirs. But your duties will come through us. Your ears remain ours. Your blade, when needed, answers here." Valeric stood straight, hands behind his back. "You will belong to households that believe they chose you."

He paused.

"You possess a power few men do. That makes you a tool. That is your purpose."

Like a knife at a noble's table. Valued while it gleamed. Discarded the moment it bent.

"You will be sent somewhere," Valeric continued. "Mentored by someone who was once like you. They will teach you the customs of the place you are in. They will help integrate you into the place you will be."

Trake rubbed his eyes. Valeric's words arrived with clinical clarity and landed strangely. He was tired. Not surprised.

The instructor's voice rose again from the yard. Something about finding the boy. Find him.

"You will listen. You will report. And when words are no longer enough, you will act."

He gave his tunic one final sharp tug, smoothing a wrinkle only he could see. It wasn't about tidiness. It was the kind of order that demanded every thread, and every life, sit where he put it.

"You will reap the same rewards as the merchants or nobles you integrate with. A comfortable life." He met Trake's eyes. "More comfort than afforded to a street boy."

Trake watched Valeric's smooth hands and said nothing. He wondered how many deaths those clean fingers had signed for.

Trake looked at Tomas. The offered comfort was no trap for him. Merely an opportunity. No anger. No fear. Just flat settled acceptance. A cold indifference that came from already having made peace with the shape of things. A readiness to contribute to an unknown cause for unknown reasons.

"There are checks and balances," Valeric continued. "Some people drift. Whisper to the wrong ear. Start believing their own legend." A shrug. "A common tragedy."

He smiled. Thin. Cruel.

He plucked a stray thread from his sleeve with the same agonizing precision a torturer might use on an errant fingernail.

"We don't send the law. We don't send a herald with a scroll. We send another of our own."

He rested a hand on the cart rail, finger picking at the raw sliver.

A warm breeze shifted the leaves above them, carrying the smell of the stables with it. A single bird began its morning routine, breaking the silence with a lonely chirp.

"Assassins then," Trake said. A statement more than a question.

"We are more than that." Valeric's head tilted slightly. "But at times, yes. Pertinent to why you are here now."

Footsteps behind them, quick and loud. "Have you seen Hoch? The little fucker will pay double." The battle instructor's voice cracked through the morning. Barrick stood behind him, chest heaving. The giant Northman too, looming at the edge of the light.

Valeric glared at them. They left slowly, the instructor's face carrying the particular annoyance of a man quietly dismissed.

Valeric continued.

"Many people who know little of the Academy want to understand its purpose. How it integrates into society. Who passes through it. Its location." His tone stayed conversational. "People watch. People spy."

Another wrinkle appeared. He brushed it away without looking down.

"It's a regular occurrence," he said.

He nodded toward the hills.

"There are five. You will silence them. Leave at least one fit for questioning. Two would be better. Fear is contagious. Useful when applied correctly."

Trake looked down at his empty hands and then to the back of the cart.

"With what?" he asked. "And how?"

"You have the training," Valeric said. "You don't need weapons. You will not always be given tools. Sometimes guidance. Sometimes access. Often nothing."

He gestured at the world beyond the cart.

"Decide quickly. Quietly. Then live with what the decision costs."

Jarl walked past. Valeric turned just enough to acknowledge him. No words.

"They'll be armed," he added. "Use what you take."

And without ceremony he gestured for the two men to take their leave, showing them as much care as a butcher watching a cow shuffle toward the block.

"They are on the ridge, west of the Lyle River."

So Trake and Tomas walked. No choice really. They entered the woods with the growing light of morning.

Trake felt the ground through his boots, the Will helping each step fall silent, like dogs on a hunt, trained and willing. They followed the forest edge until the Academy walls disappeared behind the slope and the morning mist began to pale at the edges of the world. Dawn had not arrived properly yet but announced itself in the orange hue of leaves above, turning the low mist silver where it clung to the grass.

Neither spoke. Their boots moved through wet earth and flattened weeds, each step chosen with the care beaten into them over years of training. Somewhere far behind them a bell rang, thin and distant, swallowed almost at once by the damp morning. Trake kept expecting Tomas to say something. A joke. A complaint. A question. Anything to make the walk feel less like a rope being pulled tight around his throat. But Tomas only walked beside him, eyes forward.

Trake kept walking and tried not to think about what came after. Valeric had not told him anything new, not really. The street had owned him first. Then the Academy. Now some merchant or noble would own the shape of him and never know who held the leash. Tomas slowed ahead of him and lifted a hand. Trake stopped.

They crouched low and crested the ridge slowly, the quiet shush of the River Lyle growing louder. Ahead a neatly laid out camp appeared, five men moving slowly through the early chores of morning.

They planned it with a simple look. Tomas handed Trake a stone, pointed two fingers at the men on the west side of the camp and then back to Trake.

Two men each. The fate of the fifth to be decided after the first four were accounted for. Simple enough, Trake thought. His body disagreed. His throat went dry as a bone, his chest moving faster as the ringing in his ears surged.

He watched Tomas close his eyes and take a slow breath. He followed. Blade sheathed.

They settled into the control they'd trained for and waited for the wind.

When it shifted, they moved.

Trake closed the distance on the nearest man without thinking. No rush. No panic. No sound. One of his targets leaned forward to adjust the fire. Trake cracked him on the side of the head. No heroic ring to it; just a wet thwack, like a mallet hitting a side of spoiled beef.

The body collapsed into the embers with a heavy thud, embers rising as it settled.

The smell hit. Sweet. Sickening. Roasting pork.

"Fuck," he said softly as the panicked noise of the skirmish rose from the camp.

He moved on his second target, the Will sharpening each movement, his sight blurring as the world slowed. A kick to the chest sent the man flying, ribs collapsing like dry kindling. Trake followed with a punch finding the temple with brutal precision.

Behind him the first man attempted a scream. Too shattered to move.

Trake glanced left.

Tomas had been efficient. One man lay unconscious, mouth open wide, chin pointing the wrong direction. The other was very dead, blood pooling from a throat split so deep the head cocked backward at an impossible angle. Hanging by a thread. He almost looked surprised. Staring down at the dark steaming pool gathered in his lap as if he couldn't quite account for the source of the heat.

Tomas was already in pursuit of the fifth when a shadow burst from the trees. Jarl hit the man with a sound like a ship's mast snapping in a gale. A fluid swing of a club and he went down in a tangle of limbs, spine breaking with a sound Trake felt in his teeth, face landing in the earth as he slid to a stop.

The man tried to crawl away, arms dragging useless bulk across the dirt. Trake had seen this before. Men hold onto hope even when death is looking at them and smiling. The man surveyed the trees like the path to safety just had to be found. Like he had a chance.

Hope becomes heavier when you have no legs to carry it, Trake thought.

A bird landed in a branch above Jarl and added its voice to the noise. The broken man's strained groans and the sound of his body dragging on dirt and leaves filled the space between. Jarl surveyed the carnage. Not impressed, but like a man inspecting a blade that's good enough to cut. Tomas looked like a man ready for the next task.

The burnt man had somehow crawled out of the fire, his rasping breath a chorus to the broken man's groans.

His face was ruined. White eyes seeming to glow against blackened skin.

"Fuck. You," he hissed.

Trake felt pity. He was too tired for it to take over. He just felt done. No music. No glory. Just two dying men and the stench of scorched hair.

Tomas met Trake's eyes. Nodded once mid-step and drove a blade clean through the man's heart. The sound like a footstep in mud. Premeditated. Unhurried. Professional.

Trake looked toward the sound of Jarl's grunt as he hoisted the fifth man over his shoulder like a sack of grain and motioned for them to follow.

"We have one for questioning. Leave the others."

Trake and Tomas followed.

Jarl glanced back.

"Avoid the head if you need a man alive. And it helps if you don't roast them." He adjusted the broken man on his shoulder. "No man wants to sit in a room with that stench."

They walked back to the cart. Other than the killing and the smell of burnt flesh lodged in his throat, it would have been a nice morning for a walk. Quiet. Peaceful. The only sound was the broken man's involuntary groaning matched to each of Jarl's steps. Something leaking rather than spoken. A rhythmic pulse of life leaving his body.

Valeric waited by the cart.

Calm. Unprovoked. The stillness of a guillotine blade waiting for the rope to snap. The smile almost a distraction from his dead eyes. A sunset over a battlefield.

Jarl tossed the broken man into the cart. No ceremony. No care. No mercy for mangled limbs. Just a sack of grain after all.

The man stirred. Tried to speak.

Jarl addressed the annoyance with a single punch. His head bounced off the cart and went still. "Fuck yoooouuuu." A whispered groan left the man's mouth somehow. Jarl looked down at him, turning his head slowly, annoyed at the man's resilience, and grunted once. He punched him again. Another fuck you rose from the man's throat. Jarl's eyes narrowed then softened.

"I assume all went well," Valeric said. "Well enough."

Not a question.

"Good enough to get answers if we hurry," Jarl said, still staring at the man. He raised his eyebrows, impressed this time.

"Great," Valeric said enthusiastically.

He flicked a leaf from his seat, then glared at the trees as if they'd personally offended him.

Tomas sat on the edge of the cart, posture perfect, breathing steady. Already scraping dried mud from his boots with a twig. For him the world was simple. A job given. Done. Move on.

Trake felt like he was rotting from the inside out. He spat over the edge of the cart.

His hands twitched against his thighs. Every blink brought the fire back, the screaming, the smell of pork a permanent resident. His stomach turned as he looked at the broken man in the cart.

He looked at Tomas and felt a spike of loathing.

To Trake it felt unreal. Like another bad vision dragged up by leaf or mushrooms.

The cart jerked forward, the broken man's body following. He looked up at Trake and smiled.

Trake spoke first, voice shaking as he watched him.

"Why did you send us? There are senior officials who could have handled it. Our lessons have not yet covered murder by rock."

Trake's shoulders bounced with the cart.

"It was merely a lesson, Trake." Valeric's voice was calm. "I told you we all have a purpose. But before we assign it, we must know you're capable." He motioned for Jarl to move around an outbuilding. "As you enter the real world you will need to adapt quickly. Complete tasks cleanly." He explained their future as assassins the way he might explain the function of a wheel on a cart.

Trake kept his eyes on the broken man. The smile had faded, replaced by a clenched jaw and the slow trickle of blood from his lips.

"These are bad men," Valeric said. "As are the men the Academy pushes against. We cannot change the order of things with pity. Sometimes it demands a stone." He looked directly at Trake, smile disappearing. "Part of your life now is keeping secrets. I trust you know that."

The smile returned.

The cart rolled back toward the Academy walls.