King Marlo woke up sitting in his chair in the study. He’d been dreaming of…something. He wasn’t exactly sure what. He just had the impression of golden light and a warm hand on his shoulder. He rubbed his eyes with pale hands and realized that someone had placed a blanket over him in his sleep. It couldn’t have been the servants; they were told not to disturb him, so that meant it was either Vauna or Bren. He sighed as he pushed it off of himself. They knew he would’ve wanted to be woken, but of course they wanted him to rest. They always wanted him to rest. Sure he could smash the desk in front of him with a clenched fist, but what did that matter when he was constantly sick and a papercut could put him near death?

  He coughed, as if to emphasize their point, or at least the imaginary point the versions of them in his head had made. He took a sip of the tea on his desk and finding it cold he dipped the tip of a finger in it and heated it until steam was wafting gently from it. He took another sip and returned his attention to his correspondence.

  More polite refusals of support from Stent, Broan, Goetias, and Svict. He was unsurprised. They had their own problems that they wanted to prioritize. Sure, theirs weren't existential threats which could overturn the order of the world they all inhabited, but you know… that all paled in comparison to petty wars of conquest and fucking sheep.

  He moved on to the requests of mercenary support, but it was a similar problem. They would rather fight in other countries' wars than deal with rifts. He’d had some initial luck when he’d first taken the crown, but now that the threat they posed was better known, mercs didn’t want to eat the risk. As usual, Hume was on its own.

  He turned to the letters from the Knight Captain and the General. He’d been dreading them. There’d been so many positive reports when the new Knight showed up. Dozens of rifts sealed in quick succession, losses nearly cut in half, morale rising. He was starting to have hopes that they’d be able to reconnect with Lataxia soon, but then he’d received the letter saying the diviner that had been the catalyst for the improving situation had jumped through a rift, saving a dozen villagers before it closed… He shook his head. He’d wanted to meet that man. If he could risk it, he would’ve ridden out himself to meet him. He clenched his fist then released it. No sense waiting.

  He carefully broke the seals on both reports, reading the General’s first, then the Knight Captain’s.

  “What?”

  He read the letters again. Their progress had held, even improved in some areas. The soldiers, knights, and militia had begun taking heavier losses again, but they were fighting harder and sometimes to the last man. Ollie, the mage that had travelled with the knight, had been fighting fiercely and had sealed a rift himself. That made him sit forward. He wasn’t a diviner, just a taker and a mage. Could mages learn to seal rifts? No, his ancestors had tried that many times. It must’ve been because he was a taker. That changed things, but not by much. How many takers did he even have in Hume? He’d have to put out an inquiry to find out.

  The men and women that had been fighting were speaking more of the divine. That trend had been starting even before the knight had disappeared, but now it seemed to have actually increased without him there. Many wore the six point symbol. Some painted it on their armor and tabards and others wore it as necklaces. There were also reports of dreams, visions, and whispers from the gods.

  Dreams… Marlo thought back to that impression of gold. There had been a beautiful man. He wore Bren’s face and spoke in his voice, but it wasn’t Bren. He had placed a hand on his shoulder, and told him to protect the ones he loved.

  The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  Marlo sat up a bit straighter. He pushed himself out of his chair and walked to the shelf on the far wall with the reports from the previous weeks neatly lined up in a row. He grabbed the one where the Knight Captain had first mentioned the names of the gods he’d heard.

  …

  Pyotr didn’t hear or see anything, but one moment his cage was closed and his bindings tight, and the next it was open and the bindings undone. He felt the faintest whisper of Magicka hanging in the air and saw something wrapped around the bars of the cage. He approached it, and found his boots, a long dark coat, a dagger, and a note in a satchel. He quickly threw the boots on and belted on the dagger, giving the note a quick glance.

  A deal is a deal. Kill any men on the way out and I will kill you myself. Give my message to Michael.

  The second he finished reading the note, it went up in black flames, instantly incinerated. He slid carefully out of the cage, muffling himself as he crept into a nearby alley between tents. The pathways seemed mostly clear and he could hear… singing?

  Raise a glass for the dead

  And drink the death away

  Raise a glass for the living

  And do so every day!

  The song continued with that theme for another line, and he could swear he heard King Castor’s voice mixed among them. Another distraction for him? He certainly wouldn’t refuse it. He began creeping from tent row to tent row until he reached the edge of it, checking his Mark spell that he’d placed on Marcus’s rifle. It was miles away, but he was definitely still close to the front. He reached the edge of the camp, where pits had been dug and stakes placed within them. He watched as a soldier patrolled the edge deliberately, watching the woods as he walked. Once he passed Pyotr ran and leapt, his powerful legs enhanced by the kicking power of his boots. He flew through the air and landed well past the trench.

  There was no tree-cover close by, as it had been cut away to prevent ambush, so he just ran at full speed and hoped that no one saw him. When he made it to the treeline he risked a look back and saw no one reacting, nor did he hear any cries to capture him. Only the sounds of singing muffled by distance.

  He checked again where the mark for Marcus was and started running. Eventually they would check his cage and he needed to make sure that he created as much distance as he possibly could. Luckily, with the nighteye spell and his grace he was able to move very quickly through the swampy forest until he reached a clearing where a battle had clearly taken place recently. He was about to run across it, when he hesitated. Something was wrong.

  He waited there for a few moments, his ears keen for any signs of pursuit, but there was nothing. Then he saw it. Rising from the muck near the center of the battlefield was a large scaled creature with bright orange eyes and dark scales covered in mud. Pyotr had seen a few small caiman since they’d arrived in Cantalia, but this was far larger than those small creatures had been and power practically radiated from it. A titled beast.

  Were he better armed and armored, with ale in his belly and a dance in his heart, he might’ve made an attempt to fight it, but this wasn't the time. Instead he forced himself to be still and waited until the creature sank back beneath the water. He then started taking a long way around the clearing, making sure not to make any more noise than usual.

  He heard the faint sound of barking and yelling a distance behind him as he reached the other side and left the clearing behind. He wouldn’t mind if his pursuers were slowed by the titled beast. He hoped that Castor wouldn’t blame him for any deaths it caused though.

  He crossed deeper into the swamp and made it within a mile of where his Mark was. This was where things got a bit tricky. He lowered the hood on his cloak and held his hand up in the air as he slowly walked toward the lines. Cantalian troops usually guarded their camps with men and their blowguns that could send out poison darts. He’d felt what dying from those was like before, and he had no intention of going through it again.

  Eventually he heard a stir and a man wearing a green cloak that blended in perfectly with the surrounding swamp stepped toward him, seeming to appear from thin air.

  “Who are you and what the fuck are you doing?”

  “I’m Pyotr, and I just escaped the Burndan Camp. I am a member of the Gemini mercenary company.”

  “Gemini?” The soldier lowered his blowgun and drew a simple amulet of carved wood showing a six sided star. “Praise the divine brother.”

  Pyotr smiled. It seemed that Trina had been hard at work. “Praise the divine.”