Surprised that these never became the new "tactician" fics in terms of sheer ubiquity. Not crossovers per se, but when Ike skips town it basically gives you a blank check to take it wherever you want! Greener pastures! New horizons! Exploits weird and wonderful! Encounters strange and spectacular! Semi-justifiable gratuitous self-insert OCs! (No, I won't do this). Anyway, I'll try not to bore you with unnecessary A/Ns. There are just a few points worth mentioning:

- Yes, FE6/7 are half SRPGs, half army kid dating sims. I chose the pairings I did to best fit the story and not my personal preferences (far from it, actually)

- POV skipping abounds, but not within chapters, and it will only focus on a few central characters.

- I won't hide the fact that this is largely the answer to a score of questions that begin with "Wouldn't it be cool if..." It's very visceral, fangirl/fanboyish fare. No, I have no shame!

- Post FE10 and FE6. Will somehow manage to throw out more spoilers for FE7 than FE6, 9 and 10 combined.

- Bad jokes.

- Even worse titling gimmick.

That said, I hope you enjoy.

(And I am loving how FFn's getting bugged to hell and back. I picked a good day to write things.)

Distant Travels

He must have been drunk. A sickening flutter whirred at the back of his eyes; no matter how hard he squeezed them shut, that swaying sensation persisted unabated. He heard snatches of his sister's voice, perhaps from within or outside his head—"why would you do this to us?" in what sounded to be exasperation. He must have done something tasteless in his sister's company. Her words fell into a string of mutters before a low chorus joined her in collective disapproval.

Mud clung to his cheek. It smelled fetid and sweet at once—fertile, almost. Mist's whispering died gradually, as gradually as the fog cleared from his head; now all he heard was a deep, protracted sigh. He struggled to lift himself, sucking in cold air to combat the upsurge of nausea. Opening his eyes, he was met by a towering cliffside swinging overhead as he fell back onto his stomach, limp as a beached fish. His ears thumped with coursing blood as it rushed back into his head. Throbbed against his eyelids, his temples.

By the time the overwhelming sickliness subsided, he'd gathered that he'd been washed up on a shore somewhere. The looming seaside cliffs obscured half the sky, another half veiled in a thick layer of cloud. There was the quiet stretch of confusion, then, as he pushed himself onto his knees, a flash of panic. Memories flooded back too quickly to process all at once.

The gray-green ocean swelling with the wind, thunderheads mounting on the horizon—"we shall evade or withstand the storm, no differently than the others"—the rigging snapping and collapsing like a tower of twigs, sails tearing from the spars, spray whipping onto the deck and into their eyes, the floor beneath them lurching with a painful groan. He remembered the certainty of his own death, and the subsequent calm. A talon-like, trembling vice on his arm—"I am not afraid" shouted over the angry tempest, his voice as shaken as his hands—"I will follow you", before their vessel began to capsize, and they threw themselves over the side. Plunging into the belly of the sea, they clung to each other like the frightened children that they were, because for all their insistences that they would face death with dignity, at that cusp between consciousness and unreality, time and time again Ike felt his courage waver. He opened his eyes to an icy void, burning saltwater, and their ship sinking, falling apart and into the murk as if swallowed by the chasmal, toothless mouth of some deep-sea leviathan. That was his last memory.

So. Was he dead, then? He drew himself to his feet, dizzily, as his legs and head had not accustomed themselves to solid ground.

On either side of him, the shoreline snaked in the shadow of the mountainside—a soaring, endless vista of rock and mineral. No birdcalls, no human voice, no reassuring whispers from his heavenly observers. Barren but for the wash of waves and sloping sand, dimmed with the overcast. He had no time to contemplate the horrible weight of this isolation, nor the chafing from his soaked, salt-starched leggings, nor the inevitable fate of starvation that awaited him, for it was then that he'd come to aching realization: he had lost his friend.

How long had they been at sea, he wondered, eyes fallen to his feet as he dragged them through the wave-wetted sand. It had been all the same for about an hour now—the water mild, but the air cold, the glossy coastline yielding to his heavy, waterlogged boots. For all the endless expanse, he felt imprisoned. He lifted his gaze to the horizon; a crack of light escaped through the cloud sheet, like daylight through a prison wall. He'd only had fleeting experiences with prisons, but thought the comparison apt.

Pungent piles of kelp and sediment littered the shore; he sank his foot into one, raising a cloud of insects that swirled about his ankle. His staff officer—no, they no longer belonged to the company—his navigator had once told him of a people said to live many lives over, at times reborn as snakes and worms and other such objects of their contempt. His companion dismissed them in the same breath he'd mentioned them, yet the notion staved off Ike's loneliness for the time. He trudged from heap to buzzing heap, mindless of the approaching stormclouds as they crept inland. The sand darkened ahead of him, and his thoughts turned again to his friend.

Dead? Weren't they both? Perhaps Soren had survived their trial by water, and he had not. This was death: a singular, endless path with no destination or egress. A lonely, soggy march through oblivion.

His sodden shirt chafed him enough to remove it in spite of the chill, though he kept his trousers. He would soon have to forgo this restrictive adherence to modesty, but decided against it; he'd tried once they were out at sea, but his companion would have none of it. And once he woke from this oppressive dream—or reached the light-crowned gates to the afterlife, or whatever—Soren would reward him for his restraint, though Ike was unsure whether souls were bound to the same corporeal appetites as the living.

In any case he had determined himself to be alive, if only for a time. His stomach felt cavernous; he placed a hand to his gut as his eyes roved the weedy crests for a flicker of life. They had a deadly smell about them, but he would have rather died stuffing his face than starving. As he knelt and dug his fingers in the heap, he studied the dotting of refuse ahead. Subtle enough to slip past his notice, a pile heaved, as though an animal had nested itself in the seagrass. Then it settled, and Ike took notice.

He stood and advanced slowly, breathlessly absorbed, watching for a telltale twitch of life. It shifted again. Perhaps it was the wind, Ike considered, but it was not compelling enough an idea to give him pause. His pulse flitted in his throat, beating harder with every step; he could not contain the sudden burst of adrenaline and the dulling of his senses as he crashed to the ground beside the shape. It blended with the bed of kelp—his hair took on the color of moss in a certain light, after all, his garment dark, but the pattern of the fringe and lining were unmistakable. With a trembling hand, Ike slowly turned his companion onto his back. The insects that had made their home in the hair and robe scattered like a spray of dirt.

"Soren?"

In that moment of dread, that thick, hanging stillness, his friend was completely lifeless. Though a part of him was in denial, too frightened to ascertain his death, Ike reached out to touch his face, then just behind the jaw. It was warm to the touch; blood throbbed beneath his fingers. Against his better judgment, he moved closer anyway, feeling along his neck, and then taking his hand and pressing his thumb against the artery there—and then against the arm, and then his chest, his stomach, the soft depression between his hips. There he felt a sort of ridge beneath his robes; a knife in its scabbard? As he began to undo the sash to investigate, the body underneath him stirred. There was a groan, then a pregnant, breathless silence as the both of them were caught unawares.

"Ike?"

He was overcome with the swelling urge to gather him against his chest and crush the breath out of him. The voice was familiar as ever, cracked from thirst and tinged with irritation, his eyes a bold contrast against the black-gray muddiness of his kelp bed, but rather than persist, Ike sank back into a sitting position. Soren struggled to rise and meet him, but it was a labored, fruitless effort. His clothes and hair had soaked through, weighed him down.

"Take it easy, there." Ike swallowed back the merriment bubbling up in his chest, but a single, incredulous laugh escaped. They were alive. He was grinning like a madman; it hurt his cheeks.

"How long have I been asleep?" Soren muttered, closing his eyes; then, upon opening them: "where is your shirt?"

In lieu of a proper answer, Ike leaned in to brace Soren with a hand on his back. Their surroundings would speak for him; he could not endeavor to do the same. He lifted his navigator, seaweed dangling in clumps from his back, and gave him a moment to let the sudden rush of blood settle. He seemed to relax in his arms, took one look at the ocean, and closed his eyes once more.

"Are we dead?"

His voice carried not a hint of disquiet.

"No." Ike surprised himself with his own hoarseness. "I don't think so. I hope not."

"Why is that?"

The way he asked it so readily should have been cause for concern, but neither were thinking straight at the time.

"I'm starving."

Just as he spoke, he became aware of the cold droplets prickling along his broad back; the rain was closing in. He also felt Soren quaking against his chest with what could have been quiet, rumbling laughter at his answer—barely perceptible, almost catlike in that it could only be felt and not heard. Or he was going to vomit, but he appeared to have spilled the contents of his stomach long before.

"I see," Soren finally answered, and with a trembling hand on Ike's arm, motioned for them both to stand. His sea legs hadn't left him, but he found his poise quicker than Ike had expected. Straightening himself, he examined his robe and disdainfully peeled away a weed.

"Where to now, navigator?"

"Where is our ship, captain?" Soren came back sourly.

More silence. By now Soren appeared thoroughly disgusted with their filth and their situation, but Ike reveled in the company. At length, he spoke again, this time with a scoff.

"I see. Which direction did you come from?"

Ike nodded to the faint trail of footprints that followed him; the wash had almost filled in his tracks completely.

"Very well. Then let us continue."

"You're the boss."

Soren did not return him so much as a glance, but Ike felt that he was smiling.

"Say, I've been meaning to ask you something."

For all the menace of the stormclouds that loomed overhead, they were met with no more than a drizzle and some distant, angry mumblings that warned of a storm that would never reach them. The savage torrents that had carried them here likely passed as quickly as they arrived. At least, that was what Ike liked to believe.

"What is it?" Soren spoke through his teeth, as he often did when interrupted mid-thought. Though his more ill-tempered habits were beginning to resurface as the reality of their situation sank in, there was also a visible effort to restrain himself. In an act of surprisingly routine generosity he had given Ike his outer cloak, which fit around snugly and came up to his calves. Though it was soaked through, as was everything else that they wore before the sea spat them up, Ike gladly accepted the little protection it offered.

"I was wondering whether it's possible to cast magic without, you know, tomes."

"For some reason I feel I've explained this to you before."

Ike responded with an expectant silence, as though urging him to continue. Soren fell quiet for a moment as they continued onward, with Ike trailing behind; he stopped abruptly.

"How do I describe it… think of tomes as containers for an immense concentration of energy from which you draw. The incantations serve as a means of opening the container—they allow you to call upon the magic at will. It's for this reason that tome-making is a very exacting, laborious pursuit. The sheer mass of the energy far exceeds the scope or dimension of the pages, yet to here is where you store it, and from here is where you refine it. Does that make sense?"

More unsure than impatient, he glanced back for affirmation.

"Sure, but that doesn't answer my question," Ike said. Soren bristled and resumed their trek down the coastline.

"Conjuring without a tome would require an enormous reserve of magical power," he continued, spreading his hands as to gesture the immensity. "Moreover, one must possess intimate knowledge of the incantations; one must be able to recite them from a vast, exhaustive lexicon that very few humans would naturally acquire over the course of a single lifetime. He himself becomes keeper of an arcane lore… and the vessel to a volatile, treacherous might."

His words sunk like a great weight in the air; they went on in silence as Ike watched his back contemplatively. Finally, he spoke up.

"So, can you do it?"

"Possibly." He frowned, seemingly to suppress a smirk. "But I would avoid any situation that calls for it. Do you fear for our safety?"

He stopped and turned this time, drawing his narrow robe closer around his chest. Ike could see the outline of the scabbard on his hip. They were otherwise unarmed; with the weight of Ike's broadsword, it sank like a stone and had surely been lost to the sea. The stockpile of tomes that Soren had insisted upon bringing had disappeared with the wreckage as well, and were he and Ike to somehow fall upon them washed along the shore miles away, they'd been drenched beyond salvation.

"Don't worry," Soren said quickly, leaving no room for response. "We'll find us something to eat, somehow. If it comes down to it, the herbs in my satchel are edible." He thumbed the pouch sewn into the lining of his robe. "They're little more than pulp now, but they're edible. And those cliffs—" He indicated them with a nod. "Those are home to a host of seabirds. They may fly down to feed, which will be good for a time, but if we can somehow force one to hunt for us..."

"Soren. I'm not hungry anymore," Ike reassured him. "My stomach's gone numb, if I had to describe it."

Soren wordlessly accepted this, but as they pressed forward, his gnawing hunger came to be replaced by a faint nausea, and the very thought of food only sickened him further. He wondered how long the both of them had been unconscious. At length, he began distracting himself with idle conversation.

"Rain's coming in harder," he observed.

"A windfall in more than one sense," added Soren, though he hardly seemed pleased with the weather.

"Why's that?"

It had grown darker now. The sun burned on the rim of the sea, scattering shoots of light across the cloud cover and cliffside. Their shadows stretched up the face of the dunes, hunched and deformed and fading with the light.

"We'd sooner die of thirst than chill or starvation. The latter two can be avoided easily enough, granted you've a friend who's willing to share himself." He slid Ike a sly smile. Gallows humor—or suggestive humor, but Soren tended towards the first. Ike wasn't sure which he preferred. Dismissing the thought, he tipped his head back and let the rainfall gather on his tongue. It tasted "raw"—purer than drawn water, shimmering in the dying, seaward sunbeams. It woke him from his heady numbness.

They didn't know when they would next come upon a source of fresh water. Their reserves were gone: both the water and the wine. They'd benefit little from falling upon their wreckage, aside from validation that they had certainly survived the storm—a pouring squall that, ironically, could rescue them from imminent thirst. Ike wondered why Soren hadn't mirrored his small bid for survival and drunk from the skies.

"Ike."

A subduing arm brought him to a halt; he looked down at Soren quizzically, then ahead.

"Is that—"

Its jagged outline stark against the fading light, Ike saw a set of wooden stairs that led up an outcropping—on which a cottage perched, a looming silhouette that overlooked the sea. Ike did not trust his own eyes, but he trusted Soren's. His heart swelled with the hope he had felt when he stumbled upon his companion, as well as a dormant but perceptible trepidation. He sensed it in Soren as well; they gathered close together in their cautious approach, close enough that Ike could feel him stiffen with uneasiness.

The house was squat, raised on an abutment and stilts to avoid the rising tides. A faint, orange light flickered from a single window, dashing down and up the staircase that connected to the wooden deck. Chimney smoke twisted and disappeared against the shadowy backdrop. There was a fire.

They stood at the foot, drenched, benumbed, chests tight with anticipation.

"So… Someone's home," Ike said at last, before the hiss of rain enveloped the sound of their breathing. "What are we so afraid of, anyway?"

Perhaps it was the surreality of their situation; from the moment he woke Ike had felt detached. His limbs were great, hulking weights rather than live extensions of himself, and he was suspended amidst an endless cloud; his conversations with his companion had been lucid, but just hours afterwards he could only vaguely recall what had been said between them. There was something dreamlike even in the landscape in all its infiniteness, its indefiniteness, its indifference. He needed food to clear his head.

"I don't know." Soren's eyes were fixed on the window; his irises caught the light with a strange, shimmering glow. Though it was no choice of Soren's, Ike found his eyes eerie at times. He appreciated their rarity, but there were moments—at the edge of sleep, his last waking sight a heap of black robes and a red, tired slits—moments when he could not shake his beorc conditioning: red was demonic. In the eyes of the simple homeowner, though, perhaps they were the demons.

Distant memories of the Gallian border revisited him in snatches. He remembered the day the company first crashed through the Sea of Trees, a jungle enshrouded in secrets and thick, oppressive humidity. Rationally, he had known the laguz were not man-eaters, but when one stumbled into unknown territory with an undefined, desperate purpose, imaginations tended to run amok. Before, he was inclined to fear the worst when faced with the unfamiliar. But now, the exoticism surrounding the laguz had thoroughly worn; he no longer feared the revered, the tyrants and the divine, the travelers from distant lands, the mystics and criminals, bearers of darkness as well as the light, those who espoused different ideals, those who called his own morality into question. Whatever lived here, he'd likely faced worse.

Besides that, there was a sort of charm to the cabin— a squat, earth-crusted cabin, thick with overgrowth and warmly alight, it almost blended with the craggy slope. It hardly seemed the home of choice for maneaters or cultists or deranged murderers or whatever beasts their silly waterlogged heads could dream up.

"We'll go together. I've always felt more confident with my words when you're around."

Soren bowed his head, partially in affirmation, partially to hide his smirk. But as they mounted the noisy staircase, his hand found its way to his hip, and the smile faded. Ike noticed and stopped midway.

"Soren, we can't take over a household at knifepoint. I'd rather not be murdered in my sleep."

"It's not a coercive measure, Ike. It's precautionary."

"Look, relax, alright?" He put a hand over Soren's and felt it slacken. "We're not a couple of rogues. Worst case scenario, they turn us down and point us to the nearest village. We'll get cleaned up and figure out where to go from there."

Soren was still for a moment.

"Whatever happens, we've been through worse," Ike reassured him.

He seemed to accept this as an answer, and silently complied for the remaining few steps. With the door just within reach of his knuckles, Ike balked.

"But you're going to have to let go of my hand. It'll look a little weird."

Soren mumbled an apology and dropped his hand. While any other man would have taken that moment to ease his breath and steel himself, Ike did no such thing. He reached out and knocked—hard. Soren winced.

The downpour's roar had a muting effect—they strained their ears for footfalls, creaking floorboards, and heard nothing but the din of rainfall and the hollow splash of runoff flowing into a rain barrel. Finally, there was a bump, the noise of something groping at the door—and then, with finality, the grating resistance and click of a lock releasing.

The door swung open, throwing a sudden, hard light over their unready eyes. In the door stood a woman, older, plump in the face and stomach. Startled, she mouthed a question that was most certainly lost to the wind.

"We're sorry to bother you," said Ike, raising his voice over the barrage of rain, "but we're travelling mercenaries, and we lost our vessel and supplies to a storm. If you could give us a place to stay, we'll repay you to the best of our abilities. If not, well… some directions would be nice. Maybe to the closest inn? Any job openings, if it comes down to it?"

He paused and realized that woman's expression remained fixedly dumbfounded. She held her gaze level with his, wordless and unmoving.

"Excuse me? Ma'am?"

Suddenly, she twisted her head and shouted into the house. Then came a man's voice from within—it sounded pleading. And then when the woman responded with a near-shriek, a fiercer edge to her rapid spill of words, Ike came to a sickening realization, and one glance at Soren told him that they both knew. They could not understand this woman.

"I can't believe it," Soren murmured. The woman's attention snapped back to them, and a man, presumably her husband, joined her at the door. He gave them one good once-over before posing a question. At least Ike perceived it to be a question from the rise in his pitch. A lengthy silence followed.

Ike tried to affect the most pleasant grin he could manage, but a part of him knew this would do nothing to temper the couple's bewilderment.

"So, do either of you speak Common?"

To his surprise, the man laughed—his (presumable) wife shot him a reproachful glare. His next question was directed towards the woman, and the conversation shifted between them. Their words were nimble, cadenced. They spoke with a lilt, particularly the man, but it was easy to discern the irritation in the woman's tone.

"This is ridiculous," Ike heard Soren hiss, recapturing the couple's attention. They turned to them and the man tried to initiate conversation once more, immediately arrested by a lash of the tongue from his wife. He stepped back to make way as the wife ushered them inside.

She indicated to the discarded boots in the corner while the man crossed the room to a large fireplace. The fire seemed to have been burning some time before their arrival, the room diffuse with a warmth and the familiar aroma of woodsmoke. They watched as he threw on a splintered log before removing the cauldron from the flame, passing them with a nod, and heading out the door.

They removed their boots upon the woman's urging and allowed her to lead them to what was undoubtedly their kitchen; she turned to them with an almost imploring smile. She then asked a question, and though Ike suspected she did not expect to receive an answer, he responded.

"I didn't understand that. Sorry." He placed a hand to his stomach, and the woman's eyes lit up. They were seated at a small table near the stove and the woman left them to themselves, retreating into what was likely their larder. Before they could gather their wits enough to find words for each other, they heard the front door fly open, the husband's scraping footsteps, water sloshing as he put the pot on to boil. He'd likely drawn water from the cistern Ike saw earlier.

"This is ridiculous," Soren murmured, breaking the air of astonishment between them.

"Look, let's not look a gift horse in the mouth."

Soren seemed to mull over this for a moment, but the woman seized both their attentions as she returned carrying a loaf of bread and a glass jar. They were served bread and jam, which Ike devoured readily and Soren eyed with suspicion. The couple was making a concerted effort to appear agreeable now; the woman did not betray her disapproval when Soren offered his food to Ike—after a taste to ascertain that it hadn't been poisoned, of course—and only ate upon his insistence. Though it wasn't enough to tide Ike over—in fact, the little morsel, however inoffensive, only served to stir his appetite—he followed the woman when she motioned them to stand and led them back to the entrance. Since she had her back to him most of the time, Ike came to study her hair more carefully than her face. It was knotted into a frayed, bushy braid, faded olive in color; it came loose at the end, as if she'd been in the midst of undoing it when they arrived on her doorstep. The man, who met them again to remove the heated cauldron from the fire, was brunet and round, with cheerful eyes and a sort of lightness to his gait. They took them to a cramped, barren room—barren but for the deep, wooden tub in the center and the row of vials lined up against the wall. The woman had lain a fresh change of clothes by the door while the man filled the tub; they scuttled away quickly thereafter and granted them their privacy, though it took some time before either registered what was expected of them.

"This is ridiculous." Soren slumped against the wall, expressionless as ever, while Ike seized the opportunity to shuck off his leggings and toss them aside with his companion's cloak.

"It never occurred to me how awful we'd smell after enough time at sea."

"Didn't it?" Soren asked tersely. Ike ignored him and lowered himself into the water. It seared him, but with a welcoming heat. He reached towards the line of vials and chose one at random—larger, prism-shaped with blue-tinted glass, presumably containing some fashion of oil—and a slab of soap.

"Here," he said, pressing himself against the side of the tub, "there's room enough for both of us."

"I don't think that's a wise idea. Hospitality in itself I can understand. But this? We're lost in every sense imaginable. We don't know this language, never mind the country or its location on a map."

"Come on, I'll even wash your hair."

"Ike." Soren finally crossed eyes with his, but only for a moment. His gaze quickly fell to the far corner of the washroom. "We are unfamiliar with their customs, and they ours. And if I may be honest," he said, meeting Ike's eyes once more, "you seem entirely nonchalant about our situation."

This gave Ike pause, if only for a moment.

"I don't know. These are questions I want to ask tomorrow, when we're clean and fed and rested. Then we can orient ourselves," he said, then laughed, "Just get in. It'll be like when we were kids."

"Awkward and conspicuous. I'm not convinced that would make it any better."

"Then let me phrase it differently. In the spirit of efficiency, it would benefit all parties involved if you spared these nice people the trouble of reheating another batch of water lest they feel too inconvenienced to bother with us." He stopped to catch his breath, and then added, "We'll do it quickly if that's the only way you'll have it."

"That's still poor phrasing on your part," said Soren, but he stood and obeyed regardless, loosening his sash.

They lacked the time or energy to discuss the matter any further, as exhaustion took over by the time the steam had spread into a calming haze, and their thoroughness dissolved to languor—and wantonness, to Soren's chagrin. Neither were strangers to the taxing whims of the environment, and Ike hadn't seen a mirror since the outset of their voyage, but he assumed he fared no better than Soren, who seemed more weather-beaten than usual. His gangling limbs had taken on some definition from all of the exertion that travel entails, but he was still startlingly thin without the bulk of his robes, and there was an almost comical contrast between the tan on his hands and the paleness of his back. Their time at sea was marked by the rare clear sky between darkened days; they had both toughened, but not baked to a leather.

Running his fingers all the way through his companion's hair became an arduous task, and they both gave up once they were suitably clean. The couple had provided them with two sets of house clothes: thin pairs of hose, a white chemise and an oversized undertunic that certainly belonged to the husband. It was clear which shirt had been intended for whom. They left their discarded clothes scattered about the washroom and crept back into the entrance lounge, where the homeowners awaited, nestled together beneath a woolen blanket before the fire. Ike could see by the window that night had fully descended, and by the frost at the edge of the windowpane, so had a terrible chill.

The wife rose and, after her husband shot them a glance and a cheerful word, led their guests up the stairs into a darkened hallway. There a room waited for them, a single bed, a cold, frosted window, a rug with a pattern they could not discern in the dark, a nightstand with a washbasin, a closed, wooden trunk.

The woman said something softly in her own language and closed the door behind them. They waited for the fading footsteps as she left and descended the staircase, then the murmur of voices as they resumed their conversation below. Then, before Ike or Soren had thought to speak or move, there was complete silence, but for the drum of rain on the rooftop and their shallow breaths.

It was easy enough to locate the bed in what little illumination the clouded moon offered; Ike collapsed into the heap of fabric, limp as a beached fish. Every one of his muscles slowly worked itself loose, as if the fibers that held him together were coming undone. His mind and body were untwisting, untangling like Soren's once matted, sweat-oiled hair or the woman's braid, falling apart as it swung side to side up the stairs, a rhythmic pendulum.

He reveled in the softness of the sheets, his clothes, his skin and hair fresh anew, before giving way to sleep. The last waking sound was that of rustling behind him. There was a hot flutter on his neck, and a voice.

"I was not afraid."