“These things have got to weigh a hundred pounds each!” Nora quietly complained as I handed her a golem from across the small gap between buildings.

  Mika would remain on this roof a street away from the warehouse, while his golems went in with us. Even with the new communication rune he finished earlier that week, he was essentially dead meat while controlling that many golems at once, and we decided it would be better for him to stay here. While I agreed with the strategy behind the decision, it was one of the failure points I’d spotted. By stationing himself here, he was cutting himself off from communication.

  Even with his new runes, he’d spent barely a week on them in total. Add to that the fact that I’d only seen the new rune series tested once and even then, the golem fell apart shortly after the spell left it. Now we were going into the warehouse with our commander streets away, and his only way to communicate was through a half-developed golem.

  I handed off the last of the golems to Ellen, got up on the ledge that surrounded the roof we’d climbed to be here, and lunged. Another short jump, each of us holding one of Mika’s golems, and we were on the roof of the warehouse.

  Thin black stone dotted with green glass windows tiled the roof. The three of us snuck our way across the roof to the back of the building, wary of any loose tiles slipping to reveal us.

  Ten minutes of agonized steps, and we huddled around a skylight. Each of us positioned in a way to not cast a shadow, now that the green glow of the walls had overtaken the orange of the sunset.

  Part of what added to our time crossing the room was the fact we paused at each window to see if there wasn’t any movement below that we could spot. It’d all been quiet, the entire band asleep, but that didn’t mean no one would wake up, so the three of us huddled around the skylight and watched for any signs of activity or movement below us.

  Even with the lack of movement, the signs of habitation were everywhere. Dirty dishes, garbage, and clothes littered every available space on the first floor. Not dissimilar to the barracks I stayed in when I was thirteen.

  At the end of a successful mission, all thirty of us returned to those barracks and trashed the place. What lingered below reminded me of what awaited us in the mornings after those victories when we woke to hangovers and furious [Paladins] looming over us.

  When I looked away from the window, I saw all of Mika’s golems were up and operational. Each golem moved in a precise pattern that tested every individual joint. I’d suggested now would be the time for Mika to test his new rune series. He’d hesitated, his already pale face lost what little color it had, and he refused. Staunchly stating that it was too big a risk, creating as much noise as talking would.

  Knelt next to the window, Nora and Ellen hugged each other. Nora’s head rested on Ellen’s shoulder and Ellen’s head on Nora’s. They drew strength from each other. Pre-battle nerves hit everyone differently and not seeking to disturb the moment I looked away from the pair.

  With nothing to focus my attention on, my pre-battle nerves reasserted themselves, and the almost comforting swirl of butterflies invaded my stomach. These butterflies were old friends, so I took the time Nora and Ellen were providing to work through the standard pre-battle breathing exercise, followed by a short payer.

  Iona Black Hand. Witness me. I dedicate these deaths to you. May the souls of the dead ever fuel the Howling Winds.

  Nora and Ellen broke their hug seconds before I felt Iona’s hand wrap around my neck and drain the heat from me. Everything faded. The world was starker, clearer. The only pinprick of warmth in my existence at that moment was my connection to Ylena. Nothing Iona or the Howling Winds had ever done had been able to fully close that bond.

  Almost as if she had sensed my thoughts, Ylena’s presence filled the bond, and I felt her love for me projected through in images of her domains.

  A mother wolf watched as her child went out on his first hunt with his siblings. A moose watched their child leave their territory; the oak watched its acorn be taken to lands unknown. All that and more, a million and a half scenes of hope, connection, and separation condensed and sent through our bond. The Grace Mother would witness me this day as well.

  When I opened my eyes from prayer and looked at my party mates, they were both crouched over the window again, ready. With a last look at both of them, they gave me small but determined nods. When I glanced at Mika’s golems, he had them perform a small salute in response.

  The skylight window opened without a sound; the well-maintained hinges making our job that much easier. I was the first to enter and dropped onto the wooden catwalk like I would from a tree; my shield raised to cover most of my body while my knees took the brunt of the fall.

  I made a quick scan and briefly stood to look over the half walls of the catwalk. When I saw no one was on either side, I motioned for the rest of the party to follow.

  Ellen handed down the golems to me first. Next came Nora, who I had to help down because she was too short to hang from the window and land on the catwalk without a sound. Ellen was the last of us to come down, and like me, landed without making one of the wooden boards creak.

  Made from paneled teak, offices lined the back wall of the warehouse, connected by a thin walkway half the width of the catwalk at only five feet. The plan was to move from office to office as quietly as we could, killing as we went and returning once the job was done.

  As the three of us, and the three little stone people, walked down the catwalk, we fell instinctively into a soft formation. Nora in the middle, Ellen at the rear, me at the front, and one of Mika’s golems next to each of us. When we planned this, Nora wanted to be the rear guard, and it took no paltry amount of convincing not only from me but from everyone that the best place for her in any formation with our party composition would be to be in the middle.

  I stayed closer to Nora, not because I was worried about [Archers] or [Mages] but because every couple of feet her body would relax slightly and she’d expose too much of her silhouette above the catwalk’s half walls.

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  The first door we opened didn’t have any locks or visible traps, but when I pushed the z-framed door open, I did so crouched. Shield raised, braced for any impacts or blasts. The room was austere, and two cots made with strict discipline sat on opposite sides of the room. The only other furniture being a shared chest on the far wall. We figured the room to be John and his companions, so we left it be for the time.

  Ellen kept a lookout, and we slipped into the next room down. Sprawled out together on the bed was a naked man and woman barely covered by a thin, stained white sheet. The woman was slightly older than the man, who I recognized by his mustache as Trevor. Scattered across the room was a mix of empty and half full liquor bottles of various hues and sizes. A narrow tendril of smoke wafted up from a pipe nestled into a pile of blue and red powders on the nightstand.

  I moved to follow the plan we’d come up with, but when I heard no more footsteps, I looked back to see my party frozen in indecision. Like a distant chime, I could feel irritation flash up in me before the Howling Winds scoured it away.

  Using my drawn belt knife, I pointed at Mika’s golems and then to the torso of the woman, and directed Nora and Ellen to grab the legs of one of them. Nora was the first to move, following me to Trevor, but she was hesitating.

  When we all gathered around the bed, I looked up from the targets to watch my party. The gloom of moonlight, tinged only slightly green because of the stained glass in the room, was our only illumination. Each of them looked worried, as if this was all going to go wrong at any second.

  The woman was unplanned for nothing we’d heard or found out, said anything about Trevor having a partner, but this was not a big wrinkle in the plan. The woman would have to join her lover.

  I counted off three on my fingers, and we moved to secure them. Mika’s golems jumped from the bedpost to land on the woman’s shoulders, holding her still and clamping her mouth shut. Nora and Ellen grabbed the feet of both and I clamped onto Trevor’s mouth with one hand while the other pressed my knife just far enough into the man’s skin to draw blood.

  The pair of them shot awake, their pupils wide and eyes dazed. Trevor’s eyes took in the room slowly. They passed over each of us multiple times before he finally made the connection in his brain and understood what was happening. Trevor scrambled weakly, stretching at my arm and trying to buck Nora’s grip from his legs.

  Naked and intoxicated, the man could do little to get past my armor, but the noise he was making might draw some attention. I pressed my knife in ever so slightly deeper, just enough to remind him it was there, and nodded for Mika to bring one of his golems over.

  Mika sent the golem of the pot-bellied baker crawling across the mattress to sit on Trevor’s stomach and press his hands to the bed.

  The man’s lover put up much less of a fight. As soon as she’d opened her eyes, she’d taken in her surroundings and determined she couldn’t win a fight right now. She had none of the haze to her that Trevor did, and consented to remain in bed.

  I surveyed my party and idly noticed that my glove was becoming damp as Trevor panted, the weight of the golem uneasy to bear on his chest.

  “What do we do about her?” Ellen whispered to the four of us.

  “We kill her.” I whispered back.

  The woman’s eyes widened, and so did Trevor’s. Oddly, though, she remained calm. Trevor fought even harder than he had when he realized what was happening.

  “No!” Nora hissed. “What if she’s a [Prostitute] or something? The Guild would kill us.”

  I stared at Nora for a moment. I really looked at the wild-eyed, nervous way she stared at our soon to be victims. Deep within the influence of the Black Hand, her concerns seemed petty. A complaint to be discarded in favor of efficiency. Had I been in the barracks of the Pack Matriarch or some other enemy of the Cult, I might have just ignored her.

  That would have been selfish, however. This was a training mission. We were here to teach my party mates how to kill the enlightened. Leaving this woman alive was a mistake that would complicate things, but it was my duty as the sentinel to make sure they survived this mistake.

  “Ellen, Mika, you feel the same.” It was a statement, not a question. I knew they did.

  Ellen nodded and mouthed the word yes. Her eyes locked on the knife, a bead of blood pooling around the tip. While all three of Mika’s golems, nodded in exact unison.

  "Mika, point her face towards me.” I said.

  The golem who held the woman’s mouth closed did so and gently prodded the woman to turn rather than force her.

  Iona’s grip tightened on my neck and the warmth of Ylena’s presence flared as I stared into the woman’s eyes. This was too important to be a coward, and within the grip of the Black Hand, fear had far less of a sway on me.

  Staring into the woman’s brown eyes, memories tried to flare, images seared into my soul attempted to burn but were frozen dormant by the Hand of Winter. Leaning down across Trevor, I kept eye contact and whispered.

  “Your friend is going to die.”

  Trevor squirmed, but stopped when I squeezed and pushed down with the hand over his mouth. The pointed tips of my gauntleted fingers dug into his cheeks and positioned as I was, I could drive all of my weight down onto him.

  “You do not have to. We are here to collect the bounties on Hardbuckle and his lieutenants. If you remain silent, you will leave here with your life. Am I clear?”

  The woman looked at Trevor, her eyes filled with sadness. As the pair locked eyes, I knew what would happen. When she looked back at me, remembrance tried to surge, but Iona tightened her grip again, to where it almost became painful.

  Trevor struggled again, but I held firm. With one of Mika’s golems on his chest, his arms locked to his sides, he couldn’t punch at me, but he tried to bite through the thick leather of my glove.

  I ignored the struggle and looked at my party. At some point, Nora had looked away, eyes now focused on the floorboards.

  “Nora. If you are to learn, you must watch.” I tried to soften my tone, to make the ugly words less distasteful, but couldn’t muster the compassion to succeed. Even to my own ears, my voice was harsh. My words a rebuke rather than the gentle chide I’d meant them as.

  It took thirty seconds for Nora to gather the will to look up. During that time, Trevor struggle and fought against us with increasing fervor as his brain finally caught up to the situation he was in. Once I had everyone’s eyes on me, including one of Mika’s golems, I plunged my knife into Trevor’s neck and tore it through the side.

  Trevor was dead within the minute. Blood dripped across the steel of my armor and onto the yellow stained sheets. That unmistakable spark of life left and glossy orbs locked in an expression of defeated terror stared sightlessly at the blood splatter on the ceiling.

  Stepping back from the body, I turned to see how everyone was taking it. Ellen was staring at the body stoically, the only sign of her shock the fact that her hands shivered, fingers locked in a death grip on the ankles of the dead man.

  Nora’s eyes had also gone glossy, and she stared at the body without really seeing, a small splatter of blood beneath her left eye. Her blinks were slow, but eventually she turned her head from the body to me, down the knife still in my hands, and then to the woman whose ankles she held.

  Mika’s golems were acting like statues, but that told me little of how he handled this. I knew he hadn’t done well back at the bakery, but I was unsure if seeing the death through the perspective of his golem so far away would change anything for him.

  It was Trevor’s lover that held the strongest response. As soon as the knife pierced flesh, she tried to scream through the stone hand on her mouth and thrashed so hard she almost knocked Nora over. I knew this woman would do anything she could to alert the rest of the band or kill us without a doubt, but looking at my party mates, I knew they would still want to spare her.

  Killing her would be the right move, but this was a learning experience and a mistake of this size would be a valuable teaching moment.

  Do not think yourself infallible child. You have only begun your steps along the Martial Path. This is as much a teaching moment for you as it is for them.

  Ylena’s voice filled my mind like a shouted echo, her tone chiding in the way I’d wanted to be with Nora. I tried to take her words in, to absorb the wisdom. But it was harder to do so through the frost of the Touch of the Black Hand.

  At that thought, I felt Iona’s grip loosen on my neck, from almost painful to the barest touch, and the embers of emotion reignited. A new voice filled my mind, one used to command and as sturdy as an evergreen.

  Absorb mother’s wisdom Bran, but now is not the time to meditate on them. You will have the opportunity once you have done your duty.

  I could accept the wisdom in Iona’s words and turned away from the woman to look at Nora. Ellen had joined her and the pair say quietly against the wall. Mika’s golems had fully taken over, holding the other down, one on her head, the other on her arms, and his third on her legs.

  Nora was looking at Trevor’s body almost curiously, like she couldn’t wrap her head around the fact he was dead and would no longer wake. Neither woman looked to be taking it as hard as Mika did, and I was inclined to give them some time to think about things because no one knew were here.

  I gave them both a few minutes to collect themselves before I asked the hundred gold question I already knew the answer to

  “What do we do with the girl?”

  “Is there anyway we can find out who she is?” Nora asked, her voice muted and small.

  "We could just ask her.” Ellen said, her voice similarly small but backed up by an undercurrent of hope.

  “Sure, we can do that.”

  This was the moment I knew was going to happen as soon as they baulked the first time. The woman had barely struggled the entire time, even while her lover died. Now that we were about to give her an opportunity to act, I knew she would try to do something.

  I knew this moment would be important in the growth of my party. I’d had my own important moment all those years ago, but I still had to figure out what Ylena thought this would teach me.