We were running through the streets but this time without a destination. For now we just wanted to get as far away from the soldiers and the horrible scene we just witnessed.

And then…

My sides were hurting and my heart rate was far too high to be healthy, it was not only the exertion from the extensive running but also the hopelessness of the situation. This time we didn't care if anyone saw us, as long as it were only fleeing citizens, but their numbers had dwindled, as more and more soldiers entered this side of the city.

We finally came to a halt; the river had come into view before us, the raging fire reflected by its rain disturbed surface. There was a bridge that was not yet blocked by enemy forces, a small scrawny thing made of wood and splinter, but there was no need to cross it, was there? On the other side only awaited doom, we could try to hide somewhere, but the fire soon would smoke us out.

My eyes were burning, despite the heavy rain smoke was wafting on this side of the city, making my eyes sting and the air heavy to breath. A single lonely tear fell down my cheek and was swallowed by the ever falling rain. My heart ached as it had never ached before, in my mind replayed the last image of Mathias I had seen and that would be the last image of him I would ever see in my life. The worried expression in his eyes as he looked back right at the moment when he reached the space between the two houses, locking his eyes on mine, and I could just see that he would have come back any moment just to get me, to make sure that I would be safe. But then the woman had appeared and he was pulled deeper into the darkness, his eyes never leaving mine until he was gone.

It was hard to accept that I would never see him again. And not only him, I would never get to see Emil playing with his puffin again, or Tino's smile that rivaled the sun and even Arthur whom I had known for nothing more than a day but who I had grown to deeply respect.

"We need to get to the palace." Francis interrupted my self-absorption, with the most ridiculous statement ever. I looked at him and was seriously wondering if he had lost his mind. And only then did I realize that my companions were in a similar situation than me.

Francis was pale, his clothes were a mess and his hands were rhythmically clenching and unclenching, but his eyes were shining through the rain with mad determination. Berwalds was the same; he clutched the talisman I had made for him not so long ago in his hand, the pale blond strand of Tino was darkened by the rain but it still contrasted against the surrounding hair. He carried a similar determined expression on his face.

We all had someone we wanted nothing more than get back to.

And maybe Francis wasn't so crazy at all, maybe he had a plan.

"There is a secret passageway that leads from the palace to an abandoned farmhouse outside of the city, the place is supposed to be haunted so no one goes there anymore. But I don't know where the entry is on this side, Arthur and I discovered the exit by accident but we never dared to open the door at the other end."

And there it was, hope, hope that maybe just maybe we had a chance to get out of here and see our loved ones again. Even if only a little, it was enough. "How do we get there?" I asked, and we exchanged glances, I could read on their faces that we all though the same thing. No matter how impossible it seemed, we would try, because this was our only hope.

"The palace is not yet on fire." Berwald, the tallest one of us, informed us and we hunched back down, bringing our faces close together to form a plan.

It was desperate but we were all ready to bet our life on this only chance, and so we set out again into the shadows of the night, crossing the bridge as silent shadows, into the pure chaos that reigned on the other side. The air had been cold and biting where we came from but on this side it was warm, almost comfortable. The stars were gone, erased by the shining light of the fire that still raged on, despite the rain.

The streets were full of people, most of them dead, some dying, some living and too many of them soldiers who were killing and raping, but thankfully, mercifully most of them were looting and plundering, to absorbed into their greed than to pay attention to us.

Still it was a hellish chase through the burning city. The temperature rose the closer we came to the palace, buildings had tumbled down and blocked most of the available paths, while new one had been formed by the fire that had burned away some houses completely. At this close range I realized that I had never before seen flames like this, they were dark red, almost crimson, and they were too hot to be ordinary flames. But then again that had been clear from the moment on when the rain didn't stop the fire.

We were now in a completely deserted part of the city, fire was everywhere; no one in their right mind would go there. On the ground lied corpses burned, or covered with blood next to pieces of destroyed carriages and carts, furniture and everything else their owners tried to save from the flames. A sick feeling was forming in my stomach at the sight, it smelled faintly of burned flesh and death. Some of the bodys had been once children, I had to avert my eyes or else I would have thrown up. I had never felt so dirty in my life.

Some of the corpses even seemed to have been soldiers; the wounds that brought them down were crude, as if they had been hit with something blunt and sheer force.

The air was almost impossible to breath, and we had to press pieces of wet cloth against our mouths and noses to prevent us from suffocating. Not even the rain was able to wash the thick smoke out of the air. And it was unbearable hot.

Berwald had stopped at one of the soldier corpses and pulled a sword from under the body that was probably a good idea. Though before I could look for a weapon for myself a loud 'creak' echoed through the night, its sound audible even against the roaring of the flames and I froze in place. The building to our left was close to collapsing, the foundation was almost completely eaten away by the flames. It was already slanting and if we didn't get moving that instant we would be crushed beneath it.

"RUN." I yelled and sprinted in the only direction that was still comparable free of obstacles, flames were lashing out at me and I didn't have time to check if the others were following. A burning piece of wood tumbled down and I had to jump out of its way to avoid being hit.

A loud crash sounded and then I felt the blast of hot air, created by the collapsing building behind me, against my back. I kept running, and for a moment the roar of the flames almost seemed quiet compared to the earlier noise. And then to my immense relief I heard the sound of footsteps behind me, sturdy and heavy ones, belonging to Berwald, and lighter ones that made more of a clacking sound that belonged to Francis.

Sweat was running down my face, mingling with the rain and the salty liquid stung in my eyes, but we were still surrounded by flames, so despite my hurting eyes and legs, despite the throbbing pain that I still felt in my hands I ran, and then eventually we were out of the inferno. I came to a skidding halt at the beginning of a sloped street, taking deep breaths of the fresh rain flavored night air.

We had reached the foot of the palace hill. Although it was an exaggeration to call it a hill, it was really more of a slow outstretched bump.

Francis was coughing violently, trying to get the smoke out of his lungs, and I could feel it too, the burning itch against the back of my throat. Berwald clenched his sword, there was soot on his face and in his hair, but I probably looked the same. We all did, actually.

We were exhausted, almost at our limit, but we didn't have time to rest. The road before us was still empty and the fire had not yet reached the houses of the nobles that surrounded the palace, but it was evident from the sounds that came from there that there was already plundering and worse going on. It was only a matter of time until the soldiers had finished with looting valuables and started the destruction.

We didn't have any more time left.

But none of us had the strength left to run, the bags we were carrying, as light as they had initially seemed had grown heavier and heavier with every minute and the strap now cut into my shoulder, but I was too exhausted to bother with changing the side.

The power boost that had fueled me with energy was worn off, and now I had to drag myself forward. The others didn't fare any better, Francis was no longer coughing but his breath was labored and his face was contorted with pain and Berwald, albeit carrying on with a stoic expression was clearly suffering from exhaustion too, and the hand that gripped the sword was shaking ever so slightly. He had put the charm back into his pocket to protect it, but occasionally his hand would pat the spot through the fabric of his coat.

And of course the rain was draining us of our energy, our clothes soaked through and now that we had left the part of the city that was burning, the air had become cold again and I had started to shiver violently.

Only willpower kept us going, the burning wish to be reunited with the others, to not give up and see the light of morning again.

But at some point we had to leave the easy path of the street and sneak through the back yards of the wealthy houses that lined the road. The closer we came to the palace the more and more soldiers we had to dodge. At first they hadn't paid much attention to their surroundings, the wealth that could be found inside of the houses that grew bigger the farther we came, was too promising to care for anything else.

Occasionally a scream would echo through the night, when the soldiers had found another victim who had tried to hide but had been found. I didn't try to think about what they were doing to them, what the soldiers back then had done to the helpless woman right before our eyes. But I couldn't get rid of the images that flowered in my mind at every new scream of pain or fear that was sounding through the air.

By then there were guards standing outside, keeping an eye out in the area, while their comrades were plundering and doing probably much worse. And there close to the palace gates that appeared to be barred, they were gathering, preparing for an attack on the palace and with that, effectively blocking our way.

My heart had sunk at the view, maybe there was a back entrance, but with all those people between our position and the palace grounds there was low hope of getting there, even if we'd actually knew where to look.

We were hiding behind a group of trimmed bushes in the once lavish back yard of an especially noble looking mansion. The brick wall that surrounded the house had been overgrown with vines so it had been fairly easy to climb over it. From where we were hiding we couldn't really see what was going on outside, but we needed a moment to catch our breaths and revise our strategy.

But in truth the situation was pretty much hopeless. So far the premises had already been searched, the house was dark and silent, the gate and door broken, windows shattered, so we were pretty much safe here, but that didn't mean it would stay like this.

Most likely this part would soon burn like the rest of the city. We had to get out of here, but there was too much commotion to have any real hope of sneaking through. And even if by some miraculous chance, we managed to reach the palace, what then? The gates were closed and since the enemy soldiers didn't look like they were able to break through, what chance did we have? And we would still have to find the entrance to the hidden passage, and that could be anywhere.

No, this plan had been impossible to begin with, but we just didn't want to accept the inevitability of our situation. I sat back down into the wet grass, not caring that the grass would leave stains on my coat or that more water got soaked into my already wet clothes.

It didn't really matter anymore at this point.

"What now?" whispered Francis; the hopelessness was evident in his voice too. When even Francis, the only one of us who lived in this city, who had at least been to the palace, didn't have any idea how to get in, there was truly no hope left. Berwald seemed to be in deep thought; his brows were furrowed in concentration as he tried to come with a plan. But even he couldn't think of something.

"Hey what are you doing, who are you?" A voice spoke from behind us, a rough voice with an all too familiar thick accent. Berwald reacted faster than I had ever seen anyone move; he spun around, a silver flash soaring through the air, followed by red and then the soldier who had spotted us fell on his knees, the short sword in his hand slid out of his grasp, landing in the wet grass, a surprised expression on his face as he looked at the red flower that bloomed on his chest.

He looked up at us, his mouth moving as if he tried to say something but no sound was coming out, he raised his hand to cover the wound on his chest, as if to try to close it again, but the blood continued flowing, painting his gloved fingers red as the liquid seeped through the fabric. He made another attempt to speak but again there was no voice and then he fell forward, the life drained out of him by the lethal wound that Berwald had inflicted on him, face first into the wet muddy grass.

Maybe I should have felt something, remorse or even sympathy for the nameless soldiers who had died at our hands, but I didn't. When Mathias had killed that man at our escape I had been shocked and distressed and it took a while until I had come to terms with it, but this time I didn't feel anything, because this time, even more than the last time, I knew that it had been necessary. He would have killed us if Berwald hadn't acted; I was surprised that he didn't actually kill us the moment he saw us. We had our backs to him, we wouldn't even have noticed before it had been too late. And he had a sword, so he hadn't been unarmed.

I looked down on his form; the pale moonlight barely illuminating his form, he looked so young; he couldn't have been much older than Emil, almost a child. But still I felt nothing.

He wore a different uniform than Ludwig and his troop had, but they had tried to pose as bandits, while this one was on an official mission from his country. The Orushian sigil was embroidered onto his chest and on the shoulders of his dark grey uniform was a single white stripe, indicating his rank, even though I didn't know what the symbol meant.

Berwald was kneeling beside him; he had turned him around and was now searching his clothes for anything of value, while Francis was looking out for any more surprises like that. Both were as indifferent to what we had just done as I was. By then we were all past caring. As I watched Berwalds hands move on the lifeless body, his sword lied forgotten on the ground, the blood was already washed away by the rain; I unexpectedly had an idea.

It was a crazy idea, that most likely wouldn't work and end up in our deaths, but then again we would mostly die nevertheless if we did nothing. There was not really much to lose.

"I have an idea." I announced, and the hope that had suddenly returned on Francis' and Berwalds faces was almost too much to bear. As dangerous as my idea was it still provided a chance and they, as much as I, were desperate enough to clutch at every piece of straw, as thin as it might have been.

And maybe, just maybe it would be enough.

...

A/N: So is anyone interested in what the others are up to? If yes, I might write a chapter on their own little adventure, even though I don't really know what they are doing in the moment, but I'm sure I can think of something.