Our lips are a breath away. Sweat glistens on his skin like morning dew on grass, and I just want to gaze at him, like this, forever.
“That you remember who it was who stepped in for you when Güthric was beating you bloody, while your friend was partially responsible for your punishment. That you remember who it was who you enlisted with, admirably, while your friend was behind bars for stealing from people like us. That you remember that, once we’re in the Shadowthorn, I will do whatever is in my power to continue protecting you, but people like your friend will always, always choose to protect themselves.”
My mouth is open, whether to protest or in welcome invitation, I cannot tell, but Dimitri heeds it none. He leans up to place a gentle kiss on my forehead, gazes into my eyes with something akin to sorrow, though I’m not sure for what exactly, and then leaves me alone with nothing but my thoughts.
Bloodletting & Necro-Ink
Catacombs, Castle of Nigh, Arcathain
A raven circles overhead as we make our way across the courtyard. I watch it from the corner of my eye, unable to convince myself that it’s any ordinary bird. After what happened yesterday at the training grounds, and days before that in the library, and weeks before that as we were leaving Gravenburg, I’m not sure I’ll ever look at another raven the same way again.
The other recruits and I march out the north exit of the castle and veer toward the Shadowthorn, making our way through the frosted grounds and to the catacombs. My breath is grey and gauzy, and I burrow as deep as I can beneath the folds of my cloak. It’s never deep enough though. Winter has been harsher this far north, and my simple wool cloak is no match for the glacial winds that seem to sweep over the valley.
This morning falls more silently than usual. No matter how early we’re forced to rise, the air almost always rings with the sounds of our lighthearted chatter, the hallways echoing with the myriad of ways we keep each other distracted. We have little time to enjoy each other’s company, so it’s often during these transitionary periods when we are at our utmost unruly and jovial.
But today, none can seem to shake the feeling of impending doom as we approach the catacombs of Nigh.
The last time I’d been here, I hadn’t thought about the bodies stacked in the crypt walls, hadn’t once considered who they’d been, or what that could mean to me. Oh, but it’s had all night to sink in now. They are the fallen. They are the former Crusaders whose beds we lay in, whose leather armor we have inherited, and whose weapons we now wield. They are the reflection of the only path that lies ahead of us, and ever since Alphonse told us what we would be doing today, I have not been able to once stop thinking about them.
Dimitri’s sharp elbow finds my ribs. “Chin up. The dead don’t bite.”
“Says you,” I say with an unamused laugh. “The man who’s never been uncomfortable around them.”
“Not never,” he counters with a considering tilt of his head. “But life makes stone of us all before we’re turned to ashes. You have to harden to the elements you’re presented with, lest they crush you.”
Biting my lip, I think about how, despite knowing what he says is true, I still struggle to come to terms with certain things. I know I’ll see death again once we’re inducted to the Shadow Crusade as true Crusaders; I know I’ll see my comrades eviscerated, decapitated, devoured, but no matter how much I try to numb myself to all that darkness, my chest rips apart every time I consider it.
The thought of watching Dimitri as a pack of demons rip apart his arms and tear into the soft flesh of his neck, churns my stomach every time and makes soup of my fragile heart.
Fox huffs beside me. “Maybe you’ve allowed yourself to be turned to stone, Dimitri, but some of us would prefer to hold onto our humanity, lest we become the very beasts we’re meant to hunt.”
Wedged between the two of them, I cringe at the hostility that hisses in the very air around us. If it’s not Dimitri poking at all of her shortcomings, it’s Fox doing the same to him. Their hatred toward each other grows stronger every day, and I can’t wrap my head around it. We are fighting on the same side.
Dimitri, for what it’s worth, crooks his head and glances down at me as if to say, She’s your friend, and then he hastens his pace to catch up to Güthric, Silver, and Sai.
My shoulders tense and I turn to Fox, ready to chastise her with the same lecture I gave Dimitri. It worked with him, after all. Maybe it’ll do her some good as well.
But Fox leaves me no opening. She leans over, her voice a low whisper. “Why do you think we’re just now being brought here?”
I blink back my surprise at her new line of questioning. “W-what do you mean?”
“I mean—” She huddles even closer. When Fox lowers her hood, auburn hair shining like blood against the backdrop of snowy white, I notice the short length has been tied back in two sections that barely reach past her ears. “Why wouldn’t they teach us about the necro-ink in the catacombs until today? Our very first day we were here, General Alphonse sent recruits to dispose of the bodies—in fact, by now, we’ve all been down there at least once. Why not tell us about the necro-ink before?”
A cold, sluggish sliver, like blood that’s clumped in a body long dead, slips down my spine. Since our arrival a little over a month ago, I’ve had to assist with disposing the bloodless bodies in the catacombs at least a dozen times. It was one of Alphonse’s favorite ways to punish me, knowing just how much I hated to be in their presence. To be fair, it seemed his favorite punishment for everyone. That is, everyone except Maxwell and Fox.
To the best of my knowledge, they’d only been sent to the catacombs once each, enough to have seen the process for themselves and sooted their hands, but after that, their punishments always varied. Emptying Alphonse’s chamber pot, dusting his personal study, emptying the ash from his private fireplace, changing the linens on his bed—it was like Alphonse was grooming them to become his personal assistants once they were initiated into the Shadow Crusade.
It was easy to see why he’d give such tasks to Maxwell, who hardly seemed capable of a life outside of Nigh once he was initiated, but Fox was a different story. She’d done well in every physical match she’d had. She even managed to stay standing the few times she’d been paired with Güthric.
The only rational explanation I could think of was that Alphonse was doing it to punish her and I both.
Giving her these tasks meant she had less time for socializing, which meant he was taking her away from me, something I was sure he reveled in. But it was more than that. On more than one occasion, Fox would be summoned during our lessons, missing out on crucial information about our survival in the Shadowthorn and making her all the more vulnerable once we stepped foot across the border.
Fox had been a criminal. Coming here was meant to exonerate her, but she was still being treated as if her life was meaningless. The same treatment wasn’t given to all those who’d been caged alongside her on their journey here. He saved his scathing remarks and trivial tasks for her, and I knew without a doubt it was because she was someone I called friend.
Regardless of any guilt I might feel toward Fox’s predicament, I was still relieved he saved those special tasks for her. Far worse than having to drag dead Crusaders into a blistering forge was having to spend any additional time with Alphonse, especially time waiting on his every whim.