It was the fifth morning in a row that Avad was late for his early meeting with his council.

Usually, that kind of thing wouldn't have worried Erend so much. Avad was entitled to dispose of his time as he wanted. After all, he was the frickin' king. Frankly, it was not Erend's place to tell the guy just how to live his life.

Then, Erend wondered, why did the whole damn thing left him so worked up?

Maybe it was from seeing a man known for his even temper snap at every little provocation. Maybe it was from hearing incoherent ramblings from a ruler who usually shone with intelligence and poise. Maybe it was from sensing the shadow of doubt sweeping through the whole of the royal court, imprisoning Avad's subjects in the icy grip of uncertainty.

Or maybe it was from smelling the stench of booze clinging to the king like cheap perfume.

Erend of all people had no right to turn up his nose at the guy. He was who he was, a useless lug on the mend, lost adrift because he was trying to uphold a promise he'd never made to the ghost who lived inside his brain. The king had never said a word—never!—even when Erend had been at his most useless. Avad had stuck by him when everybody else had been ready to write him off as a drunken fool nowhere suitable enough to fill the late Captain's shoes. Really, it would be pompous as shit for Erend to open his big damn mouth to give the king a piece of his mind. Avad was ten times the man he could ever hope to be.

Then, Erend thought, gnashing his teeth together at he watched the guy laugh behind his cup of wine, why did the whole damn affair leave such a bad taste in his mouth?

"Erend," Avad said, "you haven't touched your food at all. Is there something on your mind?"

Erend startled in his seat, abruptly pulled out of his musings. Oh, yeah. Avad might have been drunk, but he wasn't stupid. Just staring at the guy like a creep without saying anything wasn't going to help. Erend groaned, absentmindedly passing a hand through his beard; it would be so much easier forming a coherent train of thoughts if his head would just stop hurting so much.

"Not hungry," Erend said in half a grunt. "Ate not that long ago."

Subtly, he eyed Avad's plate. The latter had eaten very little as well. Avad tipped the neck of the fruit wine bottle toward his cup, refiling it with more alcohol. Erend scowled as he looked at his own mug of ale. He didn't dare bring it any closer to his mouth. The smell of booze would only tighten the grip pain held over his head, that he was damn sure.

Avad continued to talk about inconsequential things throughout the evening. Erend only nibbled at his wild turkey roast, worry churning in the pit of his belly. Avad kept laughing at his own (bad) jokes, cheeks flushed by the wine. He never noticed Erend's unease, not once.

After a while, it seemed as if the very sound of Avad's laughter grated on Erend's ears. Abruptly, he stood up, making the king sputter in the middle of the latest inane thing he was going on about.

"Well, I'll be going," Erend said. "Gotta conk out early if I wanna wake up at a reasonable hour tomorrow morning."

"So soon?" Avad said lightly. "Truly, you're growing to be the most responsible of the pair of us, my friend. In a while, you'll make me look bad."

Erend bit down an unflattering reply, only saying, "Eh, comes with the new job. G'night, sire."

"Good night, Erend," Avad replied with a chuckle. He downed his cup of wine, before reaching for the bottle once more.

"Don't you think you had enough of that?" Erend said, exasperation and amusement colouring his voice in equal parts. He made to grab the fruit wine. With a rapidity that stopped Erend cold in his tracks, Avad pulled the bottle toward him, putting it out of Erend's range. For a second or two, the latter could only stare, dumbfounded. "Hey, take it easy, Your Brightfulness, I wasn't going to—"

Avad displayed a sham of a grin. "I was just going to pour myself another cup," the king said, in an icy voice that featured none of his usual charm. "Only one more, and then I go to bed."

"Seriously, Avad," Erend pressed. "Gimme the bottle. You'll thank me later."

Avad only glared at him, his eyes narrowing. "I know what I'm doing, Erend. Don't treat me like some idiot child. I can take care of myself perfectly well."

"Oh?" Erend said, anger flaring despite all of his best judgement. "Coulda fooled me."

"Good night, Erend," Avad repeated, in a tone that brokered no discussion.

"Fine." Erend turned to leave; goddammit, his head felt like it was about to explode. He stopped by the doorway, glancing at Avad from over his shoulder. "I won't tell you what to do, Your Radiance. S'not like I know anything. I'm just some dumbass Oseram, after all. I'm no one important."

Avad's brow creased slightly. "Erend—"

"Good night, sire. See you tomorrow." And with those words Erend was gone. He tried not to think too much of the distress and pity that had fleetingly shown on Avad's face as he left.

It grew more and more difficult for Avad to keep track of time.

He often woke up in the early afternoon, adrift in a daze, remembering nothing of the evening that had come before. He would then stumble through his daily duties, trying to act as if nothing was unusual. Thankfully, all of his servants and courtiers played along with the delusion, never uttering a word of reproach as to his obvious failings as a leader.

Everyone save Erend, that is.

Oh, Avad's oldest friend never said anything out loud, not to his face, at least. But Avad knew him well enough to see the signs. Erend had become unflinchingly, uncharacteristically polite, in a way that almost made the most mannerly members of the royal court seem boorish in contrast. Yet every time Erend addressed Avad with his correct title, every time he stood by the throne without offering a snarky comment or two, every time his face remained impassible, a smile nowhere in sight, as the two of them supped together, Avad could feel his spirits plummeting toward what seemed like an endless depth.

Hours stretched into days, days stretched into weeks. The reconstruction effort picked up speed, and hope—fragile, precious hope—began to spread through Meridian. To Avad's great relief, the Sundown's Oseram allies sent unexpected help in the form of some tinkers and stonemasons. The idea had come at Petra Forgewoman's prodding (Avad could have kissed the woman, but something told him she would only have brushed his effusive display of gratitude with a laugh). More importantly, the workers brought along food, tools and other manner of supplies. This unexpected kindness was more than welcome, but it did nothing to assuage the sense of unease crawling under Avad's skin. More and more he felt like a spectator detached from his own life, watching as other people accomplished what should have been his Sun-given duties as ruler of the Carja.

No wonder Erend had begun to scorn him so.

Still, the man continued to offer him the pleasure of his company, once a week during supper. Of course, Erend had now developed a fondness for gruff, stubborn silence. Avad, ever the good politician, fought to hide just how upset he was by his friend's newfound taciturnity. Thankfully, Erend never noticed a thing—or perhaps, it was just that he knew better than to offer a snide comment or two. Avad wasn't sure which one was the case.

And so on each of these nights, Avad talked and drank enough for the both of them. It was a weight off his shoulders to finally let go of the cool, self-assured persona he was forced to adopt in front of his subjects, at least for a few precious hours. As always Avad broached many topics throughout their evenings, all of which seemed to draw out but the barest of interest from Erend. Yet there was one thing Avad wanted to talk about above all else—the very one thing he could not bring himself to speak about, the one thing that made him go to sleep every night with a coldness enveloping his heart like an embrace.

For more than a month now, the two men had never uttered Ersa's name—not once.

Avad often referred to her in an oblique manner, but Erend never caught on to his intention. Tentatively—despairingly—Avad thought to use a tried-and-true approach to ease Erend into the subject: talking about Aloy.

Six months had passed since she'd last been seen in the Sundown, and still there was no news of her. Not long after the battle at the Spire, Avad had sent an envoy to the Nora lands, extending what he hoped was a helping hand to a people in sore need of help. To Avad's disappointment, nothing had come out of this effort, and he had thought it best to not press the matter further.

(Or rather, that was Avad kept telling himself in the dark of his room at night, whenever the sense of guilt started to crush him. The truth was that he could not summon the energy to fulfill yet another duty that was expected of him.)

Avad sighed as he mulled over these reminders of his inadequacy. He'd managed to take just a spoonful or two out of the delicious stew the palace cooks had prepared for him and Erend. The latter, thankfully, seemed to have regained a bit of his usual appetite. Still, Erend ate in near silence, never offering more than one or two words to add to the conversation.

Avad frowned. Something else had caught his attention: Erend had not touched a drop of the scrappersap that had brought from Mainspring. That strange behaviour was starting to get unsettling.

"Erend?" Avad finally prompted. "Haven't you heard what I asked? Have you finished the selection of potential recruits for the Vanguard?"

Erend squirmed in his seat. His gaze had become rather evasive, Avad noted. "More or less. But it'll take some time 'til they're trained. And the number of guys we've found is nowhere near enough to—" Erend scowled, then fell silent. Avad felt a dull pang. Nowhere near enough to replace the ones we've lost, he completed somberly. The Shadow Carja and their demonic machines had torn through the ranks of the Vanguard. With a flash of remorse, Avad suddenly understood; no wonder Erend acted so downtrodden these days.

"I'm sorry, Erend," Avad said. "You've not only lost men under your command, but brothers-in-arms. Friends."

Erend shrugged. "Yeah. Losing people. Seems like a recurring thing nowadays."

Avad drew a sharp breath. "Erend—"

"Any news from the Nora lands?" Erend interrupted him, not too subtly.

"No," Avad answered. He knew full well the true subject of the man's inquiry. "And none from Aloy as well."

Erend slumped into his chair, casting his gaze downward. Unbidden, the sight of Aloy's face, her fierce features twisted in disgust, came to Avad's mind. Your warrior princess is barely cold in her grave, and you're lining me up to take her place? she had spat, her words as chilly as the lands where she'd been born. The memory sent blood rushing to Avad's cheeks. She must have thought him such a fool. Covertly, Avad chanced a peek toward Erend. It was a good thing that the man had not heard this particular exchange. There was little else Avad feared more than losing the respect of the only person in the world he could still consider a friend.

"Do you think she'll be coming back?" Avad asked Erend, sounding contrite as a child. "Her people have suffered so much. I expect she'll devote most of her time to them now."

"I dunno about that," said Erend. "They cast her out at birth, remember? And she doesn't strike me as someone who's looking to settle down somewhere. She didn't seem too enthusiastic about staying here in Meridian too."

"Oh," was all Avad said in response. He tried not to sound too disappointed. "Poor Aloy. Wherever she is, I hope she is well."

"Me too." Erend's voice dwindled to a soft mutter. "Someone close to her died during the massacre at the Proving. I think it might have been her father. She never talked about much, but you could tell it was always on her mind."

"Sun in shadows!" Avad exclaimed. "I had no idea. Throughout all this time, she was carrying this burden? And to think I dared presume—" He shook his head, realizing he could say no more. No wonder her words had been so venomous. Avad really deserved no better.

"Yeah. S'why I felt so rotten for asking—nah, begging—for her help. She clearly had better things to do."

"Yet, she helped anyway. Without her, we would have never stopped Dervahl. Without her…" Avad cast his eyes downward, murmuring, "Without her, Ersa would have died alone."

Erend said nothing. Slowly, carefully, he reached for his mug of ale.

"I… I should have seen through Dervahl's trap," the words stumbled out of Avad's mouth. "Before she went to confront him, Ersa came to me. I should have told her to stay. Something was amiss, it was plain to see. I should have told her it was too dangerous…"

"Avad," Erend said, "shut up."

Erend's words were like a blow from a warhammer, and the air was knocked out of the king's lungs. "Erend, I-I…"

"I said shut up! If you want to whine, choose another subject. Stop talking about my sister."

Avad's voice strangled in his throat before he could retort. Blood thumped in his ears. Ersa was all he wanted to talk about.

Because if he stopped thinking of her—hearing the sound of her laughter whenever he recited a poem he'd written for her, remembering the fierceness in her eyes when she had a weapon in hand, picturing the little dimples in her cheeks when she smiled—then she would truly cease to exist. Ersa's mortal remains—the hallowed vessel in which her precious soul once dwelled—were now slowly rotting away in her grave in the Claim. Avad could not let her memory die as well, not when his words could still make her spirit linger on.

"Do… do you truly wish to never speak of her again?" Avad said finally, in little more than a whisper. "Are you trying to forget her? Why are you acting as if she had never existed?"

"Because it's the only way I can function, dammit!" Erend said, slamming his mug on the table and spilling half of its content on the fancy wood. "The moment I start thinking of her, I'm done for! I can't get my mind to settle down! Usually, I would—" He swore, loudly, instead of finishing his sentence.

And suddenly, everything became clear for Avad. His gaze came to rest on the bottle in front of him. "Usually, you would drink," he said. "But these past months, you tried to stop drinking… didn't you, Erend?"

Erend dropped his head slightly, hiding his expression from view. "Yeah. I tried. I did as my sister asked me."

"…but I did not," Avad said. "Instead, I chose to disgrace her memory. You ran from your pain, but I chose to numb it with something she profoundly hated. You were right to chastise me, Erend."

Erend grimaced. "S'not like I had the higher ground, you know? I'm a piece of work, too."

"No," Avad said, "you sell yourself too short. All this time, you were suffering too… and I never stopped to think twice about it. I was too mired in my own misery..."

Erend rolled his eyes, but something soft settled on his features. "Hey, now you're the one who needs to stop beating yourself up."

Avad managed a weak smile. "What a pair we are…"

"Yeah." Erend grimaced, as if he was struggling to make the next words come out, "It's as you said before. Ersa would have laughed her ass off."

"No," Avad said, "she would have been sad. I think, more than anything, she believed in us more than we believe in ourselves."

Erend was silent for a while. Then, voice choking, he added, "Yeah. She'd always been that way, even since we were kids. She had her own shit to deal with, but she always kept out an eye for me."

"For me as well." Avad hung his head low, shameful that he had decided to squander the gift of her faith in such a way. He could still taste the tartness of the alcohol on his tongue. Revulsion came over Avad in a wave of nausea, making him want to retch. For a moment, he wished for nothing but to fling the wine bottle at the wall.

Instead, Avad inhaled deeply to will himself in a state of calm. It seemed he needed all the strength in his body to put his cup down, and even more to push the bottle away. Erend watched him without a word; still, Avad could not feel the sting of his friend's judgement, only a sense of sympathy. A strained silence followed, heavy as grief. Then, Erend sighed, rubbing his face with both hands.

"Do you," he began hoarsely, as if he had not used his voice for years, "do you wanna talk about her? Do you think it would make you feel better?"

Avad nodded. "I… I think it would. We need to do right by her memory. Talking about her will be painful… but this pain is nothing to what she's sacrificed to keep the two of us safe."

Erend's eyes shimmered in the light of the candles. Avad realized with a start that he had never seen his friend cry in the years they had known each other. Much like his sister, Erend had always put up a brave front for Avad's sake. And never he had complained about the miserable hand life had dealt him. No wonder he had to turn to something else for comfort, Avad thought, saddened.

"Yeah," Erend said. "You're right." He continued, managing a lighter tone, "I mean, I still don't get how a hellion like my sister ended up with a stick in the mud like you. I'm sure there's a funny story or two behind your courtship of her."

A bit of colour touched Avad's cheeks. "Oh, you don't know half of it, my friend." He glanced askew, his lips twitching into a sheepish smile. He could almost picture Ersa's indignant face in his mind as he added, tongue firmly planted in cheek, "I never told you that time when I introduced her to the previous Sunhawk, did I? It was the event that brought about her lifelong suspension from the Lodge. Before she even joined in an official capacity."

Erend smirked. "Oh boy. Why am I not surprised?"

Avad folded his arms across his chest, pride and affection swelling in his heart. "Well, of course. Why else do you think I wanted her to become my queen?"