Quiet surrounded him in the way only early morning could manage. Half-lit, still, the air thick with the lingering cool of night. Marc August sat on the edge of his narrow cot, shoulders hunched forward like a man whose back was broken. In his hands rested a dagger. It wasn’t ornate. Just steel and wrapped leather, worn down to near-smooth from decades of honing. The pommel bore the faint shape of a boar’s head, barely visible after years of use.

  Thom’s dagger. He turned it slowly in his palm, the edge dulled, the balance still perfect. It was heavier than it should be. Not for its make or weight, but for what it carried. He remembered when Thom first picked it up. That gods-damned riverbank in the Gory push, a half-dead bandit coughing blood beside his broken horse, the weapon still clutched in his ruined grip. Thom had eased it from the man’s fingers like taking something sacred. “Good steel,” he’d said. “Would be a shame to waste it.” Marc had teased him then, called him a crow, but Thom hadn’t answered, just looked down at the blade like it meant something more.

  They were barely out of boyhood then, just months into the war, still green enough to think luck and grit were all you needed. Marc hadn’t even been issued full kit at that point. The two of them had been sleeping under the stars, rotating watch with starving farmboys and washed-up militiamen who pissed themselves when the drums started. But Thom had kept that blade. Sharpened it each night with a little square stone he carried, always muttering about the edge. “Keep it ready,” he’d say, “’cause no one else is coming.”

  Marc hadn’t touched it in years. Not until eight months ago, when the ash finally cleared, and the dragon’s breath stopped echoing in his ears, and all that was left of his brother was a shattered spear and a torn tunic. The dagger had been sheathed at Thom’s hip, somehow untouched. Marc had taken it before they burned what was left of the body. He hadn’t let it go since. It didn’t feel like closure. It felt like a reminder.

  He hadn’t cried when they burned him. Not at the pyre. Not in the weeks that followed. He’d stood at the gate like a statue, taken every rotation. Cleaned his armor twice a day. Said nothing. Drank little. Slept less. He floated somewhere between here and not, the absence of a man who had stood beside since birth, had families they had lost, gone. But this morning, in the silence of his room, Marc August held a dagger and remembered the brother who had taught him to fight, to track, to survive. The one who never let him fall behind. The one who’d died screaming under a monster’s talons so the rest of them could live.

  There were new mates now. New kids joining the Freebooters, eyes bright and voices eager. They nodded to him when he passed. None of them truly understood what it had taken to get up in the morning. He set the dagger down gently on the cot beside him, rubbed his face, and sighed. There was work to do. Always was. That was the thing Thom used to say, too, in the thick of it all. Marc sat in the dim stillness of his room, the grey of morning barely seeping through the shutters. The cot beneath him creaked when he shifted, but otherwise the space was silent. No birdsong, no footsteps in the hall, no clamor of drills in the yard yet. Just him, barefoot and shirtless, hunched forward with Thom’s old blade. He stared at it, not really seeing the steel.

  The leather grip had gone smooth in places where his brother’s fingers had worn it down. The boars-head pommel was chipped now, a clean strike taken out of one ear. Marc had done that himself, thrown the dagger across the room the night after the pyre. It had lodged in the wooden beam. He hadn’t touched it for a week after that.

  He couldn’t quite remember what time meant anymore. It had been eight months, or so they said. Since the dragon. Since Thom died screaming beneath her claws. Since Urskine was killed. Since Ibrahim, old Ibrahim who had fixed Marc and Thom’s armor every week and argued with them the finer merits of Preonian steel versus Braiden. Since the dead died screaming. Since he faltered, dragon fear all encompassing, causing him to stumble and recoil like some child scared of the night. Since the smoke had choked the sky and the children had wept and the screaming hadn’t stopped, not even when it was over.

  It had been longer since Kina, his wife, passed. Twenty years now? He’d stopped counting. Illness that time. A slow rot that no one could name, no magus could touch. She’d wasted to bones while his father watched, helpless. Marc and Thom had buried them all. Carried their bodies or scattered their ashes. He rubbed his thumb across the dagger’s flat edge. It didn’t cut. It had been dulled by time and use and fire. Just like him.

  The Freebooters still marched. Still took jobs. Still fought monsters and bandits and tyrants alike. He stood the gate most days, patrolled the walls, trained the younger recruits. He could still hold a line. Still throw a man twice his size. Still hit what he aimed at. But at night? At night, he sat in this room and asked himself what was left. What was worth keeping going for? The cause? The name? The damned Word etched in cold stone?

  They called him veteran. Survivor. Staunch. Strong. They didn’t know how wrong they were. He stared at the dagger a long while more, his mind drifting, heavy and slow. He wasn’t going to do anything with it. Not really. Not today. But the thought sat there, quiet and patient. Not like a scream. More like an invitation. The idea that maybe, just maybe, he’d done enough. That there was nothing left to guard. No one left to follow. In that quiet, with the morning just beginning to reach through the shutters and paint long shadows across the stone floor, Marc August finally whispered the words he hadn’t spoken to anyone.

  “I don’t know why I’m still here.”

  The dagger didn’t answer. Thom didn’t answer. He was dead. Kina didn’t answer. She was dead. Their children didn’t answer. They were dead. The Bulwark didn’t answer. He was dead. Neither did Urskine or Ibrahim, for they were dead as well. He looked down again at the dagger, Thom’s dagger, lying like judgment in his hands. Ache. Of memory.

  “I was the one who ended it,” he muttered. “I was the one who killed the damn dragon.” His eyes unfocused, glazed, drifting through the past, unbidden and vivid. He remembered the sound, Eruch’s cry when the beast struck him, the sudden stillness as that arm went limp, the crushing heat and smoke as the monster reared back. And Marc, armor cracked, lungs half-shattered, Thom’s name pounding in his skull like a war drum, charging forward because there was no one else left. He’d grabbed Knightslayer, embedded in the things chest and plunged it into the dragon’s heart. Shoved it with every scrap of rage and loss he had left. Thom’s name echoing, the last thing the wyrm heard. He’d done it.

  He’d ended her.

  For Thom.

  For all who had died over the years.

  So why?

  Why was he the one still breathing?

  He looked down at the inside of his wrist. The skin was thick there, scarred from work, from battle, from life. But it was soft enough. Vulnerable. The blade hovered. His hand trembled. The pain was already there. Had been for months. This wouldn’t be worse than that. Just quieter. He closed his eyes. Then, with a growl building in his throat, he flung the dagger across the room. It hit the bed with a dull thud, bounced once, and lay still.

  Marc rose. Slowly. Like a man twice his age. He staggered toward the washbasin, cupped water in his hands, and splashed it over his face. Once. Twice. He leaned forward, gripping the basin’s edges, water dripping from his beard, breathing through clenched teeth. His face twisted, not in sorrow this time, but fury.

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  “Not today.”

  He grabbed a cloth, wiped the water from his brow, and stood tall. His shoulders still hurt. His chest still ached. Thom was still dead. None of that was changing. But he stood. And for the moment, that had to be enough. Marc stood still for a long time after the water dried from his face. Then he moved to the bench at the foot of the bed, where his armor lay in a neat, deliberate pile. Lamellar. Leather reinforced with iron scales. Old. Repaired too many times. But still his.

  He sat and started with the underlayer, pulling on the worn linen, smoothing the sleeves flat along his forearms. Then came the vestments. One strap at a time, he buckled the chestplate in place, the scales overlapping like jagged feathers. He fastened the pauldrons next, sliding them over his shoulders and cinching them tight, his hands methodical, almost mechanical. The motions were habit, older than his time with the Freebooters. Older than most of the men he'd outlived.

  He stood again and reached for his belt. The longsword came first, plain, and dependable. The edge was clean, the grip dark from sweat and age. He fixed it to his hip without a word, the familiar sense of it settling into place. Then the spear. He slung it across his back in its sheath, six feet of worn oak and steel, notched from a dozen battles. It had been his brother’s too, once. He stepped in front of the narrow mirror beside the washstand. Reached for the horn comb on the shelf. Ran it through the mess of his hair, black shot through with silver now, longer than it should be. He worked the tangles free, then did the same to his beard. He trimmed nothing, just tamed it. At last, he turned and lifted Thom’s dagger. He fixed it to the left side of his belt, opposite the longsword.

  There. Fully armed. Dressed. Armored. Alive. He looked at himself in the mirror. A warrior. He didn’t feel like one. His eyes drifted down to the washbasin. Water still rippled inside it. A second passed. Then Marc suddenly seized the basin and hurled it across the room. The metal clanged against the wall, water flying, splashing over the bedpost, and scattering across the floor. He grabbed the pillow and crushed it to his face.

  He screamed. Long and low and hoarse. A roar through cloth and clenched teeth. The sound of a man coming apart. The sound of grief too old to name. The sound of someone still alive when he didn’t know why. He collapsed onto his knees, the pillow still in his grip, breath hitching in his chest. But he didn’t break. Not all the way. Not today. Marc left the room without wiping the water from the walls.

  He moved down the hall with his shoulders squared, the rupae plates of his armor clicking faintly with each step. Morning light cut across the stone floor through high, narrow windows. He passed a pair of mates, younger fighters still rubbing sleep from their eyes, and gave each a slow nod. They returned it with the subdued respect the veteran always commanded, though neither dared speak. The mess hall was half-full. The early risers. Some already seated, some grabbing what they could before drills. A few heads lifted as Marc entered, but no one hailed him.

  He caught sight of Lincoln seated at the long table near the hearth, armor half-laced, a steaming bowl at his elbow and a ledger in hand. The captain glanced up, offered a short nod. Marc nodded back. No words. Just mutual understanding. He made his way to the food line, picked a biscuit from the tray, then a thick slice of ham still hot from the pan. A mug of watered cider. He didn’t linger. He stepped out through the compound gates into the cool light of morning.

  The city of Braid was waking. Down the slope of the hill, smoke curled from the chimneys of the shopfronts and inns. Across the promenade, carts rattled over uneven stones, sailors and merchants striding past in knots. The scent of brine and baking bread drifted in on the wind, mixing with the harbor’s constant call: gulls, creaking wood, distant shouting. Marc sat on the edge of the Freebooters’ outer steps, elbows on his knees, food resting in one hand. He ate in silence. One bite at a time. He watched a baker unlock her doors and sweep the stoop. A pair of boys, no older than twelve, kicked a leather ball between them as they made for the docks. A cart rolled past drawn by a thick-shouldered mule, its driver humming a soft tune. The world moved on. Ships docked. Bells rang. People lived, and Marc August, armored, broken, but breathing, just sat, and watched.

  Marc didn’t hear Cheri approach until she was nearly beside him. The sound of her boots was drowned out by the morning din, but she always moved quiet when she wanted to. The goblin surgeon likely wasn’t always a surgeon. The older goblin stood with a slight hitch in her back, gray hair bound under a scarf, sleeves rolled, apron stained with the memory of work done in blood. She handed him a clay jug without a word.

  “Water,” she said finally, glancing up at the sky. She sniffed once, then spat in the gutter. “Gonna be a hot one. Noticed you didn’t bring none. Don’t want you falling out halfway through the day. You’re big ass means two mates hauling you back in.”

  Marc looked at the jug, then nodded. “Thanks.” His voice was rote. Like the word had been taken from a shelf, dusted off, and handed back unused.

  Cheri looked him over for a moment, then eased down onto the step beside him with the grunt of old joints. She scratched her temple, peered down the street, and then said, “How you doing?”

  “Fine,” Marc replied.

  She gave him a flat look. “Fine’s a four-letter word for a merc. Don’t mean nothing. Just means ‘leave me be.’”

  He didn’t respond.

  She waited. Then added, “If you need to talk, I’ll listen.”

  Marc was quiet a long while. The street kept moving. Boots and wheels and life. Then he said, still staring forward, “Everyone I love is dead.”

  Cheri didn’t speak.

  “Wife, sister-in-law, pa, and kids,” he continued. “Gone more than two decades back. I was off playing soldier with Thom. Didn’t have a choice. Conscripted. Came home to an empty hearth and graves. My father not long after.”

  Cheri spit into the gutter again.

  “Thom… Thom died at the dragon.” Marc’s voice cracked a little on the name. “Right beside me. We’d survived a thousand fights, crawled out of the shit, outlasted the worst. And it took one moment.”

  He drew in a breath, lips twitching. “It hurts. Gods, it hurts. But it’s not even that, not really. It’s that I don’t know what to do with it. The pain’s just… sitting there. Constant. Like I don’t exist anymore. Like I’m watching someone else live my life.”

  Cheri nodded slowly, then reached into her apron and pulled a small tin of salt lozenges. She popped one into her mouth, chewing slow.

  “You know what you just did, Marc?”

  He shook his head slightly.

  “You spoke. That’s a start.” She stood, stretched her back, and looked down at him, eyes gentler than usual. “You’re not alone, even if it feels like it. And you ain’t dead yet. Which means there’s still time to figure out why you’re still here.”

  Marc didn’t look up. She stayed standing beside him, watching the street for a moment before speaking again. Her voice dropped a little, less like a field medic and more like a woman who’d seen too many winters.

  “I’ve been a booter now almost twenty-five years,” she said. “Longest I stayed anywhere, truth told. Got this limp somewhere around year ten, and less hair than I started with. You’re in year seven, right?”

  Marc gave the faintest nod.

  “I remember when we picked you up. You and Thom. Pair of tall bastards, all big shoulders, and quiet eyes. Liked you both from the start. Not bragging men. Not pricks. Didn’t try and impress anyone. Showed up to do work, get paid, and be polite. Thought you was twins, you know that? Didn’t even find out you were two years apart till, what, a year later?”

  A hint of something moved in Marc’s face, maybe the ghost of a smile, maybe not.

  “We’re both north of forty now,” she continued. “Joints ain’t the same. Mind’s heavy with all that’s happened. But I’ll say this, and I’ll only say it once, because I ain’t the type to repeat myself like some drunk like Brannon.”

  She leaned slightly, her voice firmer.

  “You’re a good man. Good plankholder. Good, steady brother with a spear. You watch your crew’s backs, and you don’t ask more than you’re willing to give. I’ve patched enough of you lot up to know the difference between good and stubborn. You’re both. And that’s rare.”

  Marc kept staring out at the street, but his hand had stopped clenching around the water jug. It rested now, quiet, fingers splayed. Listening.

  “I won’t pretend to know how deep that hole in you goes,” Cheri said. “But I’ve buried my own. Friends. Loves. Kin. Buried parts of myself. And I’ve seen too many good folk dig their own graves while they’re still breathing.” She tilted her head toward him. “I’d not want to see you in one. Not yet.”

  Marc blinked once.

  “There’s purpose out here,” Cheri added. “Even if, for now, that purpose’s just sitting on this gate, making sure shitheels don’t wander in.” She shrugged. “Ain’t glamorous. But it’s ours.”

  Marc finally looked at her then. Just a glance. But he met her eyes. Cheri gave him a short nod. Then turned and started walking back toward the infirmary, muttering something under her breath about the sun already being too damn hot and no one knowing how to drink enough water. Marc sat for a while longer. Not smiling. But not sinking either. The gate stayed quiet, and for the first time in weeks, so did the noise in his head.