"Don't do it."
Norvin felt assured listening to this—he didn't want to be the reason of death of the magnificent creatures his mother used to spoke up.
For a second he felt ease, and in the next, he felt fear, because the words spoken were not his own.
He turned his head, seeing who spoke to him.
Had someone from the patrol already been stationed inside? Norvin could instantly feel that his life was in danger.
Expecting to see an enemy lunging forward to kill him, he didn't expect what he saw in front of him. A red mist was taking a humanoid figure, with no clear distinctions of who it was; it resembled a human. Norvin, for a second, thought he was hallucinating, his mind gone mad. He could see a red mist with the slender figure of an adult woman, complete with long hair, standing in front of him. The mist, as if giving shape to a formless entity, was like a blurry ghost.
In the very next moment, a calm voice spoke, "Get out of here, boy."
Norvin was stunned. He hadn't expected to stand before a ghost, and though his mind screamed that he had gone mad, he knew this was real.
Norvin instinctively took a step back, ready to flee, but he forced himself to pause. The enemy hadn't tried to kill him, let alone capture him. He couldn't even feel any hostile emotions from this ghost.
'Huh... get out? Did she not want to capture me, an enemy?' Norvin thought.
"Who are you? No…What are you?" Norvin asked in a fearful voice, his hands instinctively reaching for the knives at his waist.
"I am just a soul wandering by." Her voice remained calm, giving no hint of emotion. "But you, boy, you need to leave now."
"What?" Norvin didn't understand anything, but he knew not to doubt her warning. Yet, he couldn't bring himself to trust that wraith. After all, what fool trusts his enemies?
"You're not here to capture me?" Norvin asked, his voice low with hesitation. The red mist swirled, its presence chillingly certain. "No," it replied. "But he might."
Just at that moment, Norvin heard a huge clanking sound from behind him. Someone had opened the den's heavy doors. As the moonlight made its way through the open doorway, a silhouette of a man could be seen, holding a sword.
'Crap' Norvin shuddered.
Turning his head back to see the mist figure, Norvin couldn't find her. She had dissipated into thin air, as if a simple mist had been disturbed.
"What are you doing here, kid? How did you get in?" the man in the doorway demanded.
"Why did you require Norvin to go? He is a child, Mat! He has not even received formal training on how to hold his own, let alone take a life!"
Remus and Mat walked briskly through the muddy rows of the encampment. The flickering light of the oil lamps cast long, dancing shadows across their faces, illuminating the stark contrast between the two men. Mat's eyes were sunken, heavy with the crushing responsibility of a battle they could not afford to lose, while Remus's face was twisted in a snarl of pure, paternal fury.
"We discovered a path to enter the enemy's stronghold—a collapsed drainage sluice beneath the walls," Mat explained, his voice tight. "It is too narrow for an anyone, and the awen residue in the area is too dense for a Cipher to pass without triggering alarms. We needed someone small. Someone with no awen nor numen signature. Sadly... he was the only one who fit the criteria."
Remus stopped dead in his tracks, grabbing Mat by the pauldron of his armour. "So you just let him go? You took a terrified boy and threw him right into the dragon's den?"
"Sir Remus, please... I could never do that willingly. This was all our Captain's orders. Lord Thane looked at the boy and made the decision in a heartbeat. How could I, a simple senior knight, question the word of our Captain?"
"I know what kind of person that kid Thane is. He sees people as numbers, not flesh and blood. But you?" Remus's voice dropped to a dangerous whisper, shaking Mat's shoulder. "I taught you better than this. I taught you strategy, yes, but I also taught you honour. You promised me. You looked me in the eye and swore you would keep him safe. I didn't expect you to break your oath for a tactical advantage."
Mat looked away, unable to meet the burning gaze of his mentor. The guilt gnawed at him, sharper than any enemy blade.
"Sir Remus, the position I hold... the man I am today... it is all because of your guidance. During my initial years in the Serpent's Maw, you were the only one who treated me with decency. I am indebted to you in ways I cannot repay. Do you truly think I wanted this?"
He took a breath, composing himself. "The task given to Norvin is of no combat danger. He is a courier, nothing more. He has been strictly ordered to fall back and retreat the moment he senses even a whisper of a threat. He is not there to fight; he is there to observe."
"Mat, I have trust in you. I always have," Remus said, letting go of Mat's armour, his hands trembling slightly. "But trust does not stop an arrow. It does not stop a blade in the dark. What if he gets captured? What if he is killed before he can even think to retreat? He is a boy, Mat. Fear freezes the heart before logic can save it."
"I..." Mat started, but the words died in his throat.
"If he dies," Remus continued, his voice hollow, "it won't be Thane's face I see in my nightmares. It will be yours."
Mat and Remus stood amidst the suffocating silence of the camp, Mat had no answer.
Remus clenched his fists until his knuckles turned white. The veins in his neck bulged, threatening to explode. Every instinct in his body screamed at him to draw his sword, to storm out of the camp, to tear down the forest himself to find the boy. But he was a soldier. He was a piece on a board controlled by a madman. Without the Captain's permission, he was paralyzed—a chained beast forced to wait and watch as a lamb walked into the slaughter.
"Every night as he slept in my tent, I could hear the rain, the rain of grief ,from him."