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Chapter 7 - A Return Home

28th Day of Xenar

128th I.E.

After procuring the supplies they needed for their journey from Northern HQ, Dane and his soldiers set out for Tran. As the village came into view, he could tell that Tran was smaller than it had once been. Was it merely because he had grown a lot in four years time?

Grass and bushes grew over ruined buildings that had once been homes for the villagers. Dane smelled the air, and he found it no longer smelled of pine needles, cinnamon, and the sulfur of working forges like it had when he was a child. Now it just reeked of dust and decay. The buzz of insects was eerily absent from the town, and all that could be heard was dust whirling along the ground as it was carried by the wind.

Dane came to a stop and dismounted from his horse, giving it a light pat on the side as he walked towards the town. Aiden pulled up alongside him and hopped off his horse as well.

The other man's face had a blank expression on it as he glanced around. "This is the town you came from?" he asked, his voice devoid of the exuberance it usually held.

"Yeah. But it's changed," Dane said.

The town looked dead compared to how active it had been in his youth. The village streets used to be bustling with merchants haggling and bartering with prospective customers. The air had been thick with the scent of baked goods and the sound of hammers striking anvils as sulfurous smoke rose from the forges.

Dane never imagined that Tran would fail to recover from the orcs' attack. When he had left, everyone seemed ready and willing to keep working to return Tran to what it once was.

Out of the corner of his eyes he could see Aiden looking at him, with a worried expression on his face. Dane wondered if anyone else had noticed his darkening mood. He frowned and clenched his fists, silently cursing the orcs and the corrupt soldiers that had done this to his home.

"Lieutenant," Sergeant-Major Vedray said as she pulled her horse up to join the two men. "It's not likely we'll make it to Northpine before dark. Might I recommend we camp for the night here? This place looks like it should be... suitable for our needs."

"Agreed," Dane said.

"Where should we camp?" she asked. The plains were wide open and they could go anywhere. Space wasn't an issue. They could even have camped right where they were standing if they had wanted to.

Dane had something else in mind, however, and he wanted to show the troops that he was a better leader than Digran. He wouldn't treat them like garbage as the balding old military commander did. "See if there's a stable we can put the horses in. Make sure the horses are taken care of and well rested for the journey up north. I'll see about lodging at the inn, so maybe we can sleep in a soft bed rather than on the cold, hard ground."

"Sir, the military doesn't pay for luxuries like that," Elizabeth stated matter-of-factly. "We are trained and equipped to sleep out in the wilderness, if need be."

"No, they don't," Dane affirmed, remembering the trouble he had gotten into for utilizing inns in the past when on long deployments. "I used to know the innkeeper here, assuming he still runs the place. I'll see about getting us rooms and if not we'll camp north of the town."

Elizabeth hesitated for a moment, and seemed to be considering his words. Much to Dane's relief, she conceded without further argument. "Yes sir. I'll give the orders and take the troops to the stables."

Dane signaled to Private Welshy. He moved over and handed the reins of his horse over to him. "Take care of her for me."

"Oh, I'll take _good_care of your mount, sir," Welshy replied. The obvious sarcasm in his voice didn't escape Dane's ear, but he let the remark slide.

Dane turned to Aiden and said, "Come with me, Corporal. The rest of you follow Sergeant-Major Vedray until we return." The troops saluted him and galloped off to enact his orders.

As Dane headed into the village proper, he felt an arm wrap around him and lightly grip his shoulder. "You wanted some privacy, huh?"

Dane smiled as he placed his hand over Aiden's. "A bit. It's a lot harder to see Tran like this than I imagined."

"It's fine, Dane," Aiden said. "You don't need to explain anything." He looked around for a moment and said, "I can see why being in Mullead bothered you. This place looks similar, except..." he fumbled around, seeking the right word to use.

"Only worse," Dane finished for him.

"Yeah." Aiden shrugged. "Which one used to be your home?"

"It was none of these, actually," Dane admitted. "I lived in a cabin north of the village with my father. I would've been safe from all this carnage if I stayed there, but I was in town when the orcs came."

The pair walked together down the streets, slowly so as to take in everything around them. Dane called attention to some of the buildings and pointed out the places he remembered as a child, when he could recognize what the buildings were before they had become ruins. Not all of them were left in shambles and burnt out though, but a great deal of them were exactly the way they had been when Dane had left. The majority of the repaired buildings were centered around the town's square, but even those were dilapidated, as if they had been constructed using the broken down materials from the ruins.

He pointed to a building on his left. "That's where my teacher, Professor Lynn, lived and worked. It was a library once, and she's where I got all the books I learned from." His hand pointed to the building next to it. "I wish that one had made it. That's Frank's Bakery. His family were all skilled bakers, and they always made the village smell like fresh baked bread."

"You're making me hungry," Aiden chuckled as he rubbed his rotund belly. "What ever happened to Lynn? You've mentioned her before a few times when we were at the academy."

Dane shrugged. He never found out what Lynn's fate had been, but he had never sought her out, either. He was afraid of what he might learn. "I heard she was a sorceress that had been a scholar from the R.A.A.S. She could really be anywhere if she knew her teleportation spells. If she even made it out of Tran. I never thought to look for her. I was afraid that maybe if I did ask around, I'd find out that she might have been killed and I don't know how I'd have handled that. Her lessons were boring but she was a kind hearted person that I'd hate to see taken from this world."

"Yeah, I know what you mean. When my father went missing, I think I was happier thinking he was still alive out there, still fighting the enemy. It gave me hope, you know? I spent a lot of time upset about it, but I also entertained these fantasies that father was still out there helping people. When we finally heard the news that he fell in battle, everything I dreamed of came crashing down. There were no hopes of him maybe coming back again. He was gone from this world." Aiden's voice was a hushed whisper. There was a small pause before he spoke again. "Sometimes not knowing gives us hope, you know? Hope for a brighter tomorrow and a better future, even if never knowing can be agonizing."

"Yeah," was all Dane said. They walked in silence, and he no longer felt the desire to talk about Tran. The town was nothing like it was before. There was no point in talking about what it was in the past. "The past is the past though. It's nothing but distant memories."

The town square was in better condition than the rest of the village. The inn had been fixed up and was more well off than most of the town, but even then everything about the building still showed signs of what had happened. Windows and roofs had been fixed, but the walls had cracks running up along the sides. Doors looked well worn, and the cobblestone road was cracked and went without repair. Seeing it all felt uncanny to Dane. Everything was familiar, yet it all had the scars of that horrible day when the orcs had attacked.

"I guess they gave up," Dane said. "Damn Nicoli and his men!"

"It looks like they tried to make due, though," Aiden said. He always tried to put a positive spin on everything, but this time it wasn't enough to bring Dane out of his bad mood.

He opened the door to the inn and stepped inside. It was empty, and eerily quiet, as if the place hadn't been lived in for years. It was cold, and Dane noted that the fireplace was not lit. There weren't even any logs in the hearth to begin with. There were no bottles of alcohol behind the bar, and he thought it strange that a tavern would have no booze. A fat cat snoozed on the counter, and though it had been years, Dane instantly recognized the grey and white tabby cat.

"Zoey?" Dane took a few cautious steps towards the animal. Zoey had been a kitten when he left Tran, living in his father's cellar. He'd given the cat to the innkeeper after the attack, because he knew he couldn't take her with him to the orphanage.

The cat's ears twitched, but it didn't look up to acknowledge him. The feline had changed drastically from the kitten he had once known. She was a lot more fat, with mangy fur and scratch marks on her face. Dane approached Zoey to pet her, but the cat only hissed, swiped at his hand with a paw, and bounded away.

The pain he felt from being rejected by the cat hurt more than the sting of the claw marks on the back of his hand.

"Was that your cat?" Aiden asked.

"Was."

"Who's there?" a female voice called out.

"Lily?" Dane responded, using the innkeeper's wife's name.

A girl stepped out from the back room, with dirty blonde hair and wearing filthy old linen garments. "How do you know mum's name? Who are you?" she asked as her eyes wandered. She spotted the swords that Dane and Aiden carried, sheathed at their hips. "Are you thugs!?" She said, panicking.

Aiden looked down and pulled at the tabard he wore over his equipment. "I didn't realize thugs took to wearing the empire's colors," he said with a wry smirk on his face.

"The last one's in here who wore those took everything. Why should I trust you?"

"We're not here to cause trouble. Where's Mr. Langsten? Could I speak to Ted?" Dane asked. His voice began to rise as anger took over. He couldn't believe Nicoli's men had taken from these people, too. Aiden placed a hand on his shoulder and whispered something in his ears to soothe him, but it wasn't doing anything to calm him at that moment.

The girl hesitated, then called out for her father. A voice called back as footsteps approached, "Who's there, Francine?"

Ted Langsten stepped into the room, his arms running along the walls as he walked slowly towards them. He still wore the same red tunic and green apron that he'd worn all those years ago as a bartender, but the colors were faded. He had a oak walking cane in his left hand, and he poked around at the ground as he moved. "Ted, do you remember me?"

There was a pause. The man seemed to be staring off into the distance, just to the left of Dane's face. "I don't know, I ain't had such good sight since my dear Lily was taken from us." His voice had a hint of rage just beneath the surface of his calm demeanor.

"Lily... died?" Dane stumbled back and nearly tripped on a chair had Aiden not grabbed his arm and held him up.

"Careful, Dane." Aiden said as he pulled the chair behind his friend and eased him into the seat. "Who was Lily?" he asked quietly.

"She was a wonderful woman," Dane muttered to him. He leaned forward and put his head in his hands, doing his best to hold back his tears and his anger. When he spoke, his voice shook as he trembled. "I never had much chance to get to know her, but she was here the day the orcs came. She gave me a meal and a place to stay after I ran from home. She hid before anything could happen to her, and she was fine when I left." He lowered his head. "But this... this is too much," Dane mumbled into his hands.

"Dane Trueshot?" Ted asked.

"Yes, it's me. Jon's son." It felt strange to be saying that he was his father's son. He'd held on so hard to the belief that he was nothing like Jon Trueshot and wanted nothing more to do with him, that admitting he was Jon's offspring felt so alien to him. He wondered if his lingering resentment was validated, or even worth holding on to, especially now that there were clearly more important things for him to worry about.

Fran turned to regard Ted. "You know him, daddy?"

"That I do. He's Jon's boy. His father was the one that saved you the day that the orcs came."

"Oh." It was all the girl said before she walked away. Dane wondered if something was bothering her, or if the girl was simply not interested in what was going on.

Aiden rested a hand on Dane's shoulder. "Are you okay?"

"No," he admitted.

"What are you doing here, boy? This place isn't safe."

Dane felt annoyed to be called boy by the elderly man. He was younger than Ted, but whatever danger that may have lurked around town was no match for a mage such as himself. "I'm not a boy anymore, sir. I'm with the Rogarian Imperial Forces, 81stMobile Infantry Division, Warmage, First-Class."

"Really?" Ted scoffed. "I can't believe Jon's boy would join the military."

"I was drafted because I was born with the Gift for Magic, just like my mother," Dane lied. He knew that he could've been a scholar instead, like his father had always wanted him to be, but he had never liked the idea. Would Ted even know otherwise, with how rare human sorcerers were? "Besides, Jon isn't here to guide my actions anymore."

Before either Ted or Dane could say anything further, Aiden cut in. "It sounds like you don't have much respect for the military." Dane told him to stop, but the man continued. "Why is that?"

"You are?"

"Corporal Aiden Philem, under the command of Lieutenant Trueshot. We trained together at the Rogarian Academy of Arcane Sciences."

"Well, Corporal, there's a lot of reasons to hate the military for what they do and how they conduct themselves. I've seen their corruption first hand when it came to the Jintaren Incursion twenty years ago."

"So I've heard," Dane said. "An elf by the name of Sylenthros Leafsblade told me the truth about what happened in Ingraad during that war. The military abandoned the village and left only a group of mercenaries to defend it, right?"

"You think their corruption ends there?" Ted laughed. "Think harder. After they wiped out the orcs and sent you kids packing, they wanted us to pay protection money to keep Tran safe. Did you know your grandfather donated all his wealth to our fair village to help us rebuild after the attack? After his wife passed shortly after Jon was killed, I guess he had no need for it. Poor woman probably died of a broken heart..."

"How could he have? The day I left Tran, you told me that my grandparents had passed away already. Now you're telling me they were still alive?" Dane asked. Aiden was resting a hand on his shoulder, and he gave it a firm squeeze.

"I lied," Ted said flatly, and Dane's heart began to race. "Don't think I'm a horrible person for what I did. The last thing I'd want to do is send you to Wersgrauff when the late Mr and Mrs Trueshot were practically on their deathbeds. Then you'd be stuck in an orphanage up there instead of going to the capital. You'd be dead, too, or serving some sailor in his quarters."

Dane shuddered, not even considering how close he could have come to a fate worse than death. Wersgrauff really was as horrible as people made it sound.

"So what happened after we left Tran?" Dane asked when Ted didn't continue.

"I wrote Jack Trueshot, and told him about what happened. The man wrote me back and though he didn't sound happy to hear from me, he pledged his remaining wealth to the recovery effort here. A week later, I heard he'd died and his gold arrived on the next shipment of supplies, tucked away inside a stitched pocket in a wolf pelt."

Dane looked out the window at the ruined village. Everything looked just the same as the day he left, if not worse. Aiden followed his gaze and seemed to pick up on what Dane was thinking.

"What happened to the gold then?" Aiden asked.

"Bah, well, that filthy Colonel caught wind of it and bled us dry. Even killed a few of our own to drive the point home that the money was rightfully his."

"There's no way a man serving in the military would kill an unarmed civilian!" Aiden shouted. His hand gripped Dane's shoulder so hard that the other man winced.

"You're still green, kid," Ted replied as he drummed his fingers on the table. "You're too naïve if you think that those murderers wouldn't stoop to such levels to get what they wanted. Who would take up arms against them? The military has too much power in this region without a noble family to rule over the province. As far as I'm concerned, there's no bigger group of shameless crooks in all the realm."

Aiden found he couldn't think of anything further to say. It wasn't news to either one of them. Dane had already filled Aiden in on the discussion he'd had with Colonel Nicoli, and both men were at a loss as to what to do about the situation. If there was anything that could have been done.

"I doubt having a baron in control of the province instead of leaving it to Northern HQ would matter," Dane said. "They can be just as crooked."

Ted shrugged. "At any rate, what are you doing here? It's a long way to come from the capital, and judging by the sounds of it, you're wearing some heavy armor there."

"There's some orcs near Northpine. We're here to clean them out." Dane said, making sure Aiden couldn't get any further under Ted's skin.

"There's still some left? Guess that no good Colonel didn't do a good enough job in the first place." Ted spat on the floor. "Northpine is still a ways off, so why are you here in my inn?"

Dane carefully considered his words. It was clear the man didn't seem to have much respect for him, and he obviously held none for Aiden. His men needed a place to stay, and it would be better to rest in the inn if possible. "It's almost dark out. My men and I need a place to rest for the night, and I was hoping you could give us the use of your inn."

"It's not much of an inn. Fell apart when the bandits came and took whatever was left after Wersgrauff bled us dry and left us to rot." Ted's voice began to rise. "Those thugs took everything of value to me, and then they took my Lily away while she was still pregnant! All those years we lived in peace, but once the orcs destroyed our village and the military wasn't around to protect us, we were nothing more than walking targets for thieves and murderers!" He stuck a pointed finger in Dane's direction. "And you military dogs, where were you then, huh?"

"I was still just a boy, sir." Dane was confused. His pulse quickened and he leaned away from Ted. What had suddenly come over the man to forget that he was barely of age when he had left Tran? Had the loss of his wife and child taken a larger toll on him than just his eyesight?

"Get out! I don't want anything to do with the lot of you corrupt dogs!" Ted screamed, standing and waving them away. "Out, OUT!"

Dane and Aiden both complied, and didn't argue any further. They got up and left the building, and as Ted stood in the doorway, he muttered, "Your old man would be ashamed of you," before he slammed the door shut.

"Ted! Wait!"

His muffled voice could be heard coming from the other side of the door. "I want nothing more to do with you! You're a failure of a man!"

Dane stood on the doorway for a moment with drooped shoulders. "I guess what the ursar always say is true." Dane rubbed his eyes with a thumb and index finger. "You can't ever go back to how things were, no matter how hard you try. Everything changes and moves on, even if you're not ready or willing to change yourself."

"Dane..."

"I'm fine. Really. Let's go tell the men that we're camping outside town for the night."

Despite saying he was fine, Dane truly wasn't feeling it. He wondered if Aiden had picked up on that fact and just wasn't saying anything. Nothing he could say or do would change the impact the encounter in the inn had on him. He looked one last time at the dilapidated building, and it looked as if it had changed since they had entered it, like it had grown more ruined in the last ten minutes. He turned his back on the inn, and kept walking.

"Dane, wait," Aiden said as the man kept walking away from him. Dane stopped and slowly looked back at his lover. "We should do something to help these people."

"Mr. Langsten was right. There's nothing left here. There's nothing worth saving," Dane said.

"I know it's hard, but you and I will change things. We'll help people. That's what we always said we'd do. We'll start right here in Tran. Once we're done our service in the military, we can do whatever we want. We'll fix Tran up."

Dane sniffled, cleared his throat and looked up at the town that was slowly falling apart around him. It would take a lot of work, and it would require someone to protect the village from the abuses they suffered at the hands of Nicoli and the rest of Northern HQ. Power surged towards him as he pulled at the threads of mana in the air, collecting them in his hands. He clenched his fist, and the hairs on his arms stood on end from the gathering electricity.

"If only we could do something now," Dane said, barely containing his rage. "I'm tired of feeling powerless all the time. When the orcs attacked, it was because I lacked strength. And now that I have that strength, I'm bound by something that can't be overcome." He looked at his partner as a fire burned within his eyes. "I want to kill Nicoli. The bastard has it coming." He sighed, and his voice dropped to a whisper as the magical energy he gathered began to dissipate. "But that's not possible, is it? Though wizards like us are rare, there's bound to be people more powerful than I out there. I might be able to kill him but I'd be found."

"It's just as well," Aiden said. "I'd hate for you to be taken away from me. Nicoli may have hurt this town, but its not worth losing your life over. You can't change anything if you're dead or in prison."

"I will restore this town one day," Dane said, reaffirming his goals out loud. "You're right. We became warmages to serve and protect the people."

Aiden smiled again for the first time since they arrived in Tran. "That's the spirit. You and I can do anything together." He clapped Dane on the back as they started to walk away from the inn. "Come on, let's go find the rest of our squad and set up camp. I'm starving, and you look like you could eat a whole boar."

"We only have a bunch of trail rations," Dane said with a smirk. He looked to the forest beyond the town. It would be dark within the hour, but perhaps there was still enough time for him to try out his hunting skills and see if they had dulled over the years.

With his mind momentarily occupied, Dane grinned at Aiden and said, "On second thought, boar sounds good. How do you feel about hunting?"