Indirk shook the vestiges of moss from her claws. She’d left scratches on the stone when she’d cleared it, further marring the already illegible name upon the monument. “This is Adroit Leisess, Revash born of Gray Watch, served in the League’s coalition forces. He commanded the Cradsoun infantry regiment behind the Rhyqir incursion back in 1061. My family lived in a little community around an outer watch tower on the Aethel ridge. Cradsoun ran us over on their way to the Hearkening Bulwark, killed just about everyone, but didn’t stop to dig through the rubble and find me. I was nine years old. It took weeks for anyone to come check on the place and take me away, and by then…” Indirk looked at her hands and scratched some dirt off the underside of one claw. “I’d already dug more than forty graves in this big circle around the tower.”
Amo watched her quietly, arms crossed, and responded quietly. “You must carry a lot of hate for that.”
“You’d prefer it if I did, wouldn’t it?”
Shaking their head, Amo huffed, “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I did a lot of reading about this, Amo. Most of the Cradsoun soldiers in that regiment were actually Aldos refugees that took a deal to serve in exchange for homes for their families. They were all fishers and hunters, young men or fathers with nothing else to give their kids, with their commanders driving them south like clueless cattle with swords and crossbows in their hands. They were terrified and angry, and the only reason they were there was because the RVA – the Laines, and Pharaul, and Vont – had destroyed their homes and left them nowhere to go. None of them are still alive, all dead in the mountains or the mire, their official records pruned down to conscription registry and salary code.”
The shadows of seabirds reeled about the plaza, their shrill cries a sound without echo. The children that had been chasing one another had run off somewhere else. Those braiding the grass continued, but the oldest among them had paused and watched Indirk carefully. There was a dire set to Indirk’s shoulders, to the way she stared at her claws, to the deep-chested grumble of her voice, a disconcerting, heavy hollowness. Even a child could sense it.
Amo spoke in a careful, measured tone. “Why are we here, Indirk?”
“This is the closest I’m going to get to meeting the people that killed my parents.” Indirk closed her eyes and rolled her shoulders and neck, saying as though through pain, “After… everything… I’ve decided I need to do something radical. And the most radical thing I can think of, that’s actually worth doing, is… forgiving these people.” She stretched her arms and sighed. Her eyes never left the name on the stone. “They’re not that different from me. I was a refugee, too, once. My parents wanted me to be a mediator, sing in the voice of the Green, but that bitch who adopted me wanted a soldier. Took me to Pharaul, put a rifle in my young hands, my little girl hands, raised me up like she could mold my hands around the gun. Sent me into the service as soon as she could, like it was some deal I made in exchange for a home and a mom. Driving me to war, like a thing on a leash, and I remember…”
“Indirk.” Amo stepped toward her, eying the space around them, making sure nobody was eavesdropping. “Indirk, stop. We can’t talk about this.”
“Battles on the Meidr,” Indirk was saying. “I remember battles on the Meidr. Standing next to the cannons. Line of sharpshooters. Aim and fire. And fire. And fire. And feeling…” She looked at her hand, the palm that took the rifles weight, the finger that curled around the trigger. She’d been fifteen, staring through the haze of cannons at the carnage. “Terror comes wafting out of the valley like smoke. It gets stuck to you. You wouldn’t know. You wouldn’t. You don’t like guns. Why don’t you like guns, Amo?”
Amo stared at Indirk, the question strange to them. They knew by instinct that they couldn’t lie, but that they shouldn’t give an honest answer. They shouldn’t. But Amo did say honestly, “I want to see a person’s face when I kill them. I want to remember it.”
Indirk’s gaze flicked toward Amo. There was no surprise. “That suits you, I guess.”
In Amo’s gut, something twisted, knowing that Indirk didn’t understand. Amo felt like they’d told a lie, even though they hadn’t meant to.
“The trigger changes your hand,” Indirk said, voice flat and features plain. “I don’t know how, exactly, but it’s permanent. Like the rifle writes a claim on your bones. If I’d been old enough to choose, I’d have never picked up a gun, but I wasn’t. Now it doesn’t matter anymore.”
Amo shook their head. “Your mom just wanted to share the only thing she’s good at.”
Indirk’s smirk was a troubling thing, the amusement crooked. “Killing, yeah? So good at it.” The smirk vanished an instant later, her tone darkening. “We don’t have moms, Amo. At least you were raised by Sgathaich, and I always got the feeling she kind of cared if you lived or died. But my foster mother sent me away as soon as she could. And every time I came home, she sent me away faster, for longer, and further and further away. It was like she was disappointed I came back. Like she wanted me to die out there.”
“That’s not true, Indirk. It couldn’t be.” Amo spoke with honest offense. “I know your mom, Indirk. She’s not like that. No mother is.”
“You weren’t there when we had the conversations. To see how she looked at me. You weren’t there when she made me watch them tear that man apart, bit by bit, hang him like a lesson on the wall.”
“What are you talking about? What man?”
Indirk looked back to the stone. “It doesn’t matter. He didn’t matter. She doesn’t matter. Mom? The August Seat of the Warmaker? Forget her.” She touched the side of her head, and repeated, “Forget her. Forget her!” as though issuing a command to herself. Then, abruptly, she shook her body and sighed. “It’s all about choosing who to hate. A thousand years ago, the Green Word’s Reply chased some Cradsoun explorers into the Starmire and started a war. They could’ve let them go; they hadn’t hurt anyone. But they chased them down and killed them, and that started a war. As far as I’m concerned everyone who’s ever died in this war, a thousand years of dying, is all on them.”
Indirk’s gaze snapped toward Amo. “Ten million murders, all on them. All on them.”
“That isn’t fair.” Amo locked eyes with her, keeping their own expression placid. “Times change. New crimes are committed. You told us that Gray Watch is torturing people, and if you’d just talk to Phaeduin about what happened at the Sickle-Sough Festival…“
“You think Pharaul isn’t torturing people?” Indirk snapped, her voice a carrying snarl. It echoed around the stones, as though her anger lurked in every shadow they cast.
The children startled and looked toward her. The oldest grabbed the others and pulled them up, hissing, Let’s go! Go! And dragging them out of the plaza. This left the place empty. Amo was grateful for that.
Indirk pointed an accusatory finger at Amo. “And haven’t you killed your own share? I know I have. This war is a monstrosity that’s infected us all. It’s a nightmare that takes people who want to live in peace and forces them to kill each other. It grinds our souls into fuel to keep itself going. And it’s never going to end.”
Amo’s gaze flicked about the place to make sure there was nobody else in earshot before they said, “It’ll end when someone wins. Soon. One way or another, soon. I know it.”
“Really? After a thousand years, Amo?” Indirk cackled bitterly and shook her head. “Wars don’t last a thousand years. It isn’t natural. It’s because they’re addicted to it: Cradsoun and Pharaul and the Laines, the League and the Alliance.” She gestured this way and that with her hands. “Cradsoun’s whole society is built on the war. Gray Watch stays rich off it. The Laines feeds money into Vont which feeds steam into Pharaul which turns weapons back into money and passes it off to the Laines, like some sick heartbeat. If the war stops, the cities die; that’s how they’re built. It’s never going to end. It’s never…”
Indirk’s brow lifted, a realization hitting her as suddenly as a blow to the chest. She exhaled a small, “Oh.”
Amo squinted at her. “What?
“I’m quitting,” Indirk said, at first mystified. And then, after a breath, eying Amo with a certainty that could only come with the realization of the inevitable. “It’s all pointless. It’s always been pointless. So, I’m done. I’m quitting. It’s over.”
