(As recounted by Aurelio)
The old man rose from his chair and walked to the window. Outside, the night had deepened into that peculiar hour before dawn when the world holds its breath. The Scholar watched him, saying nothing. He had learned that silence was the best companion to memory.
"Godbrand did not vanish after the Anvil fell," Aurelio said, his back still turned. "He did not flee into the hills to hide. He went there to build. To gather strength. To become something worse than a preacher."
He turned, and his face was carved from stone.
"He became a prophet. And prophets, my young friend, do not need armies. They need believers. And in a world consumed by plague, there were so many who were desperate to believe in anything."
— Memory —
The road to the coast was a river of mud and misery.
Three weeks had passed since the Anvil burned. Three weeks of marching through villages turned to graveyards, fields turned to wastelands, forests turned to ash. The plague was everywhere now; a green-black fog that clung to the low places and seeped into the lungs of the living.
Aurelio walked at the head of a ragged column of survivors. There were perhaps sixty of them left; a mix of Norsemen, Italian soldiers, and refugees who had nowhere else to go. They moved slowly, burdened by the sick and the dying, their eyes hollow, their hope a currency that had been spent long ago.
Cecilia walked beside him, her hand resting on his arm for support. The Shade's mark had faded, but her body was still weak. She coughed often; a dry, rattling sound that made Aurelio's chest ache.
"You are thinking about him again," she said.
"Who?"
"Godbrand. You have been clenching your jaw for three days. Every time someone mentions his name, you go silent."
Aurelio's jaw tightened further. "He should be dead. I should have killed him when I had the chance."
"You had your sword at his throat. You chose to sheathe it."
"Because the crowd would have torn me apart. He had already poisoned their minds."
"And now?" Cecilia's voice was soft. "Would you kill him?"
"In a heartbeat. Without hesitation. Without a trial."
Cecilia was silent for a moment. Then she said, "That is what he wants. He wants you to become what he claims you are. A violent man dressed in righteousness."
"Then what should I do?"
"Survive. Outlast him. Let his own poison consume him."
Aurelio wanted to believe her. But he had seen the light in Godbrand's eyes; a light that did not flicker or fade. That kind of faith did not consume itself. It consumed everything else.
They made camp that night in the ruins of a Roman aqueduct. The arches provided shelter from the wind, and the stone walls held some of the day's heat. The survivors huddled together, sharing thin soup and thinner hope.
Gerald sat apart from the others, sharpening his axe with slow, methodical strokes. His face was a mask of concentration, but his eyes kept drifting to a small leather journal tucked into his belt.
Alicent's journal.
He had not opened it in weeks. The words inside were too precious, too painful. They reminded him of who he had been and who he could have become. But tonight, something drew his hand to the cover.
He opened it to a random page and read:
"Gerald told me today that he is afraid. Not of battle. Not of death. Of becoming nothing. I told him that no one who has ever loved can become nothing. Love leaves marks. Even when the love is gone, the marks remain. He did not believe me. But I saw something in his eyes. A flicker of hope. I think he wants to believe. I think he is trying."
Gerald closed the journal and pressed it against his chest. His eyes were wet, but he did not wipe them.
"You are thinking about her," Liam said, appearing beside him like a ghost.
"I am always thinking about her."
"That is good. The dead should not be forgotten."
"The dead should not be dead." Gerald's voice was rough. "She should be here. She should be arguing with me about stupid things. She should be rolling her eyes at my jokes and telling me I am impossible."
"But she is not."
"No. She is not." Gerald looked at the journal. "And I am left here, wondering if I am honoring her memory or using it as an excuse to be miserable."
"Both," Liam said. "That is the nature of grief. It is never clean. It is never simple. It is just... there. And you carry it."
Gerald nodded slowly. "You have carried it a long time."
Liam did not answer. He simply looked out at the darkness, his face unreadable.
Later, when the camp had settled into an uneasy sleep, a scout came running into the ruins. His name was Marco; a young Italian who had been with them since the Anvil. His face was pale, and his breath came in gasps.
"Riders," he said. "Coming up the road. Torches. Maybe twenty of them."
"Whose colors?" Aurelio asked, already reaching for his sword.
"No colors. But they have a banner." Marco swallowed. "A wooden cross. Painted red."
Godbrand.
Aurelio was on his feet in an instant. "Wake the others. Form a defensive line. Keep the civilians behind the arches."
The camp erupted into controlled chaos. Men grabbed weapons, women herded children deeper into the ruins, and the Norsemen formed a shield wall across the main entrance.
Gerald stood beside Aurelio, his axe in his hand, his face set in stone. "He is either very brave or very stupid to come here with only twenty men."
"He is not here to fight," Aurelio said. "He is here to talk."
"Then we do not let him."
"We listen. And then we decide."
The riders emerged from the darkness like specters. Their torches cast dancing shadows on the stone walls, and their horses moved with an unnatural calm. At their head rode Godbrand.
He was different from the man Aurelio had confronted at the Anvil. Thinner, harder, his eyes burning with a fevered intensity. His hair shirt was stained with mud and something darker. He carried no weapon.
"Peace," Godbrand called out, raising his empty hands. "I come in peace."
"You come in lies," Gerald shouted back. "Turn around and leave, or I will feed you to the crows."
Godbrand smiled; a thin, sad expression. "The crows have no interest in me, Viking. They are too busy feasting on the dead you left behind. The dead you could not save."
Gerald took a step forward, his axe rising. Aurelio grabbed his arm.
"Let him speak."
Godbrand dismounted and walked toward the shield wall. The Norsemen tensed, their spears leveled, but Godbrand did not seem to notice. He walked as if through a garden, his eyes fixed on Aurelio.
"I have been watching you," Godbrand said. "You and your companions. You fight so hard. You sacrifice so much. And yet, the plague spreads. The people die. The world burns."
"And whose fault is that?" Aurelio demanded. "The Cabal started this. But you... you are making it worse. You are turning people against each other. You are turning hope into poison."
"I am giving them something to believe in." Godbrand spread his arms. "What are you giving them? A promise of a cure that does not exist? A hope of a future that will never come?"
"There is always hope."
"No." Godbrand's voice dropped, became almost gentle. "There is not. There is only the truth. And the truth is that this world is dying. It has been dying for centuries. The Cabal was just the final push. The plague is just the final harvest."
"Then what do you propose?" Cecilia's voice cut through the tension. She stepped out from behind the shield wall, her face pale but her eyes steady. "That we all lie down and die? That we let you decide who is worthy of salvation?"
Godbrand's eyes fixed on her. For a moment, the mask slipped, and Aurelio saw something ugly beneath. Greed. Hunger. The desire to possess.
"The worthy are those who submit," Godbrand said. "Who surrender their pride, their fear, their desperate clinging to a world that has already rejected them. The worthy are the humble. The broken. The ones who are ready to be remade."
"And you will remake them?"
"I will guide them. I will show them the path. And when they are ready, I will lead them into the new world."
"You are mad," Cecilia said.
Godbrand smiled. "Perhaps. But I am not wrong."
He turned back to Aurelio. "I did not come here to fight. I came to offer you a choice. Join me. Bring your people. Let me show you a better way."
"And if I refuse?"
"Then you will die. Not by my hand. By the plague. By the despair of your followers. By the slow, grinding erosion of hope." Godbrand mounted his horse. "You have three days. I will be at the village of San Marco, two miles east. Come alone, or come with your army. The choice is yours."
He rode away, his followers falling in behind him. The torches faded into the darkness, and the camp fell silent.
Aurelio stood at the shield wall, staring into the night.
"We cannot trust him," Gerald said.
"We cannot ignore him," Liam replied. "He has followers. Dozens, maybe hundreds. If we fight him directly, we lose."
"So what do we do?"
Aurelio turned to face them. His eyes were hard, but there was something else there. Something that looked like resolve.
"We prepare," he said. "We fortify this camp. We send scouts to San Marco. We learn everything we can about his forces, his weaknesses, his plans."
"And then?"
"And then we do what we should have done at the Anvil." Aurelio's hand went to his sword. "We end him."
— Present —
The old man returned to his chair and sat down heavily. The candle had burned to nothing, and the room was lit only by the faint grey light of approaching dawn.
"We did not end him that week," Aurelio said. "Or the week after. Godbrand was like a shadow; the closer we got, the further he seemed to slip away. He knew the land. He knew the people. And he knew how to turn our own doubts against us."
He looked at the Scholar.
"The hunt for Godbrand lasted months. And in that time, he took everything from us. Not all at once. Piece by piece. Friend by friend. Hope by hope."
He closed his eyes.