Kovren
She saved my life twice in four days. Saw the berserker and didn't run.
I don't understand her. The not-understanding has become a constant ache, like the wounds on my chest, like the years of hunting that live in my bones.
We left Gorvani at dawn, slipping out through the back gate while the village was still cleaning up the wreckage from last night.
Harren watched us go with relief written plain across his face.
He didn't say goodbye. Didn't thank her for the lives she saved.
Just watched the monster leave and probably prayed we'd never come back.
I can't blame him. I'd pray the same thing.
The road unwinds through farmland gone wild, fields that haven't been tended in years slowly being reclaimed by forest. The sky is gray and low, threatening rain, and the wind carries the smell of coming winter.
She walks beside me. Not behind, not ahead.
Beside. We've found our pace over the last five days, her two strides to each of mine, and she doesn't ask me to slow down.
Just keeps moving, that stubborn set to her jaw that I'm beginning to recognize as the way she looks when she's decided something and won't be argued out of it.
My cloak is wrapped around her shoulders, knotted at her waist to keep the extra length from tangling her legs. She's belted her pack over the top of it, the straps pulling the wool taut across her chest. It looks ridiculous. She doesn't seem to care.
I feel different this morning. Lighter. The fever burned itself out during the fight, and my body is fully mine again. No infection dragging at my blood, no heat blurring my thoughts. My wounds ache, but it's a clean ache. Healing, not festering.
She did that. All of it. And paid for it. There's a bruise darkening along her jaw from where the creature threw her, and she's favoring her left shoulder after she hit the ground. She hasn't mentioned it. Hasn't slowed down.
I steal a glance at her. She barely comes up to my ribs. I could lose her in a crowd, lose sight of her entirely if I wasn't paying attention.
My chest clenches.
“You're staring.”
I look away. “Apologies.”
“Don't apologize. Just ask.”
“Ask what?”
“Whatever you're trying to figure out by looking at me.” She adjusts her pack, winces at the way the fresh supplies from Gorvani dig into her shoulders. Bandages, herbs, two new bottles of alcohol, food for two. “I can practically hear you thinking.”
“Brother,” I say. “Last night. It called me brother.”
“I heard.”
“You want to know the story.”
“Only if you want to tell it.” She keeps walking, her eyes on the road ahead. “You don't owe me your history just because I stitched you up a few times.”
“I owe you more than history.” The words come out before I can stop them. “I owe you my life. Twice. And you're still here, walking beside me toward something that wants to kill us both. The least I can give you is the truth.”
She's quiet for a moment. Then she nods, a small motion, and waits.
The words are there, all of them, pressed into me like scar tissue, and I don't know where to start.
“The stronghold,” I begin. “That's where it started. Where I was made, in a way. Where all of us were made.”
“Us?”
“The Bogatyr. My order.” The word tastes like ash. “We were guardians. Protectors. We swore oaths to defend the weak, to stand between the darkness and those who couldn't stand for themselves. There were more of us, once. A full order. Dozens of strongholds across the mountains.”
“And now?”
“Now there are fewer. The order is scattered. Some strongholds still hold. Most don't.” I watch the road ahead, the wild fields, the crumbling walls. “But the one where I trained, where I grew up. That was the heart of it. The oldest. The strongest.”
She's listening. Not interrupting, not asking questions, just walking beside me and letting me find the words at my own pace. Her head tilts back occasionally to glance up at me, and each time I see the angle she has to hold to meet my eyes.
I slow my pace further. She doesn't seem to notice.
“Rodvek was there.”
The name. I held it back in Gorvani. Wasn't ready. Now it comes out like something dislodged, sharp-edged and tasting of copper.
“We grew up together, trained together, took our oaths on the same day.” I can still see his face, the way it looked before the rage twisted it.
Sharp features, quick smile, eyes that always seemed to be laughing at a joke no one else had heard yet.
“He was better than me. Faster, smarter, more disciplined.
The masters said he'd lead the order someday.”
“What happened?”
“I happened.” The guilt is old, but it still cuts.
“There was a village. Two days' ride from the stronghold.
We got word that raiders were coming, that the people there had no way to defend themselves.
I wanted to go. Rodvek said to wait for reinforcements, but I couldn't stop thinking about the children. About what would happen if we waited too long.”
“So you went.”
“I went. Alone. Against orders.” I can still smell the smoke, still hear the screaming. “I got there in time. Barely. The raiders were already at the gates when I arrived.”
“And?”
This is the part I've never said aloud. The part I've carried for eight years, the weight of it grinding into my bones.
“I went berserker.”
She doesn't flinch. Doesn't slow her pace. Just keeps walking, waiting.
“To save them. That's what I told myself. The raiders were too many, and I was one man, and the only way to stop them was to let the rage loose.” My hands are shaking. I fold them into fists, try to still them. “It worked. The raiders died. Every single one of them.”
“But?”
“But when I came back to myself...”
The words stick in my throat.
“There were bodies that weren't raiders. Villagers. People I'd come to save. And I don't... I don't know if I killed them. Don't remember. The berserker doesn't leave clean memories.”
She stops walking.
I stop too, bracing myself for the horror, the revulsion, the moment when she finally sees me clearly and turns away.
She turns toward me. Has to tilt her head back to find my eyes. But she holds my gaze, gray eyes steady, searching.
“You don't know,” she says. “Whether you killed them.”
“No.”
“But you've been punishing yourself for it anyway.”
“I was covered in blood.”
“That doesn't mean you killed them.” Her voice is sharper now, edged with anger.
Not at me. At the story. “Raiders kill villagers.
That's what they do. You could have found them already dead.
You could have been trying to protect them and failed.
There are explanations that don't involve you murdering the people you came to save.”
“You don't understand.”
“Then make me understand.”
I stare down at her. This small, stubborn woman with her tired eyes and her absolute refusal to let me be the monster I know I am. The top of her head doesn't clear my shoulder.
She's standing there, demanding that I see myself the way she sees me.
“The berserker doesn't care,” I say. “It doesn't distinguish between enemy and innocent.
When the rage takes me, everything is just meat.
Obstacles. Things to be destroyed. I've felt it, Maren. Felt the urge to tear through everything in my path without caring what it was. The only reason I come back is because some part of me is still fighting, still trying to hold on. But if I lost that grip, even for a moment...”
“But you didn't.”
“I don't know that.”
“I do.” She steps closer. Inside the safety margin I've been keeping, close enough that I could touch her without reaching. “You came back. Whatever happened in that village, however bad it was, you came back. That means something.”
“It means I was lucky.”
“It means you're stronger than you think.” Her hand comes up, stretching to press her palm over my heart. Even on her toes, her arm is almost fully extended. “What you do when you come back. The choices you make when you're yourself. That's what defines you.”
I want to believe her. Want it so badly my heart aches with it.
“While I was gone,” I say, because she deserves the rest of it, deserves to know the full weight of what I've done. “While I was in that village, losing myself to the rage, the stronghold was attacked.”
Her hand stills against my chest.
“Rodvek was there. He tried to hold the line, tried to give the others time to escape. But there were too many, and he was alone, and he did the only thing he could think of.”
“He went berserker.”
“Yes.” The word comes out broken. “He went berserker to save them. Just like I did. But he never came back.”
“Never?”
“The stronghold fell. Almost everyone died. And Rodvek... the part of him that was my oath-brother, my friend... that part drowned in the rage and never surfaced. What's left is the thing you saw last night.”
She doesn't speak for a long moment. Her hand is still on my chest, warm through the fabric of my shirt.
“That's why you're hunting him,” she says. “Not to kill him.”
“I've tried. He doesn't die. The oath keeps him trapped in that body, keeps him suffering.” My voice cracks on the last word. “I'm hunting him because I have to find a way to end it. To free him. To give him the peace he deserves.”
“And you've been doing this alone. For eight years.”
“Who else would help me? Who else would look at that thing and see anything worth saving?”
Her fingers curl against my chest, gripping the fabric of my shirt. The stretch is hard to hold. I should step back. Should give her space.
Instead, I kneel.
The motion brings me level with her. She doesn't have to crane her neck. Doesn't have to stretch to reach me. We're eye to eye, and the surprise softens into warmth.
“I would.” She says it low, but there's steel in it. “You've been carrying this alone. Fighting your brother, fighting yourself. And you're still here. Still trying. Still hoping there's a way to save him.”