Author's Note: Maybe I'm getting a little too obvious with the butterfly imagery, but on the spur-of-the-moment I decided that Nicnevin should have a sword that looks like an insect's pupa, both because the idea itself is kinda cool, and because the name 'Chrysalis Blade' is friggin' bad-ass.

What? Don't judge me...

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"The Transience of Things"

Letterewe – 1651

Colors swirled in his head. His vision came and went in erratic little bursts, like sunshine peeking through a canopy of trees swaying in the wind. He couldn't open his eyes, and so he didn't.

But, still, he could see things.

Another eye met his face: coal-black and dead, set atop a scruffy and poorly-kempt muzzle. The fox head bobbed back and forth before the boy's face:

"Run!" It screamed.

The fox... 'screamed'?

Penance's swimming brain fought with itself to work out this little problem, and finally he realized that the source of sound wasn't the fox head.

Because that would be ridiculous, right?

No. It was coming from the person holding the fox head, playfully tapping its dead nose against Penance's nose, gibbering like a little child:

"Run, run, run, Penance, dearie! Hehehe!"

He still couldn't move a muscle, and his eyelids hung limp over his eyes, one of them partially cracked, like a crooked shutter in some long-abandoned shack, lifelessly batting about with the wind. He could barely tell that he was in his own room, splayed out on a tabletop at its center, hands folded neatly over his chest, bound with twine at the wrists. He saw the hand holding the fox head, and the arm it was attached to. Abhag's madly-painted face leered down at the boy, and his rotted teeth parted with a salivating grin as he taunted Penance.

"That is enough," Uallas spoke from the other side of the room.

The mad pagan looked up at the other man with a sour expression, like a child denied his cookie, and he sullenly tossed the fox head on the floor beside the table.

"Mistress marvels at my mischief..." he grumbled.

"Get out, cretin!" Uallas snarled. "And don't you come back in until your wagon gets here; you will not touch him, again!"

Abhag's lips twisted with a delirious smile, and he chuckled while pointing at the man:

"Seller's remorse, metalmaker? Really?" The pagan clucked his tongue while nibbling on his sunbleached lower lip. "But it's such a small price, isn't it? For peace of mind, and all…"

Penance's numb skin suddenly crawled with an ill feeling; Abhag stroked one of his cheeks, and his skin responded with a small twitch. The feeling was slowly seeping back into his fingers, and he struggled with all his might to resist trying to reach up and strangle Abhag with his bound hands.

Uallas nearly did it for him; he picked up a silver longsword from the table against the wall and pushed the pagan against the opposite wall of the room, elbow to his throat and sword tip against his chest. The painted man chuckled at his anger, and Uallas snarled back at him:

"I said: you will not touch him, rotter!"

The pair was interrupted by the arrival of another pagan, this one also painted up like Abhag, but with more modest coloration. He stared at the feuding men disinterestedly, peering at them with a pair of serious and narrow eyes. The dark bands of paint around his eye sockets made him look something like a scheming jungle cat.

"The wagon is a mile out, and the wheel is stuck in a rut," he said.

"Why bother crying to me about it?" Uallas grumbled.

Mister Jungle Cat narrowed his eyes even further, twisting his thin lips:

"We could use the strength of a Shroudless One in lifting it out. Will you assist us, please?"

"You can damn-well do your own heavy lifting," Uallas pointed his blade at the man. "And just what good are you to your precious mistress if you can't even fix a bleeding wagon wheel?"

Mister Jungle Cat perched his lips, irritated, but he did his best not to show it. He merely gave a short and respectful bow in Uallas' direction:

"As you wish, Do-bhàis. However, it will take time. Will the women be back by then?" He cocked his head in Penance's direction. "And how long will the Do-bhàis beag be incapacitated?"

"The ladies are gone for the night; I sent them into town on an overnight errand. And the boy will be out for hours and hours," Uallas grumbled. "The poison I fed him is a dastardly thing. It's well-concentrated, and it'll cycle through his blood for some time, before it can be forced out." Uallas looked down at Penance's face, and he delicately brushed a stray hair off the boy's forehead. "He'll revive, certainly, but only to die again, instantly, and many times over at that, until his body can finally manage to filter out the toxin." Uallas looked up at Mister Jungle Cat, his face as grim as a grave. "His body will still not have removed all of it before your mistress has him… has him up on her altar."

This satisfied Abhag and Mister Jungle Cat, who both left to repair their wagon. This left Uallas alone with the boy. He set his sword down against the side of the table Penance was lying on, its hilt barely peeking over the tabletop near the boy's midsection. Uallas then restlessly paced the room beside Penance's body for several minutes. During this time Penance slowly felt needles pricking his toes, and his still-leaden calf muscles started twitching a little bit.

Finally Uallas looked down at the boy, drawing a slow breath. He ran a hand through his scraggily gray hair and sighed:

"What would you expect me to say right now, if you were 'here' with me, mo flath beag?" The man shook his head, again letting out a sigh. "What could I say, anyway? Nothing matters in that regard, does it? Words, I mean." The man sat down in a chair beside the boy and crossed his arms. "No, words don't matter. Not at this point, and so nothing need be said..."

The man nodded with assurance, grunting, and he stared across the room, looking absently at the wall. Eventually he got up, waving a hand through the air:

"I mean, none of this was intended. None of it. You should understand that, at least. I never meant for... never meant..." The man swallowed, again looking down at Penance's face with stern eyes. "You want the truth, child? I never meant to take a student under my wing in the first place. Never. That's not in my nature, you see. Remember when I once told you that there's no such thing as 'villains' out there? Just men doing the best they can in a difficult situation, right? Well that wasn't true, boy. Not at all..."

Uallas again sat beside the boy, looking away from him:

"You see there are villains out there, and I should know, because, well, because I'm one of them. Yes, I am. Always have been, really. Always bloodthirsty for all my life, and always opportunistic— willing to rob a baby of a lolly if I had the hankering for it. Age may have... well, it may have mellowed some of that in me. But it's the kind of thing that never goes away; it's in the blood, you see. Some souls are simply lost ones, Penance, and so when it comes to... to doing this to you, and turning you over to these pagans and their mistress, well..."

Uallas stared at his lap, lips curled, and he wiped his eyes while drawing a stuttering breath:

"It doesn't really matter one fig to me, child, because I only need to remember: I'm the villain. Yes, I am..."

The man blew his nose on his sleeve, and then quickly regained his composure. He absently straightened Penance's shirt and produced the boy's liquid-steel knife. He gently rested it on the boy's breastbone.

The numbness in his chest faded; Penance could feel the coldness of the blade even through his shirt.

"You're an unlucky sod, child." Uallas chuckled bitterly. "Perhaps we both are, at that. You're old enough to be called 'middle aged' amongst mortals, and you feel yourself unlucky, I think, to be trapped in a young child's body and brain for all the days of your life. And, in a way, you surely are unlucky, Penance. But there are fates worse than yours..."

Uallas gently touched Penance's hand, brushing over his soft fingers. Penance felt each touch, and each of his fingers tingled with heightened sensation as the man's hand went down them in turn.

"Imagine, Penance, being a mess of ancient, wrinkled flesh, drawn like sagging drapes over your flimsy curtain rod of a body. Imagine having bones of scratched and cracked marble, always threatening to snap apart even against a strong wind. Imagine spending all your days encased in a rotted old casket of a body, eternally decrepit. And then imagine the worst of it all: imagine that you've lingered so long in that form that you can't even remember those days when you rolled about under the sunshine at play, or danced in the moonlight, holding your lover's hands?"

Uallas sighed, again looking away from the boy, and he shook his head:

"'Nicnevin', as she calls herself now, suffers just so. It's a maddening thing, you know, to have lived one's very ancient life knowing only the pain and feebleness of age, and not the levity and unripe sweetness of youth. Her pagans follow her out of their desire to one day share in her immortality, but these days Nicnevin struggles only to find that deeper secret she believes the Source hides, beyond such a 'base' thing as immortality: youth. To that end she's scoured the globe many times over, even traveling to lands that are yet unknown to proper civilization. She's had a go at every potion, salve and ritual rumored to do the trick. That's what she was doing down in the well on the island, you see. The waters cure, so they say. The 'cure' she needs might just be out of their league, but still."

Uallas scratched his chin, looking down at the boy uneasily.

"Uh, but it's her 'bread and butter' treatment that's the most... well, worrisome. Remember, Penance, how I told you that a child immortal's power is 'different' from an adult's? It is true, you'll admit: young boys and girls whose blood is gifted by the Source do have differences from their adult counterparts. Nicnevin believes that, just as a normal immortal receives his enemy's power through severing their head, so too can she draw a child's 'youthful' energy through... well, through the same process."

The man again stood up and paced by Penance's side, wagging a finger at the boy:

"Now don' think of me as some mere lackey doing that woman's work, boy! No, you see she was supposed to stay down in that well for the better part of a decade. 'Beauty sleep', she called it. Let it never be said she hasn't a sense of humor. That changed though. It all changed with Fair Hair." Uallas shook his head, his eyes downcast. "You killing him was perhaps the... well, it was one of the proudest days of my life, truth be told. But it also cemented your fate, I'm afraid. Nicnevin has a certain 'keenness' to her, for lack of a better word. Having lived so long— endless years compared to myself, at least— and having experienced her immortal gifts so much longer than most, she's trained her senses most powerfully. Even in 'death', submerged beneath the dark waters of the well, she could feel the shockwave of that quickening as it scoured the land. Eventually it woke her— pulled her from her hibernation— and one day, when her pagan entourage made their routine patrol of the island, they found her down there awaiting release.

"Now it is true, Penance, that Nicnevin was my teacher. And it's true that she has a certain affection for me, not unlike the affection any teacher and their pupil may share between each other. But it's also true that— next to her desire to feel the sunshine glow on her healthy young skin—her affection for me is of very little consequence. Understand this: her quest weighs heavily on her soul, and the woman's silken smile hides a heart of brutal steel, colder and stronger than any my forge could make. She fears nothing. In fact, in all my time knowing her I've only known her to pause at the mention of one other immortal life: some fearsome pale rider out of antiquity who thought to call himself 'Death'. Before all others, though, any and all others, she strikes with her pagans like a hammer landing blows on a piece of glass. By the time I felt her presence across the dark waters of the loch these lands teemed with her pagans, and when that foul dog Abhag came to me with her demand..."

The man chuckled, and again he had to wipe his eyes on his sleeve:

"I've had a fear, Penance, for some time, now. It hasn't to do with you, or even Nicnevin, directly. You see, boy, every time I've looked at Struana, our little Stru, my little shining cherry blossom, I've seen a certain sparkle to her eyes. A 'glint', so to speak. I can't explain it, but I can feel it. Who knows, maybe it was that same thing that Fair Hair saw in your eyes back on that night when he deduced your true nature. Or maybe the two of us are just lucky at guessing..."

Uallas looked back at the boy, and he nodded as if answering Penance's silent question:

"That's right: Struana holds within her the potential for immortal life. It was troubling to learn this, as you might well know. It left me fearful, and not because of the lady in the well, no. By the time she'd come up for air I knew you'd be gone— long since on your way in the world— and by then little Stru, well, she'd be not so little, anymore. Old enough that Nicnevin needn't bother her, at least. No, my fear was always this: would I ever tell her? Would I ever explain the potential gift she carried? After all, Penance, both you and I know it's just as much a curse as a gift. So I didn't know what I'd do, if I'd guessed correctly about the little thing."

The man grit his teeth and stared at the ground, grinding one foot against the floorboards.

"But Nicnevin, in that 'keenness' of hers, needn't have guessed. One touch of Stru's hair was enough for her to feel the energy in her, even without her having suffered the pain of a 'first death'. It was all the worse for me, then, Penance, because now the lady did give me a choice, weighing our affection for each other as master and student against her need for a young immortal's body. And she was kind enough to be content with one body."

Uallas' clenched teeth quivered. He shook his head, snarling:

"Wh— what would you think I should choose? It was a simple matter! Of course it was! Would you actually have me put my fondness for you as my student against my love of Struana as an adopted daughter? Ridiculous! No, Penance: it was an easy decision! Of course it was! Y— you know why? 'Cause I'm the villain, child, that's why! Always have been, and always will be. Yo— you're just a tool now. You're a tool that I can use to keep my family safe, and so I'll use you as such. It's that simple!"

Uallas stopped at Penance's head and sighed. He gently ruffled the boy's hair once, and then clucked his tongue:

"There are villains in this world, Penance. I'm just so sorry that you happened to fall in with one of 'em..."

The man walked over to the doorway. He absently nibbled on one of his fingernails before scoffing. He began to turn around to face the boy:

"At least you'll have your family to welcome you into the next wor—"

Penance's primal shriek cut the man's words off; the boy was already up and off the table, brandishing Uallas' silver longsword with his tied hands, and he charged the man with all his might. Uallas tried to sidestep Penance's lunge, but the blade found its mark, sinking into his flesh just beneath his ribcage. The force of Penance's body propelled both of them against the far wall of the room, where Uallas fell to the ground. Penance drove the sword even deeper into the man's body, snarling as hot blood bubbled from his wound, splattering the boy's face, and he didn't stop until the hilt itself was up against Uallas' chest. The rest of the sword was stuck clean into the wall behind the man, holding his body fast.

His arms trembled, and his breath quivered like a bird's. Penance blinked as he considered the slumped man impaled on the sword. Uallas' head was draped forward, and blood still pooled out his mouth, tricking down his chest in an even stream. The boy slowly backed away from him, scooting across the ground on his rear, and he fumbled on the floor, looking for his little liquid-steel knife. As soon as he found it he used it to free his hands, and then he stumbled to his feet.

His head still swam, and he struggled to fight back a wave of bitter bile climbing up his throat. Most of his body still tingled mightily, and his muscles trembled like gelatin. He shuffled over to Uallas' body and stared down at the man with ineffable eyes. They trembled, and very soon after that they started tearing up. Penance wiped those tears away and stumbled over the body, moving for the doorway.

Suddenly a rough hand grabbed his shirt. Penance yelped in surprise, setting his knife against Uallas' throat. The old man shook his head; he struggled to speak through the blood in his mouth:

"It's... not over... flath beag..."

"Yes it is!" Penance snarled, trying (unsuccessfully) to hide the quiver in his voice. "Now let me go or I'll—"

"Finish it," Uallas nodded, smiling gently. He pulled the boy closer to him. "Mmm-hmm..." he nodded again, coughing up a wad of black blood. "Y— you must. Don't, and I'll help them run you down in the fields when they come back. I'd do it, you see. H— have to. For Stru..."

Uallas looked the boy up and down, his lazy eyes appreciative:

"H— how did you manage?" He rasped. "The... poison?"

"You used my favorite berries," Penance explained. "I make teas with 'em. And they're an acquired taste!"

Uallas' vacant face soon changed; he smiled, and very widely. He chuckled, immediately wincing. He gripped the edge of the sword stuck through his flesh.

"Remarkable," he whispered.

The boy's teeth ground together; he wrinkled his nose like a displeased rabbit:

"You could've told me about Nicnevin," he growled. "We could've... we could've figured out how to deal with them. Fight them! Together!"

Uallas shook his head:

"Not them," he whispered. "Not her. Believe me, Penance, it's been tried, and by far mightier foes than we..."

Penance stared down at the ground, nostrils still flared. He was too angry to even look at the man. That didn't stop Uallas from talking to him, though:

"Game's not over, is it? So kill me, or I'll come after you. And I will catch you—"

"Bullshit," Penance snarled. "I can escape you, easily enough!"

"Can you take the chance, child?" Uallas shook his head. "Have you learned nothing of what I've taught you? What's the rule, boy? The first rule, above all others?"

Penance again looked at the doorway, his teeth grinding like sandpaper. He looked back at the man, and his young eyes burned like coals:

"D— don't tempt me, you bastard!"

Uallas smiled gently:

"All that time I thought you'd learn something, watching me. Seems you still don't know when a man needs killing. Pity that—"

Penance grabbed Uallas' throat and snarled:

"Why're you still giving me any 'advice', anyway?"

The man looked up at Penance with calm, unblinking eyes:

"Because," he whispered clearly, "I have no way out, here, Penance."

The boy blinked at him:

"If you really thought you could run me down, later—"

"Could," Uallas smiled. "But..." The man looked away, shaking his head. "Some men need killing in this world, child. Villains, especially..."

Penance's trembling blue eyes steadied. He got to his knees and glared down at the man:

"I lo— I trusted you, Uallas. I trusted you. And you betrayed all that—"

The man glared at the boy with angry eyes:

"Oh, do you want a kiss, little man? Or have a little tea party, so we can talk some more? Shall I find you a frilly little dress to wear, too? Why don't you grow yourself some balls and act like a man?"

The boy's eyes stopped trembling. His breaths grew calm, and he looked away from the man, shaking his head:

"You're an asshole, but it's not in you to be that cruel, Uallas," Penance whispered. "And it shows. So just stop it, alright?"

The man cast his eyes aside, nodding gently. He smiled up at the boy, and his words were calm and controlled:

"Do you remember the cave, Penance? Your training in the cave? Back when I first taught you the gift of your second sight?"

The boy looked back at the man; he nodded.

"You... you asked me a question, then, and I did not answer you. Do you remember that question?"

Penance stared at the floorboards, and he slowly nodded:

"I asked you: if... if it were down to the two of us— if it were down to just you and me, the only two immortals left—"

"The answer to your question is 'no', Penance," Uallas whispered. "The answer was always 'no'."

"Why?"

The old man smiled, scoffing:

"Even a villain has to have a friend to count on, doesn't he? I'd think... I'd think that I can count on you, boy. I've come to expect that from you. I expected the best from you, child. And you've always managed to give better. Here I've got no way out, and you know that. The best I can do isn't enough. I wonder: can my friend do any better for me?"

The boy looked up at the man, and they held each other's gaze for some time. Between their lips not a word was spoken, but whole volumes passed between their eyes.

Slowly, deliberately, Penance got to his knees and gripped Uallas' forehead. He lifted the man's head up, exposing his neck, and he placed his liquid-steel knife against the man's throat.

Penance's face was stone, but Uallas' only bled warmth and tenderness. He gripped the boy's knife hand just before Penance was about to strike, making the boy pause and again look him in the eyes:

"My little prince," Uallas cooed, gently moving a stray strand of hair from the boy's eyes. "I'm so proud of you, Penance..."

The man coughed, businesslike, and then he looked away, eyes stern:

"N— now, then, a lesson. Here we are, child: the two of us. Here there are two. Tell me: what's wrong with that?"

Penance's stone face faltered.

"Penance?" Uallas whispered. "What's wrong with that? Tell me. P— please—"

The boy's lips trembled.

"Penance... plea—"

The boy's teeth rattled and he wrinkled his nose. When he shouted the sound was nearly loud enough to rattle the floorboards:

"There can be only one!"

X

X

X

Feet shuffled. Body swayed. Limbs moved.

That was about it, though.

He made his way through the empty house with all the grace of a walking corpse. His vacant eyes stared off into some impossibly infinite distance.

Somewhere. Anywhere, but here.

The boy's feet brushed against a tuft of fur. He stopped walking long enough to look down and gaze in half-comprehension at the little fox head glaring up at him from the floor. He tried bending over to pick it up, but that was too much effort, so he merely fell on his rear and scooped it up in two hands.

He stared at the fox head for some time, his own eyes as glassy as the marbles looking back at him, and then he slowly pressed the thing against his chest, hugging it tight. He rocked his body back and forth, back and forth, casting odd shadows in the dark house.

He didn't know how long he sat there cradling the fox head. Eventually he looked down at the ratty thing, his eyes less glassy.

"R— run," he whispered. "Run..."

Penance nodded and got to his feet. He quickly stuffed the fox head into his shirt. It felt good there. Warm. Not like the knife had been when Uallas laid it against his body. He wedged that little knife into his sock and then stumbled for the door on shaky legs. He managed to get outside.

He had just enough time to see the stars in the night sky before a heavy board slammed into his face. He fell to the ground, and he barely felt the second blow bust open the back of his skull.

X

X

X

The stink of blood and mildew met his nose as he stirred awake. Darkness surrounded him, and with a little effort he realized he was sealed up in a sack. Burlap, from the feel and the smell. His body swayed and rocked with a familiar rhythm. He could hear oars lapping at water, and above the creaks of the small boat he could hear two voices: Abhag and Mister Jungle Cat spoke amongst themselves. Some of what they said was in Gaelic, but much of it was in a strange tongue Penance had no ear for.

He didn't really care what they were talking about, anyway.

The boy felt new bonds on his hands and ankles, but he also felt something else: something the pair missed when restraining him. It was a certain weight in his sock. Penance's eyes narrowed as his fumbling fingers brushed against a certain staghorn hilt.

The boat hit land and was then pulled ashore. His sack was lifted and tossed indelicately on the ground. He felt the top of it being untied, and a moment later he saw starlight above his head.

That's when he struck.

The boy leapt from the bag slashing blindly through the air with his knife. His swings were good enough to catch Mister Jungle Cat clean across the throat, and that was more than enough for him. While Mister Jungle Cat crumpled to his knees, gushing hot blood like a volcano through his severed neck, Abhag leapt back and grabbed an oar off the boat, brandishing it like a lion-tamer might brandish a chair.

Generally speaking chairs aren't enough to protect someone from a lion.

Turns out oars aren't enough to protect someone from a very, very upset immortal child.

Penance managed to get Abhag down on the silty ground beneath them, laid clean on his back. Then he did things to him. It wasn't as clean as Mister Jungle Cat. Not really. In truth, the boy couldn't remember everything he did to the man, for all his anger and his rage.

But he did remember Abhag was alive for most of it.

It was all over in less than sixty seconds. A mere minute. Looking back on it all Penance liked to think that, in the end, Abhag ended up having his greatest wish granted to him.

'Cause that minute must've felt like an eternity.

By the time he was finished he could see torches flickering in the dense trees, coming from the ruined chapel at the island center. Penance's wits returned to him and he dashed off, making for the far side of the island, where he crouched amongst some thick birch trees. When he pressed his body tight against one of them he felt rusty metal jabbing his skin. He blinked in the moonlight, and suddenly realized he was standing before that dead old wishing tree.

Pretty convenient. He had a bunch of wishes to make, now.

Penance huddled up tight against the bushes as pagans shouted and screeched to each other across the island. After a time the commotion died down, although torches still moved all about the bushes and trees. Slowly the boy grew more confident; he looked to the water, gazing across the loch at the far coast. Torridon would be a short distance away. He'd have to move fast, though, to avoid anyone spotting him with a boat—

The boy's blood froze; footsteps sounded on the earth behind him, just on the other side of the wishing tree. There were at least three very heavy sets of feet— thick boots tromping on the ground—and there was another set of footfalls, too, but these were lighter, almost impossibly so. A rugged voice spoke:

"No sign of the Do-bhàis beag, mistress. We'll take the boats out and search the far shore—"

"You will do no such thing."

Nicnevin's frail, elderly voice spoke, but it was different, now. Colder. Sharper, in a way. The woman comported herself very like a queen, Penance remembered, and she certainly spoke like one, now.

"You will go to Letterewe, and you will bring me the other one— that little raven-haired girl."

"And the mother?"

A pause; Penance heard Nicnevin's delicate footsteps on the other side of the tree as she paced.

"Do not hesitate to kill her if she resists you," she snarled.

The woman's feet drew closer to the tree; Penance could hear her fingers brushing against the copper coins on that side of the dead thing.

"Mistress?" The pagan asked. "What is it?"

"I... feel... something..." she whispered. "The Source... stirs... here!"

A narrow blade suddenly thrust clean through a gap in the tree, in concert with a guttural growl from the ancient lady. Moonlight reflected off her weapon's banded metal. It was a strange thing— the sword was liquid-steel, to be certain— but it was also a stubby and fat thing, with decorative strips of polished gold wrapped about the blimpy blade at regular intervals. Penance's first thought was that the whole thing looked a little like an insect's chrysalis.

She pulled her sword out quickly and then clucked her tongue upon finding it clean. Nicnevin handed her weapon to the pagan and ordered him off:

"The Source provides, one way or another, doesn't it? Now bring me the girl!"

The pagan raced off while the elderly lady remained by the tree for a time, watched over by the remaining men. She caressed the tree trunk, remaining absolutely silent, and then wordlessly trod off, making for the ruined chapel with her entourage in tow.

Penance still held his breath. The armpit of his shirt was rent, exposing his skin to the cold loch air. The woman's sword had missed his flesh by a hair's breadth.

"K— k— keenness..." he whispered, shaking his head.

X

X

X

Two days later he lay sprawled in the road, some distance from Torridon. He didn't move, and he didn't speak, either. He only stared at the fox head lying beside him, eyes unblinking. He didn't feel like he could move even if he wanted to.

A cart eventually rumbled over the road. A man and woman sat at the front, and upon seeing Penance there, sprawled on the side of the road, the woman ordered the man to stop. They got out and questioned the boy, but met only silence.

The man waved a hand as he prodded Penance's body with one foot; the boy didn't move in response:

"Not our problem," he grumbled. "Some feeble farmhand who's lost his way, I reckon. We've got to be on!"

The woman cradled Penance's head, glaring up at the man:

"We cannot simply leave him!" She barked. "He'll die alone, out here!"

The man scoffed, running a hand through his balding head:

"Ah, hang it, woman! Put 'im in the back, then, but if he scuffs up any of our wares it's coming out of your budget, missy!"

They dumped Penance in the back of the cart, sheltered amongst bags of goods and rolled up rugs. The woman was kind enough to retrieve his fox head and put it in the cart with him, and as they moved along down the road Penance stared into the thing's vacant black eyes.

"I... wanted to speak," he whispered. "I wanted to tell her: 'here I am'. Wanted to... to protect Struana, and Cadha. But... couldn't. Nothing came out. And... and then I got scared, and..."

The boy buried his face against the fox head, his throat twitching absently.

"Why couldn't I give myself up to her? F— for them?"

The boy considered his own words, and it was only by looking at that fox head that he could voice a response, aloud:

"'Cause... 'cause I do what it takes to survive, huh?" He whispered. "I'm... of a breed... and we do what's necessary to survive..."

Penance considered the words, and he sorely hated them. Only when he looked at the fox head could he even contemplate the words.

They were terrible. And they were awful.

But, then, it was the fox who spoke them in the first place, wasn't it?

So, really, it was okay, wasn't it?

The boy stuffed the fox head back into his shirt, his eyes as cold as tombstones.

"You really are a galla beag, aren't you?" He whispered.

The cart stopped at Torridon and the woman was quick to get to the back to tend to Penance. To both her and the man's surprise, however, the boy leapt down from the cart and met them on the ground.

"Thanks for the ride," he mumbled. "But I'm fine now."

Penance started walking off, but the woman called after him:

"Wait, child: were you lost, or perhaps separated from your own caravan? Are you from down south, maybe? Do you need help getting back into the low country?"

The boy looked back at the pair and shook his head:

"No," he whispered. "I'm a highlander."