No one was happy with the journey.
The marsh stretched endlessly before them, every step slow and heavy. Insects, foul odors, disease, and every other misery imaginable plagued the swamp. For a seafarer, it was torture.
"I can't believe we're spending the night in this hell," Maynar complained. "Yesterday we were in a wonderful inn."
"Wonderful?" Kalden repeated.
"Compared to this? It was a manor! A castle!" he declared dramatically, his frustration getting the better of him.
"No one likes it, poet," Darma called from the front. "Accept it... and, for once, shut up."
Maynar merely swallowed his reply.
That evening they built a fire.
They had found no worthwhile shelter, but at least they had reached solid ground beside the Swamp Road.
Everyone was filthy.
No one spoke.
Arsik sat opposite Darma with his back against a tree, drinking rum as though it were water. His gaze was fixed somewhere far away—both in time and in place.
Darma stared at the black violin resting inside its leather case.
In his mind, he could hear its melodies.
There was something deeply unsettling about the instrument.
It brought the elven woman back to his thoughts, though her image remained hazy. He had seen her for only the briefest moment.
Arsik caught him looking.
"What?"
Darma didn't answer immediately.
"What exactly happened at sea?"
The others were asleep.
Kalden had gone to patrol the road, his lantern glowing faintly in the darkness like a firefly.
"A lot happened," Arsik said quietly.
"What is that thing?"
"A violin."
"I can see it's a violin, bastard."
"If you're not being a complete bastard yourself... tell me what kind of damned violin it is."
"Because it sure as hell isn't an ordinary one."
Arsik had never met anyone with as much anger as Darma.
It struck him as strangely familiar.
"I don't really know," he admitted.
"I have no idea what it can do."
"I've seen it do many things."
"I don't know where its power begins..."
"...or where it ends."
"I don't know who made it."
"I don't know what they wanted."
"I only know it once belonged to someone who burned an entire city by playing it."
"Then it passed to Maestra."
"And then..."
"...to me."
Night birds called in the darkness.
Arsik's voice was rough, blurred by the rum.
"What were you doing in Nalia?"
"Vacation."
"From what?"
"Life."
"Death."
"Failure."
"What the hell do you care?"
Darma remembered his own years trapped in stone.
That, too, had been a kind of retreat.
They had more in common than either cared to admit.
"You lost to the lich," Darma said at last.
"You couldn't have won."
"Back then?" Arsik nodded slowly.
"No."
"We couldn't."
"That's true."
"But the next time..."
"...we could have."
"The next time?"
"What next time?"
Arsik turned toward him.
Madness gleamed in his single eye.
Darma knew he was looking at a broken man.
"I went back, Kraken."
"Back into the depths of hell."
"Back to the Vespian Sea."
"I spent an entire year telling everyone about Karadra..."
"...about Sentrik..."
"...about everyone we lost."
He lowered his voice.
"...about Maestra."
"And people listened."
"Not just anyone."
"The Blade Guardians themselves."
"The Blade Guardians?" Darma said. "I've heard of them."
"Children of the Gods, or something like that."
"I suppose they finally put the lich in his place."
Arsik began to cry.
Only then did Darma understand.
"We lost," Arsik whispered.
"We lost again."
"They all died."
"All of them."
"Every single one!"
Now he was shouting.
The others awoke instantly.
Kalden came running back toward the fire.
"Easy, Arsik!" Maynar pleaded.
"They'll hear us!"
"We're not safe here!"
"No..."
Arsik laughed bitterly.
"We're not, are we, poet?"
"Taarum sees us everywhere."
"He pulls the strings of our lives like puppets."
"No mortal..."
"...no god..."
"...no demon..."
"...can defeat him."
"He is the fate of our world."
"The darkness above us..."
"...and below us."
"He's everywhere."
"Always."
His strength finally gave out.
He collapsed to the ground and broke into uncontrollable sobs.
No one spoke after that.
Maynar's heart broke at the sight of him.
Kalden stood in confused silence.
Pale didn't fully understand what had happened, yet showed no trace of fear.
Only Darma remained lost in thought.
How had everything become so tangled?
What was he doing here?
What did Taarum have to do with the mage they sought...
...with the page...
...with the woman...
...or with himself?
No answer satisfied him.
He lay down upon the ground.
That night...
...for the first time in many years...
...he dreamed of the sea.