Peace in the Midlands

Gyurot slouched into the room and closed the door behind him.

"I heard you were back."

The janitor stepped over to the bed, dodging the miniature gilded obelisk in the center of the room.

Jeuni Huros lay there, eyeing his friend but saying nothing. Gyurot sat down heavily on the room's only chair. It creaked noisily as he shifted his weight forward, leaning toward the juggler. Though the Golden Swan's decor was more extravagant and gaudier than the churches of Byhr, its furniture was not the newest. The sitting options in the rooms were like ancient tapestries—beautiful to behold, but falling apart at the seams.

"I thought I would come check up on you. I heard you were having a hard time."

Still no response.

"Well, it seems I'm not wanted here," said Gyurot, standing abruptly. "I won't disturb you."

Jeuni remained silent but shook his head slowly, locks of brown hair shifting minutely across his scarlet pillow. Gyurot sat back down.

"I guess you really fucked yourself up bad, huh?" Gyurot grinned impishly. "That's what you get for eloping with a little girl."

Jeuni labored to reach over to the nightstand, grab the tome that lay there, and heave it at his friend. Gyurot dodged the projectile with ease.

"Same old touchy Jeuni," he smiled. "You know what this is?" He stooped down and recovered the book. "It may seem like nothing more than a fat, floppy dagger to an idiot drunk like you, Jeuni, but this is a book. Remember Master Limm? No you don't. You don't remember anything. Hopeless drunk. Point is, it's illegal. Byhryn authorities catch you with something like this, and..." Gyurot drew a finger across his throat, illustrating.

"'I know what a fucking book is'—what's this?" Gyurot chuckled. "I'm a wizard! Zap, boom! I can read your mind! Haha! You know, Jeuni, you're pretty easy to read." He propped the book open and flipped through a few pages. "No good. It's just a bunch of weird symbols."

Jeuni rolled his eyes.

"So what were you doing with this?" asked the janitor. "You can't read, either, right?"

"He's learning," came the gentle voice of a girl. The door opened and Kihara stepped in, clad in a bulky brown dress. Her hair sparkled aquamarine in the light cast by the crystal chandelier.

"Miss Kihara!" exclaimed Gyurot, standing so as to vacate the chair.

"Good day, Mister Gyurot." The blue-haired girl greeted the janitor with a curt bow.

"I saw your name on the check-in list, so I asked around, and management said that Jeuni was with you. I was surprised—I assumed he'd finally kicked the bucket."

"What made you think that?" Kihara asked, slightly bemused.

"Well, after he ran away from the Golden Swan three weeks ago, he only went to work once, and the barkeep spread word that he'd been super depressed after the show. Rumors circulated, town launched an investigation—all covert, 'course, no one wanted Byhr to catch word—and it came up that last person to talk to Jeuni was that old grocer guy, what was his name... ugh, never mind. Point is, Mister Grocer said Jeuni had left for the Shaded Orchard. Nobody knew more than that, and he wasn't to be found anywhere. There was a quite a bit of buzz, you know! His show was pretty popular, and he is a bit of a hero amongst those who dream of peace."

"A hero? Jeuni, you hear that?" the girl smiled down at the incapacitated juggler, who returned a grimace.

Gyurot and his exaggerations...

"Anyway, a lot of people were worried. Especially me." Gyurot, serial joker, was wearing an unnaturally straight face. "I was... really worried."

"Jeuni'll be alright," the girl assured him. "He did almost die, and more than once—but it's a long story. He's more fit to tell it than I. Rather, he will be more fit, once he can talk again. For the time being, have the abridged version: he was badly poisoned. You probably noticed the menders coming and going."

"I did indeed. Uncomfortable faces and everything. Their imaginations must have started racing when they got work summons from this establishment!"

Kihara smiled patiently.

"They say that the poison has been successfully purged and now we need do nothing but wait. With rest, he'll be good as new."

"That's a relief," sighed Gyurot. "You, Jeuni. You know, you look like a right idiot right now, lying there with that stupid grin on your face. It's fitting." Gyurot placed the book on the pillow next to Jeuni's face. "The book works. Makes you look even more a fool."

"See, Jeuni?" asked the girl. "You have such good friends here."

Jeuni closed his eyes as if frustrated but didn't try to object. He knew it was true. As much as he cursed Gyurot for insensitivity, crude humor, or general stupidity, he knew that he had in him a real best friend. The two had met as fellow draftees on the Byhr-Harnecia front at sixteen and they had deserted together at nineteen, hiding behind the Harnecian lines until the prices on their heads decreased. Then, we came home, he to his family, and I to mine, and... Jeuni's eyebrows rose as he tried to think back. Things get a bit hazy after that.

"Well then, Miss Kihara, it's been a pleasure seeing you again," said Gyurot, interrupting Jeuni's ponderings. "And you, the idiot over there. Have fun learning to read. Try not to let Byhr know what you're up to. Don't want you to get in trouble. Not that you're not already in trouble! For your sake, man, for your sake this town doesn't squeal. That and we're half Harnecian, I guess." Jeuni nodded. "I'll come check in on you later, make sure Kihara's feeding you. I gotta get back to work. Take care, you hear?" Jeuni nodded again and Gyurot backed out of the room.

Kihara's smile widened as the janitor exited.

"Jeuni, how're you feeling?"

The juggler feebly reached out and extended one thumb toward the ceiling.

"You certainly don't look it, you know?" Kihara produced a mirror from her dress pocket and held it in front of Jeuni. The juggler frowned as he took in the glowing purple splotches dotting his cheeks. "The menders said the discoloration was just a side-effect of what's a pretty extreme treatment. It'll fade with time."

She sighed after saying this and then seated herself on the edge of the bed, foregoing the creaky chair.

"Hopefully the swelling in your throat will go down soon, and then you can talk again."

Jeuni nodded.

"We'll have you out of bed and walking in no time."

Jeuni nodded again.

"You'll be running laps around the stage when you perform."

Kihara put down the mirror and turned her gaze to the fake velvet rug. Her lips trembled.

"I'm ... I'm so sorry, Jeuni..."

Kihara's hair hid her face from the juggler's eyes, but it didn't hide her sniffling from his ears. He laboriously reached out and laid a hand on her knee. You've saved me so many times, Kihara. You broke into my life and you saved me from myself.

You can't disobey the god, right?

Kihara took a deep breath and stood.

"You should try to get some sleep." She took the book from Jeuni's pillow and put it back on the nightstand. After smoothing the sheets around Jeuni's legs, she made for the door. "I'll bring you food in a bit. We can work on reading more later. I... I need to go get some fresh air."

Jeuni nodded sagely. Kihara staggered from the room, head hanging low.

* * *

The sun rose and set outside Jeuni's window four times before he regained the ability to speak. Kihara and Gyurot took turns bringing him meals. When Kihara visited, she would hold a book of Uncle Snow's Bedtime Myths open for the juggler, reading to him unbelievable stories about the Shaded Orchard and Mount Poulth and the legendary insectoid behemoths native to the southern woodlands. When Gyurot visited, he would complain that Jeuni's facial discoloration was receding too rapidly.

When Jeuni finally succeeded in bringing out his voice, it was scratchy, his throat rough. Kihara was obviously torn between rejoicing for his recovery and laughing at the comical sound tone of his questions.

"Where's the beast-man?"

"King? Out and about. He came through town the other night, and agreed that we should wait for you to recover completely before... well, before anything. I don't know when he'll be back."

"What're you planning?" Jeuni asked, straining his throat in an attempt to sound normal. "What's next?"

"For now, just lying low here."

"Then what?"

"Eventually, I'm going to have to bring you south again."

Jeuni didn't respond. The god did say he was looking forward to my next visit. I guess Kihara's orders still stand. And the beast-man's. He briefly considered the possibility of staying in the Midlands; it wouldn't be hard to lay either of his Holder traveling companions low time and again in order to retain his agency. But what is there for me in the Midlands? Nothing but strife. The Shaded Orchard didn't exist, but the South was still the South. What few visual memories Jeuni had kept through his poisoned nightmares were pretty, entrancing. He wanted to go back, to feel the wind, the snow, the chill air.

And he wanted to give that blasted god a piece of his mind.

"Jeuni?"

"Just thinking."

"Any other questions? If not, I'll go fetch Mister Gyurot; I think he's planning to grill you now that your voice is back."

"Yeah. Why am I here?"

"Here?"

"Golden Swan," grumbled Jeuni.

"Oh! The accommodations here seemed nicer than those in your, um, house, and I was told it would be free."

Jeuni raised a quizzical eyebrow.

"Apparently, with a tiny price hike none of the other customers minded, the inn can put you up without any losses. It seems most of this establishment's clientele are your fans, and your fans were happy to do something nice for you."

"My fans? I haven't been to my job in weeks." Jeuni shook his head as he remembered the drunkest of the drunks, the penniless louts who stood a foot from the stage when he performed and whose eyes shone when he injured himself. Then he remembered that he had been no better and sighed. "Well, even if they haven't given up on me by now, whatever fans I had weren't the type to come here... they weren't exactly swimming in cash."

"Oh, no, Jeuni. I'm not talking about fans of your juggling act."

"What do you mean?" he asked, apprehensive.

"They're fans of you, Jeuni. You're a hero." Kihara's cheeks flushed with excitement as she spoke. "You left town in search of the Shaded Orchard. Not only did you manage to escape Byhr—incapacitating a hundred elite Byhryn soldiers, the story goes—in order to find the paradise of the South, you made it back in one piece. The townspeople are in love with you."

Instead of pointing out the obvious errors in the story, Jeuni just chuckled.

"Hell, that makes me sound like Tyff!"

"Tyff?" Kihara asked, her eyes narrowing and all joy disappearing from her cheeks.

"Yeah, Tyff! Tyff Noi. The Harnecian hero who traveled south several decades ago. You don't know the story?" Jeuni smiled. It was one of his favorite legends. "While there's been no evidence of his presence in these parts since his departure, it's widely accepted that he's pulling strings from somewhere remote, helping the occasional lucky bastard escape the Midlands, find peace in the Shaded Or—" and before he could finish the word, he began to feel abhorrently stupid. There was no way it was more than a myth. He had seen the South.

What a hero Tyff must be if the legends were true, sending people to die alone in the snow-plains!

Even as the juggler berated himself for not reevaluating the legend of Tyff sooner, Kihara's face grew graver and graver.

"What's wrong?" Jeuni asked after a minute of silence.

The girl looked Jeuni dead in the eyes and slowly opened her mouth.

"Tyff Noi was the First Holder of the Covenant."

Jeuni's jaw dropped. The First Holder—the giant had told stories of him as Jeuni faded in and out of consciousness on the trip south. The juggler couldn't remember all the details, but he knew that the First Holder was the man responsible for the founding of Byhr.

"You're lying."

"I'm not," Kihara responded.

"Must be a different Tyff," said Jeuni. "Must be."

The first name was common enough in Harnecia, and the last name not unheard of, but it seemed too much to write it off as mere coincidence. The stories were too similar, Jeuni realized: a Harnecian named Tyff Noi had gone south, survived the journey, and lived on to influence events in the Midlands.

"I doubt it," said Kihara, echoing the juggler's uncertainty. "I'm a foreigner, and I didn't know your story, but there's only one Tyff the god ever talks about."

Jeuni felt sick to his stomach, and his throat felt no better for all the strain through which he'd put it.

"Gyurot never makes me feel quite this foolish."

Kihara smiled sympathetically.

"Anyone would want to hope."

Jeuni laughed a weak laugh. Kihara silently took the book from the nightstand and flipped it open to a story about the giant centipedes of the Western Wastes.

"I've seen one of these," she said before beginning to read, holding the book in front of Jeuni so he could see the chapter illustration. "Only they're about a hundredth the size, and they don't hunt little boys for breakfast."

* * *

Three months passed, and the Second Holder didn't make a single appearance. Kihara and Gyurot paid Jeuni occasional visits, but the juggler mainly kept to himself in his room at the Golden Swan. Every day, he regained more mobility and stamina, eventually retaking the stage at the tavern to a standing ovation.

In the meantime, Jeuni had become fully literate. It wasn't hard—he had approached literacy once before the ban on writing, and he had come close a number of times during Harnecia's longer occupations of his hometown. But every time, Byhr would retake the town, burn the Harnecian school to the ground, and thumb its nose at academia and culture.

Now Jeuni knew why—the history of the Holy Empire of Byhr as taught by the clergy was a lie. If the entire country knew the truth, it would likely implode. If they knew that the elusive Holders of the Covenant were wandering immortals wielding the powers of a whimsical god, and that the Byhrate Council was not comprised of Holders, the oppressed citizens of the Empire of Good would not sit still. Jeuni pondered this many times, stopping mid-sentence as he pored over history texts. Maybe he would try to spread the word, try to enlighten the people.

Every time the thought occurred, however, Jeuni could envision no future other than a continuation of the past: the Midlands at war. He understood that without Byhr, things would be no more peaceful.

Three more months passed and Harnecia had reclaimed a sizable portion of eastern Byhr, including Jeuni's town. There were celebrations in the street below the juggler's window every night. Jeuni kept an ever-growing library in his room. Whenever he wasn't juggling, sleeping, or eating, he was reading, taking in knowledge he'd never imagined existed. Mind buried in books, he eventually stopped wondering when the giant would return. The tundra and the dark god of the covenant seemed worlds away, more distant still than the monarchal traditions of ancient Harnecia or the equestrian breeding techniques of the long-forgotten Cresso Empire.

Whenever Kihara visited, she would ask him how he was, and he would say he was doing great, and it was true. He was in good shape, his show was popular, and he was learning something new every day. All was well.

"Though... I could use some alcohol, Kihara," he said one day, out of the blue. The girl frowned and shook her head violently. Jeuni didn't bring it up again.

* * *

"Jeuni!" Kihara cried, stumbling into the juggler's room on a winter evening. She was wearing her white coat and boots, her cheeks flushed with running through the cold and her eyes ghostly pale. Her lips trembled as she approached; her whole body shook. In the year that he had known Kihara, Jeuni had never seen her this distressed. He quickly put down the book he'd been reading—a biography of famous Rynth bowyers—and leaned back against the headboard.

"What's the matter?"

"King, Jeuni. King is dead," she breathed, and then she fell to her knees by the bed and burrowed her head into Jeuni's side, crying quietly.

"He'll come back," Jeuni reassured her. Of course, he knew that she knew about the regeneration of Holders, and that for her to be this upset the Second Holder must have been obliterated without a chance at coming back. Confirming this fear, Kihara shook her head. Jeuni reached out cautiously and patted the girl on the shoulder.

Jeuni had no particular love for the giant who had admitted to riling him up for the fun of it on many occasions, but he knew from watching his interactions with Kihara that the two were very close, almost like father and daughter. Jeuni seemed to remember crying over the loss of his own father once, but the memory was hazy, and it must have been in one of his nightmares. That's right! I was going to visit my family when I came home.

The juggler held Kihara's quivering shoulders firmly and gently stroked her hair as she cried long and hard. When the sobs finally died down, Kihara looked up at Jeuni, eyes blazing red through her tears.

"Jeuni, we need to get out of here."

"Why?"

"King wasn't just the chance victim of a powerful Holder, Jeuni. The Byhrate Council ordered all the empire's Holders to hunt him down and execute him. He was wanted for Master Ynthon's death, for helping you escape Byhr—and he was had. I'm wanted as an accomplice, naturally, and you... well, you're famous."

"Oh, shit..." murmured Jeuni.

"Byhr has already begun taking action," Kihara said slowly. "I've seen wanted posters in neighboring towns, Jeuni. 'Traitor Wizard Jeuni Huros: We'll get him THIS time!'"

"Damn it, how much time do we have?"

"Byhr's troops will descend on this region in a few hours at the most. We need to get out, now."

"So, none. Shit! Okay. Let's go." Jeuni patted Kihara on the shoulder one last time and then leapt up and stretched his legs. "Are you alright?"

"I'll be better," muttered the blue-haired girl, standing. "Where are we going to run?"

"There's only one direction for those trying to escape Byhr," smiled Jeuni.

Kihara nodded, wiped the tears from her face, and clenched her fists.

Jeuni threw on his cloak—a new affair made of soft black fabric, a present from the tavern patrons—and cast about for anything he needed to bring. Piles of books lay everywhere, a few reaching all the way to the ceiling. They would all be destroyed if Byhr found them, Jeuni knew, so he quickly danced around the room, sucking the books up into his cloak. After checking to make sure his daggers were in place and that his mantle and boots were properly buckled, he made for the door, Kihara right behind him.

In the lobby, the two ran into Gyurot.

"Jeuni, Miss Kihara! Where are the two of you headed at this time of night, dressed so sharply? Hot night on the town?" Before Jeuni could reprimand Gyurot, the janitor took in Kihara's expression and grew stony-faced. "What's wrong?"

"We have to leave, Mister Gyurot," said the girl, "thank you very much for your hospitality."

"Byhr's retaking the town," Jeuni added, "and I'm... well... you know."

He didn't have time to explain everything, nor did he need to. Gyurot nodded.

"Deserters can always desert," he winked, for the first time in Jeuni's memory cracking a joke that didn't enrage the juggler. "I assume you need supplies?"

"Yeah. Four weeks' worth," he said.

"Consider it done. Hold on a moment, I'll go grab stuff from the storage rooms." Gyurot disappeared through a door behind the reception counter. He reemerged minutes later, carrying several bulky burlap bags.

"Thank you so much, Gyurot," Jeuni said.

"Of course, Jeuni. What're friends for?"

"I... Look, Gyurot. I'm sorry that I've been such a lame—"

"Don't even go there. We left the army together and we chose our own paths through life. I enjoyed your juggling, Jeuni, and your drinking was humorous to say the least. Don't regret how you lived in this town, okay? We'll always be here, waiting for you to come back."

"Thanks, Gyurot."

"We need to get going, Jeuni," Kihara said quietly, stepping closer to the exit.

"I'll try to convince the Harnecians here to surrender the town quietly, Jeuni," Gyurot called out as Jeuni pushed the heavy glass door open. "You'll always be a hero here, and this will always be your home, remember? I'll always be here, and I'll always be your friend."

Jeuni stifled the emotion swelling in his chest and dashed out of the inn without a word. Kihara followed silently. Harnecian solders stood idly all over the main roads. An air of disquiet hung over the town. Once into the back alleys and out of sight, Jeuni stuffed the sacks of supplies under his cloak and they disappeared.

Within ten minutes of their departure from the Golden Swan, Jeuni and Kihara were out of town. Traveling as fast as they could, they reached the woodlands south of town in under three hours. The pines, the spruces, the prickly underbrush, the forest at night—these things felt familiar to Jeuni, and he breathed in the scent of conifers with a hint of nostalgia.

As the urgency of escape grew less with each yard of woodland covered, the two slowed their pace. Underbrush grew thicker along with the canopy, and when the stars stopped shedding light on the forest floor Jeuni and Kihara took a break. They were breathing heavily, scratched here and there by the thickets through which they had recklessly charged.

After catching his breath, Jeuni climbed a tree in order to catch one last glimpse of the town he'd left behind. When he broke through the forest roof he saw that the northern stars were blotted out with smoke.

His hometown was burning.