The People of Glass

Section 3: The Change You Wish to See

Protecting people? Maybe that's why I survived! As the last known, living warrior of my family, I had to follow that purpose, no matter what. I shimmied down the side of my balcony.

Like an image in a mirror, the boy stood as tall as me, as razor-thin. Underneath that same luna-white hair, his matching ice-blue eyes greeted me. He smiled, nodded, and turned away.

His glance left me in chills. I knew the boy resembled me, but seeing him up close still shook the foundations. The tide of passion about him washed away everything in its path. I had to tell him my story, to prove myself. So, I followed.

We ducked down one open alley and another before finally coming to rest in a quieter plaza.

Beside the rich kid in blue sat the fat thug boy, prisoner and guard. The thug boy grabbed his table leg. "Hey, what'd I tell you!"

"Down, Collen. She's with me."

"Aw right, Dust." He bowed his head. "You get a pass then, dumb girl."

Dust knuckled Collen in the forehead, then mussed the big kid's hair. He shot me an evil grin.  "More like you get a pass, ya brute. We got our own future Watch Commander."

Glaring and jutting out his chin, Collen adjusted his leathers.

"Ah, hey." the rich boy perked up. "You're the girl tried to help me."

Dust gave him a strange look.

He bent down to check a silver thing tied to his belt, and whispered a self correction, "girl who tried to… ah."

"You've met Collen." Then, Dust indicated the rich boy. "I understand Oliver has introduced himself as well?"

I stepped toward the rich boy, pushed up on his chin until he met my gaze. "Sorry I couldn't help you more."

"I'm not." Dust pinched the rich boy's cheek. "Oliver's got to pay his fair share."

Oliver blushed. "Oh, it's a trifle. Truth is, my family provides sustenance, ah. We do alright." He grimaced, forced a smile, and kept his shoulders from sagging.

The boy belonged in a library, not a street fight, but courage starts where a person stands. Hoping to encourage him, I smiled approval, then turned to Dust. "So, what's the story? Somehow, I don't think Oliver qualifies to run with you."

Dust nodded. "If not for current events, I'd be worried about you taking my spot."

Dust's predatory grin chilled me. Clearly, he counted me among his rivals. At least, I hoped that's what it was. I raised my eyebrow.

He shrugged. "We've got problems moving in. The watch is doing nothing. We have, believe it or not, urgans moving…."

I'm not going to run again. I didn't hear the rest as lightning bolts of emotion shook every joint of my body. As I scanned the area, I couldn't stand still. "Where are they?"

Collen raised a fist in salute.

Dust's voice started out frantic. "Easy there. It's not a good idea for kids to go running off to battle." Each word faded until I could barely hear the last. He touched me on the shoulder.

I can strike back. I can make the guilty pay. Honest to goodness, green-blooded urgans would feel my wrath. Not Korog, surely, but any violent criminal could serve. "You've got it all figured out, then?"

"I'll let you chart the next offensive, Watch Girl." He turned and stared into my eyes. "Just get your bearings first."

Like an actor with a crown, pretending to superior wisdom, Dust strutted about.

Quietly noting the holes in his logic, I let him have his moment. Why did the watch do nothing about urgan invaders? If Dust plans so well, why would he lead three half-armed children against an enemy who might swing weapons heavier than a full-grown human? I sat down and listened.

His hand on my shoulder, Dust taunted, "The time for sacrifice may come."

None of that mattered against doing my family proud. It tasted sweet, yet not as sweet as joining an army against the darkness. A chance to make a difference, to set the world right.  If these feelings came from Dust, I would follow him into the mazes of despair. Our passions blended in flashes of thundering, blinding brilliance. If I had to pledge my life to cleanse the town—no, the world—of urgan filth, I could think of no better cause to bless with my lifeblood. How could it go wrong? "I'll play any role so long as I get to destroy evil."

"See that, Collen? She wants to destroy evil, not compete with it." He tapped Collen in the ear, then curled his lips to hint at a guilty smile aimed at me. "Sometimes, it is the same thing."

My cheeks burned in shame as I realized the hateful source of my passion. I glanced at Oliver.

His eyes pointed at Collen, though his ears were toward Dust. 

"Yeah!"  Collen grinned and raised his fists. "I'm the bad one."

"For now." Dust winked at me and gathered the boys in a huddle facing me. "Either way, there's a place for all of you in our empire. Right, Sigrun?"

My eyebrows clenched as I tried to work out the deeper meaning.

He didn't bother to await my answer. "This filth stains our souls. Today, we cleanse our world and ourselves. The actions we take today bring glory not just to ourselves, but to all humanity." He pointed his fist at the center of our huddle.

Collen raised his hand, and they brushed knuckles. Tentative, Oliver joined. Dust's thorn-eared, fire-haired ghost shook her head and pinched her eyebrows together in distress. Mack frowned and watched. Neither spirit spoke. The boys stared at me, waiting for me to join their ceremony, as I contemplated the distaste of these imaginary adults.

With a roll of my eyes, I met my knuckles to theirs. "All right. So, what's the plan?"

"Oliver buys a bag of goodies and stumbles around."

I crinkled my nose. "He's bait?"

"Oh, my, yes." Oliver pulled at his collar. "Please, do help, Watch Girl."

Unlike Dust or Collen, Oliver meant the title with respect. I scratched my chin. "You sure you're up for this?"

Dust raised his eyebrow and spoke to Oliver's ear. "They're his enemy as much as ours."

A hungry shepherd wasn't much better than a wolf, I reasoned. "Mack?" I whispered.

Mack still gave no answer.

"Of—course, Watch. While of course I would never personally trifle with…"

Dust made a threatening gesture, so subtle I should not have seen it.

Oliver's sun-shy cheeks went even paler as he eyed Dust. Swallowing down his fear, he pushed his glasses back on his nose. "It's from 'The Basic Stratagems'. So, yes, 'my' suggestion."

After Dust demanded it, of course. I raised my eyebrows at Mack.

"I don't like it either." Mack sighed. "But, a man makes his own decisions. Just like you."

"Listen to Bob there." Dust nodded at Mack, then at his own imaginary friend. "Much smarter than Kiele. We should set them up."

I glared at Dust. "Then what?"

Collen puffed up. "I come running! Chase the urgan right to you."

"With your trusty table leg." I rolled my eyes. "Lucky if he brains you with it."

"You have a lot of experience with urgans, I'm sure." Dust put his hand on my shoulder in that way that silences people. "But, trust me. We've planned for everything. It's going to be…"

As Dust paused, all eyes locked onto him.

Slowly, he  finished, "Glorious."

Mack whispered in my ear. "Ambushes can do anything but 'be glorious.' Are you sure the urgan's the only one who comes out losing in this plan?"

Since imaginary characters do what we decide, I tried again to imagine Mack agreeing with Dust. No matter what I did, I could not control these imaginary ghosts or make them seem less real. But I didn't have to listen, any more than I did when the real Mack told me things. I waved him away, running the battle through my imagination like Aunt Myrrha taught.

In my plan, Collen rises above want-to thug and heroically engages the gigantic, pig-faced bandit, who turns his back on us. Dust and I ambush the massive beast from behind. Dust tries some back-alley stratagem he has in mind; it fails. He ducks death and scrambles out. I stand toe to toe with the beast, covering their escape. I hold on for the precious boot-clicks it takes for them to get out of range.  Everything clicked. For the first time since walking into the night, something felt right. I smiled.

The faces of the three boys glowed in the fires of my confidence.

They thought my faith born of victory, but failure had me covered. Within the hour, I would deliver vengeance upon a deserving urgan or join Mack and Myrrha–possibly both. Either way, fortune smiled upon me. It was time for me to smirk knowingly.

Collen and Dust smiled and bumped fists.

"Sounds like a plan." Smart as Dust might be, no city dweller could buy a hint of the warrior tradition Mack and Myrrha had drilled into my bones. "Be sure not to get hurt when the games begin."

Dust squinted at me and smiled at the boys. "Told you she'd stand up. Now, we march." He turned his back on me.

Neither of us showed all our cards, though Dust always had his up his sleeve. I wasn't like that before today. Dust's presence had bent me the way Mack's had, or Ker's, or even Korog's. Old Man Wolf knew better than I dared admit. I was not right, not normal. How could I know myself if the bend of my spine changed from scene to scene?

At that moment, I allowed that to be just one of the cards in my hand, right beside the tragedy of Mack and Myrrha. Win, lose or die, I needed to play to the end.

** ** **

In the shadow below my balcony, Dust and I lurked. Collen lurked as if  he had hidden himself behind the rag-wearing crone who tended to the smallest children on the street.

As Oliver came from the baker's home with a bag of treats that filled his left arm, so much sweat dripped down his forehead that it made mine itch. He carried a scroll by the top bar, squinting and muttering at it, pretending to look down all the time. "I hope nobody gets these treats. I really hope nobody gets my wonderful donuts this time. I am really hungry." He paced the length of that square and turned back before our quarry arrived.

Never had I dreamt of such an underfed urgan. Korog, slight as he was, stood a head taller and had arms as large as the piglet's waist. Green skin had pinkish tinges. The nose came to an almost-human point. The piglet looked in every direction, stalking Oliver as if afraid—such an impossible sight, that it made me want to laugh. His fear flooded over him and made us both want to run. I grabbed Dust. "This is not right."

"Hush, Watch."

"No, we've got to call it—"

The empty-handed, urgan boy lunged up behind Oliver, squealing and snorting. He grabbed the bag and ran past.

Oliver straightened his shoulders. Suddenly the image of a sorcerer, he spoke the words, and pointed. A flash of silver-blue leaped from his finger to the piglet's feet, frosting him and the surrounding street.

The piglet's boots shattered as the fall ripped his feet from them. The piglet slipped further and landed flat on his snout. The donuts flew from the bag and rolled across the street.

Collen rushed from behind. Dust ran to hover over the piglet, pulling a bamboo straw and blowing. Sparkling dust covered the poor, unfortunate piglet's face until he coughed.

"What? Why di—?" The urgan's head fell to the ground, mid-word.

"You killed him!" This was no daring assault, just a simple murder.

Dust smiled. "Don't worry. Pig's still alive. We saved him for you."

"A gift to you." Collen smiled and bowed. "We know you hate them dirty pigs."

Oliver's fake smile screamed of sickening distress as he turned and stepped a few paces off.

I stood over the piglet, cleaver-arm hanging loose at my side. My stomach ached. Nothing I'd believed had proved true. That magic powder would fetch a huge price. Dust could have fed himself for weeks, even months, selling that one dose. He had other reasons; he meant to bedevil me as surely as Korog's unseelie pixie bewitched Ker.

In honor of the death of my family, the fires of hate burned behind my chest and in my eyes. Part of me didn't care who took the punishment, even myself. That's who I saw there, helpless on the cobblestones: a little refugee child, an orphan who took refuge in the city. She deserved to be punished for what had happened to her aunt and uncle as much as anybody. It would have been so easy to go along, to murder her in effigy along with the boy. I'd be so happy to join Dust's empire of evil. I shook my head. "Not like this. Not some snack thief, unarmed and drugged. This will bring no honor to anybody."

Collen jumped, excited, and waved his club.

Dust nodded and gave the thumbs down sign.

Dust meant for Collen to kill the piglet. With luck, I could stop the club, maybe ruin it. I readied my cleaver. My voice cracked. "Don't do it, Collen. You may be bad, but no. Please? You're better than this."

"Keep at it." Dust slapped me in the back, approving. "One day you might just turn somebody, maybe even Collen."

My furious glare only drew a shrug. "Do what you want; we're done." Dust walked away.

He meant Collen more than me. I swallowed, keeping my cleaver low.

Collen swung the club straight over his head, like a workman—as though at a fence post—and brought it down as hard as he could. I struck straight up at it, chopping halfway through.

Collen's swing wrenched the cleaver out of my hand and pulled my wrist.

My parry had saved the piglet, and cost me my weapon. I stared at my cleaver, hanging in the club.

"Really, Watch Girl?" Dust turned and made a pulling sign to tell Collen to stop. "Sure that's how you want to play?"

The word 'sure' didn't cover it. I had to protect the piglet. I nodded. He'd done wrong, maybe, but for all that, had surely not earned a weapon to the head–cleaver, or club. "Cannot let you do this."

"This has to be scary for him." Oliver looked down, thoughtfully, on the sleeping boy. "Maybe he's learned his lesson."

"Stupid wizard."

Collen pointed, "Yeah! Stupid."

Dust stood in Oliver's face. "Only thing urgans can learn, Oliver? -to hit sooner and harder. But whatever." He turned his gaze to me.

I continued to guard the piglet as Dust continued his show.

He shrugged. "Watch Girl made her choice."

I nodded and held my position.

"Whatever he does, Sigrun? From here on out, it's on your head."

I stood firm.

"When the time comes, we won't be there to help you destroy him."

So I would bear the stain of either the urgan boy's blood or his actions. Like with Korog, I found myself outmaneuvered.

"Mark well. He will destroy you." He turned his back on me and left without pausing to listen.

Collen threw down his ruined club and stuck both thumbs down. "Yeah—you heard me!" He howled and turned to follow his lead.

Oliver pulled at his collar and slowly backed away.

He wanted to help. If I'd invited him, he would–even if it ruined him. I couldn't ask him to brave Dust's ire. I nodded and waved him away as I chased down my cleaver.

The piglet woke and threw his arms up. "Ha'm sorry ah lost the donuts! Ha get more!"

Hoping to reassure the boy, I tried an insult. "What are you snorting about?"

"Shaman Dust, your boss. He tell me he let live if ha mek his the Oliver food."

So Dust had not been upfront. No surprise. I ran my fingers through my hair, and offered my hand to help the boy up. "I do not answer to Dust."

"Everybody answer Dust. Maybe not Medusa, the tho-rules-changer that play queen here—"

He referred to Queen Medusa, the statue I had seen entering the city. She could turn her enemies into glass, the story said, like her hero from an ancient Amerik fable. Gullible urgans everywhere huddled in fear at the notion. I nodded.

"—but all kids, and most adults, do him words. He mek must."

No surprise, that, either. Dust had the way of somebody who spoke the truth. Not honesty, but {popnote: "puissant"}puissant: warrior term for persuasive by action; he would make good on his words. "I am not 'all the kids.'" I didn't admit how narrowly I had escaped his clutches.

"Why I live? Ha mek hate all over girl face."

"Ker murdered my Aunt and Uncle, but you? You're just ... not." I wiped a tear from my eyes. "An urgan chief. I wish…"

He snorted.

"... I could pretend you were."

He laughed. "Thorgabent! Mother say you're thorgabent, like huma father. Protect fragile garbage, it destroy you!"

Dust had said the same thing.  "Maybe I am foolish, maybe not. But know this: I speak urga too. Ha mek medkek." Medkek, the state of metal on the anvil when ready to shape, or of a prisoner beaten past the end of his endurance. I had offered to make him a good listener—that is, to torture him. I retrieved my cleaver.
He smiled and rolled out of reach.  "Oliver say you new Dust. Oliver speak glass. You more."

My threat reassured him, as I expected it would. He ran away, and when he got far enough to duck a flying cleaver, he turned. His hands splayed in a sort of urgan 'thumbs up' gesture. "I one owes you!"

"Just don't tell the locals. That's all I need."

As if to prove my point, an egg hit me in the back of my head. I turned to look back at a cute little boy of roughly five summers. His brown eyes glistened from under the dirt as he snarled at me.

"Pig farmer! Hit the pig farmer." He scurried away.

The old lady who tended the little ones walked up behind me with a comb and towel to pull through the mess. "He's right, you know. Pigs don't belong here. Why risk your life?"

Before she finished, I pulled away from her. "Because maybe I don't belong here, either." I had never belonged, not since I had come back, since I had learned how the world should be.  I moped along, wandering through the streets. A far-off flute melody melded with my mood, putting a sort of beauty to my helpless despair as I made my way to the center of the city, toward Medusa's Tower.

** ** **

Knowing Dust would still be hunting me, I collected my things and abandoned my balcony. It would fall at the first light. Unlike the urgan boy, Dust wouldn't have me die, but would not stop until I became medkek. The weeks of living on ratspider meat had already begun turning my skin ashen. Worse than the pallor of Dread Fever. I had not believed that until I saw it myself. The time came for a new idea, a new place. I pocketed what I could and disappeared into the night.

After hours of wandering, my feet hit heavy and my head wavered.

I felt the hand on my upper arm.  "Let's have it."  The watchman who put out my fire had grabbed me.

I struggled in his grip. "What are you about?"

"I heard about you," the watchman said. "I'm not soft like Oliver or slow like Collen."

"What is this about?" 

"Vick talked to me. You've been terrorizing everybody, stealing food and assaulting the other kids like some kind of rogue watch commander."

Oliver's chicken and Collen's attack on the piglet. I found myself still walking on broken glass in Dust's web of half truths.  I pulled against his grip. "But, I do what's right."

He knelt down before me, not releasing me. "Listen, I'm sure you're a good kid, but weapons are dangerous."

My stomach burned. My cleaver, the only inheritance I had.  "That was Myrrha's."

He brushed the hair out of my eyes. "You don't understand the kind of trouble you're in. I should take you in for sentencing."

My toe started the damn tapping  "That's all that I have left." 

"All you have left," the watchman said. "You mean, from before you lost your family?"

I pulled away again. His hands held me fast, like a manacle. "Right. It was… the only thing the urgans didn't steal or break.." 

"The urgans broke everything."  He got a faraway look, haunted. "So it's an heirloom. Can I see it?"

Mack laid his hand on me. "We remain, ever by your side."

"I want it back." I picked it up by the false edge, and handed him the handle.

"I shall keep it for you." He placed it in his own shirt, his hand shaking.

"You think I have glass in my helmet."

"Urga thinking." He glared in disgust. "Vick was right about you. You've been corrupted."

Dust smiled around the corner at me, then ducked away.

"I can't believe you'd take the word of that… that… Dust is a liar."

Fire-haired ghost Kiele buried her face in her hands, and wandered away, shaking her head.

"Sigrun, stand down," Mack said. "This is not a fight you can win." 

The watchman pushed away as he stood back up. "You have my word of honor, that if you come to me as an adult I shall have this." 

Mack warned me, "Say no more. There are no words for this. Not from us."

I stifled the urge to cry and ran past him. 

Mack followed me.

When I looked over my shoulder, Mack still stood there.

Never Myrrha. I ran further.

Past vendors and pickpockets and loads of locked doors, I ran.

I needed that cleaver. Not because it made me strong, which it did. Not because I wanted to fight someone, which might be needed. Not even because it was the best way to kill ratspiders, which I could manage. I needed it to remember Myrrha. I ran faster and harder, trying to escape the memory of what I had lost.

I would have to stay sharp, to think fast if I had to fight without it.  I could do that. Victory wouldn't be guaranteed. It never was.  I looked over my shoulder, afraid that Mack had left me.

After a few boot clicks, he stepped out through a wall. "Look for me, and I will be there."

It made no sense to run randomly. I needed to find a new home.

** ** **

After wandering the town, dodging carts and lunatics, I came to rest outside an inn. The sign on the door showed a green pig with a meat cleaver.

The absurdity burned me. "The Urgan Inn? What kind of glass helmet would you have to wear to want—oh."

People stumbled and waddled their way past.

They were, fortunately, unconcerned by the pale idiot girl babbling at the inn sign.  I sighed. Watchman was right; I'd started thinking like one of Ker's men. The urgan amounted to paint on a sign, a way to tell people where to go. I walked by.

The door creaked as I passed. An armored drunk stumbled into the street. The scent of armor oil and sweat wafted out.

The familiar scents put me at ease, drew me in.  I pushed in, and looked about.

The patrons here dressed not at all like other thorga but like a smarter class of urga: a rougher style than Mack and Myrrha, yet decked out for adventure anyhow. They preferred iron, with plate and chain being the norm. Those few in hard leather jackets seemed like commoners; even they had multiple blades at the ready. Peace ties hung half-tied or false around the handles. The glimmer of enchantment peeked out beneath the quillons of several. The flaming-enchanted weapons didn't go to the richest, biggest, or the most confident but randomly—distributed to whoever had the good fortune to find one that fit. I had found the gathering place of my people, the roving freemen.

"Quit your gawking, kid." Even the host had plated leather armor and an iron-shod club at his belt, though his belly barely fit. "You got money, take a table. Otherwise, go away. This is a place to buy food, not to steal."

Why assume I'm a thief? I shook my head. "I'd really rather not."

"What's that, leave?"  When he laughed, his whole belly jiggled. He threw down a tankard at a table. "I can see that, but this place belongs to somebody else. You ain't got one here."

"Um, steal, actually." I prefer death to theft, but best to cover my heraldry under my cloak, so to speak. "Maybe you can help with that—the not-stealing?"

"What do you want–to work here?" He came nose to nose with me. "Look around. These aren't the softest customers. You aren't a little afraid of them?"

I bit down a laugh. I'd never heard anything so absurd. "Who, thorga?"

The big man folded his arms and waited.

Those could be my family. Anyhow, I couldn't dream of a human who might frighten me. Except maybe Dust. Spinning nightmare webs of glass, Dust strove for  everything that urga warned their piglets about–an evil more vile than any Korog might dream up. "Humans, I mean. Yeah, I'm just plain not afraid of humans."

"One of us, are you?" The big man grabbed my chin and made me stare into his cloudy, green-gray eyes. "The danger men—the people who like to visit 'civilization' every once in a while."

That look creeped me out. And, I wasn't visiting, I was trapped. I shook out of the barkeep's grip.

The big man looked down at me.

I had to agree; I had more in common with these men than anybody I'd seen so far. "Whatever. You got work; you got food. What's it to be?" I traced my finger along the stones of the wall, then slipped in the kitchen door.

Behind a table the size of a drawbridge stood a pink-skinned urgan. Shock burned my heart and made him seem twice as big as Ker as he wielded a cleaver the size of my chest. Seeing me, he stopped at the top of his swing and glared. "Take out of kitchen, rat child!"

The fat human thumped in behind me.

The urgan's cleaver, more an ax than a knife, cut the confidence from my voice. "This man just hired me?" That wasn't supposed to sound like a question, Sigrun.

He snorted. "That nice, Logan."

"I'm sorry, Briggen! I said nothing of the sort, didn't expect—" He pulled at his collar and looked a bit like Oliver.

Briggen snorted at the human host, keeping up his fake accent. "No mind, Logan."

He stomped around the table. "She good, like. No mind working for pigsnout?" He brought his smashed-in, piggish nose in my face.

"I got the job? If you don't like me, I hear us little ones make the best roast. Till then, if it pleases you, I'm all kinds of medkek."

Logan blanched.

I couldn't guess whether he feared his own fate or mine. I turned to Briggen, feeling in vain for Myrrha's cleaver.

Meanwhile, Briggen stamped forward, snatched me by the shoulder, and pinned me to the wall. His breath stank of ale. "Who exactly do you imagine  you are, you ignorant infestation? Nobody is permitted, under any circumstances, to speak one syllable of that incoherent prattle in my presence. So, unless I say it first..."

"Krolesh. Huma talk. Ah, human. Yessir."

"Good talk." He still held me in his palm. "Take upstairs. Find place. Sleep. Clean face."

"Um, Mr. Briggen, sir. I'm still pinned?"

He dropped me, and I ran up the stairway.

** ** **

I barged into a cheap room.

A box held straw for sleeping. A towel hung from a bar. Shutters rattled over a hole in the wall. A table held a bowl for water.

I grabbed the towel and sat in the bed, trying to clean my face in my tears.

Ker appeared, sitting beside me. "Sigrun, your name? Need money. Make dead the sleeping Briggen."

Ker didn't know my name, but that didn't affect my daydream. I wondered why my imaginary friends seemed so hard to control. "Murder, robbery? I don't do that."

"Justice. Wereguid. Huma word for tax on murder." Ker stood face to face with me, breathing my breath.

Briggen hadn't killed anybody that I know of, certainly not Mack and Myrrha, though I suppose the law wouldn't care. I shook my head. "Can't do that."

"Can't, or won't?" Ker laughed.

I gave up trying to will Ker away; I did need someone to talk to. "Just not going to happen. Why did Briggen yell at me like that?"

"He want mek if Sigrun want work for him."

"That's stupid. He can watch me."

"Briggen huma, but not. He fear, he test. Word, weapon, all same. Different way make broken."

"I don't understand."

"Kill Briggen. Simple. Quick cut to throat, but make quiet. No spirit mek sleep him."

"All right, I could, but I won't. It's wrong."

"Not wrong. Urga law in Briggen arm. Huma law say Briggen outlaw for born. Sigrun right to slaughter."

Yes, we were at war with urga kind, even when we weren't. I glared at him, unable to parry or dodge; Ker's logic covered the range. Talking to him felt like fighting Myrrha in the kitchen. Myrrha's imaginary blade had been sleek while Ker's words had the elegance of rusted wreckage. Still, he wielded them with swordsman strategy.

He looked down his snout at me, smug. "Peasant blame society. Noble blame maybe queen. Enemy, noble, queen, and law say Sigrun can take easy path. Sigrun remember this."

"I don't care," I screamed, jumping up and pointing at Ker, forgetting that I imagined him. "I'm not going to murder Briggen for being an urgan!"

Briggen's voice came from below, "Shut up or get work, rat child!"

Had I ruined another home?  I clamped my hands over my mouth.

Ker snorted his laughter and walked through the wall. "Never gave orders. Reminding you why you didn't."

Ker seemed to urge me toward evil a second ago but at the moment…. Perhaps he meant some kind of lesson. My head felt soft and fragile, like a bell-wearing fool in a glass helmet.

***

"Rat child no listen word I say. Good." He shoved a wet towel in my face and a bowl of soup on the table. "Briggen take cost of room out of pay, if ever you work."

I took the soup. Nasty and cold, it tasted like seasoned rat spider—horrible, but the best I had eaten since coming to town. After a few tastes, I drank it down like it belonged in the queen's banquet. "Thank you so much."

"Nah. Stink if no eat." He offered me two huge mugs and said, "Table by  door."

Eager to pay him back for the room and the food, I grabbed them and hustled out. What I saw there stabbed me in the chest. For a boot beat, seeing the red hair and green traveling armor, I thought that Myrrha had returned from the grave. I plunked down the mugs and grabbed her by the arm. "It's me!"

A vaguely familiar woman turned to face me.

I thought I'd seen this woman once. Many adventurers stopped at our farm-fort when passing through. I wanted to ask her why she hadn't been there, to protect the 'good woman' who had lent her home for their safety, but I knew the answer. They hadn't been there. Nobody had. Nobody could take part in the blame for what happened to Mack and Myrrha or even share it. It rested on Mack, Myrrha, and me. I moved her mug toward her.

"Do I—Oh, yes. Quite a ways from home, aren't you?" She reached in her coin purse and gave me a few coppers. "This is for you, Sigrun."

A bird screeched. Had it been another shadow raven? I looked hesitantly at the door.

"Well, go on."  She shooed me away with a wink. "We're not keeping you."

The woman spoke as if remarking on my omen. I turned to face the door, moving toward the exit as I thought.

Had she discussed my omens with Myrrha, I wondered? I stepped outside.

The clouds showed nothing definite, not like that day, just a knotted loop, a judge's hammer. I looked around and considered going back in.

Mack's voice came from behind me. "Don't tell me you didn't hear that."                                                                                         

I raised my eyebrows.

The piglet's voice cried, "Please, please! Show mercy!"

The wind carried the call far beyond where I should have heard it. Somebody needed my help, far more than Briggen and Logan. Knowing I might not be welcome if I came and went as I pleased, I frowned at the tavern.

I could barely hear the crying voice–as if it were imaginary as well: "You've got make believe, Honor! I not mek stolen that shaman Dust's food."

Clearly, the voice needed help. The refugee piglet had been trapped, and as I alone heard the call–as I alone cared–once again, it had to be me. I could stand to lose another home. At least this time, I had no one to blame. I sprinted toward the refugee piglet.

"Hear ye, hear ye!" The watchman had the piglet bound beside him. He pointed to Dust, nursing a bloody rag on his forehead.  "We have heard the account of the honorable child of humanity, Vick Chant. The valiant human defended himself against the rampaging barbarian you see before you."

Dust winced and held the rag to his forehead, the extent of his 'injury' unclear.

"Please, Honor! No mek dead me. Ha ugly. Ha look mean. Ha no attack. Just want be left alone. You saw. You all saw! Shaman friend attack Shaman Dust."

I looked about. People of all ages stood, mesmerized. A few looked uncomfortable, but most thirsted for the blood and the spectacle the law called justice.

They had seen, at least many had, except the Watchman and I. Unless someone spoke, I would see another innocent struck down. All for a slander lesser than Dust had spoken against me. "Your honor, do not trust this boy. His lies nearly compelled me to kill the young urgan before me, as they compelled you to confiscate my cleaver."

"If you had acted in line with reason, this monster would not be standing before us today."

The man believes I should have killed the boy. Looking into those sad and lonely eyes, I feared he might have been better off.

The watchman  stroked his chin. "I have heard you speak their words, and now you speak in their defense. Be glad; you are but a child. The penalty for sympathizers exceeds that for enemies."

"This is no true urgan! You've heard him beg for his life. An ordinary urgan would dare you to kill him, call you thorgabent for hesitating–even for holding this mockery of a trial."

"He would be right." The watchman straightened his collar.

The people roared at that.

"It is a peculiar foolishness of humans. We show mercy to those who are not capable of showing it in return. Merely because they seem somewhat like us."

I stepped forward, but the old woman, that cares for the children, grabbed me.

I strained to escape and yelled at the watchman. "You have no right!"

"I, Kermit Velgen, am a duly appointed officer of the law. Besides. We are at war with the urgan horde. Any citizen has the right—no, the duty—to stand in judgment of the enemy." He looked into the eyes of the piglet.

What he saw reflected in the piglet boy's eyes disgusted him. "This is cruel. I will delay execution no longer." He took my cleaver from his jacket and pulled it down on the skull of the piglet in a single chop.

The boy fell with a yelp, spilling green-black blood as he did.

I rushed forward and scooped him up in my arms as the crowd booed and hissed. The dying boy oozed green-black blood all over, but I didn't care. "Why? Why did they call me to you?" My tears burned behind my eyes but never came.

"You want to believe in them. I sympathize." He laid his hand on my shoulder.
I could not tell if he were speaking of the urgans or of the pixies–or somehow both.

Kermit put away my cleaver and stepped toward the crowd. He raised his voice and flailed his hands. "Get away. Justice is done! Find your entertainment elsewhere."

A mist formed around the clear space, with only me and the piglet. Out of that mist stepped Mack and Ker.

"Sigrun has answer."

Mack chided Ker. "You're getting ahead of yourself."

The tears began as I hugged the boy closer.

"You know, Sigrun."  Ker snorted at Mack. "Who stand up?"

"That wasn't my question." I had demanded whose fault it had been. Suddenly the question seemed wrong. "The right question is, 'Who will stand up for the innocent.'"

Ker banged his chest, and they both nodded.

"It's me.  I take that duty for my own."

They stood, approving.  Ker opened his arms and nodded.

"That's why I wouldn't kill Briggen or this boy. But, this is all wrong. There has to be more, has to be."

"All along, you listened. You believed."  Mack held my hand over the boy's wound. "Now they listen.  Ask, and he shall receive."

I put my hand on his skull and pushed with all my heart. The blood flowed into him. The wound sealed. His breathing smoothed. I didn't notice his shaking until it calmed.

Mack smiled, his eyes approving yet not surprised.

The blow had been deadly, but I had been there in time. They did more than guide me.

I blinked, and the mist disappeared, taking Ker and Mack like fading dreams. The green-black blood still covered my hands and tunic, but the boy's breathing flowed smooth. The bleeding didn't spurt so bad, but he might not survive for long. Had the miracle been my imagination?

Eggs and pebbles rained down on us between familiar hoofbeats.

Ben and Corielle jumped from their wagon. Dust's brigade of little boys launched a volley of eggs and stones, taking none-too-kindly to my display.

"You've outstayed your welcome, my lady." Corielle grabbed me. "Hope you'll forgive being rescued again."

I grabbed Corielle's shirt. "I don't understand."

"Hush." She put me up on the wagon, next to where Ben put the piglet. "When the emergency has been averted, there'll be time to talk about your Uncle and the loudmouth Circean."

When Ben had almost gotten to his seat, she grabbed the reins and started the wagon.

"Och, foolish woman, 'tis only pebbles. I think you could have waited a space for me to sit."

We rode out of range before another egg hit, going this way and that before coming to rest at an odd building. It seemed not a place for living nor a house of business—no painting to depict the wares. Instead, the windows had colored pictures of people.

Ben tugged at his sparse beard. "Are you sure we should leave the cart?"

"If a thing happens," Corielle picked up the piglet and walked to the odd door. "I'll buy you another."

"Ah, Corielle, you know right well that I'm the treasurer, and most of our wealth sits right there."

I grabbed the door at her gesture, and she led us all in, including Ben. "Do be a dragonet and sit on the thing if that's what you're about."

Ben and I laughed at that one, and he shut the door behind the four of us. Candles alone lit the dark room. Arches and paintings covered the hall that led downward. The place felt strange, yet familiar, like dreaming about home: nothing sits how it should, yet it belongs the new way.

Corielle carried the boy to the end of the hall to a pink-glowing bed. She laid him down and looked at me. The light didn't reflect on her or anything around. Though Corielle knew about the glow, Ben could not see.

"Unbleeding." It wasn't a word, but that's what happened on that bed.

Corielle nodded. "You know what to do. Put your hand on the wound and push."

I laid my hand on his skull and pressed against it until he squirmed.

Corielle laughed. "No, your breath. Humans would say, heart, whatever. Push with that."

I took a deep breath and willed the pink light into his skull. Little bits of the blood returned to him. The skin pulled together and closed the gap, leaving a subtle pink scar.

My hand shook with the effort and power of the event. The second time made it real.

The piglet awoke and smiled. "Thank you! Standing for ha, Watch Girl." His eyes fluttered and closed.

Not for healing him, or saving him, but for speaking for him–standing beside him. In the madness of battle, in the haze of the healing bed, that's all that counted. Later one might count the outcomes, if fortune granted them such a luxury. I watched for him to take another breath.

Corielle pulled me away. "He's very tired. His spirit must decide whether to hold on to the flesh."

I let go, sliding my hands over his face, and down the side of his bed.

Her knuckle traced a letter on my cheek. "Come, we have much to discuss."

She led me away to a bench, one of many as long as the room. We sat side by side. I leaned against her as she let me rest my head in her lap.

"You understand what your guide said to you about having your answer?"

I wondered how she heard what my imaginary Ker and Mack had said when they existed only in my head, but that would wait. I felt around inside myself. "I'm still sad and angry and confused about Mack and Myrrha." I paused to think again.

She waited, meeting my gaze. The pink light reflected in her emerald eyes.

"After helping that boy, the world doesn't seem so broken." I took a breath. "The magic–that's great. But, just being there…" 

Corielle sighed with relief. "So glad to hear that, Sigrun. I have a feeling you're going to be something extraordinary, something we've never seen."

Not someone special, but something. I wondered what she had in mind as I dared to dream a child's dreams—so I thought—of knights and battles and faerie princes.

"Remember, little warrior, you have only begun." She patted my shoulder. "Though it take you many lives, never need you do more than follow your heart. That is all that is asked of any of us."

Beyond the flickering torchlight, at the end of the hall, I caught a glimpse of the flame-haired elf woman that Dust called Kiele, nodding her head at me before turning and disappearing into the darkness. I wanted to ask Corielle if she saw Dust's guide also, but realized that this fire-haired spirit could not reach us.

Weeks like a hundred years had passed through me after the deaths of Mack, Myrrha, and Ker. Like taking arms against a sea of troubles, my fuzzy head could cover only the smallest part. Feeling old yet safe for the first time since then, I rested against Corielle. My eyes watered, and I closed them.

Corielle smiled up at me as I floated to the rafters, to consider the little puppet Sigrun and the adventures she had in store.

  *shield* *shield* *shield*

All grown up, Sigrun reflects upon how these events forged her heart and started a movement... "Appendix/Epilogue: Sigrun's Oath"