Stuck

"How did you even get through security?" I hissed at him, hoping no one would hear. CNN was playing on the cathode-ray-style TV's in the gate lounge at the airport. Unlike the ones in Nashvile or Dallas, this airport was miniscule and quiet.

Orion lounged in the chair beside mine. He smirked. "How do I always manage to get into your bedroom without a key to the house? How do I manage to look so good after centuries? You write fantasy, Rochelle. Don't ask silly questions."

"It was rhetorical," I covered, and the roll of his eyes told me he didn't believe me. "Anyway. Good timing. I'm stuck. On this."

He peeked over my shoulder, at the document pulled up on the laptop screen. "Raziar."

"Yeah."

"Why don't you just move ahead to the part that you like? Wrap up that scene, and skip right to the action. You know, the river scene or whatever."

I bit my lip. "Ending this scene is the hard part. Tomen and Rylan travel in the dark, but they're in a forest with a full moon up above them. Lorenda can see lines, so she should be fine... but what about the others? It needs to be real, but they still need to plow through like wolves on the hunt."

My muse closed his eyes, sinking even further into the vinyl seat. Nearly a minute passed before he answered me. "Have Lorenda guide her sister, by the hand if need be. Rylan can tell her these things, and Shakyr can trail them like a bodyguard. What's so hard about that?"

"Well how are Rylan and Tomen able to move around like this?"

"Full moon. Mirrors, too, if you want, though I don't think they'd risk it."

That could work. I looked up at the clock, and packed up my things. It was almost boarding time. "Thanks." I kissed the top of Orion's head, earning a grin.

"It's good to have you back," he said, ruffling my hair.

Kaeta

"You're back."

I didn't say anything, but just nodded at Orion and plopped another piece of pineapple into my mouth. He didn't move from his spot by the door. One moment, I'd been looking at the shadow behind the Severus Snape Christmas ornament, the next I was looking at my incubus of a muse.

"After a month. Are you proud of it?"

As if I'd committed a crime, not writing so long. "Less than that. I did revise Magpies. Did a hell of a job, too."

"Yeah, but you know what I mean. Don't try to change the subject."

I ate the last piece, and the sweetness was almost foreign it was so fresh. Like Raziar. Which I hadn't touched in -- Orion was wrong -- over a month. During that time, I'd finished up the semester without coffee (a first in my college career), taken a passing grade in that cursed C++ class (I'd been preparing to fail it), and seen the sky from an airplane window on my way to visiting the family in Texas (another first time).

"Yeah, I'm proud of it. So shut up and get off my case unless you want me to hire a new muse."

I shouldn't have said that. The moment I did, I saw his face harden, blue eyes frosting like the ice crystals that gave tonight's moon such a wide halo. I saw how crumpled his powder blue dress shirt was, as if he hadn't slept. And, if this was a time of firsts, lo and behold, Orion bore a bit of a mustache.

If people thought writers had it bad when writers' block hit, this image told me what the muses must have to endure when their charges aren't diligent.

Not that I had writers' block. Oh no. I would have tied Orion and Roman down before that happened.

He stepped closer, one foot then another across the dark fake (or was it real - I couldn't tell) hardwood floorboards. Across the Native American design rug that my parents had had for my whole life. He brushed past the more recent and cleaner leather armchair. And when Orion bent down over me, icy eyes peering down in the lamplight, I said, "Those are impossible, by the way."

It made him back up, and I sighed when he did. Having an incubus that close, whether he's trying to get under your skin or not, is like standing in front of an open oven at 450 degrees Fahrenheit. At that moment, it felt more like 500 degrees, so I was pretty sure he was trying to get under my skin.

"What is impossible?"

I pointed at his eyes, and he flinched. Yes, more distance.

"Your eyes. I know you're Japanese, or at least, you look fully Japanese. Actually, I know you're Japanese, but you look Korean, except they all have dark eyes. None of them have light eyes, like yours."

"How would you know?"

I smirked, stretching out my neck. I was sore from sitting at the computer for a while.

"I've been watching those J-Dramas a lot. And then, I saw a guy - Japanese, mind you - with gray eyes. And it hit me how odd it was, you having blue eyes, him having gray ones. I looked around online, and people speculate that it's rare, but occasional, for Mongolians to have light eyes. They said maybe Genghis Kahn had gray eyes. That's about it, though." I leaned back, smiling.

"And that Japanese actor?"

"Contacts. You?"

"Something better, you know that," he said, leaning forward and sharing my smirk. He sighed, too, and then straightened, hands on his hips. "Well? Are you going to write, or what?"

I stared at one really deep wrinkle in his shirt. Then, with a chirping voice, said, "Nope. Not tonight. If you stop by tomorrow, though, I think I could manage something."

"What? After all that? You little fox!"

"That's such an insult, Orion, especially from an incubus."

"I mean you're a sneaky little rodent, who-"

I laughed, and left the room, with him trailing after me. "Foxes are not rodents, baka." Would I ever get peace that night?

NaNo Day 9: After-Dinner Plans

Dinner involved a lot of useless chatter, but also a lot of obvious silence. Sasilyna didn't speak, nor did Lorenda, Rylan, or Tomen. Madrice kept throwing them looks over a simple fish and leek stew.

“Tomorrow, what are your plans, Raziar,” Bestole prompted for something.

“Training, as usual. Plus some errands. Rylan and his father wanted to visit the market.”

“Oh? Well, we can have Lorenda pick up anything they need, don't worry.”

“I'm not sure what I want,” Rylan objected. “It's been a long time since I've been through here, and want to see what the vendors are offering.”

If Bestole was trying to keep them from their mission, it would be as useless as trying to stand on a pile of fish. But he kept up with those prying comments all night, and by the end of it, Sasilyna was exhausted.

She left the room promptly after eating, giving Lorenda a look that said to meet her when she was done. The Raziar had almost gotten to the end of the hallway when she heard footsteps and turned. Rylan. She waited, and he quickly caught up her to her by the time she'd crossed her arms.

“What?”

“Nice work back there. Good to know I can trust someone around here.”

“What does that mean?”

“Honestly? Think about that,” he said, looking Sasilyna up and down. Not in the way that some men tried, but in the way that a coyote stares down another coyote, trying to figure out if it needs to bite the invader or just let them pass. “Tomorrow, I'm going to the market as soon as the sun is up. It sounded like you had other plans, so...”

“Why so early? Half the vendors won't even be set up...” Sasilyna felt like flicking at his red sash in annoyance.

“The important ones will be. Trust me on that. We're going to nap midday so we're fresh on the road at night.”

“Don't you think it's dangerous to leave at night?”

“More dangerous for anyone trying to follow us,” he said, and it sounded like a dagger pointed in her face. “Predators are the ones that walk at night, remember?”

His eyes seemed like a lighter brown than earlier, but maybe that was the golden reflection of lantern light from them.

“Sasilyna?”

Weston and Lorenda were further down the hall, just coming out from dinner. Weston's footsteps were quicker than Rylan's had been, and he was clearly more tense. When he got closer, she could see the heartbeat at his neck thumping.

“Is everything okay?” He said this in his “I don't like this but I don't want you to know I don't like this” voice.

“Yes,” Sasilyna said. From the look in his eyes, a darker gray than normal, he didn't believe it. “I take it you remember the way to your quarters, Rylan?”

“Yes, thank you. Good night.”

Sasilyna raised her eyebrows as he turned from them, a small head nod to each person except her. “Goodnight...” she said with a frown. She shook her head, as if that would either help her understand that oddity of a man or make her feel better about not comprehending.

“I'm serious about what I said earlier,” Weston said, picking up a pace beside hers but falling behind as they entered the staircase. Lorenda was quiet. “Please consider things carefully, all right? The last thing anyone needs to do in this situation is rush.”

“I never rush,” the Raziar said. When they were on the second floor, Sasilyna started to walk with Lorenda to their shared bedroom, but her friend's hand on her own stopped her. Weston's fingers were too warm and his body was too close.

When he spoke, his voice was too quiet, too low. “I wish she weren't gone. I know this is hard for you, whatever you do, and whatever comes out of it. But we'll work through it.” His mouth opened to say more, but choked a few times. He coughed and released her hand, standing straight. “That's... That's all. Goodnight.”

He was more confusing than Rylan. Childhood friend with a crush on her. She thought they'd settled that years ago, but clearly, he had a tough time balancing his emotions.

When she and Lorenda were behind the closed door of their bedroom, it was Lorenda who spoke first.

“What are Tomen and Rylan planning?”

The older sister started changing clothes, smiling. “How do you know they're planning something.”

“You mean besides that little hush-hush talk you were having with Rylan in the hall? I'm not stupid. There's no way they will just let this whole thing fix itself. Like Uncle said, that won't bring Selya back.”

Sasilyna's smile disappeared. “Nothing will.”

Lorenda's back was to her, nightdress slipping over her head. If she heard, she didn't acknowledge it.

“They're going after Willon. I won't tell you when, because you'll find out when they aren't here in the morning.”

Sasilyna laid down on the bed, skin grateful for the release from belted work pants that tended to rub into her hipbones and boots that made her feet sweat and feel cramped all day. A bath would be nice before...

“You're going with them, aren't you?”

She smiled as she opened the door of her bedside lantern and blew out the flame. “They don't know that.”

The silence afterwards was too long. “What is it?” she asked her sister.

“I don't know how I feel about all of this. I mean, fine if Rylan and Tomen want to go after revenge, and I'm not saying I don't want Ranara back... But, I mean, I don't think Damaros would let anything happen to her. And I don't think Willon would really do anything to her.”

The Raziar took a deep breath, willing her muscles to turn to liquid calm into the bedsheets. Her voice had to hiss through her teeth for escape. “Then why did he take her?”

“He didn't kill her, did he? I mean, he could have left her body like all the others. But he didn't, and Damaros and she obviously are... well... something. So, I think she'll come back, eventually, on her own, and be fine. We shouldn't try to start a war over it, you know?”

Lorenda sighed, but Sasilyna wasn't done.

“It isn't a war if all I do is bring her back.”

To that, her sister said nothing. Sasilyna rolled over on the wool-stuffed mattress, peering at the shadows for answers. She looked for a while before finally sleeping.

Day 8: Where is my sister?

Sasilyna stood, stepping around and working after a minute into a short, reversing pace.

“What? What could they do if they united?”

Rylan had finished with the sack and faced her, more imposing in the sleeveless mark of a Shonrad warrior than Weston had ever looked in metal-plated leather. The flicker of blaze-red from the small fireplace made the red sash on his arm leap like a snake.

“What could they do?” he echoed. She almost felt sixteen again, in front of the previous Raziar whenever she couldn't do the drills with others right. It wasn't a pleasant feeling at all. “If Willon killed a few people just to get others to take notice of him, what will he do when he actually wants power? You think he won't? Or do you think he can't get it? He's moving, he's leading, and people will follow just to follow, let alone because... because people treat Shards differently and use them all the time. Even if he didn't have Chasers coming to him, that alone would be a problem.”

“Then let me come.”

Sasilyna stopped pacing and stepped closer to the man. He didn't break the gaze, his height even with hers.

It was Tomen that answered. “Sasilyna.” His voice was like a father. Not like her father, because he had never used that tone, never. Gentle. “Sasilyna, no. Let us get her, let us do what we need to in Ragnorak. We're trained in these things, and your skills are in leading a lot of people for big things. This is small and special. Let us … let us, and you stay here to cover our hides when the Shards want to pick a bone over it.”

Sasilyna walked over to the fire, toeing one of the half-eaten wood slices further into the mouth of the flames.

“Fine,” she said. “Fine. But if she dies, and if you get out of there before she does, I will hunt you down myself.”

“I think we could still hide, but I get the-”

He grunted, and she guessed Tomen had hit his son.

The Raziar pivoted on one foot, leaning back to look at them both. Rylan had put a woolen jerkin on while she'd turned her back. Tomen had, too, and both father and son had their hands and backs packed with traveling supplies. Light, considering it was about a two weeks' journey to Grayrock, but it seemed like they knew how to get by.

“I'll escort you to the gates. Which side are you exiting from?”

[-]-------------------------------------------------[-]

Lorenda's face was tight like a garrot wire choking a man to death, and Sasilyna could only imagine what her own resembled.

“Where is she?” Sasilyna asked, mostly to herself. Lorenda couldn't predict things, none of that stuff. Sasilyna didn't know exactly how far Observer sight reached, but was sure it didn't quite reach that deep into the Lights' plans.

Except, Lorenda did know something. She bit her lip as if that could keep it from her older sister.

“What? What is it?”

“She's been with the Shards a lot lately. Particularly the blond one. The boy. Damaros.”

The Raziar's head turned, jaw locking up, and before it could release, she brushed past Lorenda towards the stairs. Ranara had been missing from dinner a lot lately. She'd seen the two together sometimes, in the market or in the courtyards, but Sasilyna was usually too preoccupied to do anything about it. It wasn't like it mattered anyway.

But something felt wrong. Because she hadn't seen any of the Shards that day. Or last night. Since the murders, she'd made sure to be in constant contact with them, day by day. If Willon didn't come to her, a letter or one of his siblings would.

“Sasilyna! Wait!” Lorenda's voice burst behind her. She heard other footsteps.

“Raziar? What's wrong?” one of the soldiers, one she couldn't recognize right now.

“Just come with me. Both of you. Witnesses.”

Silence followed her words, the only noise her boots scuffing on the carpet rugs and flagstones and her heart screaming from her chest.

Where was her sister?

The staircases she took were paved with bricks and reinforced with wooden railings against the wall. Sasilyna leaped them two at a time, like marching in place, the lanterns swinging into her vision then blurring out as she moved beyond. One of the staircases had a window, the shutters flung open to the night. This was the way to the hawk's nest, where only those with special orders were allowed to enter.

By the time Sasilyna reached the plateau of a wide hallway that ended in simple double-doors, the bruise on her thigh from a drill accident yesterday had burned a hole of pain through her muscles and become a limp in her gait. Lorenda and whoever else followed her stopped when she went forward to the doors, thumb slamming onto the brass latch of the handle of one and palm of her other hand clapping against the rough wooden surface. She ripped the door open.

The only sound was the echo of the hinges groaning and the breeze trickling over the open threshold. Sasilyna didn't wait to hear the end of of these noises, she just bounded straight forward, up the last steps. She'd been here before. But last time, there had been chatter, and lights. Now, nothing.

When she stepped onto the surface of the rug of the giant hawk's nest, she looked around at mystery. An empty bowl on a table. Wide windows where sunlight bled through. Cushioned window seats. A set or two of doors leading to smaller rooms. Dangling lanterns with their light long since snuffed. All these things, the makings of a dwelling, but no one. No one. In the six years or more that Willon, Dresaith, Damaros, and Amara had been Arhymnia's designated Shards – protectors – they had never once left the nest empty.

Where was her sister?

[-]----------------------------------------[-]

Days 2-7: Behind, but getting there

Willon looked down, and she felt the wall of silence shove up around that topic like Chaser magic derailing further trespass.

“Take me to the spot,” she said. He stepped in front of her and picked his way through the market street, crowded with housewives and craftsmen at this hour. They continued along until Market Row reached Heldis Way, the path the exited the north side of the town and led up through the forest to the Re'Asoona mountain pass. He stopped her only a rock throw from the north gate, which made her wonder why no one had heard the boy be killed.

“That's where I saw him sleeping in the middle of the night,” Willon said, pointing to the corner of the building. Then he walked further on, turning a corner left, behind the structure. Sunlight painted the wooden boards a golden chestnut mixture, except one dark spot of rusty brown near the bottom, “This is where Damaros said he found him.” That dark brown spot was blood. “Last night, this would have all been shadow, cuz the moon was behind the fort. All the north side was dark when I went through here.”

Sasilyna jiggled her leg, reaching down to itch where the leather boots met her deerskin pants.

“Go back to your duties, and tell Damaros I want to see him as soon as possible. I'll get some of my men to patrol the streets while he's gone.”

She turned to leave, but her boot stuck when she thought about that. “Wait. Willon, how are you guys managing things right now, if you came to get me outside the bridges?” Training always took place outside the main confines of the river tributaries which acted as a moat.

“I patrolled through the east side on my way to you, and I knew it wouldn't take long to get you to come with me,” he said, hands on his hips. The design of a five-petaled flower was stitched into the hem of his shirt.

“That sounds risky,” the Raziar chided.

His broad shoulders waved back like field grass in the wind. It made her anticipate that musty hay smell again, but it didn't actually come. “What else can we do?”

Standing in the sun like this was like when Ranara had dropped a lizard down her shirt once. The slimy heat just traveled down and down, sweat trickling over skin like the toes of that lizard scraped for escape.

“Fine. We'll keep in contact.”

A look passed over his face that she didn't quite comprehend. But it looked like someone who'd stubbed a toe. Angry, annoyed, and hurt. His dark brown eyes and gray skin smoothed out, then, and he turned away.

Day 5 – Rylan and Sasilyna, night

“I'm going with you.”

Sasilyna's voice carried through the small room with the volume of someone swearing to betray a secret.

Rylan's bark-brown eyes flicked up at her from where he was hunched over an open knapsack. She could see weapons and cloth-bundled food supplies in it. Then the warrior shared a look with his father, balding but robust as he sat on the bed.

“Don't lie to me and waste time trying to convince me you aren't,” she said, closing the door behind her and stalking over to the hay mattress. Rylan and Tomen were had been staying in one of the fort's spare rooms since the last death. “After her death, and after they left, there's no way you're staying. I know it.”

“So? You aren't coming,” Rylan said, turning from her to fold and roll what looked like bandage cloth. Long lines and bursts of scar tissue streaked and shined over his bare arms like falling stars through a tan cloud of dusty skin. The red strip of cloth knotted over his arm and those scars said he knew what he was doing. A Shonrad-trained warrior.

“Ranara is gone, and Selya is dead. Willon did it. Him and those Shards, and their running up to Grayrock to hide.”

“Which is why we're going. You have other responsibilities, and the Baron warned you not to. If you go, Arhymnia won't be protected.” He shoved the rolled cloth into the corner of the sack and stepped over to her. Her heart chose that moment to pound too obviously through her shirt, the same color as his, but not sleeveless. He stared hard at her. “Is that what you want?”

“There are two subordinates that could have become Raziar before me if they'd wanted it. Arhymnia will be fine.” Rylan shook his head when she said this and started buckling the bag up. She breathed out and leaned against the bedframe when he did.

Tomen was smiling as he interjected. “I'll take that. But tell me. If you come with us, what will you do when we get to Grayrock?”

“Demand as a Raziar with the Laparadon kingdom that they return my sister and give compensation for the chaos they've caused.”

Tomen laughed, but his eyes were cold as moat in winter. “You think that any amount of money is going to fix this? You think they would even keep your sister alive? Let me tell you something, Raziar. It's been one week since they disappeared. We got news this morning that two of Shards looking out over Dorma left, too. And you know what? They have a Chaser with them.”

This news was a cold finger down her spine, tensing muscles and freezing her face.

Rylan's black hair was messy and made the shadows beneath his eyes stand out, she realized. He must not have slept well. He spoke, voice gruff. “This isn't isolated, and it won't stop. They're gathering. Or at least convening. Fine. I don't care. But I know that's why the Voidspawn attacked four different people in this little town and will probably keep attacking people. He's sending a sign to the other Shards that he's tired of being a tool for this kingdom. That's why I'm going, and that's why putting your hands on your hips in front of him demanding justice won't do anything.”

Tomen finished, looking out the open shutters. “And that's why you aren't coming with us.” He closed the window.

Raziar: Day One – Ketil's Midlogue, Willon's Adventures, Sasilyna's rage

Tanryen was asleep when Ketil went outside, peeking up at the moon and its pillows of clouds. Streetlamps nearly obscured his vision of the stars, where the constellation of Ani's Castle arched northward.

It was sheer coincidence that his own castle was falling.

Earlier that day, he'd received word from Arhymnia. His daughter had been arrested. Worse, she'd been arrested for almost entirely destroying Grayrock's population, Shards and humans and Bahdregans alike. Worse still... she'd done it because of Willon.

If Ketil's tunnel-visioned protégées hadn't decided to take unifying the Shards into his own hands and went on a murdering rampage, Ketil's networks over the Laparadon kingdom would still stand strong. It wasn't enough that Willon was now dead. The damage had been done.

Ketil went back inside, cooler from the air outside. Delyza was still up.

“I have a letter I need delivered to Omairu Ipseric immediately in the morning,” he told her.

Her Shik-Sharish brown eyes went wide. “Ah-ahlright.”

Sasilyna, his daughter, was going to go on trial when she came to Gilmorda. He was positive that they would try to execute her, and maybe there would even be an assasination attempt.

He had no time to try and prepare her safe journey. He had two weeks to make sure she stayed safe in Gilmorda when she got there and won her trial.

Ketil Delkyn's first death had been for nothing.

When the twins came back, he stretched and left the north window.

“I'm going for sentry duty,” Willon said, donning a woolen jacket. “I'll tour the north sides. You keep an eye on the other areas.”

“Remember to count how many people you see.” Dresaith reminded him of their game. She kissed him on the cheek and went back to the wide window where she picked up her embroidery in the tall bench beside the bars. The hawk's nest wasn't a prison, the way it might look. The tall turrets that rose above all the fort, all the trees, and all of Arhymnia, let them see unhindered into the land. Those bars on the window were to keep anyone from falling out. As if they couldn't survive it.

“I got seventeen,” Amara said, tying her blonde hair back into a braid. Her smile was contagious.

“You must have been on the south side again, you little cheater. You're supposed to keep changing sides,” Willon scolded her with his big brother tone.

Damaros smiled with him, and messed up his sister's braid. “Nine. I was on the west side.”

Amara glared, but Dresaith looked away from the window. “Nine? That's odd...”

“Yeah, but a good lot of them were some soldiers sneaking out for a drink, so not that odd. The Raziar will give them hell tomorrow if she finds out,” the male twin said, snatching an apple from the table and moving towards the east window.

“Pray you don't run into her either, then,” Willon said, touching the door handle. “You know how far her temper reaches.” They all knew. “See you at the Castle hour.”

Willon walked silent as a snake through the fort's halls. He nodded at the guards on duty, sleepy but attentive. Sasilyna trained her men well, which was why Willon hoped that those soldiers had stayed on the west side.

The Shards' counting game didn't officially start until he was outside the building, in the streets proper. Five minutes passed of walking through the half-stone-half-mortared hallways, scarcely decorated but for a painting here and there, lit dimly by the lanterns. If Willon had seen anyone this late at night, it would have been suspicious.

Ten guards at the front entrance and the gates surrounding the compound. Typical. Willon and his lover and siblings didn't count the typical guards.

Once out in the street, he took Heldis Way north through the town. The shadows from the fort and the hawk's nest cascaded down over everything on the north side, blocking the moonlight from his path. As if he needed it to see the young orphan huddled up against the shaded, wooden face of a building, or the dark puddle of water beside him where a frog was blinking calmly.

Willon sniffled, breathing through his mouth where it was easier. After a while of being a Shard, he'd gotten used to the feeling of having a cold all the time.

Instead of continuing on through all the way to the northernmost edge of the city, Willon stopped, looking over his shoulder, up into the windows of the northern side of the hawk's nest. Bars, and soft light that humans wouldn't be able to tell was there. No one was watching him.

[-]-------------------[-]

“Teni, Kinoak!” Sasilyna shouted, and they sprinted. Teni wasn't bad, but slower than usual. Kinoak, on the other hand, was purposefully slacking. “Whichever one looses gets to clean weapons for a week!” Kinoak ran only a little faster, and Teni easily beat him back to the line. “Go,” she commanded the next two in their drills and glared at the slower boys. “What's wrong today?”

If they had been drinking again...

“Just not feeling well, Raziar, sorry,” Teni's soft voice said. His friend nodded.

“Go,” Sasilyna waved on the next two in their races. “Both of you get to clean weapons, then. After today's drills.”

They groaned, but quieted down when her eyes came to them again. “Sorry,” Teni said again, and went to the back of the line.

When everyone had done a footrace against everyone else, Sasilyna let them rest. In another few minutes, They would split up into different areas of skill. Archery, infantry, cavalry. Everyone was expected to be able to do each skill proficiently, and afterwards, they all came together in simulations. Last week, the simulations had been battling in a fire situation. This week, they would face the threat of Chasers again. Not real Chasers, no. That would be too dangerous. The Raziar simulated a Chaser attack with paint and obstacles across the field, and if either touched a soldier, he was down.

One Chaser can take down a building, and that was the one thing Sasilyna and the other officers wanted to prevent. Other kingdoms and even duchies within Laparadon had their own hired Chasers, and had demonstrated that they weren't afraid of using them.

“Raziar!”

She frowned and easily recognized the black-haired Shard approaching her. “Willon? I'm in the middle of training, can this wait?”

He wheezed a little, a vein throbbing by his gray-skinned throat. “No. Damaros was touring this morning and found a little boy, dead.”

Ice seemed to grip her heart. “What?”

“I think he was an orphan boy. But he was bloody and beaten up, right by the plaza.”

No. Sasilyna was equipped to dealing with Chasers and bandits, like the group a few years back. Not predatory killers. They didn't prey in Arhymnia...

“Uh, okay. Uhm, wait a minute.” Sasilyna turned and walked away from him. The summer sun made her leather boots warm and sweaty as they padded over the low grass.

One of two officers beneath her, Deraziar Mikel, stood uncertainly by her group of soldiers. “Raziar, are we ready to begin skill sets? Raziar?”

Sasilyna shook her head, scratching her neck and looking at the officer's Gilmordan gray eyes. “Take over for me today. You and Forest. You two can handle it. I have something I need to look into.”

Willon was looking at her, face concerned and dead-looking in the light. He fell into step with her across the field, west.

“Damaros found him, you said?”

The man nodded. He was a head taller than her, a difficult feat considering she took after her father's height.

“Who toured the area last night?” Sasilyna was well aware of their duties and how they performed them. After years of employment, Willon and his small family of Shards had perfected the routines of patrolling the city and watching over it from the towers.

“I did, and I saw him sleeping against the Gateway Tavern's stables by the north entrance when I started my rounds. He was fine. After I finished, Amara kept an eye on the north side, and then Damaros walked the area just before dawn.”

Their footsteps echoed across the wooden bridge, down over the water in the river beneath as they entered the town's limits. “No one saw or heard anything?”

“No. Amara didn't even see the boy when she was watching out, so I think it may have happened as I was on the far side, circling around to come into the fort.”

The last murder Arhymnia had seen had been before the bandits. Before the Barons had hired the Shards.

Sunlight glared off a display of jewelry, marking the entrance to Market Row as a pain to Sasilyna's eyes. Here, the hawkers were more laid back than in Gilmorda, but still called out to her.

“Raziar! Your sister would love rings, I know it! She wouldn't have to steal them if you bought them for her, now would she?”

“Where is the body?” Sasilyna said quietly, just beneath the merchant's obnoxiousness.

Willon ignored a similar clever hawker, saying “These herbs will keep away sickness, you know!”

“We alerted the guards at the north gate, and they examined the area before moving the boy to somewhere more private. I would assume the gatehouse,” he said in a similarly low voice, getting closer as some older women pushed passed them. His muslin jerkin smelled acidic and earthy, like musty hay and rusty nails. It was a smell she was used to.

“Why would someone do this, you think?”

She looked up from the dry, dirt path, up at his ink-and-granite features and dark eyes. “They must have had some personal reason. The death of an orphan does nothing for the killer in terms of money. Maybe he's sick in the head. Vicious. Or maybe he wants to shock people. Killers are like that – real killers.”

“You've met one?”

“Oh yes.”

Willon looked down, and she felt the wall of silence shove up around that topic like Chaser magic derailing further trespass.

NaNo Day One: Already Annoyed

"Orion, help."

I was plopped miserably on the desk in front of him, toes in the patch of sunlight the thin windows offered. He was perching a little ways down on the desk, like usual.

He blinked. Then smirked. "Trouble already? Aren't the first few days supposed to be easy?"

My pout deepened when I sighed. "Yes. But I've been writing in first person for so long, not only in the interviews and talking here with you, but also in class, with Jung. I don't know. I don't know if I can write a novel anymore."

My muse's face turned serious, white shirt crinkling when he leaned closer. "Five years of honing that skill doesn't just disappear, young lady. Read some good fantasy, the third-person variety. Some Harry Potter if you need to. And find a way to get into Sasilyna's head, as if you haven't been doing that all summer long."

"Do you know how much else I have to do? I've got short stories to read for English and noms to read in FPSSA, not to mention all-"

"I don't care. Shut up and go write."

Orion hopped off the table and planted himself on my bed, November's Glamour magazine in hand as he lounged back on my pillows.

Did he have to be so cold about it?