Vanguard, Book 2, Chapter 7.3

The mist swept and leaned against the massive gates of Moonby Sanctuary, hands of silky white obscuring the lifeless gray of granite that reached so tall, so proud into the sky. The mist crept around the waists of the twin knightly statues on either side of the gate, like a pair of white gowns to go with their granite armor. Peeking forth from the gentle white, colors of all five great houses behind these walls peeked forth; Rex, Cercy, Umbral, Hedwen, and Zakadiev. The horses whinnied and snorted under the shadow of the imposing gates, stretched long across the muddy landscape under the slanted light of the setting sun. Deep red and orange had grown stronger and more vibrant across the mist-riddled sky, the clouds so far above made blush in the evening glow.

If anything, Duncan was surprised that he even had the chance of seeing the sky, in a realm like this. For once, although he was so wet it wouldn't quite matter anyway, it did not rain. He sat there upon a horse just as wet, beside an aging lieutenant suffering from the same condition. His hair clung to his cheeks and the steel armor that sloped down to engulf his entire right arm shimmered in the thousand droplets that adorned it. He, just like himself, had bound a woolen shawl to his armor, to keep the rain off as well as possible—but by now, that shawl seemed only to serve as a soaked weight on their shoulders. He had been silent for quite some time now, which only fit a man like him. Duncan had grown uneasy every time he spoke, nervous that he might bring up a subject that was better left forgotten. But Duncan knew perfectly well, that it never would. It may have ceased to rain in the waking world, but in his mind, it never stopped.

“Ho, down there!” a voice called from above, hidden somewhere behind a passing length of mist “The gates have been sealed in preparation of the coming threat from the south! State your business, or begone!”

Wolfe narrowed his eyes at the voice from above, but the face of the one who owned it was nowhere to be seen. Wolfe turned a look at Duncan, and flashed a little smile “Heh, at least they realize that the demons are a threat. That's a step in the right direction.”

Duncan tried to smile and answer, but Wolfe had already raised his voice for the guard upon the walls “We are Lieutenant Edan Wolfe and Captain Duncan Montgomery Ross, of the Dawn rebellion! We seek entry to council with the nobles!”

“More of you guys?!” the voice shouted back “Tell me, what are you riding?”

Wolfe threw a befuddled look at Duncan, and all Duncan could do was give a lazy shrug. Wolfe raised his voice again “A pair of proud steeds, of course! Will you let us in or not?”

“Aha, yeah sure, 'proud steeds', uh huh.” the voice said with sarcasm so dense he might not even have needed words to express it—simple noises would have sufficed just as well “And will these 'proud steeds' try to devour my colleagues whole, armor and everything?”

Wolfe snorted, baffled “Are you quite sane, guardsman? All these steeds will try to devour are your hay supply.”

“Sane enough to know when my own hide is in danger!” the guardsman shouted back, still hidden behind the mist “So these are actual horses? Hooves, mane, and everything?”

“Last I checked, yes!” Wolfe said, sarcastically glancing at all four hooves, even though he knew that the guardsman couldn't see him “A lovely hazel mane indeed, well-groomed and with a scent of sweat and mud. As authentic as they come, I assure you.”

Duncan leaned in closer “Is this some kind of game? I'm not following.” he spoke, voice lowered.

“Damned if I know, Duncan. If it's a game, then the rules are beyond me.” Wolfe muttered back, just as the guardsman shouted.

“Good gods, that's a relief. You see, just a few hours ago, a Mjaln came riding in on a fucking warg, no less! I was so gullible as to think he could bind it where you usually bind horses, but hell, that monster tore loose like the pole was butter and decided to roam the outskirts, like we need another bloody creature lurking about in the mists, threatening to gobble up whatever sorry fool that wanders out into it. Now we've got a whole platoon of guards out there, searching for the cursed thing! Haven't seen them back since, and I'm beginning to think about how I'm gonna tell their families that they became dog food. Probably not the way they had hoped to go, when signing up for the guard, you know?”

Duncan threw a look to his left, and saw a wooden pole lay flat across the ground, torn free what seems like no more than a few hours ago. He looked back at Wolfe, and saw the tiny smile that had crept unto his expression “Gee, I wonder what Mjaln that could be.”

“A warg, though?” Duncan asked, seeming a little confused, unable to imagine Ramund sitting on one of those beasts.

“Well, a horse certainly isn't going to carry him.” Wolfe chuckled hoarsely and pointed to the legs of his steed, which surely would snap under Ramund's weight. Duncan tried to smile back, but it was weak and feeble. There wasn't much life left in him, Wolfe could clearly tell, even if he tried his very best to hide it. It was as if he had run out of life inside, and now sought life from the outside; the peace of the misty landscape breathed some soothing winds into him, some specks of respite, but he needed more. He needed far more, if he wanted to fill this empty vessel that his body was becoming. Much, much more.

Wolfe shook his head, and raised his voice yet again for the guardsman on the wall “Well I'm terribly sorry to hear about what may or may not be a sad fate for your colleagues, but frankly, that's none of our concern. Our concern, right now, is to get inside. Are you going to keep hindering us?”

There was some silence after that. Duncan gazed upwards at the misty ceiling above them, in which the guardsman was hiding somewhere. He wondered if the guardsman had just up and left, but that thought was quickly shattered, as his accented voice returned.

“You said you were from the Dawn rebellion, yeah?”

Wolfe rolled his eyes “Yes, a lieutenant and a captain. Goodness sake guardsman, if you treat every visitor like this, you'll be having some long shifts!”

“That's the thing, though—we don't get many visitors from the south, not after that whole demon threat thing came up. We've got a few lucky survivors here and there, and now you guys show up. How are we to know you're not just spies from hell?”

“Because anything from hell doesn't ask nicely!” Wolfe shouted back, his nose wrinkled and his temper rising.

“Well... I suppose that's a good point. Alright, alright, fair game. Welcome to Moonby.”
Just as he said that, the gates of the sanctuary growled and thundered, massive mechanics within the stonework coming to life, hundreds of cogs and gears churning to force open the colossal gates. Their horses snorted and backed up in wake of the gates opening, the very earth at their feet seeming to jitter like an earthquake was abound. The water in the puddles all around them danced and jumped, thousands of tiny droplets making it seem as if the rain that had fallen, suddenly decided to go back up again. And even so, the gates only opened up a fraction of their full width, to let the two riders inside. And inside they went.

The tall, grey houses of the sanctuary cast long shadows upon the ground, stretched in the colorful light of the setting sun. But it seemed that the sun was the only colorful thing present, today. Duncan hadn't ever been to Moonby Sanctuary; stories and illustrations were the only reference he had to understand what it looked like from the inside. None of those did it justice, he found. He stared up at the towering houses, homes built upon homes, built upon homes, stabbing through the misty ceiling like granite swords. Aqueducts ran here and there like an intricate granite web binding it all together, and creeks flowed through the streets as if they were part of them. There were a few evening stragglers here and there, but it seemed most people had retreated to their homes, in the coming of night. The sound of Duncan and Wolfe's horses were returned with nothing but the song of rivers that swept through the city, and that of their own echoes on the dull, grey walls. But dull as they may have been, Duncan saw beauty within it, where others may have seen little but lifeless granite and ghostly mist. These days, he couldn't afford ignoring beauty, for beauty was all he had left.

Unlike the last great city he had ventured through, Moonby wasn't a bustling, shouting city, with merchants at every corner trying to convince you that they sold better wares than the thousand other merchants selling the exact same thing. Moonby was a quiet place, he found, quiet as the mist that seeped through it like just another citizen—albeit a much larger one. The only life he and Wolfe passed now and then, were old men sitting in benches by the riverside with little to do but count the growing shadows, and boys playing a game of tag while clearly their mothers would rather have them home in time for dinner. And each and every one of these threw some slow, curious looks at he and Wolfe, wondering who these shawl-draped, armor-clad strangers were. Rarely were the looks any good. They knew what men in armor meant for the peace of the city.

“Don't let yourself be worried, Duncan.” Wolfe's hoarse and smokey voice gave some gritty contrast to the otherwise smooth and misty world around them “They may look angry, but it's not us that anger is directed at. It's fear, turned to helplessness, turned to anger. I've seen it before, as I'm sure you have as well.” he didn't even as much as glance at Duncan as he spoke, hazel eyes kept on the grey road before him “The Wasteland natives often gave us these looks, when my squad came to secure their camp from the demons. The natives and their shamans would always know when the veil between worlds was at its thinnest, and a demon attack was at hand. But they could never do anything about it, hence the helplessness.” he led a hand to gesture at a woman by her porch, who had just given them that very same look “This right here? Exactly the same. You've got these big, proud walls, but they've heard of Aegon's fall. And if Aegon couldn't withstand such an attack, how could they ever hope to?”

Duncan looked behind him at the woman, and saw her slam the door behind her, as he walked back into her home of grey granite. At some point, he could understand their helplessness. He had seen the fall of Aegon first-hand, he had seen how the demons tossed their troops over the massive walls like trebuchet boulders, and he had somehow survived it. He knew that these people couldn't hope for the same.

“And where are they to run? North, into the woods of Nightweald, where werewolves and vampires roam? East, through the Swamp of Nox where every breath could mean a slow and toxic death? South, into the very maws of the demons they're trying to run from? They've got nowhere to go. And you know perfectly well what happens when you corner an animal... the fangs come out. We're looking at them right now.”

Duncan gritted his teeth, a look of defeat slowly corrupting his expression “By Hrumalz, I pray that the nobles will know to set aside their differences when demons come banging at their gates.” He sighed, eyes rising to the tower-like homes that stood from the ground like a thousand man-made stalagmites “And even that can seem unrealistic. If they can't follow each other, how can we ever expect them to follow us in our rebellion, Wolfe? What magic words do we feed them, to bring them on our side?” ever since he woke up and was told that he was part of a rebellion, had he wanted to know this, but he dreaded to doubt his own cause “I believe in this rebellion, Wolfe, I really do—but what are we to them, but wasted veterans seeking for some remnant of justice? Is our entire cause really built up around the fair treatment of soldiers? If so, I dread the response we'll get from these nobles, Wolfe.” he spoke with such weight and honesty in his words, that a surge of relief came flooding back to him. It was a brief hint that there still was some life and feelings left in him, even if it was dread, even if it was hopeless. But it was far, far better than the emptiness. That slow, inevitable emptiness that infected more and more of the man he thought he was.

“Our 'magic words' will be nothing but the truth, Duncan.” Wolfe answered, still not looking at him, still not looking at the sorry fool Duncan knew he thought he was “There's more to this rebellion than a soldier's justice. If the fair treatment of soldiers was all this rebellion was about, how could we have rallied the Tu'Myaa, and two entire Fairlandish villages? They don't fear the dread of the Wastelands, because they've never been there, and probably never will. No. They fear tyranny. They fear a world turned into a puppet, with strings of propaganda and secret murder, and with Deum as the puppeteer. They fear the illusion of free will, where all insurgent behavior is answered with nothing but gunpowder and lead. And honestly speaking? So do I.” this time, Wolfe finally turned his eyes on Duncan, and in them, a vehemence shined brighter than any sun “The justice of soldiers is but the kindling, Duncan. And with it, we've lit a fire of greater things than just that.”

Duncan left a silence between them, after Wolfe had spoken. The old veteran turned to look back at the misty grey road before them, hands on his reins, a stifled grumble on his lips. Duncan had seen hatred in the eyes of many, but what fires burned within the predatory stare of Wolfe was something else. While some had their entire lives robbed of them because of what pointless, bloody war they had been thrown into, Wolfe had lost more than just that. There were times were Duncan wanted to ask Wolfe if he would have rather let himself be executed, rather than his wife and unborn child. But it was naught. He knew the answer perfectly well already.

“I hope you're right, Edan.” Duncan said, forcing out a smile, artificial as it may have been “I confess, there have been moments where I've begun to doubt that we're even doing the right thing—or if we're the right ones to do it. But I suppose you've a fair point... this justice for soldiers like we are but the spark of it all. There are bigger things at stake, and I get the feeling that it's too late to back out now. There's a long way to go yet, but with allies like these, we may just live to see the end of it. If anything, we can thank the gods for King Magnus... as long as he still breathes, at least someone will have a collar on Deum.”

“Indeed. He's a gold coin in a pile of shit, if anything.” Wolfe continued with the tiniest of smiles “We don't see many of those, these days. Truth be told, I'm not so certain we'll see any trace of success from this whole rally-the-nobles endeavor—the nobles are no better than Deum, after all. Worse, some might say. They dress like angels, but we all know what demons they are they beneath that velvet facade.” he shook his head, his smile disappearing as quick as it became.

Silence reigned between the two riders, after that. The shadows in all the granite corners were growing stronger by the second, and the streets were only getting quieter, as the people retreated to their home, fleeing from the coming of night. A fickle rain began to drop through the misty overhang, naught but a few lonesome droplets falling into Duncan's lengthy black hair. He looked heavenward to see the pale mist blush as it passed some of the gothic lanterns that hung from the grey granite walls, but everywhere else, it was becoming hauntingly dark in the absence of the sun. It took him a while to find the courage to stop his horse in its tracks, and look back at Wolfe.

“If we're looking for Ramund, I'd suggest we split. There is a lot of ground that needs covering, and he could be anywhere by now. The bright side is that he, being ten feet tall, is not exactly the most inconspicuous of people.”

Wolfe gave an amused smirk in return “So, just follow the footprint-craters in the road and ask the people if they've seen a giant stroll by—got it. This may just be easier than anticipated.”

Duncan mirrored Wolfe's smirk, but it felt as if that was all he could do—imitate. It felt like a mask he put on, lying to himself that he might still have control of who and what he was on the inside. The truth was that he couldn't quite recognize that man any longer—the one named Duncan.

“That sounds about right. We should rendezvous at the nearest tavern by dawn. We'll have the entire morning to get things straightened out. Let's hope Ramund has good news for us.”

“In the city of intrigue, I wouldn't bet my money on it. Best of luck to you, captain.” Wolfe gave a quick nod of farewell as he pulled the reins of his horse, and lead it down a soaked alley on his right, where gentle creeks trickled on either side of him.

“As to you.” was all Duncan got to say, before Wolfe had already disappeared down the lonesome alley. He watched as he faded into the mist, his shape becoming gradually more pale, until it was completely indistinguishable from the rest. Duncan remained where he was for a little while, savoring the quiet and the soft clatter of rain drops on the granite road. It was only when he saw an old man in rags coming by, lighting lanterns on his way, that he too turned his horse from the road and sought for a darker place, where lanterns held no flames and hearts held no law.

Finding such a place proved easier than what he had anticipated. It all seemed to melt together in the mist, that white curtain leaving everything in a fading transition, nothing sudden anywhere. It was a city of blurred lines and unclear borders, with spectral mist filling up all the in-betweens.
His horse strolled through the whiteness of it all, fickle lanterns being the only things that pushed away the darkness, but even those seemed to fade, one by one. Shadows were growing, night was falling, and Duncan knew better than to wander aimlessly into darkness, lest he risk that he might never wander out again—so he took the chance, while he was hidden in the mist anyway, to unhook one of the live lanterns and bring it with him. He held it forth with his right hand while his left hand clutched the reins of his horse, which seemed to grow more and more uneasy by the minute. Mud began to conquer more and more of the streets, the granite bricks of the road becoming less visible the further into the growing shadows he went. The houses became ragged and shaggy, the proud homes of grey stone turning slowly to a squalor of lichen-infested wood and scavenged bricks.
Makeshift planks held it all together, tall homes consisting of houses built on houses, as if they had run out of horizontal space and had to begin building vertically. Ladders and ropes and ramshackle staircases connected it all where before the elegant aqueducts served to do the same. There were even small bridges going from house to house, nailed together with rusty bolts and spare parts found lying around in the mud.

Most of these houses, Duncan found, had been long since abandoned. The only inhabitants in several of them were naught but rats that squealed and scurried as he brought his lantern close to the window, and cast its glow inside. To his disgust, he had seen what he found to be a body lying on the floor in there as well, old and forgotten, half-eaten by the very same vermin. This place reeked of plague, and his horse was starting to doubt his command. The further into the squalor he went, the more the horse seemed to realize that the safety of the road was far gone, and they had entered a realm where law had no say, and hungry daggers lurked around every corner. He had to find a stable for the creature, or he'd surely stress it to death, if it didn't run away first.

But it seemed that while law may have had no say, Keyen did, the sweet mistress of luck. Tucked away in a corner of this filthy slum, a small stable had been built, offering shelter for no more than three horses at a time. Fortunately, only one of them was taken—by a donkey. A lonesome lantern hung from the low roof of the stable, and in its somber glow, a man around Duncan's age sat, face half-covered in a plume of smoke from the pipe in his mouth. Duncan couldn't tell if he was sleeping or awake while approaching quietly, because of the way his eyebrows hung like wet towels and his eyes squinted. He was a rather gruff individual with quite a stomach to speak for, his large fingers intertwined on it as he sat there. Duncan hopped off his steed and held it by its reins, as he stepped closer, and gave a cough for attention.

True enough, the man let out a quick grunt as he was woken up, but even so, his eyes opened only just wide enough for his pupils to peek through those heavy, heavy eyelids of his. He struggled to sit up in his chair, and only then did Duncan notice: this man had no legs. Duncan was shocked that he hadn't noticed earlier, but with the darkness encroaching and the mist engulfing everything, he had to focus just to see a few meters ahead of him. The man picked his pipe from his mouth, and lay it in his lap.

“You're out late, my friend.” he spoke in a slow and wheezing tone, lungs burdened by too much smoke “Are you new here, or just stupid?”

Duncan found himself stammering over words, tongue feeling thick in his mouth. Maybe it was the way the mist seemed to coil and twist into familiar shapes, dead faces peering at him behind the shroud of white, before melding together with it. He shook his head and tried to ignore them, but they kept coming back. General Yrvan, that old veteran in Aegon, the woman he had butchered... the native girl. In the corners of his eyes he saw them, and he tried for the life of him to focus on the man before him. He hadn't noticed how horribly long he had stood there in painful silence, before he spoke.

“Just stupid.” he echoed through heavy breath, and swallowed what he hoped was his disorientation “Looking for a stable.”

“Well you found it, mate.” the man gave a wheezing laugh, smoke puffing from his throat as he did. Duncan noticed how most of his teeth had given way to rot, most of them fallen out while the rest were covered in moldy filth. And his breath, how it reeked, like something had died in his mouth and it had lain there for three weeks. Duncan felt dizzy, nauseous, he had to get away.
“Three crowns for the horse, or no stable. You can always find something fancier, but if you can't afford this, you can't afford anything, take my word.”

Wordlessly, Duncan stuffed his hand down a small pouch hanging from his belt after several tries, eyes blinking frantically, swaying in and out of consciousness like a swing that wouldn't stop swinging. He ended up handing over ten crowns instead as he drunkenly forced his horse into the stable. There was something about that horrid breath that fogged up his mind and put several clumps of vomit into his mouth that he had to quickly swallow, to avoid seeming rude. He saw how the man didn't even question being handed ten whole crowns, and quickly trickled them down a pouch on his chest. And as he did, Duncan noticed something else—something that set his heart racing. He stared at it for several seconds just to make sure it wasn't his mind playing tricks on him, all while he stood there in the mud, clutching unto a nearby dark lantern post, to keep himself from falling over. Those were needle wounds.

“Hey... hey, are those...” he trailed off, tongue fumbling and words seeming so hard to grasp. He was left with no form of communication but to groggily point at the needle wounds, but as soon as the man noticed what he was pointing at, he hid them away.

“They are. What's it to you?” he asked, suddenly sharp and defensive in his tone “I've lost my legs for gods' sake, the phantom pains are killing me. A cripple needs some relief, okay?”

“No, I know, I...” Duncan swallowed some more vomit and he tried his best to breathe the somewhat clean misty air, rather than the filth that spilled from the man's mouth “I... I want some too.”

“...Oh.” clearly, he hadn't expected this, and quickly dropped his defenses. If anything, he seemed a little sympathetic for Duncan, and bobbed his head down the road on his left “That way, chum. Just keep walking. You'll know when you get there.”

But Duncan didn't walk—he ran, to his best ability. He felt as if that putrid breath was going to suffocate him then and there, and he wheezed and gasped like a drowning man bursting through the surface, clean air flowing into his lungs in sweet relief. He didn't care what the man at the stables thought of him... but he had to confess that he did feel rather bad for seeming so rude.
The clean air washed through him like a cleansing stream of water, bringing sensible thoughts to his head and a cool reinvigoration in his muscles. He stood there for a little while, in some godforsaken corner of this godforsaken slum, breathing in deep and hearty gulps of air, another one of his senses being pulled back from a putrid abyss with every breath he took. There was something utterly unholy about that man's breath, like a gate to hell from where a thousand little demons scurried. Duncan stood in that corner for several minutes on end, feeling the air wash out more of that rancid filth, and soon found himself swept clean on the inside. He stood up straight and looked back at the muddy road that lead back to the stall. His head may have been clear now, but the memory of that breath still lingered in there, branded and carved into his mind... but why? The more he thought about it, the more he wondered why this particular breath had had such a horrible impact on him. It wasn't the first time he had smelled bad breath, but this one... this one was different. This one smelled of demons.

He shook his head and looked away, eyes squeezed shut. 'Pull yourself together, Duncan, it was just bad breath is all' he told himself, but the truth danced around his lies, laughing at them like imps, ever present. It was a truth he dreaded to admit, let alone acknowledge for being a possibility in the first place. Was his mind truly not his own any longer?

He wanted no more of this. It was nonsense, all of it. He couldn't discern lies from truth anymore, and he knew overcontemplation would certainly spell madness for him. He turned to the way ahead, and marched forward, determination in his steps.

My mind is my own, my mind is my own, my mind is my own.