Chapter 2

Three days later, I arrived in Ashford.

It was called a village, but in reality, only about thirty households remained, crammed together on both sides of a muddy main road. I hid behind the bushes at the edge of the woods to observe, too afraid to enter the village.

My left eye hasn't recovered yet. The black stuff in the white of my eye has faded a bit, but my vision is still intermittent. To make matters worse, I'm getting more and more sensory feedback from the rats—I can taste the rotting flesh they've been eating, and I can hear them crawling in the cracks in the wall when I lie down.

The church bells are still ringing in my ears. Last night, while I was camping out, I saw a troop of cavalry carrying torches pass by on the eastern ridge. They were searching the mountains.

I pulled my hood tighter.

Then I heard a scream.

At the village entrance, five cavalrymen were dragging a middle-aged man out of a thatched hut. He wore a brown uniform with an iron fist holding an ear of wheat sewn onto his chest—the Ashmore family's grain requisition team.

The scarred man at the head of the group trampled the middle-aged man into the mud: "You owe three months' wages!"

"It's all...there's nothing left...the children haven't eaten for three days..."

"Then let them starve to death." The scarred man waved his hand. "Search."

The cavalrymen began kicking down the door. There were sounds of things being ransacked, women screaming, and children crying.

A cavalryman dragged out a half-full sack of rye: "Found it! Hidden in the cellar!"

"Those are for seeds...please..." The middle-aged man clutched the scarred man's boots. "Without seeds, we can't plant anything next year...we'll starve..."

The scarred man kicked him in the face.

The middle-aged man's head struck a rock, he twitched a few times, and then lay still. Blood spread across the muddy ground.

The villagers hid behind the door, watching silently.

A cavalryman charged into the house at the village entrance and saw me.

"Anyone still alive? Come out here!"

He reached out and grabbed my collar.

I grabbed his wrist.

The cavalryman hesitated for a second. I pushed him away. He fell to the ground, his sword sliding out of his waist with a piercing sound.

Hey scarred man, look over here.

"You?" He narrowed his eyes, glancing at the herbal stains on my hands. "A pharmacist?"

He spat.

“This is none of your business,” I said. “Put down the food.”

There was a moment of silence. Then they laughed.

“Did you hear that?” The scarred man walked up to me. “He told us to put down the food.”

He poked my chest with the tip of his sword: "These farmers are the lord's property, this grain is tax, and you—have no right to speak."

My left eye started to swell.

I can sense them. The rats are gathering underground, awaiting orders. The cavalry that searched the mountains last night are probably still nearby. If I use my abilities now, rats within a radius of miles will respond. The beacon towers will be lit, and the pursuers will pinpoint my location.

The scarred man lost his patience: "Last chance—get out of here, or die."

The sound of horses' hooves could be heard in the distance.

There's more than one group. There are some to the east, and some to the south. They're all moving towards us.

"Captain," a cavalryman said, looking at the dust rising in the distance, "what's that?"

The scarred man squinted.

In the dust, a troop of cavalry in grey robes approached. Not Ashmore's brown uniforms—they were the Church's knights of judgment. The leader carried a banner of holy light, and a golden sun was branded on his breastplate.

They are searching the area.

They are looking for me.

If I were to act now—

The ground began to tremble.

It was not my order.

It was a nosebleed. Dark red blood gushed from the nasal cavity and dripped onto the ground. The rats smelled the blood, smelled the call of their true master—they surged forth from the ground.

The warhorses reared up, and the cavalrymen fell to the ground.

The rats overwhelmed them like a black tide. They climbed onto boots and scurried into the gaps in armor. Screams and the clash of swords mingled together.

The scarred man slumped to the ground, his face deathly pale.

"You...you are..."

He didn't finish speaking.

He was overwhelmed by the rats.

I pressed my sleeve to my nose, forcing myself to concentrate and stop the swarm of rats. With each rat that stopped, my headache worsened. The last few rats emerged from the scarred man's mouth—he was no longer breathing.

The hoofbeats of the knights of judgment were approaching. They could see the dust, and they could see the crows.

I turned around.

The villagers were still in the shadows. An old woman emerged; she was blind, but she could sense everything that was happening.

“They won’t let this village go,” she said, her voice hoarse. “Child, go. Your strength… is not enough to save us.”

She gave me a push.

"It's endless. Grain requisition teams like this come seven or eight times a month. We'll just have to live as long as we can."

The villagers didn't look at me. They began looting the cavalryman's belongings, fighting over his armor and money pouches.

I stood in the center of the village, my front soaked with blood from my nose. The black substance in my left eye spread again, obscuring half of my vision.

The sound of horses' hooves grew closer.

I turned around and ran towards the mountains outside the village.