Fire.
Not the wild kind that flickers and dances. Deliberate. Purposeful. Searing lines drawn with oil and torch. Smoke hunches in the hollows of rooftops and spills through broken windows. The air groans with heat and screams.
And in the center of it all, pressed against a crumbling wall, crouches a trembling lizard-boy with a long blood-stained sword in his hands.
"I'm not supposed to die yet," he says.
"Then don't," says the woman beside him.
She crouches low, one hand on the stone, eyes scanning the square. Her coat is stitched from ash-dyed leather, burned through at the hem. Her boots crack when she moves—coated with blood and soot. Her hair is white-blonde, matted to her brow, save for one loose strand that whips in the wind.
Bill tightens his grip on the sword. It isn't his. It was thrust at him by a now-dead soldier. One of the squat, uniformed grunts loyal to the White King's banner. Dogs in iron masks.
He hadn't wanted to fight, but now he has to.
Bill's eyes flick to the rows of homes collapsing inward, ember by ember. "They're burning everything."
"They always do."
Her voice doesn't rise. It cuts.
Bill swallows. "Are you one of us?"
"No."
"Then why—?"
"Quiet."
Across the square, armored figures herd screaming villagers toward the dry well. Among them, a little girl, clutching a soot-streaked doll. Her mother kneels beside her at the edge of the well, hands bound, head bowed, muttering a prayer. A knight in warped silver armor leads them. His helm is shaped like a beaked plague mask, his blade dragging behind him like a broken plow. The sigil of the White King—an eye split down the middle—flickers on his chestplate.
The woman exhales. Her hand twitches toward her hip.
There's nothing there.
No sword. No weapon. Just the empty weight of want.
She glances at Bill. "How many?"
He blinks. "What?"
"In the town. How many soldiers?"
"Thirty? Maybe less."
She stands.
Bill grabs her coat, desperate. "Don't! They'll kill you."
"They can try," she says.
And then she walks into the fire.
* * *
They notice her halfway to the well.
Two soldiers peel off, clubs drawn.
Alice doesn't flinch.
She sidesteps the first swing, grabs the second soldier's wrist, twists. Bone cracks. The club falls. She catches it mid-air and turns it inward, burying the iron head into the first soldier's neck. He drops. The second stumbles back, but her foot catches his ankle and drops him before he can cry out.
Before her a woman whispers a prayer in a language Alice doesn't know, her fingers running over a pendant shaped like a heart. A boy clings to her side, wide-eyed, barefoot. Another child weeps quietly, burying her face in her doll's matted hair.
The knight steps forward.
He towers above the crying villagers, above the smoke. Above the world. His armor is not polished, but pitted and warped. Reflected light scatters wrong, like it's remembering something painful. His voice echoes when he speaks.
"Drop it."
Alice tilts her head. "You first."
The knight does not answer. He lifts his sword.
It hums.
Alice feels the ringing deep in her bones.
She runs forward.
Bill watches from behind the broken wall, breath caught, limbs frozen.
* * *
The knight swings.
She dives, rolls beneath the arc. The sword sears the earth behind her, carving a trough in the stone. Pebbles lift from the force of it, hovering like lost thoughts.
She comes up behind him and slams the club into his knee joint. Once. Twice. The third strike leaves a dent. He pivots faster than a man his size should, and backhands her, sending her reeling.
She hits the ground hard.
The knight advances.
But she's laughing.
Blood in her teeth. Smoke in her hair.
"You're not the first thing I've killed in that armor."
The knight pauses.
His sword lowers.
"You remember me," she says.
He nods once.
"I took a Mirrorblade from your brother."
"It was corrupted. You did something to it," he says.
She pushes her bangs out of her eyes. "I earned it, and you're afraid I might earn it again."
She rises to her feet.
Unarmed.
Unbroken.
"Let the villagers go. This ends with me."
The knight's helm tilts.
"Our king can offer you land. Titles. A new name. Bend the knee, and the White King would make you his queen."
"I've had enough of crowns, and I kneel to no man."
He lifts his sword.
"So be it."
He charges.
She dodges the first strike. The sword bites the ground beside her. Sparks fly. The next blow comes fast. She tries to block with her forearm and then remembers she has no armor, so she rolls under his reach, but he's already turning. Fast. Too fast. His gauntlet catches her across the face and sends her sprawling.
She gasps, mud and blood in her mouth.
The knight looms over her. Blade raised.
"Lady!"
She looks.
Bill.
Behind a cart, pale and shaking, holding a sword too long for his hands.
He throws.
It spins. Clumsy. End over end.
But she catches it.
It's not hers. It's not right. But it's enough.
The knight swings down.
She meets it.
Weapons clash.
The force shudders through her arms. She drops to a knee, but twists, using the knight's own momentum. The borrowed blade slides under his guard and knocks the weapon from his grasp.
It skitters across the cobblestones.
He staggers.
So does she.
Both reach for breath. Only one finds it.
Alice drives her foot into his chest. He crashes backward into the dirt, winded.
Alice rises, sword still shaking in her grip.
The villagers stare.
She turns to them.
"Run."
They do.
All but one.
Bill.
He inches closer. "You… you're her."
"Alice," she says. The blade in her hand still hums, but softly now. Like it's whispering someone else's name.
The knight groans. Rolls to his side. And laughs.
"You think this wins you anything? The King will come. The Court. The Duchess. They'll tear you apart again."
Alice kneels beside him.
"I've died once. It didn't take."
Then she stands.
And she sees them.
The White King's men, emerging from the smoke, a silent ring tightening around her.
She turns to Bill.
"Go."
"What about you?"
She lifts the blade. "I'll manage."