“But why can’t you both just come with me?”

Alvin’s tatte patted his hand. His tatte’s skin was rough and soft, like old, well-used leather.

“This is your journey to make, Alvie, not ours. Besides, you know your Abba’s knees bother him, he wouldn’t be able to make the walk.”

“I’m scared.” Alvin whispered in a too-small voice, giving sound to the worries he had been carrying since his fathers had told him he was going. He was being sent from home, on a journey that had never been his choice to take, with only what he could carry in a small bag, a walking staff, and his grandfather’s healing pendant.

“We know you’re scared Alvie. It’s okay to be scared, but never let your fear control you. Being afraid, then doing the right thing anyway, that’s the sign of a real mensch.”

“Dinner’s ready!” Abba yelled from the dining room, voice deep and rough and soothing. A familiar sound, and one that sent a pang of homesickness through Alvin. “Come and get it!” He hadn’t even left yet, why did he feel homesick?

Tatte gave Alvin a reassuring smile.

“Let’s go eat. I’m sure Abba made something special just for you.”

Alvin couldn’t breathe. The musty halls underneath Shrike were suffocating him, filling his lungs with a sickening weight, filling his nostrils with buildup. He wanted to vomit, but he didn’t want to add any more smells to the experience.

“What’s your problem, shorty?” asked the woman. She had backed off, and was leaning against the wall next to him. She examined her nails, occasionally picking at one when she found something offensive. She still had her dagger in hand, on the off-chance that Alvin thought of doing anything.

He wouldn’t do anything, not until Learn came back out. Even then, Alvin was so scared that he felt his legs wouldn’t move. It took all of his strength to keep his legs underneath him. If it were just him, then maybe he would try to fight back, but the human had Learn in a locked room. Alvin found the strength to remain still to protect his friend.

“Not going to answer, huh?”

Alvin shook his head as lightly as he could. A bead of sweat fell into his eye. It felt like the hallway was getting smaller and smaller as he stood there, closing in on him, threatening to crush him up entirely. His chest hurt and it was hard to get his eyes to focus and…

And he took in a sharp breath. In his anxiousness, he had forgotten to breathe. The smell made him gag, but he swallowed hard, forced himself to breathe through his mouth instead.

He had to… he had to focus on something else. Anything else. He gritted his teeth and forced himself to speak. Reach for the anger, Al, he chastised himself. Focus on that, not the fear. You can’t just freeze whenever you’re scared.

“W-why should I? You’re holding me hostage until Learn gets out. Y-you wouldn’t kill me now, when you brought me all the way down here.”

The woman’s eyes widened in surprise. Alvin was surprised, too. As far as he knew, he wasn’t the type of person to antagonize an unhinged psychopath holding him at knifepoint.

“Huh,” she said. “Guess you do have a spine. Somewhere, underneath all that beard. Who knew?” She stalked over to him and planted herself against the wall, bouncing off the moist brick as she settled into place with one leg crossed over the other. She flipped her dagger around her hand, blade flashing, and stabbed it into the sheath, more aggressively than necessary. She crossed her arms and smirked.

“So what caused you to side with that?” She asked, distaste clear in her voice. “I mean, not to judge, but the pebbleskins haven’t been at peace with your kind for most of history.”

Despite himself, Alvin was thankful that the woman was talking, as smarmy and rude and speciest as she was as she was. The nausea was receding, though his heart was still racing. He needed something, anything to focus on other than his mounting fear, and he latched onto the conversation.

“W-what does history have to do with it? Learn is my friend. He’s helped me, so I want to help him. Friends do that for each other.”

“Friend?” The woman scoffed. “Buddy. Pebbleskins don’t have the capacity to make friends! The beasts can barely go a day without killing one another — not that I’m complaining. The fewer of the brutes, the better. They’re dangerous.”

“Y-you’re calling them dangerous? You used me as a hostage!”

“I’m still using you as a hostage. Don’t forget it.” She pulled her dagger out and waved it in his face for emphasis. Her expression didn’t change, her smirk didn’t recede, she didn’t show an ounce of menace. It was more frightening than if she had. Alvin flinched and shrunk back against the wall. He forced himself to breathe in again.

“And pebbleskins can’t have friends! Do you know what’s going on in there, right now?” She gestured to the room where she had forced Learn. “The oaf is in there with my guest — another pebbleskin, and one of them is going to be dead by the time that door opens again. Either your friend is going to kill his daddy, or his dear, sweet daddy is going to tear him limb from limb. Tell me, dwarf, where’s the loyalty in that?”

Alvin opened his mouth, then closed it again. She was wrong, obviously, but he couldn’t speak over the mounting anxiety, over the fear for Learn, for himself. Not when he was in this much danger, not when there was a knife in his face.

“Face it kid. They’re brutes, only existing to fight and kill and take. I’m sure your ‘friend’ would be perfectly happy leaving you here if I told him that he could go free after.”

“Learn wouldn’t do that!” Alvin argued.

“Oh? Then why, pray tell, did he leave you out here with me? I’m sure he was just hoping that I would take care of you. You know, solve one of his problems. The little dwarf that just wouldn’t go away.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Alvin whispered.

What if she was right, though? What if Learn was just trying to get rid of him, and this woman had provided a perfect opportunity? Alvin’s breathing caught, and he forced himself to let out a breath in a whoosh. A deep breath in, then another out, then he forced his hands to relax, unclench from each other. He wished he had his staff, something to grasp; when he got nervous and didn’t have an item, he would squeeze his hands too tight. His nails would dig in and he would bleed, and that would make him more nervous.

Alvin’s fears were always like that. A small thing would cascade, causing another bigger fear, growing larger and larger and larger until they were bigger than Alvin, crushing him beneath their weight until he couldn’t do anything about it, could barely exist in the face of the monsters his mind had built up.

“That doesn’t make sense,” Alvin said. His voice was hoarse, low. “Why would Learn have agreed to come if he just wanted you to kill me? You could’ve done it for him on the surface.”

The woman scoffed.

“You don’t recognize me, do you?”

Alvin was confused.

“No. Sh-should I?”

“Here, let me help you.” The woman spun around slowly, flamboyantly, and when she turned back toward Alvin, she was wearing a mask which covered the top half of her face. She pulled up the deep, heavy hood of her cloak and Alvin gasped as the heavy fabric settled around her head.

“You! You attacked the caravan! Learn, he – he called you Hide when he talked about it.”

The woman bared her teeth in a predatory smile, and dark mist slowly began to waft around her, blending her silhouette into the shadows, the cracks in the wall. She laughed. The sound, which should have echoed in the caverns, was eerily hollow.

“Not just me,” the woman answered. “Did you think your friend wasn’t in on it? We planned the attack together. But we weren’t expecting there to be other Tasked present. That elf, and that stupid goblin, with her grenades. It would have been the score of the century!”

Alvin shrunk back. His emotions were overwhelming him, shoving away all rational thought. His breathing quickened, and his mind raced. He tried to grab ahold of any of the threads in his head before they sprinted away, and he managed to latch onto one, grasping the thought for dear life.

That doesn’t make sense. Learn fought more viciously, more violently than anyone else in the caravan. He had killed more of the bandits than anyone else who was there that night. He hadn’t done anything suspicious since arriving in Shrike. What Hide was saying didn’t fit with anything, anything Alvin had seen Learn do. Which meant she was lying. She had to be lying.

Which meant she was bad. She had forced Alvin here against his will. She had put Learn into a kill-or-be-killed situation. She had tried to turn Alvin against Learn, had tried to lie and steal and cheat. She had assaulted a caravan full of helpless people — Alvin too. He knew how terrified they had been, he was helpless. Useless in a fight. Weak. He clenched his fist. The anger within him clarified and sharpened to a razor-thin point, and he reached for it in his mind, used it to give himself energy.

“You’re wrong.” He whispered. Hide let out a bark of laughter.

“What did you say?”

“You’re wrong!” Alvin shouted. He stepped toward Hide, fists clenched at his sides. “You’re selfish, and manipulative, and evil!” He was furious, and the anger rushed through him, sending fire cascading through his veins.

“You don’t deserve to live.” The thought came out of his mouth before he could stop it, the truth of it resonating within him, the sound resounding through the cavernous sewers.

Judge.

Alvin let out a gasp as the flames within him coalesced, growing heavy in his hand as they twisted around themselves, becoming solid, becoming real. They formed themselves into the shape of a sword, brilliant, vibrant white. The shadows in the room fled before him, and the mist surrounding Hide grew dimmer.

The dwarf felt a force within him push his body. He didn’t try to resist.

“You have been judged, and found unworthy,” said something else, with his voice. “Now face your sentence.”

His arm rose, blade held aloft, and Hide tried to run back. He swept the brilliant blade of light down, and as he did it grew longer, hotter.

It sliced through Hide’s neck, sizzling as it impacted the flesh, cauterizing as it cleaved through. Alvin felt no more resistance than he would swiping a blade through water. The head flew off and bounced off of the floor, rolling until it bumped up against a wall. Her body, gruesomely, stood for a silent moment before it crumpled to the ground in a heap, like a marionette that had its strings severed.

The bright light slowly faded, along with it the clarity it had afforded him. The sword slowly withdrew into nonexistence, and Alvin’s mind fully became his own again. He took one look at the scene in front of him and fell to his knees. He vomited, and continued to retch long beyond there was anything left to void in his body.

He was sobbing, he noticed. He couldn’t see. He had just killed someone. The thoughts spiraled in his head, out of control, and this time he didn’t even try to stop them. He let the whirlwind spin him around, let his mind veer in every direction all at once. Fear and sadness and sickness and anger overwhelmed him, wiping away Alvin and leaving a sobbing wretch. It was easier this way.

Two thoughts surfaced from the roiling maelstrom: He had finally aligned to his Command. He wished desperately that he hadn’t.