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For those of you who missed it, the last chapter is what was supposed to be yesterday's update. Stupid scheduled maintenance...

Enjoy!

#134 – Twilight

"Please! You must protect me!" the merchant begged.

"Alright, already…" Mark looked around. "It's twilight now, but soon enough we won't be able to see our own noses. Do we have torches or anything like that?"

"Right here," Lowen said, pulling a torch out of a bag. "A man back in Santaruz dropped them."

"Mark," Matthew volunteered, "I can see better in this darkness than anyone else. I can serve as a lookout."

"Take the torches, then," Mark said. "Marcus, Oswin, Hector. Guard the bridges leading to this area. Bartre, Dorcas: watch that snag. Someone's bound to try and knock it over to get to us. Everyone else, get ready to move if the bandits don't come to us first. Merlinus…just stay where you are." As they began to move, Mark sighed.

Maybe it was just being in Caelin after his yearlong 'self-imposed' exile, or maybe it was the new plots springing up everywhere he turned, but Mark found himself more on edge than usual. At this point, he wasn't sure what he was worried about more: some faceless Caelin soldier locking him up in a dungeon for plotting against Caelin, or Ephidel appearing out of nowhere and…well, he didn't know. Perhaps that was what irked Mark the most – not knowing what was going on, besides the death of one marquess of Lycia and the disappearance of another.

"Mark," Matthew said, breaking him out of his thoughts, "There are bandits knocking down a dead tree to the southwest of us. I see a village to the northwest. Do you think…?"

"Probably," Mark agreed. "Lowen, get to that village before the bandits do, and warn them to close their gates. Eliwood, Guy, follow him and head off the bandits before they attack. Somebody clear off a bridge for them to cross!"

They moved, and Mark lapsed back into thought. No matter what it was, something about the situation felt…wrong. Not this particular battle, no – it was going smoothly, all things considered – but the situation in general was wrong. Lord Hector had still shown no signs of recognizing the tactician. All right, understandable if he didn't want anyone to know about their connection. Nobody had asked Mark exactly what he was doing in Pherae, and Rebecca hadn't corrected Eliwood's perception of events. Was that the origin of the feeling of unease – was the girl setting him up?

Mark glanced over at the girl, firing arrows at the bandits. From what he knew of the girl, Rebecca didn't have it in her to try and blackmail him over something as trivial, but his perceptions had been proven wrong before.

"Heh, looks like you've breathed your last!" The leader had either gotten tired of waiting, or had realized that his men would be unlikely to try and continue the fight once true dark fell. Either way, he had finally joined the battle.

"Yeah, right!" It looked like the group Mark had sent out earlier had succeeded in driving their bandits away, and had come back to regroup. As Guy began fighting the leader, Matthew shook Mark to get his attention. "I only see a handful of bandits left," he reported. "And those ones are hanging back. If we take out their leader, they'll probably leave."

"Got it. Oswin, Marcus, use your javelins. Rebecca, how many arrows do you have left?" As she showed him her quiver, the tactician frowned. "Never mind. If we get into any more battles before we can get you more arrows, pick your shots wisely."

The worst part about not knowing what was going to happen was the knowledge that, as soon as Mark found out, he was going to kick himself for not seeing it in the first place. There was something obvious that he was missing, and Mark felt absolutely helpless in the face of whatever was coming. He hated that.

It's always darkest before the dawn, he tried to reassure himself. As soon as you figure out what you're missing, you can solve all of this, and go back to forgetting about it, except when you want to laugh at yourself…

It was for naught. No matter how he tried, he couldn't dispel the anxiety he was feeling.