The smoke was thick, blinding him. Sam coughed, his eyes tearing up and his knees buckling beneath him. The most terrible commotion had swept the courtyard, but he could see none of it. He was lost, lost in a seemingly endless expanse of smoke. Nevertheless, he continued on, waiting to hit something solid that could guide him to the steps of the Trade Delegation. Was the Trade Delegation even standing, anymore? What if the woman had destroyed it all?

It seemed hours to Sam before he made any progress. Luckily, the thick smoke began to thin out as a breeze began to blow from the sea. Finally, he could see the cobblestones beneath him, and he could move slowly and unsteadily towards the looming shape of the Trade Delegation. Relief swept over him; at least the building hadn’t been destroyed. It must have only been a particularly potent smoke bomb. Ascending the steps one by one, and very painfully, Sam searched through the limited visibility for Orris or the young girl. At last, he found Orris leaning against a pillar on the very top step–he hadn’t moved an inch. The older man was a bit dazed, perhaps because the explosion had happened so near to him, and Sam had to shake him several times before he snapped out of it.

“Orris! Orris! Are you alright?”

“My Mistress...I must find my Mistress....” Orris coughed, raising his javelin somewhat weakly. “That woman, did she take her? Did she take the Mistress?”

Sam shook his head. “I don’t know...but you aren’t in any condition to look for her. Stay here. I can look around. If that Stella woman didn’t take her, then she must still be here.” Sam turned around, thought hard. He tried to remember where he had last seen her, the girl with the dark hood. He had been down at the bottom of the steps, and Stella had grabbed her...Sam paced slowly along between the pillars, trying to retrace what had happened. Stella had thrown the girl to the side, just before she threw the smoke bomb...yes! He could see her now, lying on the marble floor just a few feet away from the smashed door. Shards of glass were littered underfoot, and he could hear the uproar inside the Trade Delegation building as he approached.

She was coughing. He thought he could hear her crying as well. Sam bent down and put a hand on her shoulder; she screamed, and swung an arm at him in fright.

“Don’t touch me! I don’t know what you want, but don’t touch me! If you hurt Orris....if you hurt Orris, I–”

“Calm down, I’m a friend. A friend, alright? Orris isn’t far, and he’s fine. Here now, let me help you up and we can go to him.”

The girl sobbed. “You’re...the man who helped him earlier?”

“That’s right. Come on now, we can’t stay here. And there’s glass everywhere. Here, give me your hand.”

“I...I think I hurt my ankle when she threw me...it hurts...” Her hand flew to something at her throat, in the same nervous gesture Sam had noticed the night before.

“Don’t worry, just give me your hand,” he answered. “The sooner we get out of here, the better.” He held his hand out and she took it, the green ring on her third finger glimmering dully in the gray air. But the instant he touched that hand, he dropped it; for now the hood was no longer in place, and he saw at last the face that had been hidden there.

In the chaos, Stella, self-proclaimed Bandit Queen and leader of the menacing Southern Buccaneers, escaped into the empty streets beyond. Five of her men were dead, and Akros, their leader, was wounded. Snapping at her band of brigands irritably, she turned a corner and disappeared. Her error had been grave. And yet, she could not understand it; how could she have been mistaken? With her stumbling crew in tow, the Bandit Queen quickly crossed the outskirts of Quinn and was soon engulfed in the immense shade of the Candlewood. Her eyes glinted harshly. There was no room for mistakes.

They had found the lost King and Queen of Gareth Kingdom leaning on one another for support in the shade of their fallen caravan. Its upturned wheels were rotating helplessly in the air. All around them were the bodies of the ill and the dead. Anna had shut her eyes against the scene, feeling nauseous. It was the battle on the beach all over again–the groans of the wounded, the cries of the thirsty and the starving. She backed away and into the solid trunk of a tree, willing herself away from the images that flashed through her head.

Thus did the days in Kolla pass for Anna. Everywhere she turned was a memory she did not want to confront. She participated in vague conversations and nodded her head numbly to the questions that were asked of her, but beyond that her body reverted into a familiar sort of emptiness. Perhaps it was exhaustion. The remainder of the Royal Entourage that had not been killed or lost in the storm needed constant care and attention, and it felt to her just like the days after the battle on the beach. Except this time, she wasn’t tending pirates; she was tending servants of the Kingdom, and even the rulers of the Kingdom themselves.

She didn’t quite know how she felt about that. She had known, of course, that leaving her brothers and journeying with Lee back to the home she had been stolen from would mean that her allegiance would change. But in her heart she felt a strange resistance, at times...it was a voice that cried out, “Traitor!”

They did not stay long. The King, when he had regained some of his strength, immediately sent for Lee and instructed him to journey at once to Asphel with news that they were alive. “Leave us here, General,” he coughed. “Return...return to the Castle...tell our daughter...we will be coming home.”

And so it was that Anna found herself boarding the ferry for the very first time. It was strange, to be on the water again. Even stranger, though, was the sensation of being able to see the sky again. After a week of looking up into a thick web of tree branches and sun-dappled leaves, the clouds and blue sky seemed foreign and empty. Anna leaned over the rail, standing on tiptoe in order to catch a better view of the Grand Castle. It was shining in the sun, but there was something strange about it...something lonely, she thought. It too had suffered from the storms.

When the ferry berthed at Asphel Harbor, she was alarmed at how briskly Lee was walking. She called out for him to wait, not wanting to lose sight of him in the unfamiliar streets.

“Come, or we’ll miss the ferry to Arholt,” he called back to her, without turning around or slowing down.

Anna stopped and stared. Arholt?

“What are you talking about...? We’re supposed to tell the Princess...”

“I’ll see to that. But first, you’re going to Arholt.”

“Lee! Why are you like that? Why can’t you give me an explanation?”

Lee turned around angrily, his hands landing on her shoulders and shaking her. “Because it isn’t safe here! Can’t you see that? Haven’t you been paying any attention? I thought we would be alright, as long as we got to Asphel. I guess I thought nothing could ever touch this place. But look, look around you. Nothing is invincible.” His hands fell to his sides. “In Arholt, you can hide. Whatever is happening in the world right now, it can’t be good...and you can’t be out here, just waiting for it to happen. You aren’t staying here.”

Anna thought she would go blind with rage. “Who do you think you are? Who are you to tell me what to do? Where to go? I don’t care if it isn’t safe! That’s all I’ve been told, my whole life! It’s not safe, Anna. You can’t do it, Anna. We can’t take you, it’s far too dangerous, Anna. Well you know what? You can forget about it, General. You can forget about all of it. And if you want, you can take that ferry to Arholt. But I’m not. I’m staying right here. I’m grateful to you for getting me out of Quinn, and you know what? I was actually starting to see your side of things. Sometimes, it almost seemed like you were a good person, and fun to be with...maybe even a little bit like my brothers. Maybe I was just trying to find a substitute for what I lost, maybe I was hoping that if I stopped crying about it, things might get better. But you’re just as horrible as all the rest...because all you want to do...” She was sobbing, unable to control her frustration. “All you want to do...is keep me locked up, because it’s safer that way. As though I was such a weak person that even the slightest pinprick would kill me.”

“Stop being so childish! Wanting to keep you safe isn’t the same as wanting to keep you in a cage.”

“Oh, is that what I am now? A child? It’s one thing to wish for someone’s safety, and another thing to force it on them!” The crowd on the docks parted to go around them, and only a few heads turned. There had been so much misery lately that it seemed commonplace, strangely ordinary. Anna stood, looking up at Lee, tears beginning to stream down her face. “I won’t go with you! You were the one who said it was my choice! I went with you because it was my choice! Or maybe you forgot already? Because all you seem to remember is a name I don’t even use anymore, and a life I supposedly lived!”

Lee stepped toward her angrily, but before he could say a word, the noise of the port’s alarm bells filled the air. On the water, splintered planks and other debris–obviously from a ship– floated on the choppy tide. Clinging to the fragments of what had once been their barge were several children. The crowd immediately ran for a better look, and their cries and murmurings nearly drowned out the loudly clanging bells. The harbor’s small force of guards wound their way through the crowd, while some of the fishermen were already poling their boats to aid the half-drowned children.

“Where are they from?”

“The poor things! Are they the only ones who survived?”

“These storms...they’ve taken so many lives...”

“Quiet! One of them is speaking!” A fisherman, having pulled one of the children into his boat, was holding one hand out in a gesture of silence. The little boy in his red rags was pale and obviously ill. He tried to raise his head from the bottom of the boat, but he couldn’t. The guards held the people back as the child attempted to speak.

“Please...” he whispered, weakly. “Please...save...us......”

“But you’re safe now, little boy. See? You’re here, in Asphel. Nothing can hurt you in the Royal City,” the fisherman said gently. He reached out a comforting hand to wipe the boy’s tears away, but recoiled in an instant. “What is this?” he cried, stumbling backward and sending the boat bobbing slightly off balance. “He’s burning up! I’m telling you, it’s unnatural!”

“Calm down, perhaps he has a cold from being in the water too long.”

But the fisherman was unconvinced. “Come here, then, and touch him! Touch him and tell me that isn’t unnatural!” The woman who had spoken took a step back, shaking her head. A guard jumped the short distance from the pier to the boat and landed precariously.

“Now, let’s sort this out folks...in any case, we’d better get these children to...bed...” The guard’s face went from an expression of curiosity to one of terror. He too pulled his hand back, as though the boy’s skin burned him. “He’s right! This boy...! It was as though I had reached out to touch an open flame!”

“The others too! All of them!” someone cried.

The crowd began to panic. Anna elbowed her way as near to the front as she could, despite Lee’s protests. Her eyes widened at what she saw. Floating slowly on the tide towards them, about to slip under the pier, was a length of sodden cloth that had been dyed the same red as the boy’s tattered clothes: the flag of Barinesh.

“The ports! Close them, close them all!” The Princess Dawn, so soon after hearing of her parents’ rescue, now felt her heart pounding in her chest as her messengers departed from the room on running feet. All happiness had evaporated into the air, which was crackling with the anxiety of all. She turned to Jal, half frantic. “How? How could this have happened? Barinesh was under complete quarantine, all of its borders were closed and the Navy has been patrolling the Western Sea for months now! How did this ship get past us?”

“I don’t know, Your Highness. But however it happened, we must now face the truth. The Fever has reached our shores. Considering what it did to Barinesh, it can be assumed that we have very little time. It was a stroke of dumb luck that we discovered they were refugees from Barinesh at all. It buys us at least some hope.”

“Hope? There is no hope!” The Princess hid her face in her hands, trembling. This was it, then. All of that effort, gone to waste. The Fever would spread, Gareth would be overcome. She would have failed her parents, but most of all, her country and her people. She should have ordered tighter surveillance of the Western waters, she should have put a larger fraction of the Navy to the task. She should have ordered round-the-clock watches at Arholt. She should have done more, so much more! “Jal, it’s over. What can we do against this? It might be too late to close the ports, even now. Who knows how many more survivors there were? They could have drifted to any of our beaches, any of our harbors. They could have been taken in already, the Fever could be taking root already, everywhere!” A dry sob tangled in her throat. Jal bridged the space between them in an instant, leading Dawn to sit on the throne and sending one of the maids for a glass of water from the kitchens.

“Compose yourself, Princess. Do not cry. Do not surrender. There is time yet. You were right to close the ports...now we must calm the people. We must tell them what to do and what not to do. As for the children...”

Dawn looked up, her eyes full of horror. “Jal...Jal, we can’t...we can’t just...”

“My lady, there is no other option. We cannot keep them here. Letting them stay is like inviting the Fever into our lands. As long as the children are in Asphel, the entire city is at risk of infection–even more than it already is.”

“But what are you saying? That we should send them to their deaths?!”

Jal’s voice was cold, but Dawn saw that she did not like the situation either. Jal was simply steeling herself for the truth. Dawn stared down at the floor, at the hem of her dress and the cracks in the polished tiles.

“I must leave you now, Your Highness.” Jal handed her young charge the glass of water that had been delivered. “I will go...you need not see to the matter. Concentrate on preparing our people, and put the children from your mind.” With that, Jal left the room. A messenger arrived soon after, one of the Castle’s errand boys. Behind him came Lee and Anna.

“Y-your Majesty...! I...I told them you weren’t seeing anyone! I told them it was against my orders...!” The boy, who was still quite young for a messenger, stood quivering in his uniform of green and gold. Dawn looked up at him wearily, and then saw the figures behind him.

“Who are you? Why have you forced this boy to disobey my orders?” The Princess rose from the throne, her troubles lending a solemn grace to her movements. She did not know it, but she was every inch a Queen to Anna upon first glance.

“Your Highness,” said Lee, “I am the General Farrier, sent to lead the ambush against the Pirate King three months ago. Forgive me for intruding, but none would take my message to you.”

“What is it, General? There is little time for trifles. I am glad of your safe return, but we may speak of that later.”

“Your Highness–” Lee ventured, but the Princess was already sweeping past him, her gaze far away. Anna quickly followed her.

“Please, Your Highness...! It’s about your parents! They’re safe. We met them.”

Instantly, Dawn turned around to face the young girl with the blue-gray eyes. They seemed to be about the same age. She looked from one face to another, and then raised her hand for Lee to speak.

“Their Majesties the King and Queen have been taken and sheltered in the village of Kolla, on the island of Harnedd. They are weak, but alive. They sent us here to tell you.”

The Princess stood, tears falling down her face, and Anna walked up to her. Quietly, she took her hand.