Note: The fact that I used (a different translation of) the same quote as a recent Asherien fic is purely coincidental.

Famed Genius

"It is only the dead who have seen the end of war." – Plato

"Mark, why don't you join us?" Eliwood called. The boy gave him a sour look and kept trudging across camp, not deigning to even offer a response. The lord turned back to Lyn and Hector, giving a shrug. Never mind.

"Don't know why you bother with the brat," Hector said from across the campfire, lifting his hands to its warmth in the early-spring evening. "When's the last time you heard him say anything pleasant?"

Eliwood smiled at them sheepishly and said, "Well, he's young." Hector snorted and Eliwood left it at that.

"That's no excuse. Nino's young, and she can march a few miles without complaining," Hector said. They all knew the incident Hector was referring to. On this march from Bern back to Lycia, with Merlinus's caravan too full of weaponry accommodate its usual passenger, Mark had whined until Lowen relented and let him ride while Lowen walked. "She can stare down a battlefield without getting a nosebleed, too. If the brat weren't so good with tactics..."

Lyn cut in with, "It's because of him that we're all alive. All of us. It's nothing short of a miracle." She eyed Hector, ready for an argument. "The least you could do is treat him well."

"I listen on the battlefield, don't I? We all do. We know he's good. Not my fault he's hard to put up with around camp." Hector turned right around to face Lyn, adding, "You tried to make him behave and it didn't work."

Lyn paused for a moment before she retorted, "Oh? I know a few other boys who won't behave."

Eliwood groaned and planted his head in his hands. "You two... We'll be back in Lycia soon. Can we talk about that?"

He appeared to be preoccupied with a stack of parchments. Nino had noticed, however, that Mark always seemed to be either busy or napping, and suspected that he wasn't actually that busy if he could nap as much as he did. She tapped softly at the tent flap and peered around it before he could give his characteristic Go away.

Mark looked up and gave her an annoyed glance. "What?"

As if accepting an invitation to enter, she slipped in and beamed her friendliest smile at him. "I thought I should keep you company."

"I'm busy. I have important things to do."

Legault had attempted to dissuade her from her endeavor to befriend Mark. The entire army was well-acquainted with his temperament outside of battle: condescending, self-centered, and short-tempered. Even Lucius had let him be after Mark repaid his patient efforts with one too many remarks about the futility of faith. (Legault quipped that it might have been Lucius's faith in the tactician that was truly futile.) And besides, he reminded her, Mark had already shown her cruelty. You shouldn't seek the company of those who mistreat you. Undeterred by both Mark's excuse and the advice given to her, Nino laid her elbows on the table and her chin in her hands, watching Mark as he made a show of staring at the parchment. "Don't you want to talk?"

"Talk about what?"

"Anything." Nino peeked at the report Mark seemed so engrossed in. There was a column of numbers running down one side and alphabetic script down the other. That was the most she could discern. "I never see you talking to anyone."

"I talk to everyone," he insisted. In the uncomfortable silence that followed, he shuffled through his pages, occasionally stopping to gnaw at a ragged nail. Nino wondered what he meant by that: His campwide announcements? His orders in battle? Surely not what she wanted to give him? After a few moments, he amended, "Fine. We can talk if you want."

"Great!" She glanced around his tent – a table with his papers and a half-used candle, his bedroll in the far corner, his only chair occupied by himself. Mark didn't attempt to find another seat for her, so she made herself comfortable by kneeling instead. "So... it's getting warmer lately, isn't it? Even though it's still a bit cold at night..."

"I have more important things to do than talk about the weather," he interjected, still not looking at her. "If you don't have anything better to talk about, you should go away."

Nino shrank back, half-burying her face in her sleeves. "I just want to be your friend."

Mark folded one parchment into fourths and stuck it in one of his baggy pockets. "All right. We're friends. I have to go see Merlinus about supplies. Don't touch anything." And with that, he left Nino alone in his tent, timid and awkward, as he went about his busy, important life.

Lyn let her thoughts wander as Merlinus disappeared into his caravan in search of a sword in good condition. You tried to make him behave and it didn't work. In truth, it had been troubling her for weeks, ever since they left the Black Fang's Water Temple: Mark's cruel comment and his unapologetic defiance. She hadn't spoken to him since.

Now his head of uncombed curls bobbed around a corner and into sight. Lyn gave him a polite smile as he slouched over. "Where's Merlinus?" he demanded.

"He's sorting through our swords right now," she said. Mark huffed as if indignant at the idea of having to wait, leaning against the caravan and drumming his fingers against his arm. He hardly seemed to be in the mood for a talk, but then, he never was. Lyn began, "Mark, have you spoken to Nino yet?"

"Just got done talking to her," he mumbled back. "When is he going to be done?"

"He just went in a few moments ago. Did you apologize to her?"

Mark scowled and said pointedly, "No. She came to talk to me. She wanted to be friends or something." Nino truly was remarkable in her forgiveness, Lyn thought. And as for the other child, she wasn't sure when Mark seemed to develop his contempt for friendship. He hadn't always been that way.

When he first woke in her makeshift ger, he had been vocal and stubborn. Were he a Sacaean, Lyn would have held him to principles of courtesy, but he was a young Etruscan and so she didn't expect any better. Yet he was friendly, and showed remarkable talent when he led her to victory against a pair of bandits. (When she told him that he was a great tactician "for his age," he scrunched up his face as if insulted. In hindsight, she could understand his indignity. Time showed that he was exceptional among all tacticians.)

He was a touch arrogant and ignorant, but he hadn't been callous or cruel. Lyn wanted to believe that he still wasn't. "That's kind of her. Nino's a good person. I hope you accepted." Mark shrugged, and Lyn bit back a sigh. "You still owe her an apology."

"I don't think she remembers anymore, unlike you."

His words had been unforgettable. After leaving Sonia's dying body behind them in the temple, Lyn had tried to soothe a distraught Nino when Mark interjected with distaste, There's no reason to cry over her. Lyn would have liked to slap him, one palm across his cheek, but settled for gripping him by the shoulders and chastising him – perhaps yelling at him – I never want to hear you say anything like that again. Apologize to Nino. He didn't, only glancing at her through his eyelashes then looking away, scowling as if to silently protest, Stop acting like you're my mother. You're only four years older than me. Before she could insist, Nino herself volunteered with a still-unsteady voice, It's all right. It's only the truth.

It's not the truth, Lyn had said firmly.

Biting back a sharp retort, she said, "I think she does."

Slouching a little more against the canvas of Merlinus's caravan, Mark turned his face away from her and gave one of his insufferable grumbles of "Whatever."

"Mark. Mark, look at me." He wouldn't look at her. "Don't you remember, on our way to Caelin, how we used to spend time together?" He gave a sound, affirmative but questioning. "I'd like to take an evening walk around camp with you again."

"Waste of time," he said sharply.

She clenched her fists behind her back where he couldn't see them and replied with thinning patience, "You should know that most of the army thinks less of you for your attitude."

"Who cares what they think?"

"May you treat Nino better," she said with a hint of anger, "or I will be the only one left to support you."

Mark cast a sulky glance at her. Before any more could be said, Merlinus bumbled out with an armful of swords in their sheaths. "Lady Lyndis! I think these will be to your liking." The swords. She had almost forgotten. At Mark's impatience, Merlinus offloaded the swords on her all at once and nervously accompanied the tactician into the caravan. Lyn sighed and began to inspect the swords, wishing she knew where they had gone wrong.

As it happened, they became friends.

Given his reputation and their first encounter, Nino was as surprised as anyone else when Mark had offered her a seat behind him on Lowen's horse. They rode together – she found it surprisingly difficult at first – for several days on the long trip to Lycia, Nino's arms around him as she gripped the saddlehorn. He willingly chatted about the weather. And as time passed, he shared a word or two of other things as well. "I'm good with horses. My dad and I traveled a lot."

"Is he a tactician too?" Nino asked.

As if interrupted in his thoughts, Mark paused for a moment before responding, "Uh huh. House Laran, my whole family was in service of Etruria. For six generations."

Nino beamed a smile that she hoped Mark could sense from the back of his head. "That's amazing! I bet they're really good."

Still facing forward, his back to her, Mark said, "Yeah. I guess. My father was great. You all would've liked him."

When they set up camp at night, Mark demanded two chairs with his personal tent. And if they were a bit loud, laughing late into the dark, no one remarked upon it.

In nine days of smooth traveling, they reached the Lycian border. Here the Archsage conferred to them that he feared the speed of Nergal's recovery, and transported a small team to Hibernia to seek the shrine near the city of Jutes. In a surprisingly well-kept inn, Mark claimed the luxury of a room to himself, leaving Matthew, Hector, Nino, and Athos to divide the other two rooms among themselves.

Nino dropped by his room after their warm but over-salted supper. Mark was sprawled out over the thin bed with a small pile of strangely-shaped rectangular blocks before him, and glanced at Nino as she entered. "Hi," he said plainly as he clicked the blocks against each other.

"Hi!" She leaned over the cheap hollow head of the bed and peered down at the blocks. "What's that?"

"A puzzle. They're supposed to make a cube." In silence, he fit a few of the pieces together as Nino watched. It didn't even seem like a difficult task to her, until he was halfway done and couldn't find a place for a crooked piece that reminded her of a staircase. Without frustration, he dismantled his half-cube piece by piece and said, "Nino?" She gave a hum in attention. "Do you remember, when we were leaving the Water Temple, and I said that thing..."

How could she not remember? Nino knew there was no reason to care for the morph, knew as she still couldn't bear to watch Sonia bleed on the throne, couldn't work up the courage to nod to Rebecca as she passed by with the bow that had done the deed at last. There's no reason to cry over her. What had Sonia ever done for her, truly? There had never been love. Sonia said as much. But Sonia could only speak for herself. Nino bit down on her lip. "Mm?"

He dropped his dismantled pieces onto the pillow and met her eyes. "I'm sorry I said that. I'm really sorry."

Something in her lightened. Pondering upon her new friend, who waited for her answer, she said, "I forgive you." Awkwardly, he turned his eyes back down to his puzzle pieces. What a difference it was, for them to have come from don't touch anything to his honest apology.

Mark continued to stare at his puzzle as he said, "I think I don't want you out there fighting anymore."

Frowning, she held herself a little straighter. "What? Why not?"

Bringing his fingernails to his teeth, he mumbled, "I don't want you getting hurt."

"Everyone's out there putting themselves in the way of danger," Nino said insistently. "And besides... you take such good care of us."

"I... take good care of you?"

"You're the best tactician in the world. Right?" She smiled encouragingly at him as he stopped nibbling at his nail and rested his head against his hand. "You've never let anyone get seriously hurt. I know it'll be okay. So... let me fight. I'm not... it's not that I'm useless. Right?"

"No," Mark said quickly. "No, you're not useless..." Nino sensed that he wasn't finished speaking yet and watched him as, again in the silence, he picked up blocks and fit them together halfheartedly, only matching pairs at a time before he scrambled them all across his pillow. He drew in a breath and continued, "It's just that it's... awful. The kind of things that go on in battle." He paused for a moment and murmured even more softly, "Watching people die."

Nino thought of standing behind the young prince's unconscious form, the dagger limp on her hand. Her passionate refusal to Jaffar, her demand that she be martyred instead. She couldn't kill a single boy once she had heard him pray. "I know," she repeated quietly. She circled around the bedpost and sat sideways on the bed's sagging side. "When I cast a spell," she began, whispering in his ear, "I'd miss, even though I can always hit targets at camp. Sometimes... I see the person I'm about to attack. I see him and I think, that could be Uncle Jan. That could be Lloyd." No, it couldn't be Lloyd any more. They struck him down last battle, as he was loyal to a fallen sect until the end. Her expression turned grave as Mark turned to face her, attentive. "Last battle, I knew it would be even worse. They were all Black Fang... there might have been someone I knew. So I tried not to see them, not really. That worked better. I guess."

His eyes running across her face, very close to his, Mark said, "You don't have to fight. I don't want you to fight."

"But I want to. I like the people in this army. And the people in our world. I tell myself – I can do this. For them." For a moment, his eyes made met hers, yet he couldn't seem to keep contact, his gaze flitting away and back as if tracing the path of a whirling fly. "And... Mark. You're fantastic. I've made so many friends here, and I know that at least we'll be all right. Because we have you."

For a moment, he was silent, his eyes still averted. Then suddenly, he said, "Will you be my girlfriend?"

Nino stared straight at Mark, who stared right back from two inches away, quite serious. "Your... girlfriend?" Mark nodded, a curl of his messy hair falling into his face. She pulled her head back a bit from its craned position as she said, "Um... I don't really..."

"Never mind," Mark mumbled. "Leave me alone."

"Mark? I don't understand. We're still friends, right?"

With a shooing motion, he hissed, "Leave me alone." His earnest glare sent her recoiling, backing away uncertainly arms crossed. "I said get out!" Biting her lip, she stepped through the doorway, turned, and closed the door with a click behind her, wondering what in the world she had done.

He could hear Mark's high voice, hoarse from the fumes, echoing through the cave: "Hector, go through the corridor on your left. All the way through. Don't stop!" Without hesitation, Hector barreled through the corridor. He sidestepped a reanimated guardian, parrying his blow without stopping to engage him. Just as he cleared the corridor, a blast of putrid air shot across it from the cave wall, rocking the earth beneath him with an angry roar, drowning out Mark's voice – instructions to one of the others, hopefully. Hector winced and stumbled, but regained his footing in time to bring his axe down upon the guardian that teetered weakly from the blast. He caught Mark's eye and nodded. "Nino! Where's Nino?"

Hector glanced about him. An impressive two-layered stone platform towered down the wide hall, steps centuries unused leading up its sides. A warrior in worn dark armor with eyes eerily aglow stood before the throne atop the dais, surrounded by a pair of axefighters and a pair of mages. Beside the platform, he saw Nino's telltale green hair bobbing up the stairs on another side. "I can see her down this hallway! She made it through the northern passages like you told her."

With a mindful glance around him – defenseless, Mark always made sure to keep himself away from enemy fighters – Mark began running and tripping down the cave toward Hector. "What can you see over there?"

"It's a platform. The cave is huge here. There's an altar or something at the end. Nino's at the other side of the platform." Mark caught up to him and peered around the passageway himself. "That's probably where the axe is," Hector said. Mark glanced at him as if to say I knew that, but the words went professionally unsaid.

"Do you have a vial of pure water with you?" Hector nodded, fumbling through a pouch for the crystal bottle. "Protect yourself with it and lead the charge. Wait at the top of the first set of steps if they'll come to you." As Hector worked the cap and sprinkled himself with it, Mark craned his neck and yelled, "Nino!" Her distant form straightened in attention. "Stay where you are. Spare some salve for your injuries if you've taken any." As far as Hector could tell through the hazy air at three hundred feet, she seemed disappointed. Mark was right, of course. Taking the initial volley was Hector's duty.

Hector hefted his axe over his shoulder and began trotting to the platform. As he approached, the lesser guardians turned their eerie eyes to him and began their approach. Just as planned. Hector charged up the first flight of stairs and stopped a few feet from the edge, planting his heels and bracing himself as he brought up his axe to parry the guardian's sloppy swing; although the blow was unskillful, his arms rung from the force of the impact. still, undeterred, he recovered from the blow and brought the axe crashing into the guardian's chest. Its eyes lost their glow. It fell back and crumpled eerily into earthy dust, almost like a morph.

Hector heard the telltale crackle of magic and sidestepped a cone of fire just in time. Before he could charge the mage, the other axefighter came to him. Unprepared, Hector barely parried in time, stumbling backward from the impact. A crackle, and Hector cringed. The second mage's fire caught him in its path. Yet despite his anticipation, Hector felt a strange bubble of cool air about him as a few stray hairs singed and weak pain laced his arm. With quick thanks to Mark for remembering the water, Hector regained his footing and made short work of the axefighter.

He charged and felled one of the mages before it could cast, but the other had time to send another volley of fire. Hector let out a grunt as the blaze hit his left side dead-on, piercing his protections, burning his shoulder and heating the metal of his armor, blazing hot against his skin. Hissing with pain, Hector fumbled with his shoulderplate for a vivid moment before the strap snapped, weakened from the fire. He let the searing metal clatter to the floor. With renewed vigor, he took up his axe and charged at the lifeless mage that showed no pride or fear, striking it down as well.

The horde defeated, Hector spared a glance to the last guardian, still unmoving on the dais. It seemed apathetic to the fighting, intent only on guarding the resting place of Armads until its defeat. It could wait. Hopefully there was enough time to heal before more guardians might arise as well. Hector signaled his wounded state to Mark. The boy caught his gesture and seemed to think likewise; Hector could make out the sound of his voice shouting, "Nino! Onto the platform! Heal Hector!"

Hector clenched his fists, trying to shut out the pain from his burn as her boots pattered on the steps. Nino looked at him worriedly as she tucked her red-covered tome under her arm and pulled a healing staff from where it was strapped to her back. "Is it just your shoulder?" she asked as she neared him.

His raw exposed shoulder must have been a sight. Hector could feel that the searing wound also extended some ways outward. "It got my arm and back, too." Nino nodded and closed her eyes in concentration – she had only taken up the staff a few days ago – as she tilted the orb toward him. Hector let out a sigh of relief as coolness swept through the left half of his body. He turned around to snatch his shoulderplate from the floor.

Suddenly, Mark's voice rang out: "Nino! Retreat! Now!"

She let out a single shrill scream as the armored guardian sank its axe deep into her abdomen. Her face contorted – she didn't look like herself with that expression, eyes wide and eyebrows pressed and mouth held open strangely – with untold shock and pain. For an instant, she seemed all too intact, no blood. Then the guardian pulled its axe from her body, edge dark ruby beautiful ugly, as she trembled and fell, spilling blood and dark tissues upon the aged stone as she gasped, still barely holding onto life –

No no no no no. Mark fixed his eyes and held his breath and summoned his inheritance forth as his vision continued to treat him to the scene before him. Nino writhing on the floor. Hector in shock, for he'd never seen death visit their army. Mark had. No. No no. Go back. Go back. Restart.

For a moment he feared that his power had left him. Then the helmeted guardian turned eyes to him, and the world began to crawl.

He felt the tingle of his consciousness blurring, his head freezing tight as if his forehead were suddenly pressed to ice. Hector and the last guardian both slowed in their movements – the latter's ghostly eyes still locked on Mark as it ground to a halt – and then stopped. His eyes throbbing, his head pounding, he wanted to bring his hands up to hold his head but he was paralyzed like the rest of them.

That was how it always went. A grisly scene forced upon his sight as he stood still in time. Nino's thin body curled on the floor, eyes unseeing, organs and life wasted in spatters around her.

Go back. Something resisted. He couldn't yet. He hated it when things were stuck like this, standing there indefinitely with a horrible scene burning its way into his pounding head, waiting for the universe to move with him. Like the world wasn't finished laughing at his mistake.

Laughing. His father laughing when he'd asked why he had any regrets with the power they had. Oh, if life were so simple. His father brought him up on his lap, nestled between the leather armrests of his fireplace chair. You think us to be gods? No, we are still servants of the universe's will. Our power engages only for battle, and even then there are things we cannot change. With a hand on Mark's forehead, pressing his head closer to his chest – Mark could hear his father's slow breathing and the thump, thump of his pulse – And even if it's something that has no longer happened, can you not regret it?

You fixed it, Mark had said.

His father's laughter rumbled softly against his ear. You will understand, when you must use it yourself.

The brains of the girl who mothered him, spattered across the grass. A man screaming Lyn, Lyn, as Mark pulled too-cold air into his lungs and trembled, trying to summon his power and fearing desperately that he could not. A freeze and a flash, and no one remembered but him, no one felt the weight of his mistake but him. He felt it every time he closed his eyes and dreamt of a horror that existed for him alone, felt for the young woman who saved his life and watched over him like his birth mother never had.

Never feel for them, his father had said one after-battle night in a traveler's inn. Soldiers. It's all the worse when they can die more than once. Mark entertained himself quietly with a wire puzzle on the bed, never understanding his father's train of thought. And it's impossible to tell them a word about yourself. Outsiders.

Didn't grandpa... His grandfather, who wanted no secrets kept from his wife of twenty years.

He did, and he died when his army was overwhelmed in a roadside skirmish a month after. It is well recorded that you will lose your power. Never a word about it, Mark. Only to House Laran. Withering House Laran, with fewer people to its name than fingers to a man. And never soldiers. It can never be worth enough.

Mark, thirteen, orphaned, in the company of soldiers alone. Loudmouthed Mark in total silence with a scream in his heart.

Mark, eight, half-listening to his father, victoriously worked a wire ring loose.

And, Mark. His father's voice hinted at lightness and he looked up. This is why we invite "smelly Aunt Bellona" to dinner. Mark giggled to himself as he made a face, remembering so naming her for her too-strong perfume. Besides that, she had always been stingy about gifts and asked for far too many hugs from him. He was much fonder of Ares, his second cousin who always brought him the most interesting puzzles from faraway places. Do we have to have her over for next Saints' Festival? he murmured. Of course, his frowning father. She was absent that year anyway, and all the years after, as she'd fallen from the roof of the Aquileia Cathedral. No one could tell if she was having an episode or if it had been intentional, and anyway – his father remarked offhandedly to his only cousin when he thought Mark was out of earshot – after a certain point, what was the difference? Uncle Tyr unambiguously hung himself three years later and Mark's father was more distraught, so Mark thought to himself that there probably was a difference.

By the time they set off to Bulgar, there came a sudden silence in their communications with Ares and young Edith had passed away from a mysterious illness, leaving them as the last lords of House Laran. His father taught him a few words of Sacaean, the sounds a blur in his memory. Hello began with an aww sound, and some manner of greeting with daw. Mark was not quick with languages and he had a terrible teacher. They both laughed over his lack of progress. Just remember one phrase, Mark. A-li-s-xx … ? ... xx. Blasé Mark looked straight ahead at the horse's ears as he asked What's that?

"Help."

Help, help. By the time he realized why his father had taught him, his thoughts were too far gone to remember a word of Sacaean. Beyond his tightly shut eyelids, he saw his father's tired smile as he placed him on the horse alone. No. I can't flee. I've tried. The universe wills that this day is my last. But not yours. Somewhere back in Bulgar, his father waited for the adviser's assassin for the hundredth and last time as Mark's horse carried him off into the plains of Sacae. It stumbled without guidance long into the night. For those few days, sick to his stomach and burning under the sun, Mark the last of House Laran had thought to himself that their power was useless, utterly useless. It couldn't save his father and it couldn't save him.

Mark looked at the portrait of deadly failure that only he would know: Nino's hand fallen almost delicately, fingers dipped in blood and knuckles bloodless white. At least his power could save her, though it had only ruined him. Save him? Maybe nothing could.

Something in his consciousness caught onto the flow of time, and colors red and brown slowly began to flush together in a warm haze. He pulled lightly with his mind to hasten them.

You will understand – Mark hated their power, like all of House Laran had before him.

With a burning flash, the jaws of the cave appeared before him. Warm liquid trickled down his nose. Hector gave him a look and a world-weary sigh. "Anyone bring Mark a handkerchief?"

They made do with a section of Matthew's ratty cape and Mark awkwardly pinched his nose, bleeding more deeply than he could ever voice. Right then, he would've liked to hide himself under the cloth like a blanket in a thunderstorm.

At the moment, they all expected battle plans from him.

"I don't think you should fight in this battle, Nino," Mark said in a small voice.

Nino shook her head vigorously at him. "After the Archsage took all the trouble to bring me here? There are only three of us fighting! You need me. Don't leave me behind."

Mark felt his breakfast tumbling within him. What was he supposed to say to her? "F-Fine... take your position behind Hector." She beamed a trusting smile at him and whirled away to Hector's side. When they had all entered and engaged their attentions on the rising guardians before them, Mark hid in a nook and retched until the ground was wet with acid and blood.

The spell released them onto the grassy Lycian plain, right at Athos's indicated point. To those waiting, Mark gave his characteristic, "We won," and curtly plunged through their ranks. Behind him, voices rose in cheers as Hector must've shown them the Armads. Mark left them to their congratulating and trudged back toward the cluster of tents.

From the corner of the eye, he caught sight of Nino bounding up to him. He swallowed and averted his eyes, the memory of her writhing fresh on his mind, her presence like a strange ghost. "Mark!" she called. "Mark, that was fantastic."

His mistake. The axe through her gut as she screamed.

"Not really," he said.

"Oh, don't be modest!" Good-naturedly, Nino walked beside him, keeping in stride. Mark stayed silent. Frowning, she said, "This isn't about yesterday, is it?" No, not at all. Mark bit down on his tongue as he thought about her pale face twisted, the blues of her shirt bright against the dark of her organs.

For a moment, Mark wondered if he would mind the loss of his inheritance. It would mean an end to the nightmarish worlds that had been and were not. It would mean an end to his lingering doubts of reality every time he woke. It would mean no more embarrassing nosebleeds.

He snuck a glance at Nino, who watched him as she awaited an answer. Whole and unharmed and cheerful. Alive by his power. A gruesome double in his mind by his power.

"It pretty much is," he lied.

Her frown deepening, she said, "Can't I still be your friend?" Their friendship: his indulgence, his need for companionship after all, even if she were a soldier. Here she walked with him as if her good intentions had not been the most painful of temptations. As if his few days of weakness and joy hadn't led to that one moment – and everything after – twisting into even greater horror. Just like Lyn, before he'd known any better.

His fingers trembled beneath his cape as he snapped, "No. I don't even want to look at you anymore." Though his power made death often so trivial, life was that which his father lost once and forever, and Mark still could not shake the fear that surged at the sight. Endless losses laced his memories with hideous images that resurfaced with each glance at the carelessly alive. He wanted her around, some part of him beyond fear. If only he could bear her presence.

"Mark!" she said, disbelief clear in her voice. "Just because I won't be your girlfriend?"

"Just because," he said, his voice too convincingly calm. As she stopped walking beside him, he quickened his pace, weaving his fingers in his cape and pulling it closer around him.

He sped by an army of phantoms, laughing, jolly, more innocent from his efforts. His fingers were trembling still, a shaking that crept all through his arms that he couldn't stop, and he didn't want anyone to see that. They loved freely, sang freely, waltzed through war like a child's game with full confidence in their life and the lives of those they loved. They hailed and teased him as he passed; he didn't feel like bantering with them right then. Immature, arrogant, ill-tempered, a child. In worlds invisible, he traded his youthful joy for them.

Pushing aside the flap to his tent, his gaze fell on the folding table, chairs arranged for two companions. With a cry, he kicked the nearest one. It toppled over to one side as pain arced across his foot. Hissing, he held his injured foot in the air and leaned against the table to balance himself. The pieces of his still-unsolved cube puzzle jutted against his stomach. He reached into his coat pocket and clutched them in all one hand. He couldn't understand why but the sight was hateful, odious, enraging – he flung them across the table – they clacked against the wood as they scattered to every corner of the tent – before he fell upon the table's surface and buried his face in his sleeves. Her intestines staining the blade, her legs swept clean from her body, her glinting-mad eyes as she impaled herself upon a waiting enemy spear, his ribs white against the air, his eyes still open and accusing even though his mouth was missing, her blood gushing with every heartbeat as she cried for herself, his unrecognizable red and black skin when he emerged from the flames –

These merry corpses would laugh around a campfire and maybe one of them, one of them who he hadn't yet driven away, would say, "Mark, why don't you join us?"

"Because you're all dead," he muttered to himself in his lonely tent. "You're dead and you're going to die again and maybe you never existed at all."He slammed his fist into the table. Pain shot down his hand and in reflex he brought his little finger to his mouth, both soothing his abused joint and his shaking lip, in fear of his world of the walking dead. He couldn't even let a single soul know. So they didn't know, and his power and misery remained his alone. If only his father were alive. Or Bellona, or anyone from mad House Laran at all. There was no one left to tell. He bit on his knuckle to keep himself from screaming to the world, How can I know it's real? How can I know that any of this—?

In vain self-assurance, he whispered, "Just a few more battles. It'll be over soon." And then? Mark nibbled at one sunken nail as his eyes followed the grain of the table, up and down and around. He didn't want to think about what came after. He knew what he wanted. No more war. No more ghosts. Peace and quiet and his own company forever. Where could a foolish young boy find a place like that?

The tactician vanished after the final battle.

Bern, Lycia, and Etruria all sought those famed skills,

but none ever found the tactician.

.

.

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