Six Years Later

The town of Laeth stood in ruins. Most of the buildings in the main town square sat empty husks of their former beauty and some still smoldered from the fires that had razed them to the ground several nights past. The town’s folk hadn’t been prepared for the attack by the fae army. They had believed themselves to be safe; after all they had signed the treaty between the Courts and their town that had stopped the fighting, an agreement that was to be upheld until the council could reconvene to negotiate a new treaty which was scheduled for the first of spring after the winter’s snow had melted. The attack had come fast, hard, and without warning.

It was the town’s folly to believe anyone was truly safe, an assumption that, in the end, had cost half of them their lives.

A young willowy woman with pale golden blonde hair and the most unusual colored eyes anyone had ever seen knelt beside a trampled rose garden carefully digging the bushes out from the ash, soot, and debris that covered them. She was dressed in plain brown pants and a pale sage tunic that was belted simply at the waist. A now sooty grey handkerchief covered the majority of her hair and held it back from her face while a dirty apron covered most of her clothes and had long since turned a molted color of brown, gray, and black. She paused in her work to wipe the sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand and left a smudge of ash across her face in the process.

“Sidra! Hey Sidra!”

Lavender eyes squinted into the distance as the young woman tried to discern who was running up the path toward her. As the figure drew closer she finally recognized that of her older brother Aran striding up to her. He was carrying a small basket tucked into one arm which looked entirely out of place as he was dressed still in his armor, which consisted of a tooled leather breastplate, bracers that covered his forearms, and matching shin guards that covered his legs with his sword belted at his waist. A dirty grey cloak hung from his shoulders. He grinned down at her when he stopped a inches from her and set the basket down at his feet, nudging it toward her.

“I brought you lunch since I figured you’d not have the mind to stop in your work long enough to get it yourself.”

Sidra laughed and grinned up at Aran wiping her hands off on her apron before giving him a nod and shifting to sit cross-legged and dig into the contents of the basket.

“You know me too well, brother mine.”

Rummaging underneath the cloth that had covered the food revealed three neatly made sandwiches, two apples, and a small jug of what she knew to be her father’s famous berry wine. She smirked at all the food and looked back to her brother who had now taken a seat beside her after laying out his cloak.

“Did Papa think he was feeding all your boys again? There’s enough food in here to last until tomorrow!”

Aran laughed, reached in and grabbed an apple. Taking a bite out of it juice running down his chin he gave her a smile.

“Eh, I told him I was eating with you so he packed accordingly.”

“Well I’m glad for the company.”

They each dug in and ate for several minutes in companionable silence. Sidra gave her brother a concerned glance when she noticed the dirty bandage that encircled the upper part of his right arm and carefully put her sandwich down in her lap then leaned over to get a better look. Aran caught her intention and leaned away before she opened her mouth, waving her off with his own sandwich.

“Leave off Sidra, I’m fine, it’s just a scratch.”

Sidra eyed the cloth and frowned. “It doesn’t look like just a scratch to me, Aran, the bandage is positively filthy with dirt and dried blood! Hold still and let me look at it.”

Aran heaved a sigh knowing better than to argue and relented allowing Sidra to remove the bandage and inspect the wound. That didn’t stop him from still protesting though, even if it was a feeble attempt.

“Really Sidra, I’m fine I was just too slow—”

“Aran!” Sidra said in alarm.

He winced at his sister’s exclamation as she took in the state of his injury. His upper arm had caught the nasty end of what appeared to have been a serrated blade. The flesh was severely discolored with bruising and dried blood, the opening jagged. As Sidra carefully prodded the wound gently with her fingertips it began to ooze a putrid smelling mix of fresh blood and some sort of black substance. Sidra hastily tore a portion of her apron off from the part that was the least dirty, doused it in the wine, and began to clean the wound as best she could before tearing another strip off to re-bandage it.

Aran held still through most of the ministrations only flinching slightly when Sidra pressed the wine soaked cloth to the area. After Sidra was finished she sat back and salvaged what was left of her sandwich.

“What happened?”

Aran gave his sister a sideways glance and shrugged as if it wasn’t important.

“Aran…” Sidra replied in a warning tone.

He sighed and tore a chunk out of his sandwich, chewed vigorously and then swallowed before replying.

“The boys and I were out on a routine patrol last night and were ambushed a few miles outside the main town gates. I was careless and missed blocking one of the damn pointy-eared bastard’s swords.”

Sidra sighed and shook her head giving Aran a disapproving look. “You should be more careful Aran…if something were to happen to you what would we all do? The militia would fall to pieces without you as Captain. Callum isn’t in any sort of condition to take over your duties yet. He hasn’t fully healed from the last skirmish you all found yourselves in.”

Aran muttered something under his breath Sidra didn’t quite catch and scrubbed a hand over his face and into his hair, a frustrated gesture. “It won’t happen again, Sidra. You know me I don’t make the same mistake twice.”

“See that it doesn’t,” Sidra shot back around another mouthful of food.

Aran finished his sandwich and retrieved the second one from the basket, took a big bite of it and then chose to then change the subject.

“How is everyone holding up here?”

Sidra sighed her gaze straying to the men and women who worked nearby, going about various tasks, cleaning, picking up debris or working on the reconstruction of the shops and homes.

“It’s slow going unfortunately. With winter setting in so early rebuilding is going to slow to a crawl if not be completely halted for the season. Master Moran has said we’re in for a particularly harsh season with the heavy snowfall he’s certain is to come. If that happens we won’t be able to resume anything until the spring thaw.” She brushed crumbs from her lap and stood to her feet stretching. “I can only hope that the weather will prove to be just as much as an inconvenience for the fae as it will be for us. Maybe we’ll get lucky and they’ll halt their attacks even if it’s only for a little while.”

“I wouldn’t bet on it. It hasn’t stopped them so far these past few years, if nothing else it seems to have made them bolster their efforts,” Aran groused. “I’ve lost more men to them in the last six months than I have in the last three years. I can’t afford to lose any more and neither can Laeth.”

Sidra turned and fixed her brother with an intent stare, her expression shifting from worried to grave in an instant. “We’re…losing too much ground aren’t we?”

“Aye, I’m afraid we are.”

“Does Papa and the council know?”

Aran took a long pull from the wineskin and shook his head. “Not yet, but there’s a meeting between them and Callum and I tonight, I was hoping to discuss altering our tactics if we have the manpower to do so and in a worst-case scenario begin making plans to evacuate the town, relocate either to Sait in the north or possibly Halan to the east if they’ve the room.”

“And if neither of them do have the room? What then?” Sidra asked.

Aran frowned and refused to meet his sister’s gaze. “Then we’ll figure something else out. We’re not giving up without a fight. This is our home. We’ll do whatever it takes to survive.”

Next Chapter: Chapter One-Snippet-Edited