“What is it?” Elder Hyde asked gruffly.

  “A man claiming to be Viscount Jack Nobart is asking to meet the Elders.” Lothar replied.

  The Elder cocked his silver eyebrows, but eventually nodded. “Alright. Let him in. Make sure your men are keeping an eye on those soldiers, then come join us.”

  The head hunter nodded in response, and went to talk to his men. He and fifteen other hunters were the only men among the thousands of Cha who had any experience in wielding weapons, so they had become their de-facto protectors.

  A young man wearing an understated but clearly well made light armor addressed the Elders and the surrounding men.

  “Greetings. I am Viscount Jack Nobart. My father has decided to block your entry into the Nobart County at any cost. I’m assuming that you want to leave Nanon through the Treacherous Bog?”

  “What is it to you?” Hyde asked, not bothering to mask his hostility.

  “I would like to help you out.”

  Hyde spat on the ground. “Help? I think not! More like slaves for your mines, or some plot of your father!”

  The young man kept his expression neutral.

  “Believe what you will. I will just state the facts: you want to leave Nanon, and the only thing that stands between your goal is the County of Nobart. You have no other refuge.”

  “You sound quite sure of yourself.”

  “Nanon is surrounded by the Bog to northwest, the sea to the west, Nogaal to the south and Sindhu to the east,” he counted on his fingers. “You will have to traverse the entirety of Nanon to reach both Sindhu and Nogaal, if they will even take you. There is no other path left to you. How would you even handle the thousands of idiots baying for your blood that stand in the way?”

  Before Hyde could reply with another insult, Elder Weber asked, “what are you offering, Viscount?”

  “Guidance. I know every part of this county like the back of my hand. If you will separate into smaller groups, perhaps five hundred each, and enter the County through separate sites at the same time, even my father’s men wouldn’t be able to intercept you all.”

  “Why should we trust you? You are that damned Count’s son!” Hyde spat.

  “I have broken away from him. I pleaded with him to just let you pass through, but he wouldn’t budge. So here I am.”

  Aprilia had pushed her way into the circle of people surrounding the meeting. Looking at the Viscount, she glimpsed something desperate underneath. Why would a noble risk so much for them? She didn’t trust him, but she wanted to.

  “What about the group they do intercept?” Erickson interjected, trying to change the course of the conversation. “Even five hundred civilians won’t fare well against a few dozen soldiers.”

  “That is the risk you will have to take, but remember, Nobart is mostly sparsely populated highlands. I’ve chosen routes through regions where you’re not likely to come across many people.”

  “What do you want in exchange?”

  “Nothing. Just your people’s safe passage out of Nobart.”

  Hyde seemed like he was going to retort when Erickson interjected again.

  “Let us confer among ourselves.”

  “Of course.” The Viscount replied and walked away.

  “We can’t trust his words!” Hyde spat immediately.

  “Lothar?” Erickson asked the younger man.

  “There are almost a hundred trained soldiers and multiple times that many armed men on that border. We can win with our numbers, but we will lose hundreds of men fighting them. We will still have the entire county to traverse and we will have more wounded to care for, on top of our sick, elderly and children. Once the news of the death of those men spreads, more Nobarans will come to avenge them. I don’t think it’s a feasible path, Elders.”

  “We truly don’t have any other option left. We have to take a chance on the Viscount,” Erickson stated his position.

  “I agree,” Elders Braun and Weber both added.

  The Council couldn’t come to a unanimous decision, but ultimately agreed to the Viscount’s proposal. They backed away a few kilometers from the border and separated into groups of five hundred. The Viscount gave fragments of parchment, with a rough map of the county drawn on them, to each group leader.

  “I have drawn a different path on each map. Follow them, and enter the border on the morning of the day after tomorrow.”

  The group leaders nodded solemnly and dispersed to relay instructions, knowing full well that their fate was still in the air.

  ──────── ??? ────────

  The fresh breeze sweeping through the rolling hills was a balm on the sweltering heat of the mid-day sun, not that Aprilia could feel anything other than trepidation. They had been covertly slinking through Nobart’s highlands in the direction of the Treacherous Bog for days, getting closer every day. Every bend where they couldn’t see more than a few paces ahead made her heart flutter with fear.

  Vinnie looked up at her with innocent eyes, clutching her hand with all his strength.

  “I’m tired,” he complained.

  “Me too, Vinnie, but we need to keep going. Just a little more.” She smiled for his sake.

  “Okay.”

  Her rambunctious little brother had quieted down in the last few days. He was only eight years old, and with her being almost twenty one, she was more like a second mother to him than a sister. It broke her heart to see all that chaotic energy replaced with a sullen acceptance of their fate.

  “The path’s clear!” A scout shouted, and she forced herself to move forward.

  Another day of walking and the hills began flattening, a sign they were finally approaching the Bog. Suddenly there was a commotion from the rear of the column. Aprilia strained her ear and found her heartbeat quickly rising at the sounds of metal hitting metal.

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  “Run to the woods!” someone shouted.

  The forest ahead became her world, as she ran towards it with all her might, while making sure her little brother could keep up. Only when they were safely between the trees did she turn back to look at the melee. Most of the men on both sides were already down, but a warrior on their side was fighting three men at the same time.

  “Who is that?” she asked the girl next to her.

  “That’s Lord Jack!” she whispered in admiration.

  “What’s he doing here?”

  “Protecting us, of course. That’s what real knights do!”

  Aprilia wanted to cringe in response, but her eyes were glued to his figure, skillfully keeping the men at bay. He took out one of them, but two more joined the fray. She found herself praying for his victory, when one of the men jabbed a spear in his thigh. One of the Cha’s fighters took out a Nobaran soldier from behind, giving Jack some respite, or so Aprilia thought.

  He successfully took down another man, when another of his opponents managed to cut him on the arm. Every injury made Aprilia wince and jump, while Jack seemed to be growing slower. Suddenly, he advanced toward the enemy soldiers. He parried one’s spear with his sword, while barely escaping the other’s jab. He grabbed the parried man’s spear by hand and swung his sword at the other soldier. The sword met it’s target, the man’s neck, which sprouted a fountain of blood.

  As the soldier collapsed, the other one managed to wrench his spear back from Jack’s grip. He successfully jabbed Jack in the gut, eliciting a scream from Aprilia and others nearby. Jack stepped aside while gripping the spear and lunged at the soldier. A swing of his sword, and that soldier crumpled as well, blood oozing from his neck. The few remaining soldiers staggered at the display, and decided to beat a hasty retreat.

  The spectators’ hearts swelled at his triumph, as he turned to look at them. He was filthy, covered in mud and blood, but he was one of them now. He tried to lift his sword in salute, but froze and crumpled, falling face down on the ground.

  “No!” Aprilia screamed, like many others. The battlefield was quiet, with only two of their men conscious and kneeling, while the rest were lying flat, either unconscious or dead.

  “Let’s go!” Aprilia said to herself as much to others. Making sure Vinnie was in their mother’s arms, she ran to the battlefield, strewn with fallen men.

  “Aprilia! Come back!”

  Ignoring her mother’s calls, she ran with all her might, heart racing in her chest. She staggered at the sight of the blood soaked ground, crudely reflecting the sky in shades of red. Gathering her courage, she approached Lord Jack’s body.

  She and the girl who had been next to her turned him around with some effort. Putting a hand on his neck, they were relieved to find him alive, but riddled with numerous wounds.

  “We need to staunch the bleeding. Help me undress him,” the girl ordered, and Aprilia immediately complied.

  The girl ripped his tunic with surprising strength and fashioned it into bandages, which she began tying on his wounds, while listing the injuries.

  “You know a lot about healing,” Aprilia stated.

  “A bit. My aunt is the real expert. I’m Emma,” she chimed up, while tying the bandages.

  “Aprilia. So, what do you think?”

  “I can’t say for sure. That last jab luckily didn’t cut his guts, but he’s lost a fair bit of blood.”

  They called for some men to carry him to one of the carts, which they promptly did. They would not leave their savior behind.

  “What about the bodies of our fallen?” Aprilia asked her father, as she looked at the eight bodies, out of the twelve who had bravely fought the pursuers.

  “We don’t have the time, pumpkin. We can’t risk being here if those soldiers come back with more men.”

  She nodded weakly, and with a heavy heart, bade goodbye to the brave souls that gave their lives to protect hers.

  “Never forget,” someone whispered.

  “Never forget,” she replied.

  They had walked for only an hour the next day, when the forest began to thin.

  “What’s that stench?” someone asked through a pinched nose.

  “Welcome to the Treacherous Bog,” someone else answered.

  As she exited the forest, Aprilia blocked her nose to ward off the foul stench. Her squinted eyes fell upon the alien landscape: flat, muddy terrain swathed in shades of brown and green, barren of anything bigger than a bush. She forced herself to breathe. This was the air she was going to inhale for the next few days, whether she liked it or not.

  ──────── ??? ────────

  Traveling through the Treacherous Bog turned out to be a slog. Their group’s already glacial pace slowed down to a crawl. The only positive byproduct was that the other groups began catching up to them. Soon their numbers swelled from a thousand to twenty five hundred.

  The next group that joined them was much smaller. Only three hundred or so, with most men absent.

  “What happened?” Erickson asked their leader.

  “The Count’s soldiers fell upon us. They rolled boulders from ridges into the valley we were in. It- it was horrible. We killed the bastards in turn, even though it… it came at a high cost.”

  “My sympathies, brother.”

  Aprilia heard the conversation as she went to talk with Emma. Lord Jack hadn’t woken up ever since he fell down.

  “How is he doing?” Aprilia asked her, while trying to keep the mosquitoes at bay.

  “Aunt Matilda says he’s gone into a deep sleep. Dunno if he will ever wake up. How are you doing?”

  “As well as anyone can in our situation. At least I’m not sick,” she added.

  “Yeah...” Emma answered evasively.

  Aprilia thought the worst part of their journey was behind them, but she couldn’t be more wrong.

  “I don’t feel so good,” Vinnie told her the next day.

  “What?” she asked, looking at him. His face shone with sweat, even though the wind was cool.

  “Why didn’t you say anything earlier?” she chided him, but understood that he was trying to be tough. Their terrible journey had taken away his innocence. She put a hand to his forehead, which was burning like a furnace.

  She controlled the fear swelling inside her and took him to Emma’s aunt.

  “Hmm... high fever, is it?” the old woman, face covered in wrinkles, asked as they approached her.

  “How did you know?” Aprilia asked in shock.

  “He’s not the only one who is sick. Did you have him at a very young age?” she asked Aprilia, with pity in her eyes.

  “No!” Aprilia blurted out, flustered. “He’s my little brother.”

  “Oh. My apologies, dear,” Old Matilda checked Vinnie, taking his pulse, looking at his tongue and pressing under his arms.

  “Come meet me alone this evening,” she told Aprilia. “And make sure he is drinking plenty of water.”

  “We... don’t have much.”

  “I know. Said it out of habit,” Matilda replied, bitterness on her face.

  Aprilia’s stomach was a knot of worry all day. She dreaded going to meet Matilda, but eventually gathered her courage and went to her.

  “Aunt Matilda?”

  “Oh. Emma’s pretty friend,” Matilda replied with a smile, which didn’t reach her eyes.

  “You wanted to talk to me alone?”

  “Yes. You seem like a girl with grit, so I will be honest. I don’t think this is some simple fever. This Bog is a nasty place. It breeds disease.”

  “Which disease?”

  “I don’t know, and even if I did, there’s not much I could do. We don’t even have enough clean water to drink. So,” she said, making eye contact with Aprilia, “expect the worst.”

  Aprilia pushed down the rising dread. “That can’t be true! It’s not the plague, is it?”

  “No. Different signs. But it looks just as deadly, if not more.”

  “We should be out of the Bog in a few days. Maybe he will recover, once away from this nasty air?” she asked optimistically.

  Matilda put on a polite smile and nodded noncommittally, but she didn’t seem to share Aprilia’s outlook.

  Her fears were proven correct when many of the sick began dying. Vinnie’s body glowed red from the fever which wouldn’t break, as Aprilia and their father took turns carrying him.

  The next day his breathing grew even more ragged. She considered stealing water from the casks their group had been carrying on wheelbarrows, temptation rising inside her like the tides, but the sight of other families suffering similarly stopped her. She spent the night telling him stories of brave knights and her shenanigans as a child.

  The very young and the elderly were the ones who were hit the worst, and began dropping like flies. The coughing fits began the next night, and wouldn’t stop. By the next morning, the little boy was barely lucid, his lips cracked and skin clammy. Aprilia constantly prayed to whichever God would listen, but no one answered. At mid-day, they stopped to give him some water and gruel, when his wheezing grew weaker. There was no miracle, and no last words. His breathing just slowed down and she watched with horror as her little brother took his last breath in her arms.

  “No! Not my little Vinnie!” their mother wailed, their father holding onto her. Aprilia did her best to not break down similarly.

  She helped the men dig a grave for his little body, tears freely flowing into it. It was only one of the fourteen that were dug that day.

  “Goodbye, little brother. Have fun running around in heaven, and don’t get into too much trouble.” She whispered to him, tidied up his curly hair and gave him a kiss on the forehead.

  They lowered his body into the grave, while her mother watched from afar, all life gone from her tear streaked face.

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