When she got close, Urduja took the handgun from Sally’s right before going for the shotgun. For a second, she froze, staring at the weapon with widened eyes and parted lips.

  Or rather, staring at the metallic hand underneath.

  Sally didn’t say anything, even when the Warden looked at her with unspoken questions. Then, the moment broke and the Warden grabbed the shotgun without a word.

  “Come on, then,” Urduja said, “let’s get you to the doctor.”

  31. Two Wardens and a Doctor – September 7, year 216

  The remaining mile of the journey to the Zjevik-Ong Vil passed quickly. They moved through valleys wide and narrow, took turns here and there and in the end, made the difficult climb towards the Vil’s location.

  Unlike the Vils Guha and Palters, the Zjevik-Ong had built their home on top of a mountain rather than one of the valleys, opting for safety at the cost of constantly going up and down whenever you needed anything. Not that many of the Zjevik-Ong needed to do so. While the top of the mountain was less fertile than the valleys below, the one they chose had a rge pteau brimming with grass and bushes for their sheep and goats to graze.

  The rest of their food consisted of low-maintenance crops down in the valleys surrounding their mountain home. From the way these farms looked they could only barely be called such. Rather than tilling nd and impnting seeds on in carefully sectioned fields on a rotation basis, it seemed the Zjevik-Ong preferred to spread numerous seeds as far and wide as they could, harvesting whatever managed to survive and leaving the rest be. Inefficient, maybe, but also generally low-effort enough to make up for it.

  Sally was guided up the mountain – it didn’t have a name, since the mountain was synonymous with the Vil itself – and waved at the Vil herdsmen and women she came across, though none but a few children waved back. She thought she could pick out a face or two here or there, but no names appeared from the deep recesses of her memory.

  Not that she figured it would. She had never made much of an effort to socialize when at other Vils, and the feeling was usually mutual. Barring a few exceptions – like during emergencies that required the whole Vil to defend or for specific reasons like she did with the medician – only Wardens interacted with visiting Wardens, while Vil-folk preferred to stick to themselves.

  And yet, it seemed that a few did remember her, if their raised eyebrows and surprised looks were any indication, though she doubted anyone could recall her name. It’s been less than a year since you were st here, her subconscious reminded her, of course some would remember you. How many visitors do they get, really? She and Niall had traveled to the Vil a month or two before the fateful day in the gully, inquiring as to whether they’d had simir issues with missing herd or people. They hadn’t, of course, or their Wardens would’ve been there during the battle with the Erlings.

  Would it have been better if they had? Sally wondered. Would two extra Wardens have been enough for someone to survive and inform others about the about what occurred? Or would they just be two more bodies added to the pile? Likely the tter, but the doubt remained.

  It doesn’t matter. Although the thought and the emotion behind it was her own, it still surprised Sally. While it was true that all was in the past and nothing could be changed, it had never stopped her from feeling guilty all the same.

  But now? She felt regret, sure, and a deep sense of loss had fixed itself in her memories, but it had stopped feeling like a fresh wound not to be touched. Maybe her newfound sense of purpose had overshadowed it, or she’d really come to accept that there was nothing she could do about it, that there had been nothing she could’ve done about it at the time. Hell, maybe she’d simply grown colder, who knew? Either way, the once-active guilt had turned into a passive regret, one to be carried along forever not as a burden, but a reminder.

  Sally shook her head to clear her thoughts and found that in her rumination, they’d arrived in front of the Zjevik-Ong Vil.

  It was an achingly familiar site. All Vils looked alike even when they weren’t exact copies of one another. The smooth exterior made of grey stone was curved ever-so-slightly upwards between the ground and first floor, making the Vil more a trapezoid than a cube. Embedded within the walls were narrow vertical slits, serving both as ventition and a means of defense. The front door of the vil was a metallic one, capable of being locked closed from within and sturdy enough to survive many a rampaging beast.

  The ground floor of the building was mainly divided into two parts: one for social gathering and one for heavy manufacturing. The front half and the center of the building housed an gathering-annex-dining hall with enough space to house everyone in the Vil. The back half of the Vil was dedicated to everything that had to do with the metalwork the Vil required to sustain itself, be it smelting ore, making tools or equipment, or manufacturing arms and ammunition. The back half was taller than the front, providing more room for better ventition and rger structures in exchange for cutting the first floor in half.

  The first floor simirly consisted of a number of workshops, but there it was mostly centered around the organic. Butchering, cooking, tanning, spinning, weaving and all other things created by or from animals and pnts were located there. Normally, in most other Vils, there would also have been a staircase going up to the roof and the watchtower, but the Zjevik-Ong didn’t have such a tower. Something unnecessary for a fortress so high up the mountain, Sally supposed.

  She’d never really made the comparison before, but both the exterior and part of the interior – especially the metalworking parts – reminded her of the water treatment pnts and early buildings of the Anteeri. The same smooth grey stone, the metal door, the industry within; none of it matched with what she now knew of what remained and came after the Days of the Long Sun, especially considering the people that survived it. Though the Vils now could create some of it at least enough to properly maintain the building, Sally doubted the children back then could’ve managed to do so in a completely barren world.

  So how did the Vils come to be? It had always been waved off as one of the many grand accomplishments done by the Ancestors, but how would that work? Was there one of those Evergraced-like figures among the Ancestors, exceedingly capable of surviving the New World and knowledgeable of the Old? Or did the Ante help build them like he did for the Anteer cities, in gratitude of the people that participated in fulfilling his destiny? Were they remnants of the Old World, like the Circuits’ roads, only less ruined and more inhabitable? Hell, for all she knew the Vils could’ve been the abodes of Demons in the past, killed during the Ante’s crusade and settled afterwards by her Ancestors, though that seemed unlikely.

  When they moved into to building, Urduja didn’t stop at the ground floor, nor did she guide Sally up to the first floor. Instead, they went to a specific part in the center, a sizeable hole in at the heart of the Vil bunker, with a staircase leading down into what could almost be considered the ‘real’ Vil: its root-system.

  After going through another, heavier steel door, a long corridor lit by electric lights revealed themselves. In the Vils, the roots contained all the housing required for the inhabitants, along with numerous other necessities like the medician’s quarters, the armory and general storage, access to the mines, mushroom farms, sewage and waterworks and many other, more minor things. To put it simply, everything that wasn’t built above, was buried below.

  Sally was guided through the corridors, her memories of travelling the roots back home cshing against the reality that this was not her Vil, but the Zjevik-Ong’s. Her instincts would say left at the end of one corridor, only to find herself being taken right. Another time, she expected a right only to discover there was no right to go into. Doors were in pces there shouldn’t be, missing where they should and nearly always misbeled. Then, just as she began to get used to it, the armory would be in exactly the same pce it was back home.

  It was a dizzying feeling to say the least.

  Thankfully, they didn’t need to travel far. They’d arrived at their destination, albeit not the one Sally expected. They weren’t at the medician’s ward, but rather a standard apartment. Urduja knocked on the door and a man soon opened.

  Paul Zjevik-Ong was an old man, looking older than Sally remembered him being. He looked tired in a way that said it had become the norm and his eyes were narrowed in the look of a hermit disturbed from his rest, and missing his gsses besides.

  “Yes?” He asked grumpily. Then, he recognized the young Warden and his attitude flipped, an easy – though still tired-looking – smile emerging. “Oh, Urduja! Thought you were out patrolling?”

  “Hi grandpa,” Urduja greeted in turn. Grandpa, huh. Sally couldn’t say she saw the resembnce. “I was, but I found someone that cims you’d recognize her.”

  “Do I?” Paul asked. Urduja stepped aside, allowing the doctor full view of Sally.

  For a few second, Sally saw him look at her, eyes narrowing and leaning forward as he looked at her face.

  “C’mon, doc. Do I need to show you my scars for you to recognize an old patient?” Sally asked, patting her side with a smile on her face.

  The doctor’s eyes examined her body for a moment before focusing back on her face. They lingered there for a moment until a spark of recognition entered his eyes. “Sarah?” He said in bewilderment. Finally, Sally thought, releasing the pent-up tension in a shallow sigh.

  “Hey Paul, long time no see. How have you been holding up?” Sally asked.

  “You’re alive?” He said, not registering the question.

  “Yep, as alive as life can be,” Sally replied.

  It took a moment for Paul to find his words again. “But- I heard- How-?” The doctor sputtered, before his eyes widened even further. “Niall?” He asked, voice full of hope.

  Sally winced at the question. “Sorry Paul, he didn’t make it.” While Sally and Paul might’ve gotten acquainted during the occasional visit and especially in the course of her week-long recovery from a particurly nasty bite, Niall and Paul had had a much closer retionship. For as much as Niall had been a grump, the man had always been quick to ugh around Paul, a change in character so drastic Sally had started using it as a joke against her mentor whenever he got to annoyed. One I can never tell again.

  A flicker of old grief passed over his face, before he forced himself to smile. “Well, at least his little cria made it!” He said in forced cheer while referring to Niall’s nickname for her: a baby lma. Why that name, Sally’d never been able to find out.

  She rolled her eyes performatively, to which Paul’s smile became a bit more sincere. “Come in, both of you! Let me get you both something to drink.” Before either could object, he moved back into his home. Without so much as a gnce toward her, Urduja followed the old medician, and so Sally did too.

  The doctor’s home was small both by necessity and by purpose. It was meant to house a single person, though that wasn’t to say it was uncomfortably small or cramped. It was simply economical, like all Vils had to be with their underground space.

  The living room consisted of a rge, low to ground table sat upon a number of stitched together goat-hide rug. Surrounding the rectangur table were five cushions, three on one long side and one on either short end, leaving one of the lengths bare of any cushion. In the corner was a smaller, though taller table with a pair of simple-looking wooden chairs, while on the walls hung a shelf filled with books. Another wall held several drawings, some meticulously detailing human anatomy while others clearly the scribblings of a child. Besides the living room there was a kitchen, a small bathroom and bedroom.

  Urduja seated herself on a cushion on the long side of the table, while Sally took pce on the nearest cushion from the entrance, on one of the shorter sides. After half a minute, Paul returned from the kitchen with a tray containing three gsses of water and a bowl of pinyon nuts.

  Sally and Urduja thanked him, both taking a handful of the nuts and a sip of the water. Sally didn’t miss Paul’s gnce at her new limb as she used it to hold the gss, nor Urduja’s renewed focus on it.

  She smiled. “You want the long or short version?” Sally asked.

  “I’ve got the time,” he answered, taking a sip of his water.

  So, Sally told her tale. From the Gully to Cardinar, the Half-Knight to Lovesse, Lake Dread, Southwall, the Cannibal Road and further beyond, all the way to the ten defunct visions at Ancora. Paul asked questions all the while and Urduja, once the girl grew more comfortable and as captivated by the story as her grandfather, followed suit. Especially the events surrounding Green Providence, the Marshen and Keringa – the tter for Paul especially, due to her describing the healing magic – were of particur interest to them.

  And why wouldn’t they be? Compared to the rest, this was a seismic shift for the Circuits as a whole, even if the Vils liked to consider it separate from them. But when she got to the part about how she got her new limb, all the rest fell to the wayside.

  “May I?” Paul asked, gesturing to her arm.

  Sally nodded, rising from her seat, removing her jacket and peeling the sleeve of her white shirt back to reveal the metal arm. She moved to Paul’s side and stretched the limb out for the doctor to grab, Urduja leaning in with interest. Paul accepted the arm, holding it gently at first, unsure of what to do or think of it, before he began prodding and poking, squeezing and rubbing, testing reflexes and bending what could bend. All the while shooting the occasional gnce at Sally to see her reactions to the examinations.

  “Amazing…” Paul said breathlessly. “And you got this from a dream?”

  “A vision,” Sally corrected. “And given by a dead guy. But basically, yeah.”

  “You know, I’ve never been as skeptical as others about the Anteer’s tales and stories about their faith and magic,” Paul said, pulling up Sally’s sleeve a bit further to look at the connection between socket and arm. “But I never imagined something like this.”

  Sally figured that was true on both accounts. The doctor was a medician, trained in their own brand of healing magic separate from the Anteeri, so for him to believe some of the more magical and fantastical stories coming from visitors made sense. But a fully functioning metal arm went beyond bits of magic, even beyond most legendary tales.

  “How does it feel?” Urduja asked.

  Sally shrugged. “Mostly? Like any other arm. I can feel with it – heat, cold, sharp and dull and those sort of things – and it moves however I want.” Sally said, wriggling her fingers for show. “But it’s also a bit like a tool. Mechanical. Precise.” Sally locked her fingers in strange positions, bending some left or right while others forwards or backwards in ways impossible for a normal hand and completely opposite from what her other fingers were doing. They remained perfectly still, not moving or even trembling in the slightest.

  Urduja touched the fingers, pressing down and trying to move them, but they remained locked in pce. Then, when the girl least expected it, Sally suddenly moved her hand rapidly towards the Warden’s face. Though not very far, of course; didn’t want to set off a fight response.

  The girl startled backwards in fright by the ‘attack’. Sally ughed out loud until Paul spped the back of her head. “Don’t bully my granddaughter,” he said with mock sternness, barely restraining his own ugh. Urduja rolled her eyes and gave an annoyed sniff in a way only a teen could.

  “Couldn’t resist,” Sally said with a smirk, unapologetic. “But anyway, while you’re busy fondling my arm-” this time it was the doctor himself rolling his eyes, “-what’s been going on while I was a goner?”

  With mild reluctance, the two began sharing their stories and news.

  Parts of it were familiar to Sally. Once the Erling threat became clear as something more than an early migration or a raid born of desperation, the Wardens moved out in order to stall and call for the aid of the nearest Anteer cities, followed by Gadeon and the Grandie Frontiersmen almost by accident. The threat eventually ended when a group of Wardens – Zoren and Mikae among them – managed to track down the shaman leading the group, kill them and break up the unholy alliance between skinner-wolves and Erlings.

  Other parts were less familiar, but not unexpected. In the early days, when help remained uncertain and the Wardens of other Vils far away, many of the Zjevik-Ong had volunteered to aid Mikae in disrupting the Erling’s movements while Zoren travelled to the other Vils. As the days dragged on, the battles grew fiercer as more and more Erlings and skinner-wolves poured down from the north. Even after other Wardens began to arrive and the cities down south began to contribute to the defense, many Zjevik-Ong still volunteered for the fight.

  During those times, Paul had treated many a wound and lost many a patient, including his wife and son, Urduja’s father. In the end, around forty or so Zjevik-Ong had died – a good fifth of their Vil – and many more wounded before the threat was dealt with. Casualties of other Vils were less known to them, but many had come to volunteer and while the majority returned, many also didn’t.

  No wonder he aged so much in so little time, Sally thought. At least she herself wasn’t there to witness her family die, let alone while trying to treat their wounds.

  The deal with the Grandies about the nds west of the Gesker also made more sense after that revetion. No one wanted a repeat, least of all the Zjevik-Ong despite their proximity to the Union’s new frontier. And while it was clear the deal didn’t quite sit well with Paul – or, at least, not during his retelling to Sally – Urduja seemed to have much less compunctions about it.

  “You should’ve seen their Frontiersmen, Sally. The way they moved, the way they pnned, their resources-” the junior Warden wasn’t quite starry-eyed, but the admiration was clear. “If their regurs are anywhere near as good?” Urduja asked rhetorically. “Well, two tombs for a permanent shield is a small price to pay.”

  Sally had moved back to her earlier position on the couch in the course of the telling. “Feels a bit different when it’s your tomb, you know?” Sally said, tone purposefully challenging in order to bait a response, though not without a bit of truth. “When it’s your Ancestors.”

  But Urduja wasn’t deterred. “Who cares about Ancestors?” The woman near-spat the Vils holy word like a curse. “The living are more important than the dead.”

  It was an attitude Sally could respect. Would respect, once the memories of the memorial stone had faded somewhat. It was one she shared, though Sally’s extended further than just the worship of their Ancestors.

  Still, she refrained from saying any of that and instead went for another angle. “And is that all they ask, then? Dead nds in faraway mountains?” Sally asked. “Seems a bit generous for the Grandies.”

  “Dead nds, yes, but full of resources,” Urduja argued back. “And the Grandies love their resources.”

  “And they’ll look for more and more, until they cover all the mountains and all the Circuits,” Sally countered. “Where do you think the Vils – your Vil – will be then? They’ll be gone, this time buried under a Grandie incursion.” The words, the accusation, slipped out unintentionally.

  “They’ll be alive!” Urduja exploded in anger, rising from her seat. “Who cares about mountains, about resources, about the Circuits or- or whatever the fuck! As long as they get what they want, the Grandies won’t care about a few hundred people atop a mountain, and they’ll protect us whether they want to or not!”

  That was an extreme position, one Sally didn’t expect from someone so young. But the point made was a logical one. If the Grandies invested men and money into these mountains, they’ll protect the Vils almost by accident in their desire to protect their own assets.

  However, Sally had her doubts at the extent the Union was willing to let the Vils be. Another people not under their control, yet inside their territory? No matter how small, some friction would be inevitable and incidents would pile up on one another. And everyone could guess which way the hammer would fall once the point of no return came.

  “Alright, alright. Calm down everyone,” Paul said, standing up. “No need for things to get heated. We’re all on the same side, aren’t we?”

  “No, we aren’t!” Urduja replied, breathing heavily. “They already offered, you know? Mikae is going to the meet right now to convince the Wardens, and- and the other leaders to accept it! And there’s nothing you can do about it!” Urduja yelled with tears in her eyes, before running off, smming the door behind her.

  Paul gred at Sally. “Did you really have to?”

  Sally sheepishly scratched her cheek. “Didn’t know it was a sore topic,” she replied apologetically. “Just wanted to find out how far they got, you know?”

  Paul gred at Sally and crossed his arms, clearly unimpressed. “You compared the Grandies with the Erlings. That was one step too far,” he said, voice clear with disapproval. “Unless you really believe it?” Sally grimaced, shaking her head.

  “Thought so. Well, you got what you wanted at least,” Paul said with a sigh, uncrossing his arms. “Just like Niall said, stubborn like a lma.”

  Sally frowned, a connection in her mind forming. “Is that why Niall called me a cria?”

  Paul smiled in reminiscence. “Oh yes. He often called you stubborn, overly pyful, independent, prideful. Though I figured the spitting was less literal,” he said with a smile. “But also kind and loyal, a natural Warden ready to guard flock and family from predators.” The st part felt more like an accusation than a compliment.

  Sally grimaced. “I should probably apologize, shouldn’t I?”

  Sally stood up and moved to do so, but Paul waved her off. “I’ll do it. I doubt she wants to talk to you anyhow,” he said casually, causing Sally to wince. “Besides, don’t you have somewhere to be?” He continued.

  She did. That the Grandies had already made a py came as a surprise. She’d expected to see creeping influence in the Zjevik-Ong Vil itself, not an out-in-the-open move like this. Maybe the Cardinar situation had spooked them, or they’d received news about what happened further east or even about something Sally didn’t know about, in Southwall or somewhere in the Gold Circuit.

  That Mikae accepted the offer – for why else would she carry the proposal to the meet? – was also unexpected. Then again, the impact of the Erlings on the Zjevik-Ong had been great, but to cause such a radical shift in the otherwise conservative guardian? And why and how had the monthly meet, one usually attended only by the Wardens – and even then, only rarely by one from all Vils – turn into a more general one for all the Vils? Clearly, something was going on.

  “At Vil Midten?” Sally asked Paul, putting on her jacket. It was the usual location for a grand meet like this.

  Paul nodded and after sharing a quick goodbye, Sally left.

  A thirty-mile journey, Sally thought as she moved out of the Vil, the harsh light of the sun making her squint. Through and over the mountain. And in only two days? An impossible for even the toughest Warden.

  Sounds easy enough, Sally thought, grinning widely.