“Ellis!” a voice called, far away.

  Ellis flinched, bringing his hands up to claw at his face, trying in vain to get the ants off. But his fingers brushed soft skin. His face was clean, not a single pinprick eating away at him. He felt along his nose, somehow still there and arched like always. What should have been skinless fingers moved like normal as they traced the curves of his face.

  “Get up!” that voice called again, closer now.

  Ellis didn’t want to get up. He was tired. So tired. And the ground beneath him… was hard. He pressed his hand into the floor and felt dirt fill the space in between his fingers. Opening his eyes just a sliver, he could see the morning light glinting off of the tree leaves that hung above him. He was still in the forest, or maybe this is what heaven looked like…

  He snapped open his eyes, as his brain started working. A kick hit him in the ribs a moment later, Ameena commanding him to stand up, her eyes wide with fear. “Get up Ellis! We’re being attacked!”

  Ellis stared up at her, dumbfounded, ignoring his aching ribs. “How are we alive!?”

  She ignored him, unsheathing her wand and dagger and facing the hill overlooking the city, Michael standing at the precipice with his sword drawn, fighting with guards on horseback.

  Ellis scrambled to his feet, “No! We need to move! This… I don’t understand…” he said, shaking his head as he kicked over his bag, and found his crossbow.

  Ameena was glancing back at him, watching as he ran over to her tent to fetch the quiver. As he picked it up, she stopped glancing and started staring, her face a mirror image of Ellis’s confusion. He started loading his crossbow and met her gaze, asking with his eyes as to what was going on.

  She shook her head and ran to Michael, grabbing him by the shoulder to make him sprint down the top of the hill hiding behind the treeline, roaring at Ellis to follow. He did so without complaint.

  Glancing over his shoulder back to the campsite, he saw Michael without his ruined eye, leaning against a tree fast asleep, even though he could hear the oaf's loud footsteps ahead of him. He looked to his own bedroll, and saw himself sleeping, a little bit of drool dripping down his cheek as he rolled over, unbothered by the morning's events. Except… they were off. The hair was a shade darker, the nose was a touch smaller, when he opened his mouth to yawn he had a gap in the front of his teeth that Ellis lacked.

  He stopped focusing on the illusion and turned back to sprint in the direction Ameena had dragged Michael off too. Ameena had stolen his cloak, so keeping up was impossible. But that didn’t mean he was going to let himself be captured.

  Three hours later, after hiding in bushes and trees as patrols of at least ten men combed the forest around him, he found Ameena and Michael hiding in a sloth hole hidden in the underbrush. He had run past the place four times before Michael reached out, grabbed Ellis by the foot and dragged him into the hole with them.

  There were fewer patrols here, and the army’s initial excitement at having found their camp and bad lookalikes had died down, their spirits lowered significantly. The patrol that walked by as Ellis peeked out of the sloth hole looked dejected, their shoulders hunched and their eyes scanning. They each had a white knuckled grip on the weapons in their hands, like they could all be snatched away at any minute.

  Ellis breathed a sigh of relief, and turned back to Ameena. “Thanks for waiting. Can I have my cloak back?”

  She gave him an annoyed look, but undid the clasp and threw it into his lap. Putting it over his shoulders felt right, his slow twitches growing quick, then non-existent. After that, he crawled over to the wall next to her, Michael sitting opposite both of them without a hint of a smile on his face.

  “So… there’s an army outside led by the Ant Killer. I suppose we’re going to need a new plan?”

  Ellis didn’t know if it was a premonition from the gods, but the morning’s events had been too similar to… his dream. He didn’t know what else to call it.

  Ameena gave him a skeptical look. “How do you know that?”

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  “I saw him from afar. He was wearing that chest piece with an ant head on it, and I doubt any man in that city besides Michael is as tall as him,” Ellis lied.

  Michael ignored their exchange, a deep scowl stretching across his face as he thumbed the sword at his side. “We have a new plan. Or well, we’re going with Ellis’s plan now. We’re going to kill that motherfucker.”

  Ellis had noted the tone in Michael’s voice, far different to his usual bloodlusted ‘let’s kill them all’ tone. This time his voice sounded focused, sharp. Like a hunting Rass had sat up and learned to speak. It scared him, and the way Michael gripped the pommel of his sword scared him more.

  Ameena had missed it. “We’re stuck in a hole in the ground, hiding from him and his army. Lucky for us, it means the city should be relatively unguarded. Slipping into the palace will be far easier once we’re out of this mess.”

  He looked at her. “Did you not hear a word I just said? We are going to kill the Ant Killer. The Archduke can wait.”

  Ameena’s brows furrowed, and she leaned back into the wall. “If we kill the archduke—”

  “Shhhh now, Ameena,” he said, waving a dismissive hand towards her. “No point in telling me all the smart reasons for why we shouldn’t do this. Your little schemes with the boy are why we’re here in the first place.”

  He pointed at Ellis when he was finished, like he was the entire reason they were here. Ellis glanced down at Ameena’s hands as she unlaced them from her lap. They were shaking, and the way they ground into the dirt had him almost shift away from her. Her cheek twitched, but she did not argue further.

  Sensing she might say something stupid regardless, Ellis tried to speak, but felt himself hesitate. Like he was expecting Michael to lash out at any point, to grab his ankle and throw him out the hole, and then watch with that scarred eye as Ellis was hacked to pieces by the patrols outside.

  But he could not afford to just sit here and follow that man to his death. He was tempted to just call the guard, and repeat that prophetic dream. At least he would die knowing they went with him.

  Except… even the gods were on his side now. He hadn’t buried his sister and future wife just to let their murders die by another's hand, and the gods’ themselves had agreed. They had given him a gift after all, a glimpse of the future. He was the one destined to kill these monsters, not the Ant Killer. Not even the ants themselves.

  Him. And him alone.

  That vision would not come to pass. His revenge will be taken. Because he would make damn sure of it.

  “Well, if I’m allowed to speak?” Ellis asked before Ameena could, watching Michael like a hawk.

  He gestured for Ellis to go on.

  “We could break back into the city, and then wait at the barracks. He will have to go back eventually, especially if he can’t find us. The Ant Killer will arrive home all sad at losing us, then we jump out from the shadows and fill him full of bolts,” Ellis said while adding some venom to his voice, hoping it sounded convincing.

  Michael raised a surprised eyebrow. “Now that’s the sort of plan I like!” A white light went off in Ellis’s eye. “Except I want the army to go back into the city after I kill the Ant Killer. We’re going to make the forest our home base. Actually, Ameena, where is that travelstone? Why haven’t we used it? We’d be back in the city just like you planned if you used it.”

  Ameena spoke past her teeth. “When we left, I assumed they would swarm the house. So I reset it at the campsite earlier. There’s no escape here. Not with that.”

  He rolled his eyes. “And how’d you reset it?”

  Ameena gave him a look. “Why would you need to know?”

  “You really are upsetting me today,” Michael said with a sad smile, returning her gaze. “Besides the obvious ‘because I said so’, if we can reset it to this little hole, I can use it in the plan I’m cooking up.”

  Ellis and Ameena shared a glance. “What is your plan?”

  His grin returned in full force now as he sat back against the dirt wall behind him. “Let’s just say both of you are going to be happy when I’m finished. So now, Ameena, stop dancing around the fucking explanation and tell me how to reset the stone.”

  She swallowed, Ellis couldn’t tell if it was out of anger or fear, before fishing the travelstone out of her pocket. “It’s easy,” she started, ignoring Michael’s unbroken stare lingering on her face.

  She gestured at the incorrect mark of the gods decorating its surface. “If you break the stone in a way that leaves three stars separated from the opposite two, and leave the three starred side somewhere, putting mana into the two starred side will cross time and space to get the two halves back together, along with you and whoever you are touching.”

  Michael crawled forward and inspected the stone in her outstretched hand. “That… wow that suits my plan perfectly.”

  Ameena and Ellis both looked at Michael like he was speaking in tongues before she cleared her throat. “Ahem, Michael, may I ask what that plan is?”

  Michael grinned ear to ear and didn’t look at either of them. “I read something a while back. Let’s just say I’ve been inspired. And it’s going to be so much fun!”